Quote from Kunle Adeshina on April 23, 2018, 6:39 AM

I had a conversation the other day with a good old friend. And in the course of our discussions, he mentioned something that got my mind thinking. He said according to Islamic doctrine, if it happens that a Muslim corpse needs to be bathed the first question whoever embarks upon that bath would ask is: Was he/she a prayerful Muslim? Was he/she a practicing Muslim? The questions are asked because according to Islamic beliefs if the answers to the questions are contrary, it is believed that the dead person's sins would be transferred to whoever bath the corpse . My good old friend is a devout Muslim so I believe him but this doctrine or perspective made me ponder about how powerful beliefs are and about how we humans are shaped by belief.

Beliefs rule our world and enable us to create our own realities. A Christian fellow in that same scenario would probably go ahead to wash the dead corpse without asking those questions or getting to know the details of the dead corpse's faith. In India, cows and monkeys are revered by followers of the Hindu religion because they are believed to be sacred or some deity. Infact for Hindu faithfuls it is forbidden to eat beef. The same beef we use here to treat ourselves to hot sizzling suya and down with a cold bottle of beer! Permit me to share another belief. The commonly held belief before Ferdinand Magellan showed up was the earth was flat. Sailors during that era believed that if you sailed too far towards the edge your ship would fall off and you perish. It was until Magellan's voyage and discovery that the world was indeed a sphere and not flat that the erroneous belief changed. Let me share another belief. Some circles in medicine believes that Steve Jobs essentially committed suicide!  Jobs had a mild form of cancer , but his faith in alternative medicine likely cost him his life. He was a Buddhist till he died and although he sought conventional medical approach it was rather late. Let me share another belief. Before April 1954 - the commonly held belief was that no human being can run a mile for less than four minutes. It was even believed that whoever attempts such would die! In the year 1954, Roger Bannister showed up and threw people's belief in their faces. He broke the four minute barrier. Since that time over 20,000 people have done it including high school kids! So what changed? Belief!

The question that naturally comes to mind is: why is it that humans can have varying beliefs, experience varying outcomes and can alter their beliefs at will? The answer isn't far-fetched. In the evolution of man, the human brain developed a certain part called the neo-cortex or pre-frontal cortex. The pre-frontal cortex is the logical part of the brain that evaluates choices logically. It is the reason human beings can think and learn. Other species in the universe are lacking this part in their brains (I mean those that have brains!) And it is for this singular reason that humans can make advances from generation to generation. I will also add that the mind is housed in the pre-frontal cortex. The mind is like a soil or garden or computer. And the mind houses our beliefs. So if the mind is our computer, our beliefs are the operating system. If the mind is our soil, our beliefs are the seeds.

The question today is what are your beliefs? What are you dwelling upon? Negative or Positive mindset? Let us closely guard our beliefs in order to have the most wonderful experiences in our UNIQUELY human existence because life is simply a collection of EXPERIENCES. Nigerian youth, do you believe that you are lazy? Emphatic No. We only need a President that would understand that his youthful population is an asset and rise up to the task and create better opportunities and not the one who would continually pile us with excuses...#justthinking