In Lieu of Concrete New Years Resolutions

Again I am trying to be aspirational here. So this year I am going to try and read more, write more, and think about negative things less. I need to do things for their own sake and not for their consequences. I am a lot more content if I let the completion of things be their own reward rather than worry about external justifications. Most of all I think I need to proceed on a track that basically ignores most of the so called "First World." Nobody in Africa can be successful if they are obsessed with an American centered or European centered view of the world. Such a path is impossible. People in Africa including myself need to work in such a way that we can be successful in terms that matter for us here not what happens among people in the US or Europe. This is sometimes hard to do because of the historical cultural dominance of Obrunistan including in the sphere of academia. This dominance has been especially oppressive in global academia in the last couple of decades. But, I can't help thinking that there are other and better ways than slavishly following the intellectual fads popular in North America. Rather than following their established paradigms what if I and other people in the former second and third worlds just ignored their rules and established a parallel body of research? I am thinking especially about the field of history here.  This has been done before and it had considerable success. It certainly can't be less successful than the current path. Any and all thoughts, comments, and criticisms are welcome.