The Story Behind the Story

             When I was about four years old my mother took me to my grandpa’s store in Bong Mines (Liberia) to deliver peanuts and vegetables from her farms—yes, farms. She employed the entire residents of Molly-Gua Town, a tiny village of about 150 residents outside the German mining company, Bong Mines.

While in the store a man dressed in a police uniform came in and demanded my grandpa give him $10 gas money because he was “in hurry to an important meeting” in Monrovia, the nation’s capital. Grandpa gave him the money without saying a word. When I asked grandpa why he gave the money, grandpa simply said, “he’s a Dodo.” I asked my mom what’s Dodo? She promised to show me a Dodo the following day.  Later that day we left grandpa and went back to the nearby village where my mom had her various farm projects and missionary activities.

            The next day my mom woke me up early in the morning and said, “…ready to go meet Dodo?” I said yes and she asked me to get ready to go to the farm. I got ready and we started walking on the small winding road to my mom’s rice field. I don’t know how long we walked but I could hear my tiny brain saying, “…are we there yet?”

            When we got to the farm, Lorpu (my mom’s right-hand person) was sitting on top of a giant ants’ hill helping to drive the birds away from the rice field.  Lorpu was a supervisor of the women working on mom’s peanuts farm, but she was also responsible for preparing lunch for everyone on the rice farm.

            After greeting Lorpu my mom asked her to go to the peanuts farm; and she (mom) took a half-broken bench on top of the ants’ hill. She told me to sit by her on the bench while we waited for Dodo to come. I asked her where Dodo was, and she said it was hiding somewhere from the other birds.  

I asked her why Dodo was hiding from the other birds, and she said she would show me in a minute. She went on, “…when you are grown enough to attend school you might read books about “Dodo without wings to fly; but that’s only half of the story.”

We sat and waited forever on the ants’ hill…or so it seemed. I fell asleep lying on my mom’s shoulder. Then she shouted, “Look! Look!!” Pointing to the sunny blue sky she said, “There’s Dodo.” Then I looked up and saw a group of birds chasing a tiny bird with a long wingspan.  Then she said, “… long before humans walk on earth, Dodo behaved like the policeman you saw in grandpa store yesterday. 

So, she began to tell the story about the real Dodo:

Introduction

  In many ways, the fictional story about Dodo is a metaphor of us, humans. Although Dodo lacked the ability to fly long distances to hunt for food like the other birds, it was gifted in other ways, including beauty. Nonetheless, the little bird was preoccupied with what the other animals thought about Dodo. While they secretly admired Dodo’s beauty, they openly bullied the little bird, due in part to jealousy.

To prove itself Dodo dreamed up a devious plan to dominate the other animals. Assisted by Woodpecker, Dodo camouflaged itself with a gigantic fake monster head and hid its body in the biggest tree trunk, pretending to be a forest tree-monster. Thereafter, Dodo demanded total loyalty from the other animals or else; backed by empty threats, manipulation, and lies. However, Dodo’s luck ran out when Woodpecker exposed it secrets, and Dodo was overthrown.

Still Running: Shredding the Dodo Syndrome is a three-part narrative about Dodo—the fictional autocratic bird-emperor’s rule-by-deception strategy, and the symbolic-similarities to humans’ characteristics and behaviors. Part-I highlights Dodo’s rise and fall. Part-II sketches or categorize humans into three breeds (human-dodos) plagued by Dodo Syndromes. And Part-III outlined the fundamentals of Shredding the Dodo Syndrome.

Shredding the dodo syndrome is meant to inform us about the different categories of humans—and to assist each person determine which category best describes him/her. It may also enable an individual to minimize unrealistic expectations about oneself, another person and/or a given situation.

Personally, the way I described it is the dynamics between my cat and me. (My daughter's big heart led her to rescue Saydee, a street cat. For whatever reason, I agreed to take care of Saydee because my daughter had two other cats to take care of. Well, Saydee is an independent cat (or so she thinks) who sleeps all day and only follows me when she wants food. As a cat, she understands and cares very little about whether I am hungry, sick or otherwise. Even if she understood my problems, it’s impossible for her to solve them. As such, it’s laughable and counterproductive to speak to the cat about my problems.  

So is the relationship between the three categories of human-dodos (breeds) outlined in Still Running II. Each breed has its own worldview different from the others; and it seems each care very little what the other thinks. The more productive thing each of us (human-dodos) can do is understand the worldview of the other, and harness strategies to bridge the value, communication or relationship gaps and value propositions.

At its core, the dodo syndrome is about how good & evil, intelligence & ignorance, or “the double burden of incompetence” are ever present in each of us. As Socrates put it, “The only true wisdom is in known you know nothing.”

It all begins with an idea.

It all begins with an idea.