Don’t Ask What I have Achieved, Please.

Hi there!

I know I know. You’re wondering where I have been, right?

Well, time does fly. I can’t believe it’s almost 2 months since my last post here.

To be honest, I have just been overwhelmed with myself. I have not been excited by many things lately – not that I post when I am excited (as in happy), but rather when something excites (as in stirs or drives) me into a writing frenzy, and moves me to share a single thought in over a thousand words.

Sighs. Time does fly, and you don’t even have to be having fun.

Anyways, by now you’ve figured I am pretty much just rambling today. But I do have a thought to share.

In the first week of June, Aisha… Hmm, a pause there.

I haven’t introduced Aisha to you before now, I’d really love for you guys to meet her. I promise I’ll do a post about her someday in the near or distant future (only God knows) when I no longer work with her (that reads some type of way – weird). So, Aisha said to herself “It’s June already – almost half of 2022, what have I achieved this year?”

No, nope, nah. She wasn’t in a serious reflective mode, it was more of a jesting, self-mocking question. But have you asked yourself that question yet this year?

Well when I asked myself, all I could muster as an answer was ‘Wo see Folake just leave me, I am tired, abeg.’ LOL!!! For real.

So instead I decided to ask myself a different question – what am I doing now, Is there some value in it?

I have a super amazing friend who has become a sister, she relocated from Nigeria to another country to be with her husband. She hasn’t gotten a corporate job yet but spends her time loving her husband, studying, reaching out to friends, sharing experiences, and counseling.
I have two adorable mums who have spent huge parts of the year being nannies for free.
I have a sister who has been home for months because of a school strike, she’s catering to my dad and brother while my mum is away, she’s sewing to make some money, and learning what she can off the internet to keep busy.

I am sure there are countless more people who have spent the first half of this year just waiting, just making sacrifices, just getting by, or just learning.

I remember January to March last year – 2021, I had just left a toxic job in November 2020, in mindfulness of my mental health (I would rather pray about, and commit my time to work towards getting a great job than get comfortable praying for strength to bear ill-treatment because of a salary. When I tell people I will leave any job hastily where I don’t have peace of mind, they think I am joking. Work can be challenging, but it must never be peace draining. Pardon the digression).

Even though I got called for interviews almost everywhere I applied in Lagos, I couldn’t take any of these seriously because I was relocating soon. Also, the companies I applied to in Abuja either insisted I show up physically for the interview or be ready to start in a month’s time. Neither of these options was viable at the time, so all I could do was wait – for 3 months (December to February), two whole months in a new year. No I wasn’t idle, I mean I started a food business, but imagine me having to answer the question ‘what have I achieved this year?’ I was only making little enough to handle my phone bills, logistics and personal effect, without touching my savings – was that achievement?

Ordinarily, it’s a great question to ask. I mean if you set goals, its safe to see just how far you’ve come through those milestones. But for some, putting the question that way would just result in depression and high BP that is not needful. You can be 33 and be at the phase where your own question should be – what am I doing now, is there some value in it? You can be 22 and you are happy to answer – ‘what have I achieved this year?’ So your age is not the point.

I am not encouraging idleness, or anything of such, I mean I have had a most eventful year so far, from having a baby, to organizing a high-impact/high-level program, I am the absolute opposite of idle, yet please Folake, don’t ask me what I have achieved, but feel free to ask me what I am doing/have done, and if there is some value in it. This is enough right now, abeg.

I am not rambling. Just reminding you to think more in the line of “am I adding value somehow?”, than “am I checking off a list of things called achievements?”.