“Life is not Fair”
If you are a player in this world called life, chances are that you may have used that phrase at least once. Or if you are like me,maybe even more. Not that you would have predicted at those times that such a mindset would find a home in me.
In fact chances are you would have laughed at my incredulity. But you weren’t in my world and certainly weren’t living my life and so to what end does your impression matter to my interpretation of fairness?
Some donkey years ago, I attended a college preparatory class with two good friends, Chido and John. We all wanted to be physicians and like most kids our age with big dreams, we gave up a lot of our childhood working hard to actualize.
Though super good friends and have remained so till this day, we were fiercely competitive with each other. We all aced the test but when the UME (University Matriculation Exam) cut off score came out we all fell short. It felt terrible but at least we took solace in each other’s fate and that way, we were able to absorb the shock. But that was not to last long!
Soon after the Christmas holiday, I dusted my books in readiness for the next battle ahead. As you would expect I reached out to my buddies so we could decide on the best way forward but got a shocker of my life. They both had been accepted to study medicine and I was now the only one left out of the crew. To say I was devastated is a gross understatement. That day, I stayed up all night with suicide thoughts flashing through my mind couple times over. One after another, I recounted how life was never fair to me. It was a cycle of depression I went through that lasted for months.
On a post-mortem analysis, I learned that even though my score was a little higher than my friends, they were able to get in through other channels. Chido’s dad was a big time estate surveyor in town and so was able to deploy his influence to benefit his son. John’s mum on the other hand was a staffer at the university and so John got in utilizing the staff quota. Needless to say none of those chanells were available to me.
Now just to put things in perspective, I was already a Doctor Mondus, even before I became a discernible mind. For no good reason this family friend of ours felt the need to address me as such and for some reason that stuck. In fact growing up, it trended in my neighborhood. As you can imagine ,I didn’t quite get it but over time all I wanted to be was a doctor. And now this! Life definitely was anything but fair. Or so I thought!
We all carry a sense of justice and what our ideas of fairness are in this life. Most of the time it manifests in a feeling of being wronged when we get the short end of the stick. But the world has never been viewed as fair. Why are some people born into fame and fortune while others are wallowing in poverty? Why should some be healthier, prettier or more liked than others? These are everyday questions begging for answers. What we do know is that no one has it all and everyone has some. Our understanding and perception of all these however differ remarkably.
Fast forward few years later and my two buddies and I had a mini reunion of sorts. I could perceive a healthy dose of envy by the way they spoke about the little progress we have made in this journey of life. Needless to say that my feeling today is nothing similar to that kid that didn’t make the admission list.
Maybe we have to be more open to the idea that every human being in some ways and at some point in life gets to face the good, the bad and the ugly. You gotta believe there is a greater sense of justice in this world.
For that may as well be the fairness in life we have all been craving for, even when it’s hiding in plain sight. But if that still is not comforting to you then I suggest you listen to Andrew Mathew when he adviced:
“The happiest people don’t worry to much whether life is fair or not. They just get on with it”.
*Osmund Agbo MD, FCCP writes from Houston,Texas