CURSE of Success:

As Kenyans made fun and mourned our marathoner Samuel Wanjiru Kamau, I kept thinking about many gifted people who have not made it in life or have died young. Talent is not enough, and not everyone who is highly gifted is bound to make it in life. Success in many cases becomes a hangman's noose, and the victim will go through the door to his doom.

Fredy Adu, resembled greatness on the football pitch at the age of ten. His resemblance to the great Pele just made it look like he will make it big before he turned twenty. Sportswear giant Nike and other brands scrambled for his signature before he got into his teens. The irony is that at the age of twenty two, today Fredy Adu does not have a club after stints in Portugal and other European leagues.

That is the big league, but on the ground level, it happens a lot, the people who looked destined for greatness never make it. They are all around us so we have to find a way to mitigate these great losses. To lift up those who fall and push forward those are strong enough.There has to be a support system around these great characters or else success will be like handing them a rope to hang themselves.

The preacher in the book of Ecclesiastes got this long time ago; Ecclesiastes 9:11 (The Message)

I took another walk around the neighborhood and realized that on this earth as it is—

   The race is not always to the swift,
   Nor the battle to the strong,
   Nor satisfaction to the wise,
   Nor riches to the smart,
   Nor grace to the learned.
   Sooner or later bad luck hits us all.