THE GIVE AND TAKE OF OUR MODERN SOCIETY: WHO'S YOUR BIGGEST SUPPORTER??

We live in a give and take society, nothing comes for free even from your parents, your friends and even the government, to get services from the government we all have to be responsible citizens and pay taxes. The problem is we have let give and take stand in our way of offering simple help to those people who think they are connected to us.

So how does give and take work with parents? Picture this, I know there are some of us whose school fees and needs are met based on performance, not necessarily school work but how we carry out ourselves. Modern parents work with incentives when we behave well and help out with work during the holidays we are rewarded, we get extra monetary support, and when we misbehave and do little to help out with work, use most of our time on social media, drinking visiting friends, and whatever, there's punishment for that probably the school fees will be paid and the pocket money squeezed. They may not tell you why because we're grownups, our parents expect us to understand the give and take mechanism but in a good way.

Social media is also a give and take society on its own. You might have thousands of friends on Facebook, hundreds on what's app some you’ve never met face to face but they give you that feeling of belonging. They make you feel like you're connected truth be said, social media makes us feel like we're connected when we really are not, at least not the way we're supposed to be. You see connection is not about viewing each other's statuses, it's not about the simple Check on you talk that ends with "am fine too thanks" neither is it about Instagram or Facebook like. connection is about support, who is there for you, and honestly, not all of your 100 plus what's app friends can offer the kind of support am talking about. Take this, for example, a friend of yours is selling trousers as a side hustle and occasionally on weekends he chips in with a bottle of vodka which all of you share in fact you drink more than him. During one of your drinking session, he asks you to "promote" him buy a couple of trousers and also inform your what’s app, Facebook, and Instagram friends that he is selling the trousers, what's the first thing you do? You will definitely compare the price, it's our nature as Africans let's say he is selling them at 950/= probably his profit is the fifty shillings tops and then there's a boutique in town where the same trouser goes for 850/=. The next thing will be bargaining to see if he will get to the boutique price or less because he is your friend after all he should give you a discount if he doesn’t agree you will opt for the boutique and so as not to hurt his feelings promise to buy when you get money. Your friend did not give you a sweet deal so you did not take it, reason being you were worried about that difference of hundred shillings and what is in it for you? You end up not sharing his business idea too because of the same mentality.

We are only connected to people who can support us to the best of their ability the rest are just people we know, a bunch of people we talk to daily, they make us laugh and we make them laugh then we sleep and wake up still the same people we were yesterday. While give and take might be good if not abused, it should not get in our way of helping others wholeheartedly, without expecting returns or looking at what is in for us. Imagine if you bought a couple of trousers from your drinking buddy and also refer a couple of individuals each, without worrying about the 100 shillings profit he will make, quick math 950 by 3 your friend will make a profit and next time he calls you for a drink, you will drink comfortably owing to the role you played.

Another example is for upcoming musicians, article writers like myself you all have them on your whats app contacts. What happens when they share a YouTube link asking for subscribers or someone to like their page? Most of us totally ignore, I have 167 what's app contacts roughly 30 of them are old enough not understand how the stuff with links work and they also don't view my status frequently, that's an exception leaving me with around 137 people who can easily click my link to the article and even read a couple of lines, leave a short positive comment like "nice work bro" or a mean one like "this is trash" either way my article will get some traffic. This will cost them less than 5mbs of their data and two or three minutes of their precious time, but my last article only garnered 6 views, with a few comments. Am not complaining, no I have no right to perhaps my topic was not that intriguing to them. How about this upcoming musician, he or she have shared their YouTube link all you need to do is click on it and subscribe, the least you can do if you can't watch the video. You'd rather be on Justin Bieber or Katy Perry’s YouTube than your friends or fellow comrade, as friends and comrades we are supposed to be their biggest supporters yet instead of playing that role the first question that comes in our minds is what's in it for us? How are we benefiting from Subscribing on their YouTube channels? Lighting one candle does not make yours dim or switch it off totally, give and take might be the norm in our modern society but it should never prevent us from supporting the people around us all, your biggest supporters are your friends but not all your friends will support you get that one right.