Five life lessons you can learn from the jilted penguin story

Social media has been awash with comments this weekend about a video made by National Geographic about a penguin cheating story.

For those who have not seen it yet, this is how the story goes. A penguin husband returns from a long hunting season to his matrimonial home to find out that his wife is cheating on him with another male penguin.

He gets into a nasty fight with the homewrecker and then calls his wife to come and choose who she really wants. She chooses the newfound lover. He is fuming with anger understandably; he is losing wife, his kids and his home. The two guys go at each other again; this time it is bloody and they start to aim for each other’s eyes with their beaks. There is blood everywhere.

The fight pauses and the wife is called again to make a choice. She sticks to her earlier decision. Feeling rejected, the penguin husband walks away from his home in what looks like a separation with imminent divorce proceedings to follow in the colony.

Now what life lessons can the penguins teach us.

1. Fight for the love of your life

The two men were ready to fight for the woman they loved. Despite being a homewrecker, the new guy deserves commendation for having fought well to keep his woman. The penguin husband also fought for the mother of his children and although he lost, there is no doubt that he was such a brave guy to get into a fight to keep a cheating partner.

2. Don’t travel far away and don’t stay too long.

Your partner has feelings too so don’t travel so far away for a long time thinking that they will be okay and you can come back and find them waiting for you. Some people desire physical attention and affection and during those long periods of absence, they will cling onto the next available person willing to give them that companionship they desire. A relationship is work in progress, may sound like a cliché, but that is the fact. It can’t work when you are far away with no physical connection to each other. You simply will grow apart.

3. Give a chance

Although it may seem like a dull move, the penguin husband was willing and ready to give another chance to his wife to make a decision to correct any mistakes they may find themselves in. Always ensure that you have a clear message from the other party before you make a decision. The only problem is that sometimes some people are not worth another chance.

4. Make a decision and stick with it

Although she may be hated for cheating on her husband, there is at least some good attribute we can learn from the penguin wife. That is; being bold and staying with your decisions. Some women (humans) are fond of giving mixed messages. It is either you like him or you don’t. There is no middle ground here. The penguin wife was brave; stayed with her decision to leave her husband and was unapologetic about it.

5. Move on!

This is the ultimate lesson. Don’t try to work out a relationship that has clearly gone south. Move on when the other party shows no interest any longer. Don’t stay in a relationship when it seems like you are the only one showing all the love. There comes a time when you need to cease fighting for someone who is not interested in you and quite frankly doesn’t deserve you. After all, ‘there are so a lot of fish in the sea.’

According to National Geographic, the fidelity rate among penguins is pretty high (an average of 72 percent). This simply shows how the penguin was not worth the fight. And can we marvel at the narration for a moment?

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Kandey Alhassan

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