Let’s tee this off by establishing a few premises you must never forget. One: please remember that this flows from the entry of last week; the edition of uncanny rhetorical posers. Two: also that the captioning is deliberate; every morphological conditionality is intentionally kept out. It is what it is; it is what it shall -not would- be.
Three: never forget that while it is true nothing is more important than how you live, when you are gone it is truer that how you are remembered is everything for your name and family. What you do in your lifetime can limit how people remember or celebrate you, during and after. Therefore, deliberately remember to live well because at the end that is all it comes down to. Four: remember that there are no guarantees.
In spite of and despite what you do or do not, people (some people) shall remember you only the way they want. There really is not so much you can do about some of these things. Evil people see others as evil because even their lenses are evil. Never forget that evil can never see nor understand nor appreciate good.
Five: the foregoing notwithstanding, doing good should be the nutrient, the driving force of your life daily. To be sure, you don’t live seeking validation, but you need validation. It is like food: human beings say we don’t live to eat, but we all know we eat every day we are alive; in fact, even during funerals. Never seek validation, but you need it.
Six: talking about funerals, always remember that when you move away into eternity, the people who encountered or knew you shall only discuss the original you; not the fake life with which you deceived outsiders. Forget all that eulogies at funerals, they all end there. Everybody knows everybody. The world only remembers the real you.
A solid foundation having been laid for the purpose of distilling clarity, let us start the discourse proper. How shall you be remembered? You know, it is possible to live a careful life but still end up being remembered as a careless coward, a foolish sage or a wise idiot. This is it: you shall be remembered as a coward if you always kept quiet in times of public trouble.
Our society is run by bad people who keep winning because good people believe it is better to keep quiet. False believers, all of them. Because it favours them. Because they don’t want to die.
So they stand up to nobody, and for nothing. They want to enjoy their loot in peace. Their children and children’s children grow up and do not have to search too hard to discover their parents and grandparents were pure cowards. Looking deeper, you connect why too many of our young people said to come from so-called decent families descend into crime, drugs, depression, insanity, etc.
Next: the person who shall be remembered as an ethnic bigot may not now realise they are setting up a booby prize for themselves in the afterlife. They kill or oppress people of other ethnicities. They block or destroy interests of others said not to be their brothers and sisters. They chose where they hailed from, right?
Wrong: it is no evil to propagate or protect your people’s rights and interests but oppressing and suppressing others in the process is a no no. Using the position accorded you by the majority to hold down the majority while going to every length to promote your minority might seem smart, but how shall posterity remember you? A minority narcissistic jingoist euphemistically known as the chief suffocater of the majority? It makes no sense, some gains.
Unlike that hater, there is another whom I remember, way back during my secondary school days in next-door Cameroon: a lover in every sense. She was powerful, from our section as the majority but was too afraid of what people shall say, was too goody-goody to hurt the minority, and so ended up misconstruing justice. She treated equals unequally and unequals equally. All of us whose golden opportunity she wasted now remember her as a leader who ought to never have been. Saintly weaklings shall never be canonised.
Furthermore, how and why are you president, governor, a person of power and prestige today, but tomorrow the same you are declared a suspect, a thief, a wanted man? Who cursed Africans like this? Pray, where does posterity keep this type of fallen angels? Shall such a one be remembered as an honourable hero or a disgraced antihero?
That is the point. One very bad thing you do can wipe off your many good deeds. The beginning is great but how you end is more. How you end is how you shall be remembered.
I know three preachers who don’t hide their past. One was given to the prosperity gospel. Two was a robber, an armed robber. Three was a witchdoctor, trained by his grandfather. Today, only cynics remember all three so; an alarming celebrate them.
I knew and know some rich people. Past and present, nobody remembers their flamboyance, their mansions, their cars. People shall always remember not what you had but how it affected them. Deploy that access, that influence, that wealth for the good of the people so that when you no longer have them, memory might accord you a warm smile rather than a frown.
The twin things about being remembered are one, that you do not have to do too much and two, that it can also happen in your lifetime. Simply doing your job well and with a smile and in/on time can coax your boss or colleagues or visitors to remember you every time. For example, how shall I ever forget Blessing, a wife and a mother? I was at some big office at the centre to see a big man I had not seen in decades.
I remembered the man for his old testament humility and goodness and seven months after he had taken a high federal office I thought I should stop by and catch up. He was himself, throughout my visit. However, his protocol chief stole the show. Blessing was/is a blessing.
That is how to get validation sans seeking it. The man had a truckload of guests and Madam’s duty was to receive us and order in. She went above and beyond. I stayed about an hour before seeing her boss, yet it felt like five minutes because she intermittently came to apologise and explain; not just to me but others waiting.
Since then, whenever I remember her boss, I remember her. She represented her boss, excellently. Unfortunately though, whenever I remember her for her professionalism, I also remember her colleague for shaming the tie and suit he wore that day. Somebody is waiting to see your boss and you bark out orders that embarrass them?
How shall you be remembered, man? As a hater, as a lover, as a madman? As honest, as humble, as loyal? As friendly, as helpful, as needy?
How shall you be remembered, Ma’am? As someone everyone avoided, as someone everyone ran to, as someone everyone used? As someone everyone liked, as someone everyone listened to, as someone everyone wished had not existed? As someone everyone found respectful, as someone everyone knew minded her business, as someone everyone thought useful?
How shall you be remembered? As an angry, bitter, corrupt ‘un? As a diffident, envious, foul-mouthed ‘une? As a greedy, hateful, insufferable bully?
How shall you be remembered? As a jerk, a killer, a looter? As a monster, a noisemaker, an ogre? As a pig, a quack, a ritualist?
How shall you be remembered? As a star who was notorious, a teacher who was popular, an uncle who was selfish? As a virtuoso who raised no successor, a warrior who won no wars, a xena who wanted no man? Pause, take a deep breath, think.
How shall you be remembered? As a youth who forgot tomorrow? As a zealot who lived and died in vain? Or as someone everyone misses?
How you shall be remembered is a personal choice. The leader should lead well, rather than playact, so that the led remember to remain patriots forever. The priest should preach well, rather than pursue the things of the world, so that congregants remember God and them eternally. The student should study well, rather than be truant, so that teachers and colleagues remember them as models permanently.
Fortunately, we all still have the chance to perfect things. Remember that you shall not always be powerful or rich or strong, so do the needful today. Tomorrow might be too late. It is in your hands how you shall be remembered.
God bless Nigeria!