In the Spirit of Gbogborima
Gbogborima is the spirit, if you like. The Spirit of the Brotherhood of All Men! No spirit is greater, when you discover it. Such men are willing to take the Steps to Brotherly love. The brotherhood does not exclude women, it embraces them. The Steps are the complete structure that arises from the 4-7 Creed. You can table it as a matrix in which every step leads to fulfilment.
The surest way to complete the Steps is thorough commitment. The easiest way to fail is to seek benefits and power during each step. You cannot have both, either you choose one or the other. After the fulfilment you will have all, you need. For you would have learned to live the life under the discernment of usefulness.
However, it is not so linear. The word spirit sounds esoteric or mystical but it’s just a convenient expression. Just like in the spirit of Justice or Democracy or Goodwill. Gbogborima is a singular or collective emotion among men in song and dance. Plus, the conditions of the 4-7 Creed. Amazing is a group of people in low spirits energised by music. Musicians travelling with fighting troops at war time can do as much for morale as lethal equipment. Parties and festivals are often great places for reunions and forgiveness after bitter quarrels. Herein lies a logic of Gbogborima as a transformative force.
Where men gather in large or small numbers, divisive egotism arises. Power lust, greed, and competition also arises for resources abound. It only takes time for strife to break out. This is where wisdom makes all the difference. Visionary leaders know egos, ambitions, and fights ruin brotherhood in advance. They also know merriment with nourishment does dissolve divisions self-interest generates among men. It’s not stress relief but a heart softener. Every Friday is not too frequent. Nor is once a month or once a year at larger levels of gathering.
Music always generates emotive responses in people. The deeper the emotion music elicits the better. Gbogborima practitioners aware of beat-talk understand the power of three beats. Pan pan-pan. Du du-du, Koin Ko Koin. These are confirmatory beats. They confirm the purpose of the music cum gathering. It confirms the emotive side brotherhood. Many can play the three beats on a percussion instrument like drums and gongs. Advanced practitioners go further; they play multiples of three beat, six or nine beats per iteration with accuracy. These men in action create the closest most will get to Gbogborima in feeling or emotion.
So, is it all sing, sing, and sing? Or dance, dance, and dance? And merry, merry, and merry? No. The 4-7 Creed is much more serious than that. Brotherhood breeds strife as a law of human nature but wise brothers ably keep it under check. Busting strife with apt timing and necessity is the right way to summon Gbogborima. Gbogborima, thus, represents peace and harmony among men.
Gbogborima is accessible. He is not a god nor deity. He embodies the subtle archetype of The Better Society. That is, a just society of different but complementing individuals; universal brotherhood. Lapotidunity is attainable with a little alcohol in the stomach. Only a little. Orgasms you can reach with strokes. The number is up to you.
Gbogborima, whether in isolation or in gatherings is attainable through mood. An irony to it is that in a gathering of thirty men, the feeling of just two men is enough for all to immerse in. The downside is so many undeserving men enjoy it. Most of the inexplicable envy within is the inability to generate the feeling while others do it at will.
The myth of Gbogborima as only embracing men of like minds is a futile approach to brotherhood that fails terribly in its futility. The human spirit is far more adventuresome; it seeks both likeness and complement. A genuine brotherhood of men will tolerate differences, even overly differences. Seeking uniform conformity among people is forever a path to collapse. There are enclaves of human activity that demand strict uniform conformity like in hospitals, prisons, and military forces. Disease, punishment, and war have their own archetypes of management. Such are not the stuff of voluntary brotherhood.
Gbogborima is also an ambience. Where men gather around it the environment fills with it. Many can feel it occasionally, yet few feel it frequently or consistently even without comrades or companions. You must be wicked, sad, or deviant not to experience it once. Still, the feeling is daily if you commit with sincerity.
Gbogborima does not require steep exercises in faith, intellect, imagination, or common sense to experience it. All you need is to trust. If you ask how, you are not ready. Please do not bother. Hint: you find it as a child learns to walk. Nevertheless, the Creed is a sufficient guide, nothing more, just the Creed. The Steps is a matrix of thought and action that leads to the fulfilment of “Love your brother (neighbour) as thy Self.” That is what it’s all about. Any addition or subtraction is a waste.
The love in question is a feeling from Gbogborima, not a function of intelligence, wisdom, or creativity. “If you know, you know” love, but if you do not know, sorry. Gbogborima is with you but you cannot feel. You are like a man who receives endless green lights from a desirable lady to come on but misses them like he is blind. Then he regrets his failure in finding love.
There are few intentions a child will pursue in life that are greater than the desire to walk and talk. The child will often ignore benefits and attention just to do these things. This is not a you-must-be-born-again message. Intention breeds fulfilment and the completion of goals.
The question is thus, how many men of the brotherhood ever muster the intention to fulfil the Steps or find Gbogborima with any seriousness. In terms of numbers, the answer and results may prove tragic. If this is the case, we can understand why substantial brotherhood is so elusive.
Gbogborima may appear not to be for every brother. It may appear not even to be for but a few. On the contrary, the internal premise of Gbogborima is its availability to all if you so desire. The only challenge is, are you man enough, willing, and serious enough? It is up to you, no one else. Is genuine brotherhood not enough of a motivation? Otherwise, the benefits are there for everyone though all you must do is dissemble. But remember it is either one or the other.
Be good, not lucky.
