SEC-S14 /W2 |"Parents, Our Pillars of Strength 👪"

What can we do today without parents, anything? The answer I believe is an unequivocal no. Parents played a major role in whom and what we are as adults today. They took their time to care, nurse, love and discipline us to become responsible and accountable individuals that we have become today.

This contest with the topic Parents, Our Pillars of Strength as well as the tips will be a will guide in explaining how they have been a source of strength as i grew up.

How did your parents shape your personality?

My parents, my guardians that I lived with for the most of my young age were all responsible for my personality today. I owe then a lot.
My parents/guardians were very instrumental in shaping my personality a lot. They were were very hardworking, kind, resilient even in the face of much difficulty and anxiety, worked hard to ensure we had the basic necessities of life.

When it comes to working hard, my late father was a good example. He was known throughout the province of my hometown. Known as Akaraka, He workwd hard as a farmer to produce rice in a large quantity. He was known as Akaraka farm. Because of how large his farm land was, workers were always flocking our house every morning to beg to be employed to work for us. He produced the best local rice that we were known for.

Most times you must have noticed that I am always online during night hours here on the blog, it was what I learned from my father who always woke us up to go to the farm to chase birds away from the farm rice. Imagine if he were to call you and you didn't wake up, hmmmm, he will use his staff and wake you up and you know what that means. So we were always alert to his calls and we were always on the move to go to the farm.

There was a day when our alarm clock deceived him, perhaps it was faulty, he woke us up by 2am to start going. We left the house, only to get there and the whole place was still dark. Well, we remained there until the morning. We took it as training and today, it is helping me.

We had farm house there were we prepare our foods. So, leaving the house very early and returning late was our custom.

	my mother. Picture gotten from my brother's Facebook page

Additionally, they were good to people they meet. Once upon a time, my mother picked a child in the farm who had strayed, she brought him home and reported the case. It took more than a year for the parents to locate him but guess what? My parents took him into their care, at that time, he was my age. They treated him as their child without discrimination. Hardly will you find out that he wasn't part of the family. When the parents eventually found him, it was hard for him to leave us. He developed that bond with us. And today, I do apply that lesson because it is a way of life that is even encouraged by the Almighty.

My Aunt that I lived with at age 5 also took care of me as if I was her child. I was part of the family and gave me all the love that I needed. And they taught me great lessons in obedience, humility and love including resilience.

When it comes to my other step sisters that I lived with, they also taught me to be hardworking. Very early every morning, I will be given an amount as capital to go to the bakery, buy bread and sale. All they want is the profit and capital. Then I will drop the profit and go again the next day. This really is helping me to cope with whatever situation I find myself.

Then the groundnut that I am selling today, I learn from one of my step sisters that I also lived with. We do finish 1 bag of groundnut in a week. We produce manually, peel and distribute the same way that I am doing it today. I took them as my parents. Who said parents are not our pillars?

	my groundnut, a trade I learned

I have a lot more stories to tell about how my life was shaped by those I considered my parents while growing up. But time will fail me.

What role do your parents play in your overall well-being?

Like I said earlier on, my parents were very examplery in their way of life. I learnt so much positive traits from them. They taught me basic principles of loving people and respecting each person's opinion. This have really helped me to be able to manage peoples idiosyncrasies and weird characters, not allowing them come on my nerve.

They are very optimistic, living each day at a time, always believing that tomorrow will be better and surely, this is true.

I have imitated their good personality traits and they are helping me in surviving the difficult world and system we find ourselves, where many people are selfish and egocentric.

Yet those negative lifestyles would not stop me from reaching out to people and helping out as much as I can.

The principles they taught shaped me not to allow other people inconsistencies to stop me from being good to others.

How do your parents encourage your dreams and aspirations?

They always do their best to encourage me in whatever dreams I have. They will always tell me to ensure the aspiration is realistic and never to relent when challenges comes along the way.

Sometimes too, they will tell me to reevaluate the dreams and make some adjustments where necessary.

They also supported me both morally and financially. This have really brought me to where I am today.

Share an experience that highlighted your parents' sacrifices for you?

Well, even though I didn't lack when I was in school, my mother will always call to know how I was doing. What touches me a lot was when my mother had to send me her wrapper from village to town where I was staying with my brother. She said that she thought of me and that I should be using it to cover due to cold. It was so touching to know that she cared so much about me.

But one that really was so marvelous was when I had an injury on by elbow. It was so bad that no one comes closer to me because it refused to heal despite all efforts by my parents. My mother was always there for me. When everyone will run away from me due to how bad the smell was, my mother will take the hand closer to her and say to me : 'let this smell kill me, I must hold it close to my heart '. She was there all through until the wond healed. I remain very grateful to her for such sacrifices.

	the mark of what happened to me always reminds me of her sacrifices

Conclusion

Parents are pillars of support to me. I really learned a lot from them which shaped my personality and for which I am grateful. I will not hesitate to be a pillar of support to my kids. I only pray for God's Blessings.

Thank you all for reading through. I invite @pajewell @heriadi and @pelon53 to take part in this contest