MEDITATION:WHAT MAKES OSINBAJO TICK?

One Morning…

(lsaac) was taking a walk out in the fields, meditating.

GENESIS 24:63

BUSY MEN LIVE AT A FAST PACE.

Their TIME is PRECIOUS.

Their TASKS are NUMEROUS.

And the DEMANDS on them are UNRELENTING

There are not enough hours in their day, and they suspect there may not be enough years in their lives to accomplish all that needs to be done. So, business, productivity, time management, meeting deadlines, and “keeping all the balls in the air” serve to define the lifestyle of such men.

Sometimes, those commitments come at huge risks of several layers of sacrifices. Health is neglected, marriage suffers, even spiritual life can be moribund in the shuffle.

Meanwhile, some men have gained some mastery and control in ensuring that their lives maintain some critical balance in the midst of these unnerving challenges and changes. Professor Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo GCON and SAN, the current Vice president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria belongs in the ilk of such men who ensures that he maintains some semblance of these delicate balance to his days. Overtime, he has come to understand the place of contemplation and rumination which he has developed in his journeying through the crucibles earlier in life. Osinbajo, like lsaac – Abraham’s scion, the professor has gained the mastery over the value of contemplation and meditation as a crucial component of a fulfilling, significant and relevant life.

Isaac knew the value of contemplation.

Being the son of Abraham obviously had its advantages, and presumably being heir apparent had its responsibilities. With his father’s advancing years and his mother’s recent decease, lsaac could not avoid contemplating his future. Added to that was his impending marriage to a woman he had never met! No wonder “he was taking a walk out in the fields, meditating” (Genesis 24:63).

Isaac was one of the Biblical characters Osinbajo must have drawn a lot of inspiration from as a worthy “patriarch of the faith of that roll call of the hall of fame and cloud of witnesses” and it can be safely concluded that he is one of his motivation for keeping his eyes on the balls like a flint and jettisoning the distractions that has always plagued him particularly on his role as the second in command of the most populous black nation in the world.

No doubt, Osinbajo like lsaac before him have always had to contend with many things competing for his attention, and undoubtedly for the duo (even though that they lived in different dispensation and generations),

there were numerous things requiring careful and painstaking thought and wise decisions. But it was never lost on either of them – that unless they consciously and deliberately take their personal times to clear their individual minds to often jettison the distractions and concentrate their attention and efforts on things that accounts for relevance and significance, there was a real possibility that their individual lives might just go the way of been busy, unthoughtful men – the way of inevitable confusion and ultimate disappointment and frustration without been truly productive and impactful for the larger task that they were designated for in their individual dispensation and generation.

Osinbajo like lsaac has consistently displayed the very deep understanding that significantly marked the life of lsaac several thousands of years and generations before him that, he needed to consistently and dutifully think through the significance of the Covenant God had made with them and in the larger context of God’s people and the entire human race. Osinbajo had been blessed with the hindsight of the way lsaac’s father – Abraham had handled the difficult, intricate and complex problem with lsaac’s uncle – Lot in dealing with the various distractions he has often encountered on his journey as the second in command in order to escape from the dire consequences that can arise from such indiscretion particularly owing to lack of contemplation and meditation.

This is a strong lesson for modern men.

So, what’s the moral lesson in the individual and collective lives of these two characters.

We live in an age where men tend to be truly busy. One in which health is neglected, marriages suffer from lack of attention, children become strangers, and spiritual life gets lost in the shuffle.

Truth is, as modern men, we are often not unaware of these situations, neither are we genuinely unconcerned about them. In fact,

we often promise ourselves that we will make the necessary changes to make our lives and those of our family members more meaningful and thereby restore some semblance of order and balance to our lives. But, painfully, these promises are never fulfilled.

The consequences of this is often, heart attacks, enforced retirement, or marital breakdown, and often nervous breakdown. But how much better it would have been if we had seen the imperative need to develop the attitude and deliberate lifestyle of contemplation and rumination.

Nonetheless, better late than never.

Modern men should copy lsaac and Osinbajo, factoring time into their lives.

Happy SUNDAY folks

Credit: Bayo Adeoshun

Photo credit:The Wall of Sir Richard Akinnola II