DIVERGENT CORNER

I was jobless and idle from October 2023 to February 2024. Those were by far, the darkest days of my entire life. My ego had just been punctured and shred into tiny little pieces for failing at what I thought was the easiest task in the world. Now I was to left to navigate life in an unfamiliar situation I never imagined myself in and never mentally prepared myself for- Idleness, all while wondering if I’ll ever be good for anything else.

I’d sleep from morning to evening and it will feel like It’s only been 2 hours. I’d watch Coco get ready for work very early morning and she will come back later in the evening and meet me lying in the exact same position she left me and I would wonder where all the time had gone. Time just flew by like it was being chased. Most times I don’t even bother drink water let alone eat. The only time I’d leave my bed or couch is when my bladder is about to burst with all the pee I have held for nearly 2 days straight. In fact, sometime I contemplate having a container near me just so I won’t have to leave my already warm and cosy spot on the couch. I was severely dehydrated that my pee was sometimes so concentrated it looked like “Pito”, a very potent anti helminth my grand pops use to deworm us with.

By the third week, I’d gotten used to, and fallen in love with deafening silence in my house. The only human interactions I could tolerate other than Coco was the endless hours of scrolling through social media, posting memes and arguing with other jobless idiots like me on twitter and FB. The voices of real people terrified me to my bones. I made sure to close windows and curtains very tightly to keep out any sight or sound of people and cars. I never set foot outside my door for good couple of weeks and the farthest I went in months was our backyard to warm my car. Coco and I got into an argument one time when she only suggested we should go and hangout outside. It sounded like the most outrageous thing anyone has over said to me. I said to myself ” why would this woman suggest something so cruel? Does she even know that there are real people out there?”

For lack of better words to express this, I’d say I simply “hated” and was scared of people for reasons I cannot explain.
By this time, I was already on a waiting list for ADHD specialist assessment. A small part of me kept praying and hoping that they were wrong about the initial diagnosis, but the more I spend time alone, the louder and more chaotic the internal monologues got. I am perfectly capable of holding 3 or 4 conversations at the same time about different topics and reaching very logical conclusions. It was during this time I knew that not everyone is capable of doing that. The evidence kept growing, the autistic features kept becoming more and more apparent as I study and reflect. Flashback of childhood events I thought I had forgotten came back in very vivid pictures that sometimes I had to pinch myself to make sure I am not going crazy and making shit up. At the same time, those memories only came with more proof of my neurodivergence. It explained my meltdowns as a kid was manifested as several days of attempting to hide and avoid human interactions or contact even with people in the same household.

Days turned into weeks then into months. By this time, I’d completely lost tract of time and days of the week. Solitude that I once only use to crave had become my true companion. I looked forward to being alone so I could mentally process the thoughts in my head without interruptions. The most reoccurring thought that kept coming almost every day was “why dint I know this fact about myself all my life until now?” Why did I have to learn this the hard, in the most embarrassing manner too. Then I slowly progressed into what can I do to become better or avoid future reoccurrence. But then, it occurred to me that I dint need to change, I only needed to know myself better and try become who I really am.

You see, I have never been Idle all my entire life. I went straight out of nursing school to working then back to school then went abroad. I did all this while joggling both school and work which meant I had zero time for selfcare, reflection, self-assessment or self-mastery. In fact, all I knew about myself was all I have been made to believe by people who even barely know me- That I was this antisocial, obnoxious, introverted, proud, self-absorbed motherfuker. While that may in fact, be true, If you don’t know yourself well enough you will actually think that that is all there is to know about a human and nothing more, That our entire being somehow only revolves around our temperaments, whether we are Cholera, or Sardine, talkative or prefer solitude, smart or dumb, antisocial or social butterfly and to the crazy, more recently famous notion that the earth’s position relative to the sun during a person’s conception somehow give them the right to be shitty humans. By that premise, some may even label me a “scorpion”. I still have a problem with both the logic and nomenclature but that’s story for another day sha. What the hell is a “Sagittarius”?

It took months of absolute silence and forced isolation for me to realise that we are much more complex than that. While I unconsciously mirrored and adapted throughout my life based on the people I around me and the ones I idolised while growing up, I credit my relative progress to the group of friends I made along the way. I navigated all this while thinking I was just like everyone else. The drive and tenacity of Debyluv meant I was constantly only thinking of my moves 2 or 3 steps ahead. The calmness and demure nature of Manfa meant I wasn’t allowed to feel pressure, I couldn’t give “two rat’s ass” about any situations that doesn’t concern me or are out of my control, man basically had ice in his veins. The resilient and no nonsense Akila meant I Kept showing up every blessed day even when I had absolutely no energy or motivation. The Meticulous Sarah, Courage’s eye for details, Franka’s absolute need for clarity all meant I had to attain and operate at a very high standard, Nanribet’s sacrificial nature kept me in touch with my ” human” side. All these meant I had to unconsciously shed a couple who added no intellectual value while maintaining absolute loyalty to the ones from my formative years. Then I met “B” who was a breath of fresh air, she came with a slightly different way of thinking and approach. Little did we realise we had far more in common. In summary, I was carried by my friends basically.

The very first time I found myself without these guys, I naturally transitioned into my real, neurodivergent self. The old me that had become used to “chameleoning” suddenly had no colours to mimic, My lowly Autistic self with distracted yet disorganised brain was left to fend for itself, and of course I failed, in a very spectacular fashion too. Alone meant I had to use a tremendous amount of energy to be able to muster my very limited attention store, which by the way, is less than that of a toddler, to be able to do even the most basic task. I had no concept of time management nor ability to judge the seriousness or urgency of tasks or situations. Alone in a place where the language was very different, a system that rely heavily on gossip and pretence, coupled with my inability to judge non-verbal cues meant I was screwed even before I started.

I know I said my idle days were the worst days of my life, but in truth, they were also the most defining and important as well. While it will take me years or even decades to well and truly know who I really am, those months, although filled with dark thoughts, dark humours and crazy Ideas, made me realise who I was not. I realised that there was more to just simply being “introverted”, I realised the need to know myself to even the seemingly insignificant detail, to know how every single cell in my brain and body works and how it differs from everyone else. Now I know that the human population is not as deep as I’d assumed. What I see, is basically what it is. Nothing more, so no need to waste time trying to decipher deeper meaning to instructions like it is some kind of Davinci code

The break mean I was able to step outside of myself and view myself from an outsider’s perspective and I realised just how simple life truly is and I understood that I never would have realised this if I hadn’t gone through that phase. Idleness made realise that my brain is a very small basket and I cannot rely on it as my only information store so I have to spare it of the stress by having a “To do ” list 24/7. I had to intentionally take a pen and paper and draw out a life plan for myself because the beautiful mess that is my brain will not be able to visualise all that in one picture, and even if it manage to do, it certainly cannot keep track let alone motivate me to proactively act in time without waiting for it to turn into chaos first. I never knew just what my head is capable of doing until now. I had no idea that in order for me to do great things, I needed to work with my eyes closed. Thatin Oder for me to stay focused for at least 60 seconds, I need to close my eyes and mentality figure stuff out from start to finish before attempting it. Now I know that with my eyes closed, I am able to manipulate numbers in head and don’t not need to memorise ideas .

Now, almost every blessed day comes with a new realisation. New weakness or skill that I thought were universal, all I keep asking myself or my friends ask me, anytime I enthusiastically share these stuff with them is that ” how did you manage to survive all these years.?” You of course, I shadowed you

So I have become this huge advocate of self-awareness and self-mastery because I now understand how we are individually genetically programmed very uniquely and this mean we vary widely physiologically and mentally. Because society has lumped us into categories based on certain characteristics doesn’t mean that all the features are absolute for everyone in the group. I know achieving a certain level of Self-awareness may be pointless or even impossible for some people due to the socio-cultural dynamics of our society. We are very social people, I will go as far as saying too social. The most jobless person here is never bored enough to have time for some deep reflection. We have 2 million owambes every other week and social gatherings to attend, there is always somebody’s business or juicy gossip somewhere to go and dip nose inside for absolutely no reason at all. This means there is nothing like “alone time”, most people are never truly lonely enough, when it is just them with their innermost self, to have this open, honest and most uncomfortable conversations with themselves. Probably what explains why it is people abroad who have experienced both sides of the world tend to relate more with my rubbish.

It took losing myself to find myself. There is blessing in boredom. You are more probably more likely to understand stuff and have clarity in absolute silence, that may even be yourself.