Delivering the Deliverables

Nelson Mandela said, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.

I cannot but wonder at this saying before I decided what to write this week. Over the past years, I’ve been making the occasional adjustment from working harder to working smarter, often against the accustomed deep-rooted habits instilled by thoughts or ideas about women’s rights and the rules or meaning we give to being at some work place trying to do the work of “empowerment”. Indeed, it takes risks to wake the Nigerian society up to its responsibilities toward women. Speaking out and celebrating women and all our many powers has been the bane for reawakening hope over the years. And if we don't celebrate ourselves, who will?

Yet, despite all the inherent risks and its attendant consequences, working in a women-focused organization with the support of key stakeholders, has enabled me put every effort into breaking the culture of silence and ensuring that the voices of women are heard. Over the years, I have used all forms of media to challenge the archetype of masculinity that allows for the resolution of conflict through violence. One strategy that has been adopted is to engage men - policy makers, parents and young boys - in discourse about the dynamics and consequences of violence. This in itself was not an all rosy affair, but it paved way for considerable results.

However while using web 2.0 tools, I have taken advantage of technology to build a bridge to something not altogether different, but workable. I take more and more working vocation and aim to develop new skills. I believe using Pulsewire will help build our movement-making skill and break the existing code of transformation. More than being able to do stuffs, skill means stuff happens when it matters. Skill is the right stuff at the right time.

As rightly put by a colleague, ‘‘A Mantra to live by is ‘We are enough’. Essentially, I believe that we are enough to solve the world's problems. We and Pulsewire are the deliverables dedicated to womanhood or people that strive on behalf of womankind. If we are all ONE, then changing how we relate to ourselves and how we work for change will change our world.