John N N Ng’ang’a Meditation Of 6th May 2024 Preparing For Old Age write a book as your legacy.
Day 1
One useful old age activity is to write as a way of assisting the younger generation not to repeat your mistakes.
But one problem I have when writing in my early seventies is it will be read by people who are in their eighties and I do not feel I have much to offer to them.one possible reader is another old age writer Ambassador PG Gitonga has written about Lari massacre very effectively. in 1968 I was a form one and my school matron was his wife. I was a very small boy at the age of fifteen.
His late son was a great family friend, and so I kept reminding him about how small he was when his mother was our matron. Although I am young, their children were younger. So, you can guess fearing they will read this makes me feel a young man. So, we are old but not equally.
And I am very grateful to be able to say something that my Elders can read
In encouraging the old people to write I want to cover three questions. Number one, why write. Why write, especially in old age? And how can you begin to write? Now, I must say that when I started writing I did not answer the questions myself. In other words, I am answering them backwards. I just wrote. But I have discovered over time how important book writing is.
I still remember some fifteen, twenty years ago, getting a telephone call from a person in Embu, saying, you can’t remember me but you used to come to speak to us in the University of Nairobi. I left the university more than forty-six years ago. But I have been speaking in the universities all the years after that. So, he said, ‘you used to speak to us, but recently I was in a Bookshop, and I found your book Leadership King David Style. After finishing reading it, I thought instead of trying to reproduce the materials for my church leadership, can I get the writer himself otto talk to them. So, he went looking for my telephone, I think he went to FOCUS, which organizes the Christian Unions in the Universities. he finally got the telephone and called me. And said, I want you to come and repeat to my elders and other church leaders, the leadership principles you draw out of King David life.
That is how I ended up in Embu on a whole Saturday with the leadership, then on Sunday I spoke in the church. And it is all because somebody read my book. And I have come to discover that I as a person, I am not well known compared with the books, although I happen to be the one who wrote them. And now I thank God and admit I did not know this importance when I started. That the books are going where I have not gone.
And another time we were with, Nairobi Baptist church women’s retreat. somebody asked, you are John Ng’ang’a? Might you be the writer of the book which we are using in my university course? I can’t remember which particular University was using one of my leadership books. And I said, what is the title of the book? When they said the title, I said yes, I am. Waah, I am glad to meet you. I was not aware that my books are being used in the Universities. I mean, I am just writing for the youth not for academic purposes.
But of course, the good thing for me is that since there are very few African writers, so whether the book is that good or not, it will enter in the library. So, it may not be that I am a good writer, but if you want to speak on leadership from Africans and Kenyan perspective, you may not find many of us. So, you end up getting one of us.
Once I retired I registered a management consultancy firm called Taruma Consultancy, and a lot of what I do is related to staff performance management and training leaders. Once I was doing a leadership training in Lagos in Nigeria. And as I was talking to them, they asked me questions which I thought were not part of what I had discussed, but I answered. But during the tea break I said that question was funny, how come you are asking it? The Nigerian participant said, because it is in your book. I said, how did you read my book? Somebody came with the books in Nigeria and I bought a copy. and so, I knew when I meet you this is what I will be asking about. So, I said, waah, the books are already in Nigeria. Are you getting my point? That the book will go to places you will never ever go.
Day 2
My first book is called Friendship, and it is a pretty small book because it was a result of VOK or Kenya broadcasting station asking me to give a series of talks on relationships. The Producer told me I am not allowed to talk about boy/girlfriend relationship, and I am not allowed to talk about husband and wife, how people relate well with one another. There was a program those days, about thirty years ago, that was called Yours Faithfully. And so, I prepared the talks. I was told to prepare four talks, because they were going to appear every Monday, repeated every Friday. So, we recorded all of them at a go. When they recorded, they broadcast the program, VOK started getting positive feedback. I think that is the time it was changing into KBC. People wanted the recording to share with friends. And they did not actually agree to produce them, to make it commercial. People wanted the tapes of the previous talks. So, a friend of mine actually went there, took the tapes and produced tapes, and started selling the tapes.
Then somebody said, Brother Ng’ang’a I heard your tape. My friend, I am not good at listening, I like reading, can you give me all that material and I type it for you so that it becomes a book? Remember at that point am not interested in writing a book. what I wanted is to talk. And I thought my job was done by talking on VOK. actually, I got very impressed because one of my mentees was doing Masters in the University of Addis Ababa, and wrote to the girlfriend to say, please open general service this time on Mondays because I am listening to Nganga. So, the girlfriend came and also told me. I was told by my boyfriend in Addis Ababa there is a program where you talk. So, I realized it was already very popular and I was already very happy with that.
The idea of writing was not my idea, but I respected the lady. And if she is offering even to type, I did not want her help. So, I went to Rebecca who happens to be a lecturer in communication and said, can you help? So, between us, that is how we got the first book out, not from my intention but simply because somebody wanted the message heard to be also read.
But I am still on the first question which why write? You need to understand why you write. if you have an important idea, that idea will go to more places than you if you write and publish it. Like, for the last forty years I have been speaking in the universities. out of the fifty-two weekends of a year, more than forty five I am speaking somewhere. And it is important to understand then, I am fully involved in talking. But the important thing is I have discovered despite the many opportunities God has given me to talk, they can never compare to the opportunities of people reading my book.
Another time I am in Valley Road church, which happens to be my church. And it is a Tuesday, we are coming out of the prayer meeting, a young man stops me and says, Brother Ng’ang’a I wanted you to know something. What? I am now a student at PAC University, and I have just finished reading your book on integrity. It is true I had written a book on corruption. It is my biggest book. So that tells you how corrupt we are Kenyans. It is my biggest book. So, I kept writing, and it kept getting bigger. And he says, this book has totally transformed my life. I will never be the same again. And I said, waaah, what if my book was not in the library, what would have actually happened. And I was so happy that it happens to be in the library at PAC and the person has read.
Day 3
Then some other time I was doing some leadership training in Zambia, and as I was in the program staying in the hotel, I got somebody trying to telephone me from Kenya. I could not pick the telephone, for two reasons; I was busy, but the other one is that it is very expensive to receive such calls. They call them roaming charges. So, I thought I can SMS him and say, please SMS. So, the person SMSed and said, we need to see you at KICC on Monday at ten o’clock. So, I did not understand what about it? So, I asked, who are you? They wrote, SCAC. That did not help. But I also looked at my diary and realized I am not available. I do not know who they are, I would want to go, but unfortunately that Monday morning I am already occupied. As I came back to Kenya over the weekend, whatever I was going to do on Monday morning was cancelled. So I realized my excuse is gone. So, on Monday morning, at ten o’clock, I went to KICC. I can’t remember the floor in KICC; I found a room full of many people, men and women, consultants, but I did not know them. I do not even know who had invited me. they seemed, consultants in government and seemed to know each other. they were all talking but I did not know any of them. And they were looking at me with very strange eyes like it is a private club. So how have I gotten in?
To cut the long story short, the president had issued a requirement that all parastatal boards and all university councils, all government bodies must go through ethical training. And the government was going to pay for them to be at the Serena Hotel in Mombasa, far away from what can disturb them, and for three months the consultants were required. There was a syllabus prepared by SCAC, State Corporations Advisory Council. So, they had prepared a program and they had written a manual called Mwongozo on how government parastatals should run.
My job as a consultant was to tell each board how they can have corporate ethics. I had never consulted for government. I had not even applied. How have they known about me? I checked with several people and although nobody ever admitted giving my name, my suspicion is somebody read my book on integrity and wanted that information made available to all parastatal directors. In other words, nothing to do with hearing John Ng’ang’a. in fact, the person I am suspecting, has never heard me talk. I think all they did was to read the book and they thought the materials in the book was worth giving to parastatal boards.
That was August, and from September all the way to December the government paid a flight for me every Wednesday to give my talk. my topic was on Wednesdays.so they, paid a flight for me every Wednesday, to Serena. They could pay my flight, pay my hotel accommodation, and some consultancy fee, every week. This is for something I never applied for. I believed God opened the door, but I believed He opened it through the book.
So, if I had ideas but I was just giving talks everywhere, would these people have seen the content? No. I was hoping that by spending the time I spent every week with different boards, because each week was a different board, another week a different board, repeating the same message but different people, that somehow the ideas would transform Kenya.
I had written the book to answer the question, it is possible to be ethical in Kenya, because slowly we are developing a climate where young people believe it is not difficult to be ethical in Kenya, it is impossible. If they see you driving a good car, they know how you got it, you must have been corrupted. Because they do not believe anybody can succeed in business unless they are corrupt. I was writing my book with pain because I want to find a way of telling young people, not everybody is corrupt.
Day 4
But if you choose to be corrupt, please admit you are on your way to hell, and we are not joining you there. Those of us who have chosen to walk with the Lord. In fact, just to give you a bit of the story behind the book, I was again forced to write it. And so, for all those years I have been speaking to students. I am still on it.
He must be around forty. And I was over sixty-five, so I have a right to call him young. He rang me and said, Mr. Ng’ang’a may I see you? You may not remember me, but I was in Chiromo campus twenty years ago, and you used to preach to us, and there is something that I want us to discuss. So, I told him, I will buy you tea in Java restaurant. Even pension buys tea, I wanted to encourage the young man not to think I am after his money. So, I told him I will buy him tea in a Java. Then he took time replying. I said, can you email me at least the subject we shall discuss. So, in the email he said, I just want to find out, do you practice the things you teach. With that kind of a comment, now it was no longer him looking for me, I was actually looking for him. When are we meeting? And sure, enough when we finally met it was fireworks. when we finally met, he did not disappoint. He said, when we were in Chiromo you kept talking to us and making it look like even after University you can live a Christian life and live ethically in business. But having now been out for many years; I have discovered that may not necessarily be true. I have Mentors of your age, and they keep telling me to be practical. Why? Surely in Kenya, you will not achieve much. These are your agemates and born again. They say You cannot achieve much without some compromise.
Like for example, Thika Road was opening up and he wanted to buy a plot in Thika Road. And he was told, you go buy, but in the process, there will be things that you will do because this is Kenya. And if you want to construct a house, city council has certain requirements which you have to follow. And he was told it is not that you are being corrupt, you are being pragmatic. But then he remembers the talks by John Ng’ang’a. I worked for Shell for around thirty years. So, I was in business. And I spoke to the students from the Bible and give my testimony. they knew the Bible works. But now the people he is meeting are all telling him, he must be practical. Do you want to become something in your life? You must be pragmatic. So, he thought before he gives in, because he was now about to give in, the best thing is to get Ng’ang’a, you know if Ng’ang’a admits he is also like that, it will give him the freedom to tell God, even Ng’ang’a is like that.
So that is why we met. And for two hours I was on my defence. You say this, but do you practice it? You say this, but again do you practice it? the answer to that is not another theology, the answer to it is a testimony. What he wants to know is your life, how did you buy your house in plains view when you were a young man? What did you actually do to get to have the house? Do you have another plot? Yes, I have a plot in Ongata Rongai. How did you get it? What process did you follow? And so, we spent the time on my defence, until he says, now I understand, I will trust in God.
We are still friends, now he became my Mentee, and we go with him preaching. But, in order to defend himself, he told me a very sorry story. It is not our topic today, but it is a story in my book, and we are talking about writing. he told me that the son of his Mentor, my agemate, was a student in the University. And because he was doing research for PhD, he decided to use the son as a research assistant. So, they went to wherever, I have no idea where they went, and they were staying in a hotel. remember this is a boy from a Christian family. when they were checking out, he left his room and came to my Mentee’s room, this friend of mine’s room. He said, your suitcase is bigger than mine. My mentee asked why? Oh, there is something I want to carry from the room, and it can’t fit in my box. He said, what? There is something very beautiful in the room and I want to carry it. He said, what? Young man, you want to steal? No, I am not stealing. The price we have paid in the hotel covers. The boy is a Christian boy, very active in the youth fellowship. So, he can’t steal. He was offended that he is claiming the boy is stealing. No, what we are paying in the hotel is enough to cover this. And anyway, my father went to Germany, or a Country in Europe, and the camera we use, a very fantastic camera, he tells us he got it in a room in Germany hotel. From that statement, my friend went quiet, because any comment will be taken to his mentor, the boy’s father a born-again Pentecostal mentor who operates on a camera taken from a hotel room.
Day 5
So now you realize, Christian family does not necessarily help a Country with ethics, because the Christian old people are living double lives. So that church and family does not seem to help. So, we need to share the teaching as a testimony. That is how I was forced to start writing my book and I called it Integrity the Litmus Test of Good Leadership. In it I shared all the ethical challenges I have faced in Shell and outside Shell, and how God helped me to overcome them. The first part of the book is defining what integrity is, the second part is talking about what are the principles that you use in business to have integrity, that help you to have integrity, and the third part of the book I discuss procurement which is one of the most corrupt areas. I go through the whole process of procurement, talking about what are the loopholes that people use, and they feel comfortable.
For example, Christians will not play around with the tender itself, but when they want you to be the one to win the tender, they redefine the requirements in such a way only Ng’ang’a has the products. So, they will follow the process, there will be a tender process, nobody except Ng’ang’a will tender. So, it is not single sourcing, the others did not tender. But do you know it is corruption, isn’t it? Because you knew from the beginning, when you are designing, you know who you wanted to supply. Anyway, all that is in my book.
But I am trying to tell you, the book itself, sells. and I have given you the story behind the book. The number of people who have been impacted by the book, are many. what I am saying in the book sounds strange. Even when I was talking to the parastatal Directors and University councils, they were saying, aaaai Ng’ang’a, which sounds unpractical. I said, you know, you can tell a Pastor somewhere is no longer practical. But I have been in industry for all my life. So, I am not talking about things that do not work, they have worked in my life. Of course, I also admit to them that there are risks.
There is somebody who came to my office and put a gun on my table to tell me he is not joking, that I will go unless I compromise. I asked him, have you ever heard of people who say they are saved? Yes. They normally say they want to go to heaven and the earlier the better. In other words, the gun is not an issue to me. Anyway, you can get that from my book.
But all I am trying to get you to understand, the reason you write is because you have a message that is desperately needed by somebody somewhere. Please do not write because I am encouraging you to write, until number one there is a target for the books message. Who needs the information? Do not just write. You must have at the back of your mind for whom you are writing.
The moment you are clear that somebody desperately needs the information, he may not be aware himself but you are aware that he needs it you will be motivated to write. Then you will write it because of that. So, the most important thing is not the book, the most important thing is the target. Who are you writing for? And why are you writing it for them? What need do they have?
I have given you just one example of resisting corruption, but the book has more. you can see credit goes to the young man who sked me if I practice what I preach. If God did not use him to show him this is not a book to write tomorrow, you need to write it now I would have written other books before it. I had so many other books in my mind, I was not going to write on that one. I could see the need, the young man was used of God to show me there are many young men like him, needing that discussion. I ended up writing it. So even as you read this, ask yourself, what is it you are unhappy about in Kenya? What are you unhappy about in the world? What are you unhappy about in East Africa? And do you have a solution for it? Has God given you a solution for it? Not to write about it will be to have to answer before God on the judgment seat. I gave you something, you never made it available to the target. Like the guy with one talent, you decided to bury it.
Day 6
So that is the first thing that we must establish before you write. is there somebody, not you but somebody else who needs that information? If they need it, my friend, they should be given it, and if you do not, how does it benefit you? You know that is the trouble with a lot of the information. If you do not give it, will you benefit from it yourself? No. So why are you writing. I think in English they call it being a dog in a manger. A dog in a manger is a dog that stays at the manger where the food of the cow is put, it can’t eat the food and it will not allow the cows to eat. The message you have, is a message for other people, you are not benefitting from it, you are not allowing others to benefit.
That is one of the things that you have to establish in your mind. My most recent book is called, A Leader Work Ethics. Most of you who have read my book have not gotten this one. A Leader’s Work Ethics. Where did the need come from? I consult in petroleum industry, and one of the issues we were looking at is that. my consultancy was given a contract by the Petroleum Institute to try to train people along the great highway, where when the road tankers have a problem and people come and within no time they are burnt. You remember Sachangwan? And of course, that is not the only one. Sachangwan, I gave some young people an assignment to do research, you know they discovered, what they discovered caused me to write about work. You know, Sachangwan is a rich area. You look down and you look up, and farmers, farmers are farming. So, they were busy. On this particular day, the tanker driver, was going I think to Congo some place, beyond Uganda. And he ate something in Mombasa that disagreed with his stomach. So, it meant for the next few days as he is driving, he has to keep running to the bush.
We normally say that the stomach is running, but the person also has to run. So, when he reached there, he could not help but again go to the bush. They were with the driver mate. So, he moved the track to the roadside. the track had no problem at all. some of the wheels on the grass, but the other wheels were still on the tarmac, and ran to the bush to do the necessary.
People on the slopes could see the track. They assumed it has broken down; it has an accident. They all ran to their houses for jerricans and came, just to discover there was no fuel leaking. They were so frustrated. nothing could come out because you see the valves were intact. They were so annoyed, they decided to break the valves. However, the trouble with a jerrican is that a jerrican has a very small opening. The valve has a very wide opening. So, when you open, and you have a jerrican, three quarter of the fuel is falling off, only a quarter is going into your jerrican. And by that time, they had queued. You know, they got tired of queuing, they opened the next valve, and they were five of them, with all of them pouring petrol it became a river, flowing downwards I think towards Nakuru. So, people now got tired of waiting there. A river of petrol was forming. They started scooping what was on the ground.
People now argue how the fire started whether somebody was smoking or not. It is not necessary. If you have some little science, form four science, you know that if you keep a glass in the hot sun, it normally is hotter than the surrounding. Do you remember that? So that there is something called a flashpoint, the temperature at which a product can burn on its own without a source of ignition. So once the glass is hot enough to reach that flashpoint, all you need is for the petrol to touch it and it will burst into flames.
As soon as it is on flames, it will follow the petrol river, isn’t it? And remember by that time there is so a lot of vapour around you, all your clothes are wet with petrol. If you remember what happened, remember we were shown it on TV, people were running to the river while on fire because you see the fire is following any wet clothes. So, if your clothes are full of petrol, you run with the fire to the river. You yourself are on fire running to the river. Do you remember the tv picture story? And more than a hundred people died.
Our culture does not allow us to tell the truth at such a time. But the truth nobody died who was not a thief. The principle requirement is you are a thief. You stopped farming to go and steal. they were not coming to help the driver. you stopped farming because farming is work, and God has provided free things in the accident vehicle. How can you continue working when there are free things?
Day 7
This incident is from a new belief system that makes work a curse. My first chapter asks, is work a curse? Because you see, even pastors will stand in front of the congregations and say, you know God is good to me. These shoes was a gift in America, and this suit was a gift in Australia. Isn’t the Lord good? At that time the congregation is asking, how come God never blesses me? The Pastor is always blessed. Because you see the definition of blessing is something for which you have not worked. So, everybody is looking for deals. Even born-again people, they are elders in the church but in their work, they do not regard their salary as anything from God since t I have worked for it. Where does God come in?
But the truth of the matter is, the Bible says, God blesses the work of our hands. So, when you are conning people and doing deals, you are booking a destiny location in hell because God does not want to bless you that way via idleness.
So, I had to write a book to correct young people from desire for free things. In fact, when Judy Mbugua saw the book, she said, can you come and discuss it in my tv program. that is a big area of need. why do you need the book? And so why I wrote the book is important question.
So, you can see the need for the book? it is real need because the church is part of the problem. the church is the one that is emphasizing and almost making it look like if you do not have a miracle you are not blessed. You know a miracle is called a miracle because it is rare. But now we have come to where miracles are supposed to be regular way of God meeting our needs. If something happens regularly it is no longer a miracle.
So, you need to understand clearly that the kind of teaching going in church, somebody somewhere must write to the pastors to change. They must know that God wants to bless the work of our hands. We must work. I am still on the first point. Why do you write?
It is because you can see the need and the need is so clear, and God has given you some information to deal with the need, you will then write.
However, let me say it right at this point, some people write in order to make money. Unfortunately, do not write in Kenya for that. Not too long ago, I was asked by the Christian Booksellers Association of Kenya, to appear in a dinner, because I have been nominated for a prize. So, I asked, what did you use to arrive at that? And they said, you know, you are one of the big writers. When I realized how few my books sell, I said, you must be a joke. They said, Ng’ang’a, you think your books are selling few? Others are worse.
No wonder many of us who are writers are hawkers. You know, we hawk our books. Have you seen people hawking them? Please buy local books. And until somebody says, I want to support Brother Ng’ang’a. So, he is not intending to read, he thinks I am fundraising. Now, my friend, that is Kenya for you. So, you need to understand that if you write to make money, you will write and you will be frustrated because many Kenyans do not read. The only time they read is if KICD makes it a required reading for students. Am I right? Now, if your book is listed by them as a set book, you are a millionaire. You know one class these days, standard one is more than a million people, so if your book is made a set book, and your royalty is about twenty shillings per copy, you have twenty million there?
So, all people who write textbooks are millionaires or multimillionaires, but if your book is on a subject like mine about work, and KICD is not about to recommend it, it will not get many buyers. So, I always tell people from the beginning, write for the reason I am giving you. There is a message. Do not write to make money. If money comes, I am sure you know what to do with it, but that is not the reason you wrote. if you do, sorry for you. I have written thirty and my Editor is now handling, my 31st book, but I haven’t seen money out of it.
So, I do not write to make money. It is not the way to support your old age. No. You are writing because there is a need, there is a target group with which you are dealing. So, the first thing is, do you have that target group? Number two, do you have the message? Because if you have the message, it is already in your mind, it may need more research, but it is there in your mind. You can see the need, you can see the message, that is the requirement to start writing.
Audio Preachings
Subscribe to my YouTube Channel for Audio Preachings
Get access to my books on Amazon:
Marketplace Leadership - The Nehemiah Style
Christianity and Culture
Discover your Life's Purpose
A Leader's Work Ethics
The Secret of Contentment
A Leader's Source of Influence
Christian Professionals - Leading in the Marketplace
The Character of an Influential Leader
Leadership King David's Style
Integrity - The Litmus Test of Good Leadership
The Leader as a Steward
Finding a Life Partner
Friendship
Check out previous devotions on www.johnnganga.org
