On this particular Saturday I felt a crazy urge to plant more trees in our green huge compound that surrounded our gazebo area as well as outside the gate area and the drive through area. The “urban farmer on fire” in me did this quite often that our house staff were so used to it. The fact that I was nine months pregnant 5 days past due with our one and only first child did not matter or make this better. And when you are expectant for the first time in Kenya I guess it’s normal to get loads of unsolicited advice from other excited moms uummh isn’t? I of course also strictly adhered to our gynecologist’s medical and health advisory. I was so determined to deliver the natural way with the hope of pushing the baby out without any surgical interventions-obviously because of my fear for those surgical needles and scissors since I was a little kid. I dread those jabs to date. So I did walk and swim often especially during the last trimester as they said it was a natural way of allowing the baby to descend downwards to the most preferred appropriate position ready for the delivery day process. And the adage is true that when a girl gets her mind into doing something she had better just do it. So right after breakfast I took my hot shower and got myself ready to go to the most-leafy tree planting nursery in our neighborhood. I drove past a few of them along Thika superhighway near the famous Blue Post Hotel right by the beautiful Thika River Falls until I settled for the one that had the most -healthy looking seedlings. At the time palm trees were so popular so we loaded up about 20 of those regular palms trees, Thika Palm trees mixed with few other flower seedlings.
I remember one of the lady nursery-owners who was used to my regular purchases who had seen me few times she asked me if I hadn’t delivered and I remembered smiling back at her and telling her that the baby hadn’t arrived. Mind you my weekly visit to the doctor’s office the previous week, the doctor had given me until that very week after which I would have to check into the hospital for the baby to be induced to actual delivery. So I paid for the seedlings, thanked the nursery owners they loaded up the trees into the trunk and off I left for our home. I got home so excited that I had managed to buy new fresh green baby trees which I figured if I planted on the same week that our first baby was supposed to be born they would be the same age with our baby and we would always remind the baby that she was born the same time those plants were planted. My ambitious self also contemplated that the “Wangare Mathaai” in me would somehow be able to convince my baby as she grew older the importance of taking care of trees, watering and nurturing them just like we would take care of her. In my world whenever I personally plant any tree those automatically become my newly acquired “babies” for me to care and nurture. After all they give us free fresh oxygen daily! Or don’t they? Trees just like our babies are to be nurtured with utmost tender care and never to be cut just anyhow. Speaking of which a few years back my arrogant neighbor cut few of my trees and this will be the last time he will ever cut a tree in our current neighborhood. I actually don’t get it why grown-ups cut trees and can’t water trees…and they are the least demanding of the ecosystem. All they require to grow is just some tilling, manures and water that’s it and there you have your daily dose of fresh oxygen free of charge!
In my world it was a normal day we planted the trees, had lunch and then showered ready to relax as usual! Being a Saturday, I was gonna take it easy afterwards and rest anyway. My delivery bag was packed and stayed in the car since the 8th month ready anytime. Since I had just officially started maternity leave, my house manager madam Akinyi knew my usual afternoon drill so she would check on me often to make sure I was alright. But as soon as I put my feet down in or living room downstairs to rest, very sharp pains started kicking my back. Having never experienced this before I had mixed reactions to the pain and didn’t know how to react but the one thing I was sure is that those are what our dramatic Lamaze training class trainer at Agakhan Hospital had described as contractions and is a sign that the baby was finally on the way out that day. The contractions were on and off for about 15 minutes then stopped and when we called the hospital they advised us to wait until we had real contractions and until I was dilated a few centimeters. Luckily the pain subsided then I went upstairs and took a siesta for a few hours. I woke up in the evening around 630pm and took a hot shower then when I got downstairs it’s like I awakened the sharper pains. The contractions now had gathered enough momentum and they were back this time with a more intensity. I could see loads of fear in my house manager’s eyes as she would come check on me as I perserved the on and off contractions. I guess at that point your mind goes elsewhere that you don’t even care or notice that you are screaming loudly when the pain comes in unexpected sharp unbelievable intensities out of this world. The one thing I knew is that the pain was still worth persevering no matter how sharp or scary because it was the only way the beautiful baby inside my belly would get out into this cruel world…and there were no short cuts about it. Also I kept reminding myself that others had gone through this painful delivery process before me in my family including my very own late mother who actually persevered it 8 times since we are eight of us. When my older sister Isabel delivered her first born son Ngugi in Pennsylvania (who now calls me “honey”) I was in her house throughout that period and I know that I wasn’t the first one neither would I be the last one to go through it. So this assurance gave me hope that it can’t get any worse and helped to turn my mind focus not on the sharp pains but I focused all my energies to the expected beautiful brand new innocent God’s creation replica of our very own image who would come into this world and so giving up was not a choice. Fear was not gonna be an option either!
Needless to say that I labored for a few longest hours of my life ever until around 9pm when now the pain was coming super sharp and furious that I couldn’t take it no more. I called my lovely friend Beth Manjie who lived not too far from us. Beth being the sweetheart she is always –she was also a bit scared and she requested her husband to accompany her to my house. My husband at that time had travelled-his business had a serious emergency that forced him to travel very early that same morning and he was meant to travel back that same day. So as soon as Beth and her husband arrived we quickly decided to drive straight to Agakhan Main Hospital along Limuru road where I had been booked for the main delivery. I don’t quite remember how our drive on the famous Thika superhighway and how long it took because I was in crazy super-duper pain but all I recall is just the way Beth took sweet care of me in the car preserving my dignity in the best way possible…you can imagine it’s not easy dealing with a screaming pregnant mother in pain –from screaming my mother’s name loudly to Jesus Christ to attempting to strip all my clothes to even almost pulling out my own hair. Those of you dads who have witnessed your wives’ give birth live am sure you feel me and for you mothers who have delivered before am sure you agree with me 100% uuummmhh? Beth held my hands tight, massaged it and squeeze them often gently every time one of those mega contractions kicked in as her husband Alias drove us safely. I also recall being received at the Agakhan emergency area and being wheeled into a wheelchair as I could not walk straight –my back yielded excruciating pains after laboring for those many hours before our little adorable baby girl Amani jetted into this world few hours past midnight. What is even more exciting and humbling is that with God’s help I was delivered by a midwife with the help of a Doula who helped me use special breathing techniques to help me push the baby out till the end. Truly when God sends you angels straight from heaven he sure does! Beth and Alias are those sweetest loving caring angels that I got at the time of extreme dire need. We are forever indebted to Beth’s family, the specific caring midwife (our heroine) at Agakhan and the patient Doula and we shall forever be grateful. By the time my husband finally landed into the hospital the baby was few minutes away from delivery which was also reassuring. By the time our gynecology returned hospital emergency calls the baby had already arrived! I will be lying to say that I was not scarred throughout the process especially when I walked into that delivery room full of screaming mothers.
The delivery process set me on a journey of discovering why God bother to take his extra sweet time and so much pain in creating us and why he put us on earth in the first place. I mean why does the delivery process of each of us take so much time, pain and effort? If a woman can labor so badly for over 9 hours in addition to the 9 patient months including the 270 sacrificial pregnancy days of carrying the baby. Surely there got be a bigger reason why each one of us was born and it can’t be that we were put on this earth to just pass time and occupy free space and just live an ordinary life. Heck no! Our mothers did not incubate us 6480 hours for nothing! Nor did they carry us for 388,800 seconds safely in their bellies in vain and the worst of all is the final 9 agonizing hours into the most painful delivery process for nothing! Instead am fully convinced that each one of was created for a divine purpose to become fearless influencers of society. This realization over the last 4 years has set me on an amazing fearless journey of not living in fear like I was first scared of what my baby delivery process would lead me to. I no longer let fear control me anymore nor stop me from becoming the Fearless Influencer that God wants me and has indeed called me to become. Had I continued to allow fear to control me from just hearing the different horror birth and pregnancy stories I would have easily thrown in the towel on the second or third month of my pregnancy which I can tell you is always very uncomfortable to bear. Of course I was very concerned especially about the unborn baby’s health in my belly! I was indeed fearful at times especially when the baby did not arrive at the expected date at the 9th month but I did not succumb to these fears, I knew I had to persevere and deliver this baby come rain, come shine, come pain, come birth date delays no matter what…otherwise it would endanger the precious unborn baby’s entire life and my health and life would be at risk too. They say courage is not the absence of fear and it is indeed true. And just as scary the delivery process, may you to never let fear hold you back from becoming the Fearless Influencer that God has created you to be! Every time you are forced settle for anything less than your “fearless self” always remember my raw delivery experience story and may it remind you that just like any pregnant mother believes that we still have so much work to do as leaders and there is no giving in nor is there any room to give up halfway!
But the devil always lies in our ability and commitment in applying the same in our respective areas of influence. Folks, let’s not kid each other that by just reading this thought-provoking article that the fearless magic will automatically rub into you. I shared my own personal story and gave you this practical example to motivate you act on the knowledge that you will acquire here. Remember it’s not the quantity of knowledge we receive which matters but our ability to act on this new knowledge we acquire putting it into practical use in our respective lifes. The problem with many of us is that no matter how much knowledge we acquire, we fail to action it within the required in our very prime years of living and then we end up regretting when we are either so old to influence others which means we simply wasted down the drain our golden God-given opportunities to lead fearlessly by influencing others positively. Am super enthusiastic that you will not just simply fall in love with this article but you will act on the knowledge and insights gained here. Whether you have a very fancy title officially accorded to you or not, may you purpose to fearlessly lead and influence others to greatness so we can all make this world a better place for you and me! Drop all your worries, fear and usual excuses! Be proactive, step up out of your comfort zone and awaken a stubborn commitment to see the world change by allowing ourselves to be that “fearless spark” especially for the new normal! Because if we don’t fearless influence now, then when? And if we don’t who will? If not you and i then who will? Every day is a chance to transform our lifes’ for the better so let’s do this shall we? And for those of you who think that you have to be the late Nelson Mandera, Wangare Mathai or Mother Theresa to do this…. you got it absolutely twisted! I dare you to read on because the way I envision this is that we are all fearfully, uniquely and wonderfully made and so my goal here is to convince that you and I are the ordinary men and women that God is asking for us to arise now above our current circumstances to fearless change agents across every sector of society! And guess what God wants us just the way we are! You don’t have to a popular celebrity or a politician to do this! God is ready and will use you for his own Glory and Honor. Worry not and look no further because you are God’s official choose Ambassador! His grace and his unprecedented favor is and will be sufficient for this mission and you can take that guarantee to the bank for sure! I am counting on you and calling upon you to go back to your “roots”, your village, your community or neighborhood in whatever country you are in and begin to be this transformation journey of the exact change you want to see in your sector and country.
Fearless Leadership 