Change your pet

This week I had one of those creepy stories told to me. It was of a Boa constrictor, yes those really dangerous snakes that kill by asphyxiation. So anyway, I was trying not to die as my friend explained the details….the said snake was actually a pet living in a house, not in a cage-just roaming free. Ok why would anyone keep a Boa constrictor as a pet, knowing full well that it is not a herbivore?

The snake would sleep curled up in a particular corner of the house daily, minding its own business, but this one day its owner found it on his bed lying stretched out….he did not think much of it and ignored the incidence. The next morning when he awoke, he found the snake on his bed lying next to him…..gasp…..when I think of a snake lying next to me, I think call the padre because this situation needs serious exorcism.  This alarmed him and he finally called the vet who urged him to bring in the snake to put it down. Apparently, the snake’s appetite was growing larger and the reason it slept stretched out next to him was to determine his height and if it was possible to swallow him whole.

Being a true story, I shuddered at the thought of being swallowed in my sleep by my pet. How awkward it would be at the pearly gates explaining to Peter how I went out….and how about this snake that has ill intent and motive towards me, watching me daily and waiting for my most vulnerable time of day? That is just horrific.

But as we continued talking with my friend, he brought up a very significant point that hit home, and sent me reeling inward for self-evaluation. He talked of the snake being secret sin in our lives and how every time we feed sin its appetite grows and grows and the more we feed it one day what we give it will not be enough. One day it will swallow you whole and destroy you. Sometimes we may think that what we are doing has no bearing on eternity. However, just because no one has found you out doesn’t mean that you are safe. In fact I believe that secret sin is worse than sin brought to the light of Christ’s love. It is much better to struggle with sin than give up….for struggling means you have not stopped fighting.

Everyone has that thing that easily besets them. Things that you are not comfortable talking about, things if anyone found out, would reject you, but God has made a provision for your deliverance. Granted, it is harder to break a habit than it is to pick one up, and years of secret sin may take years of breaking mindsets and thought processes but it is worth the fight. Get into the ring and fight for your life, because your soul is at stake. Don’t be callous when you sin, don’t take sin lightly. Just like you would not lie next to that Boa constrictor after finding out its motive, in the same way, get out of the bed, and stop sleeping with the enemy.

It could be your mouth, you just cannot stop slandering and gossiping, it could be your heart, you are angry and hide bitterness and unforgiveness. It could be your mind, and you know that what you watched last night left you empty and feeling worthless. It could be your feet- where you go is causing you to trip. Drop that remote, drop that conversation; drop that bar soap, drop that relationship that does not bring glory to God- don’t be afraid of being different. You were created to stand out so stop trying to fit in. Swim against that current that has swept you in the wrong direction for so long….don’t be afraid of doing it God’s way, it may be hard but it is worth it.

How do you fight sin? One way I have found that works for me is daily surrender. Waking up before God and saying Lord help me, I have no clue how to!! Secondly, reading the word and prayer. Whatever you constantly meditate on becomes what you are. Thirdly the hardest and most essential is telling someone you trust, someone who will not condone the sin and yet will not judge or condemn you. That is hard to find but rewarding.

So what have you been sleeping with? I suggest that it is time for you to find a different pet, one that will not kill you!!!

image from deviantart.com

All's fair in love and war

I remember the first instrument I ever laid my hands on . It was a small Sony keyboard, about two octaves long that my dad purchased for me after much manipulation and I treasured it with my whole heart. It was always my escape from the troubles of teenage hood and my growing up years are filled with beautiful memories of song writing and the love for music.

When I do get to speak about music as a career, people often ask me how songs come to my heart. Well, sometimes it could be a melody that refuses to go away, sometimes when am on the piano or guitar I will hear the music in my soul. Other times it's a bird that sings I don't know whether that counts as plagiarism but music is all around us, you cannot avoid the rhythm of life, neither can you ignore it.

Music is like a drug- it takes you to a place where no one and nothing can. It entangles all your senses and emotions taking you captive, that you will have to keep going back for a fix. 

It was like a dream to me when God gave me the song "Oh My Child". I wrote this song more than ten years ago on that very same keyboard, and till today it is one of my favorite songs off my album. I think the reason being that it came out of a place of deep, sincere trust to God. It is not tainted by my adulthood experiences, or my many doubts and grievances towards God. I think if I wrote it today, it would sound totally different. It is so childlike that everytime I play it back to myself, I want to be that child again. That child who believed that everything in life is pure and good. That when you meet someone on the streets you can shake their hand without fear of being drugged and robbed. Where did those days go sigh!!!

Oh My Child is a break up song. Not the conventional type, because in this song, it is the actual voice of God. He speaks of wonderful times spent with his loved one's and like any jilted lover asks why things have changed. In this song is the raw emotion and vulnerability of a God who wants us all to himself. It is a passionate appeal to hear Him and come back to His love......Just thinking about it makes me emotional. God is no longer the dictating and hard father who is displeased with us but is so ready to lay down everything He is so that we can have it all.....

This song changed my life forever and I am eternally greatful that God shared a bit of his heart and heaven with me....


For a snippet of this song listen here :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BALvhxons8

KILIO

Over the next few weeks I will be writing about my album KILIO what it means to me and why you should buy it :)....The first song I think I should start with is Kilio the title track to the album.

Funny how this song was written. I had scheduled studio time then had to cancel for one or two disappointing reasons....so you can imagine the state of my mind....Got into a matatu to get back to work yes I only do music for a living....and that matatu ride was one I will never forget. So my manager and I, who also happens to be the one I write most of my music with, peacefully entered a matatu bound for Lavington. Upon entering, I handed the conductor a one hundred shilling note expecting to get 60kshs back, but instead received 40ksh. Now all my close friends and family members know that I detest injustice...anything that smells like it, looks like it and talks like it. I have a small body frame but a big mouth when it comes to fighting for my rights :)

I always wonder if that exercise for counting down from ten really works when you are annoyed. I know it does not work for me but never the less I did count, then held in my breathe and shouted my lungs out. I was so incensed I could have sworn that hot air jets were coming out of my ears....you may stop here to ask why I was annoyed over such a small amount. To that I say, it is the principle behind it and not the amount. You see, the conductor had charged everyone on that trip 20kshs and just because we were alighting at Lavington, he saw two cash cows mooing in this rickety beat down matatu...what followed was a series of hand throwing, bure kabisa's and born again bleeps :)  

Finally the matatu driver stopped and asked why the conductor had charged us 30kshs even though the matatu ride should have been 20kshs.....to cut the long story short justice was served on a big plate and we left as the conductor stared at us so angrily as if to say I know where you live. 

Little did I know we would thereafter write one of my most favorite songs off my album despite all the drama that this day had dished out on me....

So Kilio, is a song of good triumphing over evil, right over wrong and justice over injustice. This song talks about a firm belief in God who fights all our battles and how we should allow him to work his perfect way in us. It does not mean that we will always be silent as he fights, but that we do what he instructs us to do when the battle rages. Sometimes it will be to stand still, other times, it will be to make a whole lot of noise in his name :) This song is my testimony, my life story and hopefully Kilio will mean as much to you as it does to me....

www.soundcloud.com/nitahungu/kilio

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWgAWHC_L74&feature=g-all-esi

The Science of Music

Last week I had the pleasure of talking to a group of ex-candidates about my music career and life. I began by telling them about purpose and how passion more often than not, can tell you what something was designed to do. Even inanimate objects follow this principle. A car designed to do speeds of over 250kph like the Bugatti will protest at low speeds because its potential is to be a super car. In the same way in nature, we see the same principle at work. The solitary eagle will not be seen foraging for worms like a chicken for it was created to be a majestic hunter and to weather the storms. I believe that all nature understands their purpose and lucky for us because how awkward would it be to see your fully vegetarian cow devouring a piece of marinated steak!!!

Awkward as that may be, everyday a dancer becomes a surgeon, a musician an architect, a pilot a lawyer. With no regard for the drum beat that thumps so heavily in our hearts, we go on wild goose chases, hoping to be fulfilled in an area we are not suited for. No wonder the lack of enthusiasm. It strikes me that the word enthusiasm comes from the Greek root word entheos which means inspired by God. Take away enthusiasm and you create a vacuum that needs filling, a job that apathy is more than willing and able to take up!

I propose that if you are not willing to lose everything for purpose then you are not ready to live at all; if you have nothing to lose, purpose will find its way into your heart. It is a desperate man who failed a thousand times, finally succeeding to create the light bulb. It is a man who had a dream that one day people of colour and white people would ride in the same bus or go to the same schools- not segregated as it was. It was that same man who died even before he saw the culmination of what he had fought for, thus it’s easy to see why martyrs embody purpose. If this be a true premise then it is safe to say that purpose equals passion and vice versa. Purpose is what makes you work hard and long even without the promise of success.

However, in a world that is more competitive than encouraging, one ought to realize that the fight for purpose is not an easy task. It is not a fight for the faint hearted. It is one that needs all facets of the being to be focused and unrelenting. I find that what we call fall back on plans are merely societies’ way of refusing to acknowledge that as much as all disciplines are indeed intertwined, they are autonomous. If all of us became doctors or lawyers, who would be left to write the histories of the world or the great symphonies that permeate both culture and time influencing the very fabric of life? Music is such a powerful socio-economic tool that one of Plato’s students said something to this effect: Don’t show me the laws of the land, show me the music, I’ll tell you the culture of the people. It was common place for philosophers to study widely and even Einstein is said to have studied the violin.

As outrageous as this may sound I believe that music is as much an art as it is a science. Could it be that Einstein’s theory of relativity was developed during his study of an art? The study of harmony itself is science. Pythagoras established music as an exact science, applying his newly found law of harmonic intervals to all the phenomena of Nature, even going so far as to demonstrate the harmonic relationship of the planets, constellations, and elements to each other.

Scientists have discovered that learning to read music or play a musical instrument develops higher thinking skills. The student excels at problem solving, evaluation and analysis. Music reading uses the same portion of the brain that’s used in mathematical thinking. That’s why so many adept musicians are also quite good in math.

The Department of Education study in The United States of America found that those who reported consistent involvement in instrumental music over the middle and high school years show significantly higher levels of mathematics proficiency by grade 12. (This observation holds regardless of students' socioeconomic status.) [cnn.com]

Though the benefits of music are scientifically proven, society today relegates the place of the arts to the extent of removing the curricula from the primary education level; an action that has proved both fatal and detrimental to the growth of the student. Basic problem solving and critical thinking have altogether been removed. I dare say that a life devoid the arts is no life at all.

The stigma and controversy that follows music is very disturbing. Through my journey in purpose, I have often been met with stares after proclaiming what I do for a living; Quite explicable, considering the history of the arts. Indeed, many a great music composers were forced into different career paths. Those who stayed the course and challenged the status quo changed the direction of what we know of as music today.

Innovators cause the world to be in perpetual motion.

I do believe that the desire to pursue the arts as a career should be met with rigorous training and study- etude, for music education bridges the gap for a musician just as a surgeon would never operate a patient without having studied anatomy! This academic approach strengthens one’s aptitude- musicians should therefore enroll into some form of study because ignorance only serves to rob one of talent; a blunt ax in the forest is no good to a lumber jack.

Music education speaks volumes for the professional musician adding value to them and increasing their image as a brand. As the world evolves in all technology and disciplines, so do the arts evolve, making for last year’s inventions obsolete, therefore study is pertinent.

If music influences the whole being of an individual, causes nations to rise and fall and no state function anywhere in the world starts without it, should it not be given more priority in the education system than it currently is?

OH LORD SAVE US FROM YOUR FOLLOWERS


I am not one of those Christians who believes that God is some powerless being out there in the cosmos who needs me to fight for or defend him. Neither do I think that I ought to fight any sceptic over what I believe.

So naturally my first instinct was to laugh out loud when I heard this quote. In my view, Christianity is not a set of do’s or don’ts limiting an individual- I don’t think that Christ came so that I can stop watching my favourite fringe series or eating a good plate of Mediterranean cuisine. Christ did not come to introduce different denominations or to make one religion greater than the rest. I think that his mission on earth was more deliberate, a well thought out course of action to restore humanity back to what God had intended it to be from the beginning.

However, lately I have thought about this quote with more intensity and a set of brand new eyes. I have questioned the light in which the church has portrayed God to the world. Fortunately and unfortunately, God has chosen to use such weak and broken vessels and will seldom explain to the world why his people make heinous mistakes. We curse those we should bless and discriminate against those that Christ wants closest. This is not the God I have come to know now more than ever!

My journey with God is a love story like no other- It was love at first sight. Only in this case, I could not see or touch him, but he was more real to me than anyone or anything. It has been one of failings and victories, ups and downs and fumbling through, as it is with all relationships world over. I am not exempt from the great losses of life or the emotional hurts, or the deep disappointments that plague me. Many times I have questioned my allegiance to a God who has allowed me to cry severally through the nights and in my own opinion needs to learn a thing or two about how to run the world! This has made for many aha moments when things unfold and I find that I had it all twisted. But that does not ease the pain of war torn countries or hungry babies or of death and desolation....it does not change the fact that we are in dire need of a permanent solution to the problems that plague this world.

A recent study I undertook on the gospels portrayed Jesus Christ not as a judgemental, high and might deity as we are often taught. Neither did I see him as a puny, weak willed human being. On the contrary, I saw him as compassionate yet strong, able to draw the line between sin and holiness yet needing of love. He was by no means the sissy many think him to be. His closest cronies were ruffians, but to be fair, the Gentiles were not considered cream of the crop. Jesus Christ was spontaneous and he was a man fully in touch with his emotions. He was not one to shy away from a loud cry when he felt the need to, or jubilance when it was needed. Once he whipped some traders- that is not the picture of a wimp. Christ was fully man and fully God- and he was perfect in all ways.

If we purport to follow Christ how come we look nothing like our teacher? I think we need to re-sit some classes if that is the case, and there need be no shame in that, being in the school of a God who is not performance oriented but is keener on real transformation. God is calling us to heart change, more than behaviour change. If you change your heart and mind on something, behaviour follows naturally. I must be honest here; Christians are not perfect; if we were, there would be no need for God but there needs to be a true representation of the kingdom we serve under. What startles me is the many masks we wear in a bid to hide our inadequacies. Because I struggle with something does not make me worthless, it just affirms my humanity and my need for God.

Individuals who genuinely need God have been turned away from many churches because they do not fit the status quo. Of course they do not fit in and for that reason Christ came! It’s only the sick who need a doctor, so how can we decide for God who is deserving or who is not? We have even categorised sin: sexual sin, smoking, partying, drinking. Anything else is not that bad but we forget that Christ in many instances speaks against keeping appearances yet inside we harbour hate, bitterness, unforgiveness, and lies. It seems that our focus has shifted. When someone falls into sexual sin they are not allowed to teach in church for a few months till the sin is paid for, but when someone lies they are allowed to go on with work- Is there anything like a big sin? Is all sin equal?

Karl Max is quoted as saying that Religion is the opium of the masses. I disagree. Faith should not be used as a pain reliever, on the contrary, God calls us to look straight into our pain and inadequacies and then give them over to him so that he can help us. He calls us to a life of honest vulnerability with fellow Christians- one that is hard to imagine because we easily run to judge than to embrace. I believe that one day the Church as a body of faith and not the religious outfit we call it, will rise above and fully take on the nature that God intended it to have from the start. One of feeding the poor, taking care of the widows and orphans, embracing the outcasts and doing what really matters in making a difference in this decaying world.

I find, from my own experiences at the hands of fellow believers saying, Oh Lord save me from your followers, but I realise that I too am a follower of Christ, so tonight I rewrite this quote: Oh Lord save me from myself.

Passion or Addiction

As I lay in bed, awake and fuming at the persistent rodent problem in my roofing, my thoughts shift from murderous to self-analytic. Having studied psychology, psychoanalysis is a term I know well and have used on many accounts to try understand and explain human behavior, usually odd behavior. The doctor has now assumed the role of patient and all I can do is wait to hear the diagnosis of my ailment.

In many cultures, Africa included, it has, sadly speaking, been considered a silent taboo to seek the help of a therapist, because if you do, you must be crazy. However, I believe that like any other ailment of the body, the soul can become ill and thus needing a trained doctor to cure it.

Therapy is important in this day and age where crisis is the norm and people are maladjusted because of several traumas faced. Self-medication involves addictions in many forms and even the good forms of addiction are still addiction. For example, a workaholic can be viewed in two lights- one that he is well adjusted and works hard to provide for his family and on the other hand, being maladjusted, he does not spend time with the family he works very hard for. To understand addiction in any form, one needs to understand the human soul, but who can ever purport to know such a complex and unique structure as the human spirit?

So, in the wee hours of the night, onward my thoughts trudge, as I carry out an introspective search for truth. I like to think of myself as a recluse who chooses a path least travelled, like the eagle that loves the thrill of a storm or the rodents in my roof whose motto, I am convinced is, Never give up. Because of this, I find myself having to explain my well-meaning addictions, music being the greatest of them all.

Music has always been a part of my DNA and not inherited, but what I believe is a deliberate act of God to bless my family with diversity. That said, as a child, I always found myself wandering off to a distant land like C.S Lewis’ Narnia, a land of boundless possibilities, of creativity and childlike faith in an art I would later call my purpose.

That dream was rudely cut short when attempting to relay the contents of my heart to my family, the one question every aspiring artist is asked, was asked And what do you intend to do with music, be a teacher with a petty income? So I was bundled up and taken to University and for the next four years pursued a normal degree which I did not myself choose (at least let me choose my subject of torture). Those were the longest, most unfulfilling four years of my life and if you ask me, repression is a coping mechanism I have mastered well. That journey of a thousand years finally came to an end and in open protest I did not attend my graduation.

Was it really my degree in the first place? It would be a case of mistaken identity if I went, was my argument!

It is such passion that drives me till this day. The struggles of an entrepreneur trying to break ground and find a place in the big circle of life can easily discourage an individual but in my view, life was meant to be conquered. If Christopher Columbus never ventured out into unknown worlds looking for Asia, America as we know it would never have been discovered. If the classical jazz artists had not stumbled upon nonsense syllables the beautiful improvisation we now call scatting would never have been heard.

This is what reminds me that no matter what my life experiences have been like, nothing just happens by chance and that in all things I can recycle what I have gone through to better myself. For there is a lesson learnt in every delay and fall. In this case, my study of psychology may have been in my opinion the worst decision a parent could make for their child, but maturity comes to show me that I understand myself and other’s much better because of my study in Psychology.

I have also come to know such resilience and patience because of the frustrations of not living my dream. And I have come to appreciate the fact that to err is human.

So as I stare at the ceiling, with the sound of the rodents in the background, the conclusion I come to is that my malady is life and to this there is no cure. 

Nostalgically

Recently I had the pleasure of being interviewed by an online radio station…..I answered most questions without the slightest hint of uncertainty, until the one question I would linger on for more than what seemed like an eon was asked.

They asked me what my most memorable moment in my music career was. Well, that seems like an easy one for most people, but being the melchol that I am (a sanmel if you ask my family), a hard to please perfectionist, I paused, searching for anything grand in the archives of my mind. Finally a light bulb went on and voila an idea struck hard like lightning. I went back to the year 2010 December, where for more than a month, every Saturday I taught a group of hungry- for-music teenagers at an NGO called Stadi za Maisha. 

Teaching music is what I do all day long…in fact once to illustrate a term used in music performance, “staccato”, to my mentee, I was forced to apply the brakes of my car at specific interludes to drive the point homeJ .That said, my experience at the NGO would become the platform for my love of music in community work. You would think that having studied Community Development at the University level would give me the much needed desire to go and work in any community, but it did not. True learning I believe happens out of class, when we are tested with real life situations.

They say you cannot have your cake and eat it, but I ate my cake with a very big spoon (licked my plate and went for more) There began my journey of a thousand steps and beautiful memories, of falling in love again and again, of cheating life out of its best and then starting all over again. Every weekend morning was literally the stuff dreams are made of, but from this dream I never awoke. 

There was the answer the interviewer needed but now to put it in a language he could understand (everyone knows the heart speaks gibberishJ) ….but lucky for me, being the sanmel my family says I am, I was able to come up with something coherent and just like that the interview was over.

Passion can never be bought. You either have it or you don’t. Unfortunately, we have bought into the lie that we can substitute passion for money and live as underachievers, as long as we are paid large sums. This has left many people disgruntled and eventually reverting back to what they should have done in the first place. I also believe that you can earn from your passion, you can perfect an art or science so well that your value goes up. Till this day my students from Stadi za Maisha call me for life and music advice. I must have done something right while teaching there. I hope that it’s that I injected hope in their hearts. That is the legacy I want to leave in my community- HOPE and PASSION.

Kabete Journals

Every Thursday for the past five months I have volunteered at the Kabete Rehabilitation School. This has been no easy task. Many of these young men come from broken homes, have been involved in drugs and petty offences and have even lived on the streets. They are not prim and proper but are rough on the edges and you would understand why!

Psychologists state that our character is shaped by two things: Nature and nurture. How we are in terms of our genetics causes us to behave in certain ways- this is nature. On the other hand we are shaped by our upbringing. What is modeled to us in our home, we become. Of course there are so many factors that determine who we become eventually. Choices play a vital role. You can choose to be different despite your genetic structure or your upbringing!

However, for some people it is not as easy as receiving information and then implementing it, it takes time and work. This is exactly what teaching music at the school has presented me with- time and work. I not only teach them music, I teach them life skills, etiquette and the basic mannerisms every well adjusted human being should have. I don't treat them like hoodlums, I treat them like young men who need a second chance, and don't we all? But to rebuff anyone based on their past actions is the worst mistake we could ever make.

In rehabilitating behaviour, there is no place for "hit and run". One needs to take time and effort to unlearn and relearn what caused that ill behaviour in the first place. Deterrence and retribution have their place in causing an individual to change. However, in my opinion it is the soul that needs to change first before a certain behaviour is changed. It can never be the other way around. That is why for example, a criminal serving the life imprisonment can be released to only go back to the same crime that caused them to be imprisoned!

"New Dawn" is a program I felt the need to initiate at the Kabete Rehabilitaion School. So far there is a great change in the young men. My hope is that they will truly be rehabilitated in order to change their communities. Music as a tool has given them a way to express themselves. I am training them in choir, instruments and theory of music. In addition to this, I am preparing them for the Kenya National Music Festivals. This is a feat for both I and the students because it will be our first time at the Festivals, however not our last.

Community change equals world change and I have decided to jump on the “change train” for my community, will you?

Click here to see the boys from Kabete in one of their classes....