Light at the end of the tunnel?

‘There’s light at the end of the tunnel’. I am sure you’ve heard/read that somewhere. It’s often used when people want to tell you to hold on and have hope/faith that things would get better. Here are my questions though,are you sure you’re not just in a really deep tunnel where you keep searching for light at the end for the rest of your life? When does leaving the tunnel become a good idea?

I am actually writing this from a place,i don’t know where to be honest but it’s definitely not hopelessness because i am still searching for the light at the end of the tunnel that i am in, but you will agree with me that it becomes tiring at some point when you don’t know for how long you have to keep walking. When exactly does life begin to make sense? When do you finally get to say that you have what you want and move on? Do we ever find light?

As a child, i was actually care free. So imagine the horror and anger at the realization that life as an adult is very hard and confusing. Oh! i long for the good days, my tree climbing days as a child at the back of my house just to feel like an aeroplane, only to itch for the rest of the evening and then go back the next day. The days that i had neighbors to play my precious football with,wearing combat trousers all over the place and didn’t get frowned at for not being a ‘girly’ girl. I miss the days when errands meant channeling my inner ‘Usain Bolt’. I really miss the innocence and dependence.

At that age, the problems i had could be solved by either going to school, crying or simply telling mummy/daddy. Another problem i had was getting back from school on time for the cartoon lineups for the afternoon, the schedule was in my head like the multiplications table.

There’s a lot of problem in the world, but i am very grateful for what i have now (life,family,few friends, etc). I just can’t help thinking about how sometimes, we are sure that the problems we have now are our biggest. You’d manage to get rid of a situation only for a bigger one to jump right out. Sometimes, we do not even realise how big a problem is until we start to tackle it. It’s like finally getting enough thread to stitch your shorts only to find another tear somewhere at the back. Very frustrating.

Don’t even get me started on how you can be in different problems at the same time. You probably just lost your job,your rent is almost due,your partner goes from hundred to zero and you cant stop the anxiety from eating you up. It happens! Sometimes you do not even know what the problem is (sad and funny at the same time).

I hate being an adult, winging life and pretending to be fine.

Where am i going with this? there’s this Nigerian slang ‘problem no dey finish’. It means that problems do not end, we are going to keep solving them and new ones will keep coming up. Know that and know peace. As long as you keep existing, you’re always in that ‘life’ tunnel, working and walking to find the light at the end. Some people get lucky, they figure out what to do on time, it works for them and they move on to other things, but we all won’t be that lucky.

Here’s what you should keep in mind though, hoping for a change in a situation you’re in right now is fine, we all do this. We hope and pray for better days, but while waiting for that, do not miss the other tunnels or places where you could reach light.

Sometimes, there is no light at the end of the tunnel you’re in and you just have to come out and go elsewhere. If you eventually leave, you might realise it had always been a dead end, but you were too busy ‘hoping’ to see it.