Plucking Your Eyes Out

A lovely friend sent this to me with the notation above it: “This story touched me”.

“There was a blind girl who hated herself because she was blind. In fact, she hated everyone, except her loving boyfriend. He was always there for her. She often complained to her boyfriend, 'If I could only see the world, I would marry you.'

One day, someone donated a pair of eyes to her. When the bandages came off, she was able to see everything, including her boyfriend. He asked her,’ Now that you can see the world, will you marry me?'  The girl looked at her boyfriend and saw that he was blind. The sight of his closed eyelids shocked her. She hadn't expected that. The thought of looking at them for the rest of her life led her to refuse to marry him.

Her boyfriend left her in tears and many days later sent a note to her saying: 'Take good care of your eyes my dear, for before they were yours, they were mine.'”

The End.

It’s a tear jerker story…

Sad right?

But so true.

I’m talking about the guy who plucked his eyes out for his girlfriend.

Honestly I have a million words for her but none of them are good - so let me focus on the dude, sawa?? He’s the one I am feeling for. Deeply. Immensely. Because I have done this a few million times in my short life, and be true - male or female… yes – you - who is reading this…how many times have you done that for someBODY? A friend, a lover, spouse, a family member, son, daughter – you’ve Plucked out your Eye and given it to someone who trod on your generosity. Shocker. You Sacrificed (with a capital S) hours, days, (time) money, friendships -  for a person you love, and you got back – let’s see – I’m looking for a nice word here – (@£$£@)….error 401. (Search for nice word failed. Please reload page)

Don’t lie to yourself, say out loud, ‘been there, done that’.

Bad.

We all get hurt by people at one point or another and wondered why we’re so flipping mad later on. Mad, sad, depressed, we feel taken for granted, used, abused, tossed aside like so much TP (toilet paper..)  

I’ll tell you why. Because when you gave your all away… you got back crap.

Tick one. Abuse – both physical and mental, insults, contempt, scorn, disdain, revulsion, pity. All because you excruciatingly and painfully gave your beautiful black eyes away, and when that friend could see – they would look at your face with utter revulsion.

Ever been asked that horrid question ..’why did you do that?? I didn’t ask you to!’..

Hmmmm….

Here is what this unfortunate story taught me:

1. Never take on another person’s Burden. They’re not yours. Simple. If by thinking you are being helpful and begin to carry someone’s burdens.. guess what, who gets exhausted, depressed, worn out and worn in? Duh. You.

2. Learn to Study people. If someone is a  constant complainer – distance yourself emotionally – and relegate them to the far reaches of your emotional borders. Or put them in your cerebral Refugee Camp. Create one!! Build a concrete wall and put Ng’ombe-triple razored barbed wire on the top of the wall - so the complainers can’t cross to you.

3. Often, when people’s status changes, they forget those who stood by them when they were in pain.

Hmmm….

Girl is blind and hates herself. Her burden, is her Blindness.

How many friends do we have who have a burden – be it ill health or lack of work, or a bad boss, or a psychotic spouse - or some other dire need, and we’re like, oh man, I wish I could help them? Yes BG (Blind Girl) had a real problem. She couldn’t see and really wished she could. But her very nature was also problem – she was a grouch. Eeeh.  She complained. She grumbled, protested and whined. And she hated. .. she didn’t consider accepting her situation and learn to live with it. Or do something with it. Don’t excuse her and automatically say, ‘she was blind, what could she do?’ There are plenty of blind people who have risen above their circumstances. And not just visually impaired persons…

We all have friends/heros/heroines who are in horrid, dire circumstances and yet they still have radiant personalities – so sunny, joyful and content that it would be hard to tell that they have any kind of lack in their life. And we love them for that – we seek them out. We want to bask in their ‘lack - less’ lives. We would rather keep company with laughter and ‘scarcity’ than misery and resources/abundance.

Tuko pamoja?

ATT matters..(ATTITUDE)

Let’s go back to BG. She’s blind and let’s assume, we’re the dude… she must be one fly girl. Let me add up the assumptions and say that he’s also blind to her qualities because which man goes for a grouchy complaining gal as hot as she may be? Maybe she was loaded?? Hmm… No, a guy who is into a chika for her chapa won’t remove an eye. Gold diggers loooouuurv themselves!! Hahahahaha. So this must be one NICE dude to overlook BG’s defects, plus popular belief is: If YOU LOVE SOMEONE:

We should help shoulder each others burdens.

Rubbish

Opposites Attract

Rubbish

Try Harder

huh??

(I have this funny look on my face…..)

So. Mr Nice BF did. Him seeing, her blind (opposites attract theory) and carrying her mzigo (We should help shoulder each others burdens theory) and trying so hard to bear the pain. Can we bet the outcome of this story if she was lame and he gave her his legs??

Btw, in society.. ‘nice gentle’ girls go for grouchy men and ‘nice gentle’ men go for utter bitches. Excuse my language. Unfortunately, the human personality such that nice people wish and want to make others as happy and content as they are, to see the world as they do – to ‘share’ their joy and therefore sacrifice something to show their loving kindness and tender concern for them. Hoping ….eesh… hoping is too small a word – EXPECTING – that what they do for them, them will one day – reciprocate.

Misleading equation:

They (nice) + (nice deeds2 grouch) = (nice deed)

Reality

They (nice) + (nice deeds2 grouch) = (nice deed)÷(rejection X (+ crap)

(X) stands for (multiplication)

hahahahahahaa!!

What is to reciprocate? It is to counter, it’s ‘Tit for Tat’ , it’s to respond, to return, share and interchange in EXACTLY the same manner. ‘An eye’ for an ‘eye’ a ‘tooth’ for a ‘tooth’ but in love.  BG’s boy wanted marriage and love. The forever-after ‘zamani za kale’  Cinderella Story. He forgot the wicked witch theory – and so do you and I. We forget that sometimes, we cannot change others, we cannot expect a mere girl/boy/man/woman to change and care for us in the same ‘tit for tat’ way –  even if we love them Blindly.

They don’t.

Love us Blindly that is.

Only God does that. Am not here to preach so I won’t go down that path…. Those of you who understand, Kudos, those of you who don’t – well ya, duh. Get a Bible.

BG had a burden, a heavy one, and only God can help us to  carry those burdens. We can ease someone’s burden in whichever way we seek to, but, therein lies the quandary… how far is too far to carry someone’s burden?

Is Plucking your eyes out too much?

So… boys n gals… whose burden do you wish to ease… before you go plucking your eyes out, ask yourself three simple questions.

·      Do you want to pluck your eye out? (Or is it society demanding it of you?

·      Do you EXPECT in return? (If so, what exactly?)

·      IF you don’t get IT (expectation), will you be annoyed, in despair, feel used and abused, taken for granted? Will you be sad, distressed, in emotional pain and will you give up on that friendship/relationship? Will your sacrifice stop you from living a full and joyful life without bitterness?

·       

If you answer “yes” to even ONE of the above, eerr… chick, dude, don’t pluck your eye out for NO BADY!! (weka t’wang)

But if your sacrifice is SELF LESS, and you will be full of joy and love inspite of knowing that you will be blind forever, despite knowing that the receiver of your ‘eyes’ will despise your now certain blindness -  and you don’t mind, then go ahead.

Cheerfully Pluck Your Eyes Out. And don’t send them a caustic ‘take care of they used to be my eyes’ note…

Quote by William Shakespeare - an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon". Wikipedia

© NYAKIO MUNYINYI for The XpenSieve Report. Nov 2013

CHEATED ON

Cheated on?

I hate being cheated on….

….. well I’m not the only one - who on earth and in their right mind likes being betrayed?

No one.

Who likes being deceived, tortured, left for dead in a restaurant, or holding a mobile phone, or staring blankly at a Facebook page, wordless, your heart in shattered pieces as you literally feel your soul and spirit fluttering out of a window in a desperate attempt to flee the scene of misery.  And the soul does flee, heading out there -somewhere – and you’re left feeling dead, lifeless, soulless, frozen and immune to joy.

Nah, nobody likes that.

But get this, being cheated on doesn’t allude simply to the sexual act. Being cheated on is a betrayal that slashes through your soul, where you know for certain that the other person is not thinking of you at all. And I repeat, it doesn’t have to be sexual.

Friends betray each other. Male and Female.

Sometimes -  family.

Sometimes it’s your own kids, sometimes - colleagues. Basically anyone who you have a close relationship with can betray you … broken promises, secrets spilled, acts that you would never condone being performed behind your back, without your knowledge. Have you ever witnessed teenage girls scream at each other over seemingly innocuous events? The fact that they are young does not mean that they do not experience the bitter hurt that you do as an adult. Betrayal is betrayal.

Being cheated on is (simply and finally) discovering – when someone who you thought had high regard for you - proves – beyond a doubt - that they actually think much less of you. It’s the sucker punch of understanding, a blow that hits you right between the eyes and breaks your nose and leaves you bleeding all over yourself. Yes, betrayal hurts when you realize, damn, they really don’t think much of me.

Actually, a cockroach is far more worthy. In their eyes.

Their emotions, thoughts and therefore their actions regarding you are not negative, they are deleterious.

They have flipped you off.

They have broken the alliance bond

          …..  and are thinking of themselves. Only.

Yap. No way someone can flip you off one sec then turn around and say they love you. Uh uh…..

So,…my advice for the day is that if you’ve been cheated on:

    1. Get over it.

          2.     Get over it.

               3.     Take a chill pill.

While # 1 and 2 may seem on the surface to be ridiculously harsh statements, they aren’t. At some point you have to say to yourself, ‘ok, what’s done is done, am not very important in their eyes, now .. what’s the way forward??’… but I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s go back for a minute:

When someone is betrayed, the first question they ask is:

‘how could you do this to me?’

… to the perpetuator, and often enough, the perpetuator, or GP (guilty party) either apologizes effusively for their selfish act, making up for the affront or bad behavior, bad talk, whatever. Depending on their pocket, apology gifts can be as inflated and expensive as cars, or as simple as a beautiful bunch of roses or a card saying, ‘I’m sorry’.

….. or you watch with astonishment as their hackles rise and they defend themselves by hurling crap at the accuser.

Note: I didn’t say hurl back.

I said, the GP defend themselves with accumulated crap from within themselves and hurl it at their accuser… That phrase: you’re so full of shit? it makes me crack up every time…because I wonder, people who are full of shit get constipated, right? which means they are …. Uptight…

Uncomfortable…. And have stomach aches….Lmao….

So sometimes it’s a whole load of garbage that they have been building up against you and themselves, because a GP has issues within themselves. This is why it is so hard to try and talk sense into a GP. Years or months have passed while they have piled up the garbage in your corner, and we all know it takes a long time to get rid of a garbage heap. A small spill is easy to clean. Weeks of accumulated garbage? Longer. Contrary to common thought, sticking around the person who cheated on you is not a good strategy.

The person who follows instinct and flees is not a coward – if you think about it - who wants to stick around – seriously - and get covered in slimy stuff in the name of Christian Charity or Forgiveness??  Okay, I hear you…. But give me just one second…. so there are those who will promulgate and spew out WWJD, and I agree, but with a twist. The GP is the one who should get themselves checked into some mind-altering anger-management or some such program, because, honestly, how does one even begin to carry such a heavy load of anger and dislike until they act it out? It’s unhealthy. And in all probability, if the friendship is closer than BFF, or if it is a repeated behavior, constant betrayal followed by effusive apologies, or a pattern of unhealthy relationships, then maybe the GP has deeper issues that need to be resolved. My advice? Flee.

‘Let’s talk from a distance’ is my motto – because that slimy stuff also gives off disease, or why do we have separate rooms called toilets to get rid of our waste matter, why do we flush loos and put the lid down? A person who betrays you has issues. Back when we were teenagers we’d walk off in a huff and swear ‘never to talk to that …. that….. @£$% person again!!!’. Why then as adults don’t we bolt off, instead asking the cheaters to prepare meals for us and then eat them? It’s worse than 2 girls, one Cup.….Is it because we listen to the lies of the very person who has betrayed us and unfortunately, somehow believe their lie over our truth? Or the belief that, mmmhh, it tastes nice even if it’s insalubrious? Truth be told, In the end if we believe in the cheater -  the GP - we end up cheating ourselves, the relationship becomes unsavory, we fall flat into denial and become co-dependents of the very person that made our souls flee..

If you have been hurt so bad that your soul flees, it’s advisable to follow it….

When our souls fly off, it happens for a number of reasons, one being protection – the flight or flee instinct. We walk around numb for a couple of days or weeks, sometimes months, the pain being too unbearable so we simply don’t feel it.  The medical fraternity has a term for that – it’s called ‘shock’.

Shock-on-you!

We could be on auto-mode, or we could anesthetize ourselves with whatever product is closest and most likely to cure our pain, be it binging on alcohol or sex, substance abuse, religion, hobbies, music, retreat, driving off in a cloud of dust, silence, frostiness, you name it. There are young girls who cut themselves – uh huh, right here in +254 – these are always a re-action and very little ACTION.

Being cheated on is a nasty experience, but sometimes, some don’t flee immediately. In their denial they stick around and are perhaps repeatedly cheated on, but whether it is a week or months later, they sometimes come to a point where they are kabisa worn out like tyres of a long-haul over-lander truck.  Worn of being passive watchers in a game where they’re constantly betrayed and taken advantage of, worn of being left for dead… but when they get to that point, there lies the beauty.

The beauty of being cheated on is that while your spirit may bolt in a desperate attempt to escape the hurt and horror of your torment, while it seeks solace and succor somewhere out there, in time a new spirit comes back, a renewed sprit for a new life.

Don’t be bitter, be better.

When your wheela’s tyres begin loosing their tread and grip and threads begin showing through, what do you do? Duh. Buy new ones. Back in the day – who remembers?? - we’d look for shops in Inda where we could get the tyres re-treaded.

Emphasis on the word, re. pronounced ‘reee’

Having a new spirit requires that old one flees so that you can begin afresh with a re-newed spirit.

There is no way to be renewed with a new spirit while you still have the old one, that’s called becoming a skizo* (schizophrenic - fun guys, I have a few friends who are totally skizo and brilliantly insane ….  hahaha..) but -  the old one must out, before the new one lodges in. Thus, before you reach for your physical solace bottle of wine, before you binge, shoot up or try and numb yourself with some chemical solution, remember this:

Brokenness and betrayal doesn’t mean it’s the end even if it feels like it, but most likely what I saw on the back of a Westi Mat juzi:

Marathon Runner be aware,  the finishing line is often the same line that represents a new race. And we think artists don’t have words? Lmao.

We often think that a betrayal is the end of us but it isn’t.  We often think that being cheated on means our life is over. Yes. It is. That one.

Hmm..

Finish the race well and with dignity, and start another one. Your past is not only his or herstory, it’s also a part of you. Consider this, if one atom of you changed, you wouldn’t be who you were. You’d be someone else, entirely different. Even identical twins make different choices, they are neither clones nor robots …. the choices you made 5 minutes ago determine your maturity and who you are today, and that whole determinant = YOU. The Red Indians of the Sioux Nation do not have the word ‘regret’ in their vocabulary, and I embraced that practice early in life – each and every spark that blasts my neurons forms ‘me’, uniquely. Every memory triggers a learning experience, each second in life gives me a choice that continually shapes ‘me’. Why regret and be bitter about what has made me who I am? Plus with this vast experience, I now have even greater choices to make my life better, full of joy and hope, and this is the essence of life.

A person with no memory cannot make great decisions based on nothing.

Take then the betrayal(s) you’ve gone though and use them to grow your life into better for you, not bitter. Grab your renewed spirit, give your worn tyres a new re-tread, get a new lease on life in manual gear shift – forget auto-shift, you can’t drift as well in a ryde that is automatic  – and yes, go burn some rubber with a new zest for life.

Leave the person full of s@#t alone. Don’t prod, poke or look for cracks in their armour. They will burst or explode at some point and you don’t want to be there when it happens do you??!!!! Lmao.

NYAKIO MUNYINYI for The XpenSieve Report © August 2013

Slender Vs Chubby

The topic of slender vs. chubby in reference to sexual performance in the bed is one which raises ire in many people, mainly due to the theme of ‘sex’ in itself, because of that old taboo  - sex and all bedroom issues are TMI and are not discussed in public, at least not in African culture. Which is both hypocritical and disturbing, as more and more often, sex is being discussed in forums, albeit anonymously, and disturbing because those forums are found in environments that are not favorable to a fun, open, tongue-in-cheek discussion, but in back-rooms where language use is suggestive and sometimes downright foul.  This piece is not a ‘dirty talk’, obscene, gossip piece, but a healthy, educative, amusing prose at how a little fat may go a long way in affecting our sex lives.

When perusing the web, there are numerous sites that blare out the negative side of men adding weight as they approach their middle age. Other sites aren’t picky – they simply plague men from the age of 18 upwards with tons of spam mail sent out by the millions – advertising the sale of products directed towards men - warning them about their large stomachs and challenging them to loose their pot-bellies so as to revert back into sexual beasts. Just incase your imagination is poor, the adverts offer shots of men in before & after photographs, one with the man looking absurdly miserable with a pronounced potbelly, the other of him smiling like a yawning lion – all teeth - while showing off an oiled set of  ‘sexy six packs’.

Groan, to the average man who has tried his level best to loose that ever-growing chunk of fat slowly inching its’ way down/ or up, his chest, covering his well-defined pectoral muscles with a visible layer of fat.

A longer stay in bed

Mature women ‘in-the-know’ smile.  Because while they may not shout it out from the rooftops of their homes, they know that sexual performance is usually rated higher when the man is – yes – chubby!

I kid you not. Researchers at Erciyes University released a study proving that men with excess body fat last longer in bed. The research which was conducted for a year, included both chubby men who had a higher count of body mass index or BMI, and slender to slim, fit and healthy men. The chubbier men were found to have higher levels of the ‘female’ estradiol sex hormone.  But, hands down, it was the chubby men who were placed as front-runners in sexual performance – heavier men were able to last up to 7.3 minutes, as opposed to slender men who lasted only 1.8 minutes!

The same study also shook another other earth-shattering myth – skinny or slim ‘fit’ men suffer more from premature ejaculation – “we found that patients with lifelong premature ejaculation were leaner than the healthy control cases” ,sources: A Gökçe^1,2 and O Ekmekcioglu¹

That’s lab test science. What do women say?

They prefer men with slightly more body fat. Women are inevitably attracted to men with a higher BMI. In another study, this time conducted with women, slender fit men with six-pack abs were tossed aside for men who had 12% more body fat. Why is this? It seems that women can tell by features alone, those men who are more likely to be healthy and who have higher hormone levels. In the study above, women picked men via photographs. These same men had been tested for both hormone and health-immunity levels. Guess what? Yes, all the chubby men that the women selected had higher health immune systems and more of that ‘hunk-stuff’ – testosterone.

Enough of science, can we gossip?

‘It’s all in a man’s head, sometimes when he knows he looks good, a man thinks that’s enough, and doesn’t try hard enough to please a woman.’ True or False?

There may be some truth in this, for a man who knows that he is a bit heavier may, by the very notion that he is at a disadvantage, take the time to study and learn female behavior plus likes and dislikes in bed, while men who spend time in the gym are reputed to spend hours in front of a mirror preening and posing and admiring the perfection of their ‘pecs’.

There is also the quick thought that when the ‘6-packer’ is in the gym tormenting himself for the sake of attracting ladies, the chubby guy is probably browsing bookstores or the web, looking for books with interesting titles such as, ‘How To Give Your Girlfriend 5 Orgasms In An Hour’, or relaxing in an café – I am sure you’ve maybe observed this phenomenon and wondered, ‘huh? what was that?’,  - when you see a chubby guy treating some drop-dead gorgeous female to a delicious fat-filled pizza or ice-cream, both of them giggling and having insane fun!

Humor as an aphrodisiac

Women like being cuddled* by nature and pillow talk after a good romp is usually top 10 on most women’s wish-list. In the past however, African culture dictated such frivolities as outright rubbish, but, today there is a smattering of men who do comply with these new requests and offer ‘humor-in sex’ and ‘pillow-chats’.

Perhaps because of the thousands of external disapproval stimuli the average pot-bellied man receives in a single hour, whether physically or while surfing the web, overweight men may suffer more from low self-esteem. As a way to ‘make up’ for their ‘deficiencies’, they are more prone to lean back on pillows and coddle a woman.  Plus, they are further likely to crack jokes or carry out a light banter that will most likely put the woman at ease – remember, he has ‘staying power’, a full 5 minutes longer, so, he can afford to query, joke, tease, and play. A psychologist may argue that because chubby people give off all these supposed bad first impressions, they tend to negate that by being jocular, talkative and sensitive.

*cuddly=soft, lovable, fluffy, warm, huggable

Older and wiser?

When it comes to experience, you have to hand it down to the older man, after all, your average pot-bellied middle-aged man has a million hours more bedroom time (and thus performance) than does a 20 year old university super stud. Add more charisma, a sheen of confidence, and accomplishment to the mix. Aside from this patina of success, which in itself is a super aphrodisiac to any woman who has her hormones in order, could it be that it is also the ‘fat factor’ that makes a woman glance twice at the pot-bellied man who winks at her from across the room? If he were the exact same age but slender, or skinny, the question arises, would she be as attracted to him?

Phat conclusions

Women – maybe it’s time for you to really look twice and even thrice, at the 12 - 15% dude as a greater-staying-power-possibility and reject the media hype regarding the skinny gym-type jocks.

Men - perchance it’s time to trash all those men’s health magazines, ditch your gym membership and give in to another beer -  plus those double-cheese-king-size burgers that are advertised weekly at your nearest burger joint. After all, why should chubby guys have all the fun?

^{sources: 1}Department of Urology, Erciyes University, Kayseri, Turkey

²Department of Urology, Tayfur Ata Sokmen Medical School, Mustafa Kemal University, Hatay, Turkey

By Nyakio Munyinyi-Okallo • 2013

For The xPenSieve Report