The Beauty and The Beast: Retrospection of Conundrum called 2022
Foreword: So this year in review is proudly sponsored by peer pressure, yes, that is it. But maybe not all peer pressures are bad though, at least now I know for sure, perhaps some are meant to help fill in for temporary moments of indecisiveness. Well, in all your gettings, get a good company so you won’t be pressed by bad peer pressure.
Year in summary: So 2022 was a good year, it had many good moments and some very low moments, I mean really low moments, like the time in May when I was interviewing for a role in this German company and my village people literally showed up during the interview, yes, I mean literally, through my network provider, it was so bad that the interviewer had to tell me no one is ever going to hire me with my shitty network (well, in a nicer way but you get the gist) or the time I travelled over 200km to ask out this babe I really liked then in the most romantic way I think I’ve tried only to be told “You’re like a brother to me”, (well, not exactly what she said but you still get the gist too). Sapa also dealt very badly with me, oh my Jesus! Never again.
There were so many other low moments but these are the few I can remember for now. But the year wasn’t all bleak, it had very great moments too like the opportunity to travel out of Nigeria for the first time fully funded (literally the highlight of my year), but the best part of it was the close proximity to ML practitioners and researcher (for the first time in that number), I loved every bit of it. I found better clarity in 2022 also, careerwise and in terms of my personhood. Found a great community of people that resonates deeply with me too (shoutout to Cohere4AI community), and landed my first ML role. And there were some in-betweens too like my mental health being on a rocking chair for some good parts of the year, and having to take Twitter breaks so many times (was off Twitter for almost four months in the whole year I think), my relationship with God was also on a huge rollercoaster too (God helping me this new year sha). ASUU did me strong thing too with their (I won’t say unnecessary sha) strike but I’ve paid too much man with my time in this school. But generally, it was a good year to be honest, and I am grateful for every moment in the year, both the good and the bad, the bad days to help remember and appreciate the good days better and the good days, to keep us moving on when almost at the end of our ropes, I guess the beauty and beast is what makes the conundrum called life beautiful.
Takeaways: If I learnt just one thing this year, it is that God shows up. I really saw God show up for me last year, in many things, both the small and the great. Man!!! And I’m not even capping, can’t fully describe it even. The first major thing I really prayed and hoped for was that my trip (it was fully funded btw), cause I really didn’t even see it happening even as of the week the conference was meant to start but it happened and it’s God. And from then, I could trace the hands of God even in the little and dismissible things, God really showed up for me and the lesson is God is faithful, even beyond the description, God is faithful, always has been and always will be. In addition to that, 2022 was the year of discovery and reconciliation. Discovery in the sense of finding niche people who closely align with my life’s goals and aspirations without draining the life out of me. Reconciliation of the opinion of those who matter the most to me, my family and what I thought they thought of me, it’s funny how you can be close but also wide apart at the same time but I’m glad I got to do that with them. Furthermore, I saw the gift of friends in 2022, man!!!! I saw friends stand for, by and with me in 2022, it’s crazy because I usually assume I don’t have that many friends (I just happen to know so many people), but my friends really came through for me, guess I really lucked out with the few I have, I’m really grateful for my friends and I love you all (muah!!). Finally and most importantly, 2022 taught me to dream, this is way crazier because I’ve always seen myself as a dreamer, but this year taught me to break every glass ceiling and spurred me to dream bigger and higher than I have ever done, to see beyond everything before me and imagine the impossible, (not really the impossible, but things I never imaged are possible until probably the next decade). There’s the saying (well, or I coined it) that “Our aspirations show two things about us, our privilege and access to information”, so I’m this year, I’m really grateful for both the privilege and circumstances that got me here and the access to information.
Conclusion and footnote: 2022 I’ll say was a good year but on a general note, I’ll say it is like that moment when you finally get to the front gate of where the party is happening, but you’re not in the party yet (cause it’s still Day Zero outchea), but now you can feel it that you're just about to join the party, what will happen in 2023, I literally have no idea, but what I know is I really want to travel more, do a lot more substantive research, make a shitload of money (cause sapa must not win in my life this year again), do me and mine every 3 business days (technically, na just paperwork we dey sign at the moment and boom!!! Here we go, I’ll y’all single to stupors) and really have the best time of my life. If you think I did X in 2022, watch me do 10X and more this new year and I’m really excited about that, it’s tabula rasa outchea people, let’s go paint the picture we want on it. Bonne Annee mes amis
(Incase you’re wondering why so many memes, I’m looking for a chief meme officer role, so consider this as my window shop and in case your company is hiring, please refer me, let me have food to eat). Cheers to a fantastic year ahead.
