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    21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn: Escaping the Collateral Damage of the ‘African Mentality'
    21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn: Escaping the Collateral Damage of the ‘African Mentality'
    21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn: Escaping the Collateral Damage of the ‘African Mentality'
    Ebook134 pages2 hours

    21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn: Escaping the Collateral Damage of the ‘African Mentality'

    By Jerry K. Bankole

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    About this ebook

    What you know also can hurt you!

    The quality of your life is a reflection of what you know and how you think, and what you know and how you think you learned.

    In this book, you would find at least twenty-one of the most common but limiting lessons you most likely have learned especially as a black person, how these have formed the bedrock for the way you think, and consequently the quality of the life you now lead.

    It would also help you do the following:

    Escape the damaging effect of these destructive mind-sets.
    Effect a revolution of your mind.
    Unleash the unlimited power within you.
    Change your life and of those around you for the better.
    Become a person of influence too . . . regardless of the colour of your skin or limitations, and all by yourself.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAuthorHouse UK
    Release dateAug 21, 2012
    ISBN9781468586138
    21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn: Escaping the Collateral Damage of the ‘African Mentality'
    Author

    Jerry K. Bankole

    Jerry K. Bankole is a life coach and fine speaker with an undying passion to help people rise above their limitations, unlock the unlimited power for change within them, and improve the quality of their lives, by equipping them with practical, tested, and proven life skills. He is a medical doctor and is happily married to Oluwatosin. They both live together in Nigeria.

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      Book preview

      21 Destructive Lessons Blacks Learn - Jerry K. Bankole

      © 2012 by Jerry K. Bankole. All rights reserved.

      No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

      Published by AuthorHouse 08/15/2012

      ISBN: 978-1-4685-8612-1 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4685-8613-8 (e)

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

      and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Cover photograph by Unstoppables International

      Contents

      Dedication

      Acknowledgments

      Introduction Looking Inwards

      Lesson #1 Don’t Ask Questions

      Lesson #2 It’s A Cruel World, So Be Careful

      Lesson #3 Small Is Beautiful

      Lesson #4 Worship People

      Lesson #5 Wait For Orders

      Lesson #6 No Sweat No Sweet

      Lesson #7 All Fingers Are Not Equal

      Lesson #8 An Eye For An Eye

      Lesson #9 Life Is A Race And Survival Of The Fittest

      Lesson #10 If You Can’t Beat Them, Join Them

      Lesson #11 No Money . . . Nobody

      Lesson #12 Vanity Upon Vanity, All Is Vanity

      Lesson #13 Men Don’t Cry, Ladies Don’t Talk

      Lesson #14 Son Beware Of Ladies, Girl Beware Of Men

      Lesson #15 Those Rich Men Are Thieves

      Lesson #16 Go To School And Make A Living

      Lesson #17 Be Contented

      Lesson #18 Whites Are Witches

      Lesson #19 You Are Still A Child

      Lesson #20 Rome Was Not Built In A Day

      Lesson #21 The Devil Is Black

      Conclusion A Revolution Of The Mind

      DEDICATION

      To the millions of black people around the world, whose struggle for significance and need for true mental liberty has motivated this writing.

      ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

      Thanks for this book is due my parents, David and Debby Bankole for being such great coaches, motivators and providing for me a true home where I enjoyed the freedom and push to think outside the box.

      My lifelong partner, the love of my life and the helper of this work; Oluwatosin, for the sacrifices made and standing by every inch of the way through this project, I’ll always love you.

      The four men in my life who have influenced and empowered me to go ahead and make a difference; Nelson Mandela, David Oyedepo, Mensah Otabil and Korede Komaiya, thank you all.

      My strongest and formidable support group and sweet siblings; Olubunmi, Tai, Gideon, Tolulope, Ifeoluwa and Boluwatife Bankole for believing in me and giving the push it takes, I celebrate you all.

      Thumbs up to the competent team that saw me through publishing this work at the Authorhouse Publishing, UK, for a job very well done.

      Finally, to every one person who sincerely believe in and seek the emergence of the new black person I say; you are my reason.

      INTRODUCTION

      Looking Inwards

      THE PUZZLE

      It is no doubt Africa as a continent has remained one of the world’s biggest puzzle. Looking at our nations, anyone would ask questions. Really, the whole world’s attention is on a people so blessed yet so unattractive. Everyone wonders why a continent of about a billion people and such a large share of the world’s reserve of natural resources are still wriggling in abject poverty, lack and underdevelopment.

      The question is always, ‘Why’? It looks like a mystery why a people with so great mental and physical strength are the world’s underdog almost eternally. It is amazing how the supposed strongest specie of human beings is the most inflicted with incurable sicknesses and diseases

      Despite the claims that Africans have well-organized family and community structure, we are equally a people known to have experienced the most frequent and disheartening incidents of civil and communal violence and unrest. You know all these are evidences of disharmony and division. So what is the evidence of our ‘so strong’ family culture anyway?

      Doesn’t it amaze you how Africa has turned into a kind of eye sore in the global community? How good does it really feel to be an African? What is it that makes you feel proud of Africa than a choice to hope that things would get better someday? But have you found any true lights at the end of this never ending tunnel? I doubt.

      Meanwhile, it is no doubt that the Black person is just as perplexed as the rest of the world. We all wonder why Africa wears the bad outlook it does today. Sometimes we want to find out about our origin and past so we can probably find clues to resolving our significant problems.

      Unfortunately very little or nothing is known about our past aside the story of the early man gathering wild fruits and hunting games. Or at best the transatlantic slave trade.

      We are a people without sufficient history that can show us how this whole mess really began or the way out of it. We keep asking; ‘How did we earn ourselves the dark world identity?’ Now that we have, must we always remain there? If the answer is ‘NO’, then why are we where we are now?

      These and several other yet unanswered questions are those every Black person has lived with over the ages. Our various attempts to answer these mind-bugling questions have made us come up with various wrong claims.

      The problem starts with the kind of questions we ask ourselves and more, the way we ask them. We ask questions that are aimed at indicting other people, events or circumstances for our downfall. It is easier for a black man to ask; ‘Who has done this to us?’ than ask, why we are what we are or what part we played at getting ourselves into the problems we are in today.

      CHANGING FOCUS

      In explaining the cause of our predicament, we point accusing fingers at some individuals, nations or events. We simply exonerate ourselves, thereby shying away from realities and truths that can set us free. We have always looked outwards for the root of our problems, rather than look inwards first. The first question should be; What is wrong with us?

      When we blame, we give away our power

      GREG ANDERSON

      One implicated foe is the West. The black man believes the white man caused his whole problem. We claim our whole problem started when the white man came, bought us into slavery and colonized our nations.

      Actually, I have no contentions with the fact that the slavery really did destroy a lot of good things about us. It truly ruined us much. The only problem I have with such claims is that we often fail to find out what the Black person was doing when his white counterparts came to enslave him.

      For example, what was he doing when the white guys were manufacturing the perfumes, mirrors, fabrics, guns and such other baits that caught him? What has the Black man to exchange for these materials other than the worthless lives of his kinsmen? What was his perception of those material things the white man brought him and why did he perceive them as such? What was the perceived exchange power or the value of the lives of those men and women that were traded for the guns and gins?

      I wonder if he was forced into slavery. Did his own kinsmen; his king and fathers not trade him? Were there no terms of trade? Was the white man created wiser? Why then won’t the black man first think of engaging the white in the trade before the white did? Or was he so ‘righteous’ to know that enslaving his fellowmen was a moral aberration? Obviously no!

      Unfortunately we still hold on to the claim that some people are responsible for our downfall. Now that the slavery is over, why are we not moving onwards in our nations as have done the rest of the world? Remember several other nations and economies were once slaves to another, however they have refused to be eternally held back by the same and have shaken off the dust of their demolition and risen up to a new and better day.

      Whichever way we decide to see it, the truth remains that the blame game is never a helpful one to solving problems. Every time you put blames on others you are beclouded and unable to find the real cause of the problem, talk less of solving it. Over the years we have played the blame game and it has not solved our problems. Instead, we get into more problems because we are never poised to take the responsibility of solving our own problems.

      We have always looked outwards to solve our problems. In fact, we beg about for debt relief and even clamor for some remuneration from the colonial masters for the lost years of slavery. Would that solve our problems?

      Do you think having more money is the solution to our problems here? I doubt it much. After all our GDPs and per capitals have increased considerably over the past few years but are things as such better? Have our standards of living improved proportionately?

      WHAT IS WRONG WITH US?

      Do you want to hear the truth? There is something wrong with the Black person. It is our ways of thinking. There is something fundamentally wrong with the characteristic way we think and that is just what has brought us as a people this back over the years.

      This characteristic way of thinking has been widely summarized in what we call ‘The African Mentality’. It is characteristic of us as a people although it may not necessarily be typical. It is our downfall; the African Mentality.

      Don’t you think it may be this our traditional way of thinking as a people which we still embrace today, that got us into the slavery mess in the first place? In my own opinion, our problem dates further backwards than the slave trade itself. The slavery experience to me is in itself only the after effect of our way of thinking.

      Really it is very

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