HOLD THE FVCK UP.
I planned to pen nothing down for today — 31st Dec 2019.
First off — my guy, shit like this gets too detailed and personal. I’m not a huge fan of “Keeping up with the Mide Johnsons” — they tell me it airs on channel 124 on Saturday evenings. I don’t watch it.
I haven’t processed the idea of throwing my personals into the eye of the almighty public. I’d rather keep the positives, the negatives to myself — it makes my introspective side more focused to reflect on them.
Second off, if you’re out here searching for a low-budget-Fela-Durotoye — my dear, get a bowl of popcorn and a take a stroll. My mother didn’t labour for 8 hours in 1998, for me to be out here in 2020 giving motivational aspire-to-require-your-empire rhetorics.
But then, as a righteous Marlian, I’ve resolved to this because — at every point in time, there’s the need to document the details of our lives. That’s how you learn when you’re out of logic — you take a look at experience.
So here is my 2019 resume.
A recap from 2018 would be a great start. In the most beautiful words, 2018 was shit. But then we make a mistake each time we reduce 365 days to one description or adjective. So, as much as 2018 didn’t totally go right, my blessings were engraved in the lessons I learnt.
By the way — J Cole’s “Love Yourz” just come up on my music player. My personal Daddy G.O. just rapped “there’s beauty in the struggle, ugliness in the success”. Thanks for the new year prophecies, thank you sir. More anointing, daddy Cole.
So what did the struggles teach me?
— I LEARNT TO HOLD THE FUVK UP.
kini mo so?
— I LEARNT TO HOLD THE FUVK UP.
So early 2019 came and I scheduled the production of an album — not your family photo album, aunty. An actual album. I ticked all the boxes — saved up a shit load of money for album expenses, ensured the content had the most conceptual outlook on life, the instrumentals and samples were fire, I got one of the best producers and the most amazing team around to work with me in the studio (HKF, Omar, Nnenna, Sukanmi Stevens).
Now I want to tear up —
my cheese ball wrapper. (who did you think was about to cry?)
So after 6 months of hard work. You guys must’ve heard the singles “Home” and “Get it back”. The album upon release, was supposed to be that feat no campus artist had ever attained — a 10 track compilation of tracks. But guess what? The finished record was handed to me by my producer in early May. I listened to it and that was it — It never got out. I never released it.
Don’t stress — It’s scheduled to drop on my 73rd Birthday party bash in June, 2071. But there I was in May 2019 — Khalid, Dumb and Broke. The album was not not-great. I just felt like I wasn’t feeling it at that point in time. My “feelings” cost me a lot.
During recording too, I was hit with one of my biggest bout of depression ever — my good, amazing and loving friend had connived with a corrupt Faculty system to deprive me of a #70,000 refund I was supposed to receive after sponsoring myself to represent the faculty outside the country.
But what if I stopped at all these garbage and didn’t locomote?
What if I didn’t HOLD THE FVCK UP?
Sometimes, you need the grace to hold on too. I ain’t go’n front. My first church service was sometime in June/July — just some fulfill-all-righteousness-this-guy-has-been-on-my-neck-to-come-to-his-church-attendance.
I knew I wasn’t down for a religious year. It was clear from the start. I was to uphold “faith” and not “religion”. To be honest with you like a cheating Lekki husband — I failed at faith too. I failed at faith when the windscreen got cloudy. I failed at faith when I felt it became to “inconvenient”. I failed at faith when I felt my ego was more than enough to see me through life’s challenges.
What if I didn’t HOLD THE FVCK UP?
I wouldn’t have witnessed the “Jesus take the wheel, take it from my hands. I don’t have my driving license..” part.
SERAP responds to a mail I sent after weeks of my procrastination — turns out my procrastination was for a reason. They had a need at the time. My lousy mail came in handy.
That started a chain reaction.
My baby — the Clinic For Human Rights which I had co-founded a year ago; stopped dancing, it started making money moves.
I went back to the studio and made a second mixtape that changed my life. My feelings were in agreement with the finished product this time.
I was retained by SERAP and started doing stuff for the community.
Remember my depression? Oh well. I started giving therapy to about 6 friends.
I gate-crashed an examination I’d never heard of before and that landed me an internship at the Lex Lata Centre for International Law and Comparative Constitutionalism in Africa.
I got my standard 6-digit life savings back. Very important.
Kanye dropped a gospel album.
I found the prettiest thing in the world in the weirdest of places — turns out she’d been listening to the mixtape.
So yeah, Charlie — this is where the motivation speakers drop the microphone. But, I won’t. Cos I love you and I’d be real with you.
I’m still broke sometimes, unstable, scared, insecure. As much as I have my lows — so do you. The last paragraph where I stated how things went right would be that beacon of hope for me, when next my lows decide to pay a visit. Imma make the mental reassurance that things get better when I hold the fuck up. I want you to do the same. Life’s like a marathon — It never quite ends. Sometimes we lead the race like them skinny Kenyans, other times — we’re prolly Donald Trumping at the back of the line.
When you’re low — know it lasts a while. When you’re high — reach out to those in their lows.
But never forget, hold the fvck up.
