the immortality of struggles

“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.”
– from “The Prophet” By Kahlil Gibran

“Life is a struggle. Not only is it a struggle, but it is a continuous struggle.”
– Mahatma Gandhi

“Grief was the celebration of love, those who could feel real grief were lucky to have loved.”- similar to how those who struggle deeply are those trying deeply to live.
– Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

do you ever wonder why the weight never leaves your shoulders? why it seems that no matter how hard you work, no matter how many times you rise, there's always something waiting—something pulling you, testing you, stretching you until you almost forget who you are? that was your first question at twenty-one. you asked it with a bitter smile on your face as you sat by the roadside in your father’s compound, watching the sky melt into orange. you had just lost your third job in two years, your rent was overdue, and the shoes on your feet had opened their mouths wider than the hunger in your belly.

you whispered it again as you stood in line at an overcrowded job fair, dressed in borrowed clothes and washed-up dreams, surrounded by people just like you—people clutching cvs like they were life jackets in an ocean of despair. your shirt collar itched, your armpits sweated, and yet your face wore hope because society said looking tired is unprofessional. so you smiled like a liar and begged like a man who didn’t know what dignity was anymore.

still, you told yourself: this is just a phase. a test. if you can endure this season, the reward will come. you spoke those words with the blind faith of a man raised in prayer meetings where pastors called poverty a demon to be cast out. you prayed. you fasted. you rewrote your cv. you rewrote your dreams. and eventually, something gave.

you got a job. it wasn’t perfect, but it paid. you could now contribute to the household. you could afford your own toothpaste. you bought your first phone—not a new one, but one that wasn’t cracked in three places. the sky seemed brighter. struggle, you thought, was finally behind you.

but it wasn’t. it had only changed clothes.

now it came dressed as targets and deadlines, office politics and unpaid salaries. you worked twelve hours and slept four. you learned how to say “yes, sir” even when you wanted to scream. you learned how to stretch one salary across thirty needs. you learned how to show up, even when you were unraveling inside. the struggle wasn’t gone—it had simply matured. it became mental, emotional, invisible. it sat beside you at meetings. it followed you into church. it lay next to you in bed when your wife asked if you were okay and you replied, “i’m fine,” even though you weren’t.

then came fatherhood.

and suddenly you were not just a man—you were a provider, a protector, a planner. your own childhood came rushing back—your father coming home in silence, your mother sighing while slicing onions, the unspoken tension that filled the house like smoke. you used to wonder why your father stared at the wall for so long. now you know. you do the same. at thirty-six, you’ve become him—silent, brooding, trying. every decision you make echoes into someone else's life. you breathe, but it never feels deep enough.

your son grows. he is bright, curious, full of questions that sound like the ones you asked at twenty-one. you watch him stare at the world with innocent eyes, unaware that life is slowly sharpening its claws. he does not yet know the taste of rejection. he does not yet understand the rage that builds in a man who gives his all and still falls short. but he will. one day, he will ask himself why peace is never permanent, why happiness feels like a guest that always leaves too soon. one day, he will carry the weight too.

because struggle is immortal.

it does not die with your success. it does not retreat when you marry well or travel abroad. it mutates. it learns new languages. it grows with you. it will sit in your children's homes, in their marriages, in their ambitions. it will wear different names—depression, imposter syndrome, burnout, existential crisis—but it will always be there. it is the invisible inheritance, the portion no father intends to pass down but always does.

you will one day watch your daughter cry quietly in her room after failing something she worked hard for. you will want to carry her pain, but you won’t be able to. you will only sit outside her door and whisper, “i know.” because you do. because you’ve lived long enough to understand that comfort does not erase pain; it merely shares it.

your grandchildren will grow up in a more digital world, more connected, more efficient. but still, they too will feel it. the weight. the noise. the ache to prove themselves. to be seen. to be enough. they will struggle with relevance, with meaning, with finding love in a world too fast to care. and you will be old by then, maybe fragile, maybe wise, but you will smile a sad smile because you know the truth: no generation escapes it. struggle is not an era. it is not a punishment. it is not even unfair. it is simply the price of being human.

you used to think the goal was to defeat struggle—to arrive at a place where life finally becomes easy. but now you know: ease is not the destination. understanding is. maturity is. gratitude is. you start to see beauty in the fight itself. how it makes you softer in some places and harder in others. how it carves humility into your voice, how it teaches you to pray, not because of religion but because there is nowhere else to go with your anguish.

and every time you wake up to the hurried realization that your struggles are forever constant, you close your eyes and whisper painstakingly: “may the grace that makes things softer finds me.” the morning will commence the day swaddled in its white regalia, but you won’t be the same person you used to be.

because every night rewrites you. every burden adjusts your posture. every sigh reminds you that you are becoming someone your past self wouldn’t recognize—someone not just trying to survive, but learning to breathe differently. you begin to appreciate the quiet victories:
your mother’s laughter during harmattan.
your child saying, “i missed you, daddy.”
boiled yam that reminds you of home.
the neighbour’s generator humming when nepa strikes, and somehow, you’re still okay.

the immortality of struggle does not mean doom. it means life.
it means you're not asleep.
it means you are still in motion.

and if you are lucky—no, if you are faithful—you will pass down something stronger than comfort: resilience. you will teach your children how to bow without breaking, how to suffer without self-hatred, how to carry pain and still laugh with their teeth. you will teach them what your father couldn’t say, what your mother endured in silence, what your ancestors buried in their prayers.

and when you finally lie on your back one last time, breath shallow, body worn, you will smile—not because you escaped the struggle, but because you danced with it. because you didn’t let it swallow you. because in every phase, through every weight, you still lived.

and that is all a man can do.

By Adewole Daniel Bamidele (theprorokk)