Thursday, December 7, 2006

Back in full force...I think

I haven’t blogged in a while, and it’s not out of not wanting to. I just don’t got the time!!! I’m starting to suspect the It Factor for others is the superhuman ability accomplish ten million tasks in a 24 hour period. I’ve been trying to do it all, but I’m starting to come to the realization that it’s impossible to be great at it all. We wear so many hats as employees, parents, mates, sisters/brothers, friends, etc, that it’s impossible for us to do it all and still have time for ourselves and our passions. When I start to focus on my responsibilities at work, I find that my personal life starts to slip. When I make a switch to developing myself and focusing on how to get myself to the next level, I find that my work starts to slip. I can't win. Let’s not even talk about making time for my friends. It’s not possible. I am absolutely driving myself crazy with playing all these roles, and trying to be great at them all. I’m at the point where I have to accept defeat and just focus on a couple of the roles, and leave the rest for when I can tackle them. The question is how do I decide on what to focus on without feeling guilty. I know work is important since it's the only way I have now to pay my bills, being a great mother is super important for the development of my kids, of course being a great companion is also there. But what about my friends, my family, etc. And what about me??? Aarghhhhh!!!

Anyways, I have so much to get off my mind, since I haven’t written in forever.

Mo money, mo problems?

I’m sure most of us know this already, but Bono of the group U2 and Michael Shriver of the Kennedy Clan have an initiative called the RED project. The idea behind it is to try to eradicate AIDs and other diseases in Africa in our lifetime by donating a portion of the proceeds of certain RED products to a Global Fund. The fund was set up in 2002 and has received close to $9 billion in overall financing commitments through 2008. It's also approved the spending of $5.2 billion on disease-fighting projects in more than 130 countries, but the organization claims it's still short of its goals. Doesn't this beg the question "If 9 billion dollars is not enough to solve Africa’s problems, then what is?" What's interesting is the whole world has been throwing money at Africa for the past 30 years now, and our problems continue to get bigger and bigger. And with all the charities and organizations in Africa, here are the disturbing facts on AIDS in Africa:
  • 70% of all adult living with HIV are in Africa
  • 0.1% of the 28.5 million people living with HIV/AIDs in Africa have access to HIV/AIDS drugs
  • Out of the 28 most infected countries, only 2 countries are not African


Pardon my French, how in the hell is that possible? A couple of years ago, I would have drifted off on a tangent about how these figures are CLEARLY inflated, and perhaps even challenge the existence of AIDs, but maybe some other time, since that's not the intention of this post. The intention is to discuss the fact that the more money Africa gets thrown at it, the more problems we have. When is someone going to stop thinking the problem is money and realize that we as Africans have to start to explore some other solutions. Let's start with the government. How do we avoid corruption? Nigeria is one of the wealthiest countries on the African continent in terms of its natural resources, yet the average nigerian does not have 2 pennies to rub together. I don’t think Africa’s problem is money. I personally think it’s lack of responsibility in the hands of our leaders. Our leaders would rather line their pockets, and spend greedily, than to spend the time and brain power to address the problems of their citizens. I think it's noble what the RED project is doing, it's even great when Oprah goes and sets up schools in South Africa, and I guess it's nice when Madonna and Angelina adobt African children, but our problems aren't getting any smaller. I know it's got to be hard for the rest of the World to watch Africa's problems continue to pile up without doing nothing, but I say let Africans deal with their problems themselves. That's the only way we'll find lasting solutions.

Why can't Britney Party?

I’m not a fan of Britney Spears, but why can't Britney Spears party if she wants. I’m tired of my news consisting of what Paris and Britney did last weekend. My take is why can’t she have fun just because she has kids. It’s no wonder women find it hard to do anything or take time out for themselves once they have kids, because the world will forever pass judgments on them. They only have pictures of her going out at night, so I'm sure she's with them all day long. I don’t see anything wrong with her going out after putting the kids to bed. I’m sure she’s able to afford more than capable nannies to watch the kids while she's, so why not? She's probably trying to get it out of her system since she's been MIA the past 2 years while she was pregnant, so I say go for it.

Time flies by
Where did the time go? Can anyone believe it’s December already. I could have sworn it was only yesterday when I was at my cousin in laws house ringing in the year 2006. Making resolutions about how 2006 was going to be my year. Now here we are, December 7, 2006. What have I done to work towards my goal of finding my It factor and taking over the World….nothing! Nothing? Is that possible? Have I possibly wasted the year 2003, 2004, 2005, and now 2006 on hopes and dreams? Wow, I've got to get it together.

3 comments:

Naija Vixen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Pro-Facts Nigeria said...

Here is a site that speak to the issue of aid money in Africa: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=1955664&page=1

It's by John Stossel who has a program on ABC News. I like many of his ideas.

Anonymous said...

Naija Vixen...thanks!! You're officially the first commentator that I didn't bully into commenting on my site. I appreciate your words. Yeah, it's hard to know what you want to do and how to get there. But I think you're right. I'll link you as well, and I look forward reading your blogs.