A Prayer - Brighten my heart

This song captures my feelings so exactly. I have nothing more to add.

Brighten my heart by Sixpence none the richer.

Lyrics:

My heart is as dark as the soil, sodden with winter rains My soul is as heavy as the peat, freshly dug from the bog My thoughts swirl like willow branches caught in autumn winds My body is as tense as a cat's as it stalks its prey Help me open my heart to You Help me open my heart to You Help me open my heart to You, oh Jesus It's what I long to do, oh, to do, oh My heart is as dark as the soil, sodden with winter rains (Lord, brighten my heart) My soul is as heavy as the peat, freshly dug from the bog (Lord, lighten my soul) My thoughts swirl like willow branches caught in autumn winds (Lord, still my thoughts) My body is as tense as a cat's as it stalks its prey (Lord relax my body) Help me open my heart to You (Help me open my heart to You) Help me open…

-ONWARD!

Thankfull

I've been looking at some of the older posts here and a rush of nostalgia filled my heart.

I'm so thankful that some of my life is documented here. I'm glad that I wrote my thoughts on different things over the years. I can see so much growth, some changes and stuff.

I'm at the office here in Port Harcourt, it's raining. It's cold. I have my headphones on in one ear only, but nothing's playing. There are two women to my left and right and one more in front of me to the right. This is our office setup. The window is behind me.  There's another room to the right and next to that is the kitchen. It's a double storey building. I'm not sure why I shared that but there you have it.

I'm thankful for friends, for work, for opportunities, for writing, for every things I have, and for who I am. I'm constantly evolving and changing with new experiences and information. Each interaction with people and communities shifts and bends and blends the concoction that makes up this dude.

I'm thankful for family who are always supportive. I'm grateful to God for my siblings, nieces, in-laws, parents and other close friends who are also family.

Yeah, that's it for today.

-ONWARD!

Managing Expectations

You have heard it said, do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
But I say, yes, do that but don't expect them to do unto you as your have done to them.

It took a while for me to get this.

People will not treat you the same way you treat them. They will treat you any way they darn well please, irrespective of what you do for them and to them.
It was difficult for me to accept this at first and I still struggle with it but I'm learning to accept that people will do whatever they want and there's nothing you can do to change that, really.

So find peace. 

Live your life according to your standards, not as a reflection of what others do or do not do.
Live up to your own standards and maintain it irrespective of what others do.

-ONWARD!

Gaining Clarity

I've been doing some introspection and I've discovered a few things.

I have a background in Computer Science and Engineering but more and more I don't find those things interesting. I still love software and tech but I don't enjoy working as a developer.

Here's what I actually enjoy.

I enjoy design and creative work.

I enjoy solving business problems with simple tools.
I enjoy reading and writing.

I've had trainings as a Virtual Assistant, Data Entry, Inventory Management, Copywriting, Email Marketing, Creative Writing and some other general business courses. While I can do all these jobs, I don't enjoy all of them equally.

My inability to choose a path forward is keeping me from making progress in my career and side hustle. Ideally what I want is a role where I can write, design and use software to help small businesses and founders. These are the things I actually enjoy doing and what to do more of.

-ONWARD!

You need more than the skill

You have the skill, you can do the work but no one is hiring you.
That's because those basic skills are not very useful. You need to do more than what you have learned in the course or video you watched.

For example, you learned how to manage email, calendar and schedules for clients and now you want to offer that as a service to busy executives and founders.
You will need to have a value-add in addition to the basic email and calendar management service you have learned because the client will ask for more than just this service. 

You will need to have a growth mindset and be willing to stretch yourself to accommodate new requirements from your client. If you insist on offering just the service you learned, you will find that there's no market for it. Yet that's what's advertised by tutors online.

Don't fall for it. 

Learn the skill, but add real world practice, it will help you uncover the 90% you didn't learn from your course. Also having a growth mindset will allow you learn new things in addition to the basic skill you have acquired.

-ONWARD!

There's always something more

You're interested in drawing, you love to draw. Nothing else exists once you're in front of your canvas. You can draw for hours, never get tired, forget to eat, time flies and you don't notice. It's your passion. You can't think of doing anything else in the whole wide world.

So you draw and study and improve and go to school and learn and get better and now you need to make money.

You can't think of anything else to do but to draw so you look for jobs where you can draw or you start putting your work out in the world on YouTube or Behance.

Once it's not longer a hobby, and becomes something that people pay you for, it changes.

You find out there are all these other things that you much do to support the thing you love that sometimes get in the way or drain all your time and energy and ends up keeping you from the thing you want to do which is to draw.

So you have to write a script for YouTube now, have a camera, have lighting, have fast internet, fight with your computer, edit the videos, look at analytics, do B-roll, create a content schedule, manage money and so on.

There's always something that comes with the work your want to do that you don't really care about but somehow have to do it.

The web developer wants to just code but now she has to sit in a meeting and endure endless back and forth of two people saying the same thing with different words and not realizing it. All she wants to do is code and ship great products. 

There's always something more.

If you think you'll just do the thing you love and nothing else. I'll break your heart now, it's not going to happen.

Factor in time and energy for all the other things you will have to do in addition to the thing you love.

When I come home from work, I'm usually exhausted but once I can create, I'm energized. I just want to create but I'm forced to deal with people all day.

There's always something more.

-ONWARD!

Friends

Friendship are harder when you're older.

I feel jealous of people who still have their primary school friends.

When you find a good friend, keep them.

-ONWARD!

Too much information

 At some point we lived in the information age. Right now I'm not sure what age we live in but what's sure is that we are drowning in information. Too much information.

For everything there are experts hailing it and other experts saying the opposite.

Then there are 'influencers' who amass large followings sharing their ideologies and let's face it profiteering from them.

How many people did Sir Isaac Newton listen to or read from? How many people would you say influenced him. I don't know but I can bet you it's not up to 10. Yet he achieved great things our generation can't even touch.

In a world of noise, we need to actively protect our mind, reduce the sources that have the power to influence us. Go deeper on small topics, values and vocations instead of having thin surface knowledge on all the things.