I have been trying to make my life “work” for a while now. That meant getting more serious with my business with the focus of making bags of money, settling down with the love of my life and starting a family, cultivating more “serious” social contact, keeping regular schedules with the hope of being more accountable with my time, and so on. By yesterday, I was so tired that I couldn’t bear to hear my cell phone ring and so I switched it off.

When I woke up this morning, I didn’t jump out of bed as usual, and neither did I switch on my phone. I lingered under the covers until around 11 o’clock when it finally became apparent that life has to go on. And as I ate my breakfast, I half distractedly watched a program on TV as I also prepared to go to the office. The program was about the life of a wild hamster in the bush.

The particular family of hamsters that was the focus of the program consisted of a mother, father and their seven children. It documented about how the mother takes care of the children, the challenges of life through the seasons of the year, and how the rodents survive in an environment surrounded by predators. When the seven youngsters left the nest for the first time, they were so overwhelmed by the new world that many of them forgot to look out for predators and they perished. I remember one that was whisked off by a kite while it was in the process of grooming by licking its paw and slicking it over its face.

It was while I was watching this program that I realized that there is much more to a hamster’s life than meets the eye. For example during winter, a hamster’s metabolism, heart rate, breathing, all slow waaaay down in a form of hibernation called torpor. Animals that hibernate go into a deep sleep during the winter months when it is very cold, and their food is in short supply. But before hibernating, the animal eats more food than usual, which is stored as excess fat. The animal then lives off that fat as it sleeps through the winter. Another interesting fact about a hamster is that it eats its own poop. Yes! Hamsters have a different digestive system than humans. Hamsters produce two types of excrement – one that is partially digested containing lots of nutrients, and one that is just garbage. Hamsters practice coprophagy, eating the nutrient-filled excrement to get the nutrients from it and digest it fully.

It then occurred to me that there must be a higher intelligence that orders the lives of not only hamsters, but all the other animals in the wild. That intelligence understands that it is just as important for some hamsters to live to adulthood as it is for others to be whisked off as food for birds of prey. For a while this higher intelligence which is what I have learnt to label as “God” seemed to metamorphosize from just a concept in my mind that I have to worship and into something that not only contains my existence, but that of everyone, and everything else as far and my thinking will ever go and imagination can ever take me, and beyond.

When I asked myself if I could trust this intelligence to guide my life, I decided to suspend making my life “work” for a while and see what happens.

As I stepped out of my house, I met the neighborhood kids and spent a few minutes helping them with their bikes. It felt quite good to share just as small bit of what I know with them, and they seemed quite happy. On a day of making life “work”, perhaps I might just have rushed off with all my thoughts focused on what I would need to do as soon as I got to the office. I might not even have noticed or welcomed the warm sunshine on my skin or the clean dustless air after the last few rainy days. As I got into a public transport “matatu”, I realized that a story had began to form in my head, and that I would just need to sit at a computer to put it down. On a day of making life “work”, I would not entertain day dreams considering that I would have more important matters of “business” to think about. When I got to the office, I couldn’t wait to sit down to start writing, but then I was called to look at some computers that had some minor problems – the kind that take a lot of time to sort out. Well, it didn’t take as much time as I initially thought and the computer users were genuinely grateful for my efforts. On a day of making life “work”, I would have fixed the problems while grumbling to myself about being above “manual” computer work, and would most probably have made the users feel like it was their fault that the computers had problems.

After several months, I am inspired to write and post something online. On a day of making life “work”, I normally do not have what is required to write what is in my mind coherently enough for any other person to read.

In Matthew 6 in the New Testament Bible Jesus Christ said:

“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, “What shall we eat?” or “What shall we drink?” or “What shall we wear?” For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

“Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.”

With this in mind, it is easy to let go of all those things that don’t seem to “work” and let God take care of them: at His time, in His place, in His way. Amen!