“My country did not send me 5,000 miles to start a race;
they sent me to finish it.”
-
John Stephen Ahkwari, Tanzania
runner, 1968 Olympics
The quotation above is a true mark of self-reliance, being
firm and steadfast despite the challenging circumstances ahead. John Ahkwari
represented the
Tanzania
in the 1968 Olymipcs marathon which was held in
Mexico.
As described in detail at
http://speedendurance.com/2007/07/15/how-to-finish-a-marathon-1968-olympics-in-mexico-city/
by Jimson Lee, “He came in about an hour and a half after the winner,
practically carrying his leg, as it was so bloodied and bandaged.” John Ahkwari
was hit during the competition and had stumbled really hard to the ground.
Still, he survived the race even if he’s the weakest among the players on that
competition. He is stable and unmovable because he knows his potentials. He
believed himself. He is self-reliant. He didn’t rely on the consideration that
his country will probably give him because of his disposition. He didn’t rely
on the possibility that the other people might only say that he just wanted to
make a show. He just relied on himself, and that made the difference.
Not all people can have that kind of self-reliance that John
Ahkwari portrayed. It takes passion and very deeply-rooted perseverance to
reach that kind of self-faith. In short, it takes life-long consistency and
application. But believe me, there’s an easier way. If you wanted to become
self-reliant, then rely to the eternally durable hope. Rely on God.
A dependent person has been thoroughly described by
Col Gurnam Singh in his
article Self-reliance is a Virtue (
http://www.speakingtree.in/spiritual-blogs/seekers/self-improvement/selfreliance-is-a-virtue).
He described that person as someone who relies on crutches which contribute to
one’s weakness of spirit, mind, and body. “A man walking with the crutches of
others help cannot think of running a race, he cannot compete, he is sure to
end with the crutches.” As
Col Gurnam
Singh explained in the previous quotation, a person who lacks
self-reliance can still finish the race, but still end as a handicapped. The
crutches symbolize our friends, family--especially our parents--, internet, and
others which influence us to become dependent in the wrong way, stagnant, and
unproductive.
We sometimes depend on our friends whenever we’re financially
incapable, down spirited, or when we just need a company. That’s good because
no one can live without friends who can supply some of your emotional and
personal needs. In that scenario, your friends don’t serve as your crutches,
but they do if you relied on them completely and wrongly. If you’re always
asking for financial aid from them even if you still have some money to spend,
then, you’re now walking with crutches. If you failed an exam which stole all
the hope inside you, and you start to rely on your friends’ answers for the
next examinations, then, you’re now a handicapped. If your parents supply you
with five iphones which you don’t really need and you will not be able to use
every time, then you’re also walking with crutches. If they were always
providing you all the resources and job opportunities, and preparing everything
that you’ll need in the future and the only thing that you have to do is to eat
them all, then, they’re making you lame. The internet provides people with all
the resources which will supply the information they need for a research paper.
Take note, to supply the information and not to supply a research paper. These
resources, if used for one’s own abusive interests, will make a person an
unproductive one. We can also find in the internet numerous social networking
sites to communicate with people we know to whom we’re separated by varying
distances. These sites were not created to replace our real social world and
produce another imaginary society. It keeps us from enhancing our own social
skills and makes us very ashamed when meeting new people in person. These
valuable people and resources are gifts from us, they are God’s blessings, but
they become curses if we abuse their help and if we go beyond what they were
really intended to do for our needs. That’s when they began to serve as our
crutches and we began to become incapables.
People are really dependent in nature. Dependent in the sense
that we cannot be completely reliant on ourselves because in some point, we
really need others to live. That’s why the early people learned to worship the
sun, the nature, some animals, and some places. It’s because it is our nature
to worship, to find someone whom we could we could rely on, a mighty someone
who could never fail us, someone who is not a powerless human being. Although
the early people sought that someone in the wrong things, still, they’re right
with their intention: they wanted to find God and seek refuge on Him. The good
news is, even though we will entrust and surrender everything to Him and rely
all our lives to Him, he will never be a crutch to us because his provisions
are the complete reverse. If we rely on Him, he will strengthen us. He will
teach us how to hone the skills that He gave us. Please be reminded that He
will only teach us, which means it’s up to us if we’re going to comply with His
instructions or not. God made a very wonderful design on each of our lives but
it’s up to us to be consistent with his teachings and learn it by heart. God
knows the final fresco of our lives, but the shapes, color, and size of that fresco depends
on us. As what
Col Gurnam
Singh quoted from the old saying, “God helps those who help
themselves,” God will only help those who are perseverant and determined.
Relying on crutches makes men become unproductive, but relying on God makes man
become fruitful. Crutches deprive us
from relying on our own skills, but God teaches us to polish and make use of
those skills which He endowed on us. Crutches lead us away from self-reliance,
but God paves the way towards it.
Self-reliance is really a hard to earn virtue, but if you
make God the sole center of your life, you will no longer need anything else or
someone else. God alone is enough. When you’re dependent to God, then you’ll be
independent from others.
