Dazed.
I remember I was working that day when I saw the pop up, I quickly clicked on it, my face emotionless but my heart very expectant. It was the only one left that I was holding on to, it was the last one I was trying and I knew I would get it.
Too much work had gone into the whole process and what I expected was nothing but good news.
This email however, suddenly changed my bubbly mood and I stared momentarily into thin air. I tried to compose myself very fast because this wasn’t the place nor the time for a melt down. Work is not a place to burden people with your flaring emotions, you get a hold of yourself because really, everyone is going through their own shit. You got to man up or in my case woman up! hehe.
Being as teary as I am, this was surely a difficult task. I felt my eyes slowly start to betray me, as they always do.
I quickly remembered the advice they always gave of taking a deep breath , I guess I heard this statement from my primary school teacher, Mr. Mwangi. The evening stories that Mr. Mwangi used to narrate to us in class four were frightening to say the least. I used to go home terrified every time he gave us stories. Up to date I have never quite figured out if he was an avid reader or just a story teller.
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This is how my regret for Mandela Rhodes Scholarship came in.
This is among the countless other scholarships I had applied for before, including Chevening. For Chevening actually you apply to the universities separately from the scholarship itself, so was Mandela Rhodes. For Chevening, I got accepted to all three Universities that I applied to, LSE, Bath and Leeds. The process of applying to LSE is like applying for a whole scholarship. Being accepted into all these universities without the scholarship was however a chase after the wind.
The school fees in these schools was too much. I decided to do my due diligence, call up relatives to ask for help and individuals in my life who I thought could be willing or in a position to help. I forwarded emails, I was still hopeful at that moment that something would happen and that last month, September I would be in Europe ready for my one year Master course.
I couldn’t get help from anywhere and it’s at the beginning of this month that I decided to sort of move on. I still get numerous emails from the schools reminding me of matriculation, fees and all the information that the schools send.
But, I am glad I gave it a shot.
Sometimes things don’t just fall into place as we have mapped out in our heads. Sometimes the answer to our prayers is a no. Sometimes it’s rough and you can’t make sense out of the whole situation.
Moments of uncertainty will come very many times in our lives. In our relationships, career, marriages, finances and much more.
When we are in these moments, it’s easy to forget all the good things that have happened to us. We can however intentionally choose to pick up our lessons, pick up ourselves, Let Go and Let God.
