Are We Independent Dependants Or Dependant Independents?

There was this old couple that had been married for 50 years. Both were professionals and very independent people. As age caught on, they increasingly drew strength from each other.

The man was good with geographical directions but forgetful with routines including taking his medication.

One day, the man received a disturbing text message from his wife. It was a confession to having had an affair with the man's good friend. So he typed back the message: "why did you do it?" Upon receiving the text message, the woman phoned her husband for clarification.

A distraught man read the message aloud to her. The woman was very shocked for she never sent the message and had had her phone with her that whole time.

Their son was a techie but they could not reach out to him because the message was hurtful. They could not also reach out to their neighbour because they felt exposed. So they went to their phone service provider.

After two days, they were invited for a detailed analysis. Her phone was hacked by a notorious gang that preyed on wealthy old people. The idea behind such hacking was to destabilise old people and then find a way into their lives should they split. They would both need helping hands.

This story captures for us the question behind our article's title. It's time you checked on your folks just to be sure that they have endured nothing of the sort.

The financial freedom enjoyed by a family man or lady with a great job is pretty obvious to many. This person is independent of his or her parents but is dependent on his job for continued success. This is the first case of an independent dependant.

We have adult kids, some 40 years of age or more, living with their parents but doing what pleases them including watching Netflix the whole day. These are dependant independents.

At the country level, we attained independence just under sixty years ago but our dependence on richer nations for aid places us in the latter category, our national pride notwithstanding.

Are there instances when we are in both categories at the same time? Yes!

We are invariably incapable of total independence from everything. And for our own balance, there are both positive and negative vulnerabilities. Our dependence on God is a positive vulnerability for it makes us draw our strength from a much higher being.

Negative vulnerabilities cause us to fall for short term pleasures and ill-natured solutions.

Our dependence on others is what got us to learn all that we know of today. No one is fully self-taught.

Dependence has brought forth several industries. They call it market development. Tech firms, we are told, sometimes create viruses so that they sell you the antivirus software because you won't be in the market for a newer operating software in a long while.

Some pharmaceutical firms and medical practitioners as we often see in movies, collude to maintain a critical mass of patients. In such movies, viral-based infections result in billions of dollars for those with the antidote.

The car mechanics are in a class of their own. We have those who have more women clients than men. They have understood their clientele's psychology and vulnerabilities on vehicle repair matters. They fleece them for years undetected because they trust all their service providers alike. The hairdresser, the grocer, the kids tuition teacher and the doctor are revered. Their work however needs independent auditing from time to time.

Politicians are perhaps the iconic examples of people who prey on our vulnerabilities to win our trust and votes. Once in office, they hike their perks to levels above our economy's moral understanding and justification.

So the moral of our storyline is that we are in an ecosystem. And ecology reminds us that we all need each other's strength to thrive. Equally, we must identify and curl the practices of those hell-bent on inducing situations on us to profit at our expense. We may be accomplished professionals in our chosen fields but at the end of the day, we must be one another's zealous watchman. Please be a proud one clad in honesty and sobriety as your uniform.