The reason I can't read law is the same reason I admire women

When I was in my teens, there was a girl my age who had a good physique and seemed to win every fight she engaged in, until the day she brought that uncontrolled anger to me. I broke her jaw and part of her lip.

While my boys and I loved the outcome of the fight, the girl’s family took the matter seriously. I was even banned from using their house as a shortcut to school. We were an extended family, and the girl was my classmate, my seatmate in JSS. Every time I thought of that fight, I felt some pride, believing I had beheaded “Yaa Asantewaa,” and thus all women were weak.

However, as I matured from my teenage years into adulthood, everything about women began to look refreshing to me. I started to perceive their strength beyond the scope of that fight.

Before I ever thought of becoming a husband, I had already grasped the truth that I can’t be a woman. You get me, right? I won’t and never will be. Because as a man, I have observed certain things about womanhood that make me stop wondering how they manage to draw breath.

Every month, their monthly flow makes it difficult for them to afford even a simple smile. And oh, after witnessing pregnancy for the first time, how it tosses women about, and seeing what happens in the labour room, I was reoriented. Watching them battle for their own lives just to usher another life into this world, it would not be out of place to believe that women have a special strength men simply do not possess, but can only admire.

It reminds me of Michelle Guinness’ profound statement:

“When God has a difficult job to be done, He looks for the best possible person to do it. When He has an impossible job on His hands, He looks for a woman.”

I have always thanked God for making me male. I believe He made no mistake, because I can’t imagine myself being a woman. The work of a woman is, to my understanding, like the cross of Jesus, too heavy to carry.

With the same respect, whenever a conversation about law arises, I admire it deeply and everyone who is called to the bar. I hold them in high regard and often send congratulations to people I do not even know on Facebook.

But one truth I always tell myself is that law is not just about reading and writing, as some friends say. They often remark, “Since you are a writer and read voraciously, you could easily make it.” Yet I always resist that temptation. The decision to study law begins with a mindset, a deliberate choice to submit oneself to a field that demands everything.

In the end, the reason I can’t read law is the same reason I admire women. Both demand a depth of intelligence, patience, and endurance that I deeply respect but know I was not created to bear. Just as womanhood is a divine assignment, so is the law a sacred trust. And in acknowledging that, I think we should learn to find peace in our own place and choose to honour those who have chosen to walk those paths.