Priceless Love: A Matter of the Heart and the Gift for a Lifetime

By Caroline Arit Thompson

Caroline . Thompson enjoy s encouraging others to build and preserve family unity, tradition, and heritage. She believes strongly that these, along with unconditional love, are all vital to the healthy development of children and young adults. In Priceless Love, she reminisces about her experiences as a child growing up in Nigeria, sharing her thoughts on the importance of giving priceless love, emotional support, and discipline to best shape todays youth. She also draws upon her background as an educator, counselor, and youth advocate while expressing her views on the value of a quality education and career fulfillment.

She hopes to inspire readers with her thoughts and recommendations on priceless love and the impact it could have on our children, immediate families, local communities, and society at large. Priceless love can facilitate the building of a lasting legacy and enhance the moral, spiritual, and emotional development of children and youth of today.

By providing priceless love, we can equip youths with beneficial and desirable attributes such as strong moral values, well-rounded educational training, self-esteem, creativity, patriotism, self-sufficiency, integrity, trustworthiness, hard work, dedication, faith and hope.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Sep 17, 2010
• ISBN: 9781450247146

Caroline Arit Thompson

CAROLINE ARIT THOMPSON was born in Nigeria and now resides in Houston, Texas. The mother of two daughters, she has worked as a radio producer, a news analyst, and a freelance writer. She holds a master’s degree in counselor education with a focus on molding youth and family unity.

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Other Books by the Author

Ema, A. Cross River State At a Glance. Calabar: Government Printing Press, 1987.

Thompson, C. A Daughter’s Love: Remembering my Father, My teacher, and Friend(s). Lincoln: I-universe, 2005.

Thompson, C. The Joy of The Overcomers: Slavery from an African Perspective. Pittsburgh: Dorrance Publishing Co., Inc., 2000–01.

Thompson, C. Parental Influence Matters: The Positive Legacy of Good Parenting and the joy of Training Up a Child with Priceless Love. Lincoln: I-universe, 2007.

Priceless Love

A Matter of the Heart and the Gift for a Lifetime!

CAROLINE ARIT THOMPSON

iUniverse, Inc.

New York Bloomington

Priceless Love

A Matter of the Heart and the Gift for a Lifetime!

Copyright © 2010 Caroline Arit Thompson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-1-4502-4712-2 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-4713-9 (cloth)

ISBN: 978-1-4502-4714-6 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 9/7/2010

Contents

Other Books by the Author

AUTHOR’S NOTE

To youth, with love

Acknowledgments

Foreword from the Editor

Foreword 2

Preface

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Biography

Praise for the Author

Madam Arit Ema

Selected Bibliography

Photo Album

AUTHOR’S NOTE

This book is dedicated to my loving family: to my affectionate parents, Papa Okon and Mommy Atim (Mmama) Thompson, who were there for me in the world before I even opened my eyes to see its beauty; to my devoted paternal/maternal grandparents, uncles and aunts, whose words of wisdom made for my happy childhood and success in adulthood.

It is also dedicated to my loving daughters, Comfort and Patricia; to my wonderful sons-in-law, Devon Chevannes and Roland Effiom Efa; to my brothers/sisters; to my great motivators Rep. Joe & Mrs. Mmabong (Edemawan) Etenne and family and Dr.& Mrs. Francis Ekene and family. Your generous love, encouragement and support, mean so much more than you ever know. I Love and appreciate you!

I am also personally inspired by President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama who have made me prouder of my African heritage. Thank you for your inspiration, performance, and leadership as the first black president of the United States of America! Indeed, your distinction as a world leader has raised the image of the black race in world history. May the wisdom of God be yours, guiding you through your tenure in leadership!

Caroline Arit Thompson

To youth, with love

Acknowledgments

To all who supported my efforts as sponsors, readers, typists, advisors, encouragers, inspirers, editors, publishers, reporters, agents, photographers, mentors, launchers, and promoters—you are my true friends.

I am always grateful for the editing work of Raymond Levy and Alexandra Grant.

I am thankful also to the following key individuals: Dr. and Mrs. Francis Ekene (who sponsored this work); Dr. Emeabo Emeabo (who provided consulting advice/Reader), Dr. Emma Etuk (colleague and mentor); Dr. MacJOHN AKPAFFIONG; I-universe staff; Dr. Obidike Kamamu; Nona Kay Honeycutt; Engineer Imeh Akpan (for technical advice); Dr. Joseph Ibiok(Reader); Mrs. Rann Thorne Johnson(Reader); Mr. and Mrs. Akpan Okop and family; Dr. Joseph Akpan; Retired General Edet Adam Akpan; Professor Victor Archibong, Councilman Aniedi Abasiekong; Mr. and Mrs. Godwin Enyong; Elizabeth Asari Edet; Dr.& Mrs. Olorunnipa; Ms. Regina (Mayen) Orok and family; Mr. Tom and Mrs. Eunice Adam; Mrs. Shirley Corn; Mr. and Mrs. James Bertha Snr; Ms. Grace Mathews and family (who provided marketing and promotion);Mr. Augustine Akpati; Sir Steven Bassey; Jessica Woods, grace Udofia, Becky Utuk (for manuscript typing) and Idara Okop (for typing and research Asst.); Rev. Emem Umoh (for his faith); Mr. Ufia Willie; Mr. & Mrs. Tony E. Umana; Mandela Effiong (for youth photograph) Mandela Effiong (for youth’ photograph); and Israel Chinyo Uhuegbu for the poem.

I cannot forget all your kind thoughts and daily encouragement.

I am also greatly indebted to my loving and ever supportive family, nieces, nephews and all other relatives, and friends.

And above all, to my Heavenly Father, endless best friend, captain, adviser, director, and confidante, thank you eternally.

Foreword from the Editor

By Raymond Levy

One of my favorite scenes in the 1967 film Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner is the climactic moment when the great actor Sidney Poitier’s character takes his father to task for the father’s insistence that the son—a highly educated, upstanding citizen who has overcome social prejudice and racial discrimination and ended up a successful, reputable doctor—owes more to his parents than just proudly keeping their legacy alive.

I owe you nothing! Poitier shouts. If you carried that bag a million miles, you did what you’re supposed to do! Because you brought me into this world. And from that day, you owed me everything you could ever do for me, like I will owe my son …

This idea movingly encapsulates what I think of as one of the better ways to approach the responsibility of proper parenting: acknowledging that by bringing a life into this world, one has implicitly accepted the obligations that come along with it. This is, indeed, how I believe my own father and mother—to whom I owe my life, in numerous ways—viewed their raising of me and how I hope I will one day have the fortitude to, as Caroline Thompson has dubbed it, possibly train up my own children with priceless love (when I have them).

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Raymond Levy with former President Bill Clinton at New York University, 2002

In any case, it is a philosophy that I always keep in mind to make the world a better place and to help contribute to society, particularly in my work as a writing instructor at Florida International University, where I consider it my sacred mission to enlighten the minds of our nation’s future community members. Actually, it is this aspect that has struck me most about the book you are about to read, which Caroline has given me the privilege and honor of editing. The effort has been a pleasurable, tremendously enjoyable undertaking—and one that I am sure you, dear reader, will soon come to appreciate as well.

Miami, Florida

June 2007

Foreword 2

I am immensely thankful to God for the opportunity accorded me to write the foreword to this wonderful book—Priceless Love. The author’s choice of me as the writer of this foreword, despite the brevity of my acquaintance with her and her books including this one in your hand is an honor motivated largely by her belief and practice of agape love (the love of God) which is timeless and boundless. This is the epitome of priceless love.

The subject addressed in this book, love, is—in my own estimation—the most important factor of life for a number of reasons. The Holy words of wisdom declared twice by an inspired writer John, that God is love. Obviously, nothing can be more important than God and His awesome love. As long as the context of love is based on agape love, God is love. However, when the context gravitates toward the other two major types of love, phileo (brotherly love) and eros (erotic love), the two concepts may be worlds apart. Love is supreme, says Corinthians. That’s the honest truth!

Realizing the importance of love, Ms. Caroline Thompson, in her book, Priceless Love, has aptly articulated numerous and potent roles true love can play in molding the lives of today’s youth and empowering them to be productive citizens capable of making positive contributions to national and global economic development. The author has shown that, among other things, priceless love can facilitate the building of a lasting legacy and enhance the moral, spiritual, and emotional development of children and youth of today.

Based on an overview of her own personal upbringing, life’s history and professional involvement with various youth development activities, the author demonstrates in the book that giving priceless love can equip the youth with beneficial and desirable attributes such as strong moral values, well-rounded educational training, self-esteem, creativity, patriotism, self-sufficiency, integrity, trustworthiness, hard work, dedication, faith and hope. Furthermore, the author demonstrates how nourishing and nurturing children in an atmosphere saddled with priceless love can be a worthy investment in averting social vices such as drug addiction and violence.

The challenges of our time in raising children and molding the lives of our youth for success are humongous, but not insurmountable. The key is our knowing what to do. The book Priceless Love contains practical panaceas centered on providing true and genuine love for averting moral decadence in children and youth of our time. Parents, school teachers, counselors, youth leaders, young people, organizations, government agencies, and others who are looking for ways of raising morally sound, well educated, successful, and productive citizens must read this book.

Dr. Pastor Zacch Olorunnipa, Professor of AgricBusiness, FAMU, Tallahassee, Florida Coordinator, RCCGNA, Florida Zone 2

Preface

True Love is a Legacy

The true sign of success is not whether we are a source of aid that helps scrape by—it is whether we are partners in building the capacity for transformational change.

—President Barack Obama (2009 Ghana, West Africa)

My reasons for writing this book are numerous but paramount is my passion for the improvement of humanity, especially the youth. Contributing to the progress of our society, mostly the younger generation is of huge interest to me. True loving parenting lasts a lifetime and leads to beautiful memories and a solid legacy for our children.

Teaching our youth to exercise priceless love, hope, faith, wisdom, and continued learning leads to success stories in all areas of their lives and benefits our society tremendously as well. This is the message I wish to convey to my children, parents and all readers through this Work. Priceless love is an inspirational story demonstrating its values as a positive counseling process for our progress and treasure that brings happiness for all, when we can show love to another in various tangible ways.

Hopefully, it will inspire and help us to express more genuine love and foster more unity among our families, neighbors and friends all over the globe. As the backbone of society, the older generation is expected to train children to develop strong character and integrity. Certainly, no caring parent or community can stand to see a child excluded from enjoying quality education and proper home training for their happiness and success. It is crucial that our children are properly educated and raised with love and wisdom. This helps them to excel in many areas and leads to a better world for all!

As a friend and fellow parent, it is my sincere desire that Priceless Love provides you with the inspiration, motivation, and opportunity to share valuable interaction and happy quality time with your family and friends. Hopefully, it’ll be fun reading, nourishing, memorable, and educational fulfilled legacy to all! Thanks and enjoy with happiness and success, the best of priceless love!

Caroline Arit Thompson

Chapter One

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PRICELESS LOVE IS BUILDING A LEGACY

Duty makes us do things well, but love makes us do them beautifully.

—Unknown Author

True love leaves a lasting and priceless legacy. I believe it helps make our children happy and productive members of the community. Children all over the world desire parents who shower them with the gift of priceless love. It helps them appreciate family values and communicate love and sensitivity to others; this in turn enhances their moral, spiritual, and emotional development. Surely, this is primarily based on how we portray love in our family relationships. Indeed, the passion to love and bless others leaves a priceless legacy that our children can learn from and emulate. My philosophy is rooted in the simple belief that when we love others, it leads us to care for their entire well-being as a whole. I hope to adequately express and demonstrate examples of priceless love in the ensuing chapters of this memoir. I am a thankful daughter filled with love for my grandparents, parents, mentors, relatives, neighbors, and friends all of whom invested and expressed priceless love to me.

I consider myself truly honored and blessed to have had the ability, strength, wisdom, and privilege of twenty-plus wonderful years of professional work and interaction with youth. I have a profound interest in the growth and development from childhood to adulthood. As best as I can remember, while growing up in Nigeria, I was a strong and active member of several youth organizations such as the Edimo Youth Association, among numerous others. Looking back, I realize that it was not a wasted endeavor being happily engaged in youth programs and community service. Today, I consider those years as an extremely rewarding investment, and I am very proud of my ancestors who were my staunch supporters; they constantly showed genuine love and moral support and encouraged my participation in meaningful activities that taught me to contribute to society. They faithfully prayed that I would pursue only rewarding activities that would enhance my future prospects for success and happiness. It is obvious that their encouragement and support inspired my career path.

I recall being very versatile and devoted to youth development issues and programs and had the honor at an early age, of serving as a Girl Scout assistant patrol leader, youth chorister, and committee member. Thankfully, after cheerfully volunteering my services, I was able to successfully perform in other more advanced civic duties in other civic organizations and programs. Today’s youth have many challenges facing them, but they too can be nurtured by participating in challenging programs that positively contribute to society.

I have fond memories of serving in youth programs both in my home town of Ediene, Obio Imo, Uyo Akwa Ibom State, and at Port Harcourt (Rivers State). This is always very refreshing to recall and warms my heart; the outcome of our efforts was amazing! It is even more moving for me to recall that from the start, my family was committed to faith in God and served at the Qua Iboe Church. Truly, that was where my passion and eagerness to help others was born and nurtured. Ultimately, it is true that charity begins at home.

I am very proud and thankful to my ancestors, as I believe they truly showered me with priceless love and left me with a valuable legacy. Their faithfulness, wise stewardship, and godly integrity also led them to embrace several other children in my lovely community of Ediene. This type of investment in the healthy and successful development of all children truly is priceless!

Sadly, many children of today’s contemporary and progressive countries lack this type of deep rooted familial love and encouragement. We owe it to them to provide proper training, encouragement, and love with no strings attached. It is interesting that people from a third world nation, as my ancestors were, whom many perceive to be uneducated and limited, actually demonstrate quite sophisticated parenting. In many ways, I continue to believe my ancestors in Nigeria were wiser, richer, and more successful in parenting than people in other countries may realize or appreciate.

Indeed, there was a strong emphasis on building a solid and strong legacy of family love for future generations. Today’s youth, with enough love and proper upbringing, will benefit and flourish better from a strong, sound influence of dedicated parents and grandparents. I believe this will help them become well-rounded, educated, caring, and mature adults who can then build a positive legacy for their offspring. They are the leaders of tomorrow!

Overall, it is my greatest desire to be an advocate on behalf of children on a global scale. I have always loved to serve, help, and share my passion with others. But it has now become my utmost mission to serve in the area of counseling as a liaison between teachers, parents, and children of the community. I want to work with them regularly to teach valuable life skills, help mold their character, and foster their ongoing academic success. My goal is to reach out to as many children as possible over the course of my remaining professional years. In return, my greatest wish is for today’s youth to show respect for authority, behave with dignity, and lead productive lives with healthy relationships with their parents, family, and friends.

Ultimately, I would like to see today’s youth improve the way they relate to teachers, the elderly, the disabled, and the less fortunate members of society. I know that if they develop the ability to show sincere love, respect, and a cooperative attitude to others, we will have much healthier and wealthier communities.

Chapter Two

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PRICELESS LOVE IS SUPPORTING OUR CHILDREN

Actions, not words are the true criterion of friendship.

—Carolyn Coats

As a college student at York Tech, Rock Hill, South Carolina, little did I know what the future had in store in terms of my