Haven’t written you in a long time, but I got my spark back!🙂‍↕️

(Check out my song of the week here. Listened to it while writing this)

As an anime lover, you must have heard of the “slice of life” genre; I love it too! But that’s not what this is about. “What then is this nigga saying?” Relax and breathe; we bout to enter.

Tranche de la vie

The phrase “Slice of life” originates from the French term “tranche de la vie,” which literally means a cut or sample of real, unedited human experience.

Emphasis on “real”, “unedited human experience”.

Are you living for real? Or are you trying to put up a facade based on what you have seen?

Are you living your human experience unedited, or are you trying to force your control over the forces of life that you technically don’t control, so you can live based on the edited human experience you have seen on social media?

I imagine God gave us the power to edit our lives, some almighty ctrl + Z type shi; I bet some people would have entered an infinite loop of constant editing and not actually living the life itself.

This is the same reason why I do not really like movies or stories like Flash (it’s good btw) where the MC always travels back in time to change some shi, and as a result of that, alters the time loop or timeline, yada yada yada 😂 Like dawg! Just fucking live with it; it has happened already.

Before I miss the plot…

Life is lived forward, but understood backwards.

Social media has made it seem like everyone is living life and understanding forward, if you understand what I mean. I am in my 20s, and let’s not even talk about the information saturation generally- just the number of “What you should do in your 20s” content is alarming. Like, suddenly, everyone is trying to give me knowledge on what I should do with my life again 😂.

Another thing is how social media has created these personas in our heads that we envy. You will see lots of people with the same age gap or whatnot, flaunting different sets of luxuries. Let’s even say they are not fake; what you are seeing is just an edited version of their lives. Real life is unedited and messier. You do not understand their leverage, their unfair advantage, their strategies, etc, but you get sad just because of an edited reel, which isn’t an actual slice of life.

Now Movies too.

Mainstream movies are greatly edited, and only a few actually capture the unedited nature of reality. The way movies portray romance, sex, childbirth, etc. is edited. Of course they won’t show real childbirth videos, cos you could go mental watching them😭. These things in reality are messier.

This is why I take time out to watch unedited real-life stuff. To see the original.

I said all of that to say this: most of the people we admire and say oh I want to be like this. Most of the time, we say that because the slice of their lives we have seen is the edited one; we have not seen the actual. The responsibilities, the setbacks, the opposition, loneliness (when Asake sang " Lonely at the Top, it wasn’t a joke o 😂 ), etc.

Your question to me now would be: Why are you telling me all this shi?

I want you to accept the real, unedited human experience, which is what life is.

Beyond accepting it is finding happiness in the mundaneness of life.

Saw this post showing Elon 18 years ago. I am def not trying to motivate you (sorry if that sounded harsh 😂); I am trying to help you see life through an unedited lens. 12 days from bankruptcy is crazy frr. Success stories are very messy.

It only makes sense now because we are looking at it in hindsight. Remember how I started with living life forward and understanding backwards, exactly!

Most times, when I am asked how I was able to balance life in school with tech and then graduate first class, it’s tempting to talk polished and mention this and that and even claim “Balance” but frr, in real life it is messier. I don’t even believe balance exists in a present context; it’s always measured from hindsight. The number of times I slept by 3 am and woke at 7 am, the stabbed lectures, the tests missed, the deadlines missed, the random depression breeze at 7 p.m. while locking in for exams, the sudden urge to run away sometimes, and many more messy shi 😂. But looking back in hindsight, I could see how managing priorities over time helped, and the results look like someone commented, “Oh, this guy was able to balance his life,” Dawg! Nothing like that here. Even till now 😭

Since life is lived forward and understood backward,

How then do we make decisions?

As a stoic overthinker, when given options A and B, I travel into the future with calculations and speculations to analyze both options and the facts attached. In the end, it boils down to which option I would regret the least (this applies generally).

“Regret the least” is relative to the context and point I am at in life, meaning the option I regret the least could be option A, but after 2 years I figured option B would have been better and then started sulking. This is why I spoke about real life being messy, because part of what makes it messy is the decisions we make.

Many of us have a cloud of these kinds of situations in our minds. Sulking about them is perfectly human, but when we think about it, at the point we made the decisions, we did not fully understand everything (we are not omniscient like God); we did not have all the cards in our hands and also did not have control over the forces of life. In this situation, the best thing is to take in the feedback and improve.

Japanese call it “Wabi-Sabi”, where imperfection becomes a truer expression of art and beauty, and ultimately of life.

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Storytime

I read this story in The Alchemist.

A merchant sent his young son to a wise king to inquire about the secret of happiness. After travelling for 40 days, he arrived at the castle, which was high up in the mountains. At his appointed time to meet the king, he went in and asked his question: “What is the secret of happiness?” The king said he was busy and could not answer the question in the short time he had with the boy, so he rescheduled their meeting time. He gave the boy a spoon and placed two drops of oil in it. He asked him to explore his beautiful castle, but he must not spill the oil on the spoon.

The boy spent hours moving up and down the stairs and going around very carefully, with his eyes fixed on the spoon. He returned to the king and showed him the spoon with the oil still there. The king then asked him if he saw the tapestries, magnificent gardens, libraries, and ancient scrolls. The boy confessed he did not see any because he was focused only on the oil and preventing it from spilling. The king sent him back out again, but this time asked him to explore the beauties of the castle. This time, the boy relaxed and marveled at the architecture, gardens, artworks, etc.

When the boy returned, he eagerly described all the wonders he had seen to the king. The wise king looked at the spoon, and the drops of oil were gone. The boy realized that he had spilled them while he was distracted by his surroundings. The king then said, “The secret to happiness is to observe the wonders of the world and never forget the drops of oil on the spoon”.

If you don’t get the meaning, you should read again much more slowly… I bet it would sink!

Reading this story, I realized how much I have focused so much on the drops of oil in my spoon that I do not see and explore the wonders of the world. Some people are too busy that they don’t even notice the beautiful sky or the glowing beauty of the sunset.

A friend of mine, Ade, puts it in the best way:

So with these few points of mine

I hope you live life unfiltered and unedited

I hope you experience life and humanity

I hope you experience love and all the beautiful things you have in mind

I hope you have a unique definition of the things that matter to you in life

I hope you don’t get carried away by acting for the internet and an audience, because someday you will be 6 feet beneath, and there will be no audience or internet connection

I hope you live life frrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Until next time guysss! ciao

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient

It’s 10:10 am on a beautiful Saturday morning, woke up by 8:00 am, and had my devotion using the RCCG “Open heavens” (sleepyhead version durhh but I remembered praying) after which I drifted back to sleep. Woke up some minutes before 10:00 am, and because this time represents a significant mark in my day, I rushed off to the bathroom, splashed some chilled water on my face, and boom! I was alive again. I then jumped into reading a book that I have been on for some time:

It’s a really chill book, and it’s one of the key inspirations behind today’s topic.

Tbh, I did not plan to write today at all. Already had the topic drafted previously. So today, after reading a few pages of this lovely book, I was about to do my affirmations and stuff to start my day, but my mind drew me to the newsletter, and it was like my mind was writing, omo that’s how I found myself here 😂. Today’s letter comes with some extra spice, and I know you’ve been wondering, “Whaddup, guy?”. Well, well, well, I wonna use this opportunity to break the news to you that I am finally done with uni, which university? uniiiiiilaggggggggg. I know the next question in your mind would be “How’s life as a graduate?”, or maybe it’s another, Idk, but I get this particular question a lot from people. Well, from my perspective, it’s been cool and all about freedom. The freedom here isn’t from parents or whatnot because I have had that since, rather it’s freedom from the thought of “exams”, “tests”, “project”, “meeting with supervisor”, all these are cringe and trigger words for final year students. I feel nothing can stop me rn because I have control over my time, and I am holding myself accountable to people on how I invest/spend it, tbh, in one word, I feel unstoppable. In terms of responsibilities (finance, family, etc), I have been doing that right from my sophomore year, like finding means to survive without dependence on family. I already have an article title drafted to talk about this, and I really look forward to putting it out later.

Whew, that’s a lot of gist and tea I just spilled. Since I don’t write as often as before, I figured I owed you guys some. If you’re looking for more tea, follow me on X and IG (I will post some of the latest tea here sooonnn), and I might just have a newsletter titled “More tea” to spill all the tea, cos a lot has happened and is happening.

I thank God for keeping things running smoothly.

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Can we be foolish again frr?

Children are one of the most beautiful creatures on Earth, and yeah, they can be very annoying too. Children do not see limitations; they are very audacious and think as though the world is working in their favour to make things happen the way they see it. I remember watching Power Rangers with my younger brother, and when we were done, we did role-playing and acted out our version. I always went for Gold or Blue Ranger, while my brother went for either red or green (I really don’t know what’s with the colours, but to the best of my knowledge, different colours had different special powers, the powers were relative ). Imagine an adult seeing us as kids mumbling lines like, “Power Rangers Ninja Storm…. transformation!”, “Power Rangers SPD Megazord” (I really racked my brain to bring this, give me my flowers 😂), or even Ben 10 and the other things we played out. The adult, in this case, would just shake his head and mumble something like “It’s their time to be children.”, because watching us act all of that made us look really foolish.

I remember when I was grown and I went home, I saw a couple of kids doing the same thing with the Power Rangers stuff, broooo 😂. The seriousness it took, the intentionality in the role-playing, and all of that was on another level.

Even while the world saw what they were doing as foolish, they gave their all to it and enjoyed the moment without any fear.

This is what being a child truly means.

• Doing what you believe in, even if the world calls you mad

• Giving your all to what you believe in

• Enjoying the moment without fear of tomorrow

But what happened to us?

What happened to all the happiness we had as children? Some of us did not have the best of things growing up, but we were happy as children, and lived today, not worrying about tomorrow.

What really happened?

Is growing up a scam?

“What do you want to be?” - This is the question that likely starts all the drama. Well, my family sat together one time, and this question was asked. Each person took a turn to answer. I can’t vividly remember what I said, but I remember what my younger brother said. Without fear and shame, he said, “A fisherman”. The whole house burst into laughter, you know, those types that lasted very long. When asked why, he said something about his liking of fish. Thinking about it now, that could be refined into a Fish business worth millions of dollars with the right prospect and plans (but I laughed then, because I was young).

The journey of a child starts with wild dreams and being told what to become. Society already defines ‘high-paying’ jobs, and lots of parents and people engineer their children's minds towards that line. People have a job to ‘guide’ children, not to shut down their geniuses with self-acclaimed desires or what the world seeks. I know you might say “passion does not pay”; you might be right, because only a few percent of people love what they are doing, but I can tell you that wealth is not in a thing, but in the business of a thing. Say you love painting and artistry stuff, the wealth is in the business of that stuff, but being in the right environment determines a lot in this regard.

An environment is anything and everything that makes you think the way you do and become what you are.

Pick one thing you believe today, for example, “love is a scam”, what makes you believe such is perhaps the 3-5 people you have dated (like 0.00000007142857% of the world population according to ChatGPT), those within your circle who have had similar experiences, the toxic posts on social media, etc. If you keep thinking this way, chances are that you won’t find true love, because a person becomes what he/she thinks (as a man thinketh so is he - KJV version).

What you are today is a product of your past environment, and what you are gonna be in the near future is a product of your present/future environment.

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When we were children

Do you remember that when we were kids, we always wanted to grow up so fast, and you know why?

We wanted freedom. Freedom from our parents telling us what to do, what to eat, when to sleep, etc.

Our hearts yearned for the freedom that our environment had not prepared us for.

Freedom from primary school, only to land in secondary school and realize we lost something on the way.

Freedom to leave the house for university, only to realize that home was everything you had.

Our constant quest for freedom was great, but the freedom we sought over time was only progressive to the actual freedom - Becoming a child again.

As we grow, we lose pieces of ourselves, our identity, in a bid to compromise to faulty standards, trying to please people, trying to fix broken things, innocently going through broken systems. Then we get to a point of realization and awareness that “we are now adults” and have lost all child-like (not childishness) properties I listed earlier.

Children are original; they don’t discriminate except that their environment taught them to, they don’t fight, they love wholeheartedly, they cry a lot, they laugh a lot, they smile at strangers, they get angry at each other but reconcile the next minute, they enjoy the moment and live in it.

In the course of growing up, many of us lost these. So it’s not just about our big dreams alone; it’s our entirety. And I have discovered that the most beautiful people on earth to me are exactly like this, child-like.

Someone might be reading this and saying, “Oh, this does not concern me, I just need to chase the bag, get loads of cash, and I’ll be good.” You’re not bad at all; you’re simply a product of an environment that defines success in those terms, because the truth is, you can be much more.

Becoming foolish again

According to the book I was reading, there are 3 categories of people. These are:

1. Those who surrender completely: These guys who completely surrendered to their negative and dysfunctional environments. They only think the way the crowd thinks. You want to hear what the world says about your idea? meet them. Tell them about your big idea, and it dies in the scourge of their laughter or negative statements, which are largely unconstructive. Every opening of their mouth is an opportunity to cast spells of negativity, “This idea won’t sell.”, “You don’t have what it takes”, “You can’t do it”, “This country will never be great”, “Love is a scam”, “Marriage is a trap”, “No Nigerian can ever do …”, “It’s not possible to make $100k in 3 months”, and many more. You can find a lot of them, especially on social media. This is the group with the largest representation because it’s easy to row with the crowd and not make a difference.

2. Those who surrender partially: This group is much smaller than the first. They did not completely surrender at first; they were shielded from the brunt of society, but did not form a solid persona. When the shields went off, after years and years, they began to slowly rationalize everything, including being average, and hence became complacent. This group of persons develops fears: fear of failure, fear of social disapproval, fear of insecurity, and fear of losing what they already have. Deep down, they are not satisfied, but they know they have surrendered. This group includes many talented and intelligent people who choose to crawl through life rather than run because they are constantly crippled by fear.

3. Those who never surrender: This is the smallest group (about 2-3% according to the book). They have seen it all: a dysfunctional environment, negativity, fear, name it. But they choose to make a difference. This is the hardest group to be in, hence why it is the smallest. Lots of individuals here are optimistic, filled with hope and not just hope, but faith. They believe and take action because actions kill fear. Lots of wealthy people, highly successful individuals in all ramifications of life, are here.

Reading through this, you might have identified the group you belong to, and if it is not group 3, pleaseeeeee make your journey there ASAP.

The journey to being in the third group is the journey of being what society calls foolish.

• Start seeing the good in things: Like the red car philosophy, if you don’t find the good in a thing, by default, your mind will constantly seek the bad. This is not damage control or ignoring what is wrong. If it is in your capacity to fix, do it, but if it is a situation (something outside your control), see the good in it. It is not about what happens to us, but how we see/react to what happens that matters. If it’s a mistake, be intentional about taking notes and learn from them. Look for the good in things.

• Create your environment: “As a man thinketh so is he” - This is one of the most powerful bible verses I’ve read. It is largely underestimated. You are what you think, a product of your thoughts. Imagine an engineering company called Your Thoughts Inc., and the product they are working on is you. The raw materials the company uses are from your environment. Your environment: those you are following on social media, your fyp, your YouTube content, your friends, your contacts on WhatsApp, the events you attend, your fave music artists, the books you read, the ideologies you subscribe to, your babe, and the WhatsApp statuses you view consistently. These are a few to mention. Identify people in group 1 and group 2 on your socials, feel free to unfollow, mark posts as uninterested, mute people's statuses on WhatsApp, delete songs, stay away from certain events and associations, and stay away from gists that make you feel lesser. I have done all these and am still doing them every day because I have a responsibility to create the environment that feeds my mind. Look for people in group 3, follow them, engage, watch movies, read books, and listen to uplifting songs. Speak the right things to yourself, words of affirmation, gifts, a goal tracker, a gratitude journal, etc.

• Enjoy the moment: One of the things I enjoy about myself is doing something for myself, not for the glam or because of the “this would be a banger on socials”. Enjoy the moment, the little ones, the silent ones, the big ones, and the boring ones. Take pictures to freeze that moment.

  Redacted* [So guys, there’s the pretty bird by the side of one of the windows in my room, she’s incubating her eggs, and is most of the time the company I have recently because my roommates have left for holidays. The fact that she’s incubating her egg correlates with the current season of life I’m at. I was so happy to see it, but each time I get closer to taking pictures, she flies away 😭]

• Just do it: Reading about the thing is not doing it, writing about the thing is not doing it, talking to people about doing the thing is not doing it, doing the thing is the only way to do it; other things are secondary, so just do it. Do it scared, don’t wait for the perfect time to do things, just do it. Of course, your mind and thoughts have to align, but without the right environment created, your mind might have been influenced by the wrong information, and hence, your time of alignment runs till infinity. For example, if you are not fully in group 3 or not fully incorporating these things listed, start now! make steps, don’t wait.

• Be grateful: I wrote a while ago on “The Gratitude attitude”, it’s a really lovely read, and I’d advise you to check it out too. Be grateful, guys! It creates room for more and forces you to see the good in things. If you think your life is a mess and you are worried, take a piece of paper and think through the last 2 years till now, write down things you’re grateful for, don’t just write the big things, start with the small things, you’d be shocked to see what you write. You did not see it before because you did not position your mind to see it. How much more can you do this every day, or every week, or say every month?

Yo! It’s been a jolly ride. You can’t imagine my joy writing this to you!

Writing to you these first unplanned hours of the morning is one of the most beautiful highlights of my week. I enjoyed every bit, and I hope you did too.

With these few points of mine, I hope I have been able to convince you and not confuse you, that we can be foolish again and achieve our wild dreams with the right environment we cultivate and our minds set on great things.

Dream so wildly, work so hard, let time reveal our wonder, and the future behold our greatness.

Also, check out one of my fave songs

Itterasshai furendo!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

With the evidence I added, all I am trying to say is: “It’s not you, it’s me” 😂

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Hoomans are Insatiable

“Have you felt too tired to eat? Like having good food before you, but just feeling too tired to eat?” I shared this with a friend, and he laughed because he had never experienced it. Well, perhaps my tiredness ate way too deep 😂.

I won't describe myself as perfectly social, but I do try. Some ladies I met at a dinner in Nairobi last year called me “Antisocial.” 😭 I can't forget that experience, but I will save that for later. I felt tired of many things in the world, like the wars, food, and social media. To top it all off, I watched AOT(Attack on Titan) for the third time.

Speaking on the issue of insatiability, I recently moved from not being able to shop for myself to shopping, and currently preventing myself from shopping. I usually don’t buy stuff based on impulse, I always stick to a budget, and if I see a need not within the budget, I log it to the notes so it will be factored into the next budget. But the next budget never ends. As much as I try to be disciplined, there’s this inner ‘aza man’ feeling within me to explore something new. For example, my strange desire to visit Japan, or travel to Singapore and then touch down in Kigali 😂 (Peak delulu, but like they say ‘delulu is the solulu’).

Think of the goals you had last two years, and the ones you have now. That’s not the end, you will keep having goals to you exit this world. Once you clutch what is a real goal, another one will surface almost immediately, and more after that, it keeps going. But when will you stop? Or why won’t you stop?

I suppose that in any field you are in, there is the clifftop that marks the hallmark of extreme excellence. In football, for example, the clifftops are Messi and Ronaldo. Beyond the material wealth they have, they have, through blood, sweat, and pain, carved their names in the hall of fame and impact.

Think for one second that you have exactly the wealth Messi has, what would you do?

Now think again for a second, if you were Messi, what would you do? How would you see the world?

The two questions are different; one is tied to “having”, the other is tied to “being”.

If life were about having, these men have climaxed in that reality. But you see, it’s more about being.

Many of us are so focused on “having” that we lose track of or are careless about “being”.

The subject of Being

I watched a reel that had Will Smith on a podcast. He spoke of something called the “abyss”, which people at clifftops (top of their careers) and rock-bottom (opposite of clifftop) face. “The abyss is a state where life loses all of its ability to sustain and please you”.

For the clifftops, people have gotten to the peak of wealth, excellence, money, and material stuff.

For the rock-bottom, people are so deep down, unknown, and lost, such that life loses meaning.

This ‘abyss’ forces the real question: “Who am I?”. The question of being and identity.

Finding the answers to these questions is really important because it becomes what makes up the grit and pillar of faith and sustenance.

As a Christian, I believe my identity is deeply rooted in my beliefs in Christ, and my being is modeled after this personality.

What I am trying to say is, as young people trying to break through life, our current motivation often starts out as the need to attain some sort of comfort as defined by our minds.

But what if you attain that,

Will you stop?

Will you plateau?

What will keep you going?

If that thing is material, e.g, buying a private jet, when you get it, what will keep you going?

I remember having a discourse at night with my roommate, and he said he wants to have “money like mad”. Some other phrases I have heard are “bastard money”, “trust funds”, etc. While these are good, when the purpose of a thing is not established, abuse is inevitable. The real question is “why”, why do you want to have bastard money? What impact would you make?

Success is not a destination; rather, it is a personality. Success is in “being”, not just “having”.

Success is in who you become by sojourning the pathway of destiny.

This is a perspective that makes you prioritize your becoming and character development.

But the truth is the world unfortunately does not see these, it rather pursues the noise and claps for the achievements rather than the ‘personality’.

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Tired? Keep Going

Exhaustion is real, boredom even more real. But if you stop now, then why did you start?

Many times, we start for the wrong or even funny reasons, but what matters is the reason why we continue!

I am currently in a peak delulu season of my life (Imagination wan kee me guys 😂). So I have a personal Discord server for myself, and I created these 2 new channels for peak delulu.

I am a thinker and a very spontaneous executor when I have a predefined purpose guiding me. I have had thoughts that were hard to believe for myself, but by writing them down and reading them almost every time, what I thought was impossible at first now becomes my default being. It feels like I am moulting into future versions of myself, but this is in terms of “being”. The mind is the most powerful asset we have, because as a man thinks, so is he.

How do you keep going?

Don’t overthink it, just keep going.

“How do you stay focused and committed to a thing?” I was asked this recently. The answer to this boils down to the subject of being. There’s no such thing as “It’s not in my makeup to be committed to something” or “I can’t finish this project, it’s too hard”. When faced with hardship or difficulty, the body jets out. The body hates the difficulty of any sort, but what keeps it going is the mind. I once read a statement somewhere that the body does not give up until the mind does.

A warrior who prepares for the battle of his destiny would feel weak when training, but what pushes him is the wild cry of his enemies on the field and his future victory. This is why in gladiator movies, when the MC is beaten to a point where you think he’s cooked, all of a sudden he disconnects from the present, and gets vision flashes of his wife, child, loved ones or his glorious destiny, something that strikes a chord in his being and with some strange moves he comes out a victor. I am painting this so you can see that many times the gladiator is You. You are currently being beaten by the challenges and situations; you need to disconnect from the present and connect with something that touches your being. Connect with your why!

The truth is, everyone at some point feels tired, but we keep redefining reasons each day to keep moving forward.

Do everything but stop.

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Many of us are going through the toughest phases of our lives, not like the next phase is not gonna be more tough but there’s something about this ‘Adulting’ phase and what we dreamed of as kids. This leads to intrinsic conflicts and this is why I am writing this. Not like I am exempted from the Shege, but this is me expressing a few things I have found out hoping in good faith, it serves as a soothing balm for you.

Childish Illusions

There’s a saying that you don’t value what you have until it is gone and I think I feel the same way regarding my childhood days. I think I matured too fast and did not really get to enjoy all the fullness but I cant blame me, responsibility found me even when I was much unprepared.

I walked into a primary school recently and seeing the kids running around helplessly and unbothered about anything was nostalgic for me. As I climbed the stairs, I tried picturing my younger self in primary school and how playful I was then that I always came home injured. School was a total stress then except the break time and, extracurricular activities. My illusion was that when I get older, I would be free from all these. Free from the burden of school and my parents and even elder siblings telling what and what not to do. Guess what, I am older now and I think if it’s possible I would trade what I am faced with now with then haha!

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Metamor what?

Metamorphosis involves the series of processes that a young goes through to reach adulthood. Using a butterfly for our case study, it starts from the Egg stage to Larva to Pupa and then Adult. My focus in this article is Pupa to Adult which relative to humans is like from teenage to Adults. The target audience for this are those like me who are either just starting to become independent or have been for sometime and seeing the realest shege.

I don’t know much biology, but based on my research (ChatGPT research abeg 😂), I found out that one of the main turning points of the to-be butterfly is the point in its pupa stage where it begins to metamorphose into an Adult. I have not spoken with a butterfly before, but based on some pain points I would go through shortly, I think it’s the most daunting for the creature. How much more you?

Not to bore you with biology jargon but these are the painful and intense transformations that happen to the caterpillar (Pupa) :

1. The caterpillar melts into a thick liquid. There’s an enzyme that breaks all its tissues and organs into like a thick soup

2. There’s rapid cell division and growth which forms the butterfly’s wings, legs and antennae.

3. The caterpillar goes through this while inside a hard protective shell called the chrysalis. This shell protects the caterpillar all through the transforming process but when completed, the butterfly is expected to break free from this shell. This process is exhausting and take time. If the butterfly gets stuck and does not make it out, it may die inside the shell.

Does this sound familiar?

Many times we dissolve our old personalities to build new ones.

Growth? I mean at this stage, it’s painful but one must embrace it. Growth professionally, emotionally, financially and all other areas.

Breaking free from the shell is like we leaving our comfort zones, breaking our fallow grounds and facing our worst fears.

Regarding this, here are a few things I made priority this year:

• To fail fast and fail forward

• To do the hard things

• To be true to my emotions

• To live each day like it’s the last I’ve got.

It’s not as easy as I typed here, but I have been true to myself regarding these and hopefully soon, I’d write on the results.

My question to you are:

Are you still remaining in your comfort zones?

Are you scared of failing?

Are you leaving your ground fallow?

Are you facing your fears?

Are you too scared to try?

Are you scared of what people would say if you failed?

But one more question, What will you do if today is your last day on Earth?

Will you worry about all those things? Will you give that opportunity a shot? Will you confess to that lady? Will you take that role? Will you compete in that hackathon/challenge? Will you take that big shot step? Will you move on and never worry about the past? Will you?

The fear of what people would say is old story because guess what? They don’t freaking care. It’s a paradox we have in our minds that someone is perpetually watching us, for example, when we are strolling down the road and fall down, we are embarrassed like everyone on the road looked at your fall and laughed or something. That’s not true, they might have looked or be started by the fall, even if they laughed, who cares? for a fact they don’t care. Do you!

Adulting is…

Adulting is knowing you can’t do life alone, you need God, you need the right people.

Adulting is knowing that many times when shit gets real, you will be left alone with those who love you deeply.

Adulting is knowing that no one owes you a favour and when they do help you, it’s out of benevolence.

Adulting is knowing that when you do good, you don’t expect it in return.

Adulting is knowing that you could love someone but not get loved in return.

Adulting is knowing life isn’t a straight line but a contour one filled with ups and downs, so basically your plans sometimes might fail woefully.

Adulting is knowing that in this life, it’s you versus you, while your achievements are the scoreboard. So you keep getting better to win the yesterday’s version of you.

Adulting is knowing you and the next person would not have the same privileges so never compare yourself. Comparison is the killer of self worth. All of us starting out life are starting at different levels, some have rich relatives, sponsors , or at least some form of strong support, meanwhile some of us only look up to God.

Adulting is knowing that disappointments come in different shapes and sizes, don’t let them weigh you down.

Adulting is knowing that any human can let you down, only God can’t. The best of man is still man.

Adulting is knowing that people who you rely on might not be there when you need them the most because they are probably facing their problems too.

Adulting is knowing that we can’t help everyone who comes to us seeking help because most times when the helper needs help, those he helped wont be there.

Adulting is knowing things could get really cold and lonely living this life, but having those who can give you warmth in cold times is golden.

Youthful realizations

"This is not the life I dreamed of." A realization that hits many of us. Starting out with little to no leverage can be incredibly challenging, but is it fair? And if not, who is to blame?

The truth is, at this point, who you blame or not does not make this better. As a forward thinker, I love to think forward not back. What can you do about this situation? What can you control?

Many times we wish that our lives get easier and to live in comfort, but if wishes were horses beggars would ride. If you are enjoying life and living in comfort and luxury as a young adult, this article does not apply to you because you are enjoying the fruits of sacrifices some other person paid (which is cool). For us without those privileges, we are the ones to make that sacrifice so that those coming behind us would have a leverage to begin life with.

Takes me back to my first ever business, a poultry. I started with some money I had saved off from teaching in a secondary school. I funded the business and at the end, It was quite profitable. I have seen cases of youngsters whose parents give them capital to start out, but my case was different and I have my peace with it. There’s no use complaining and getting angry about a situation, the real question is What can you control? What can you do? Some of us will have to do double the work, face pain for some basic necessity but it’s paying the price, and soon because of us, others coming behind can stand on our shoulders.

These are the days when you will make crucial decisions that will be appreciated in the future. So do you! Take those tough decisions, don’t be a people-pleaser, take the leaps, fail as much as you need to, and most importantly, learn from your mistakes without being too hard on yourself.

The pain is a lot frr but trust me YOU WILL COME OUT WELL AND STRONGER!

(Had to put in caps so the emphasis is not lost)

You are not facing this alone, there are many of us on this table, never forget that!

As you metamorphose, keep pushing. Pause if you need to. Relax, Restrategize, but never Quit.

I would like to end with this quote:

Write you soon, buddy!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Writing this I’m still looking for the perfect title to give this article but couldn’t find one. This is 5:25 am, I woke up 2 hours ago, had my prayer and started my daily musing. Usually when writing an article, the title is always a challenge as I do a lot of brainstorming to come up with the prefect one but this time around I didn’t care because I didn’t want to get caught up in selecting the title that I forget the essence - The content. I thought about the title “2024 Wrapped” (It’s giving Spotify 😂), I even had a draft titled “Lagos to Nairobi✈️” but none of these cut it because things like these would involve people talking about their Wins (Which I quite had a few) but what of the Ls?

If you’re reading this and see a much proper title that means I finally came up with one because thinking back from January till now, I barely can find an actual title that fits.

There were many times I thought about writing this newsletter to you and I always thought the title will be really badass and the experience would be glamorous but since I didn’t always make the prefect title, I just procrastinate and continue my bug-fighting 😂 (If you’re a non-techie reading this, “bug” is not bedbug, ask any programmer, it is our best companions 😂). When I started again this morning, I didn’t feel the need to arrive at the perfect title because writing this alone felt like an escape from the bugs haunting me in my code 😭.

Maybe this is You.

You keep waiting for the perfect time to start, but such thing doesn’t really exist. You keeping waiting for one day when you could start with Day one. You keep waiting for the perfect start of a thing and oftentimes give up when the start wasn’t as good as you or people around you expected.

The start of a race for a runner in a sprint might really matter but in a marathon, it doesn’t. The marathon is all about perseverance, endurance, grit and many more hardcore virtues than just speed. And remember, Life’s a marathon not a sprint.

This is the story of how my 2024 went.

I never have a good start (lost my non-tech job), and I moved from being a self-sustaining student to a God-sustained student (omo na God dey run am🤲). I joined Lockedin, the social media for those locking in 😂. Got a really good gig in Web2 space, transitioned into Web3, won a number of hackathons in Web3, flew in a plane for the first time, flew twice (one local and the other international). My experience on the international trip is a different story on its own 😂 I might write about it but you can check Linkedin for details.

I became an NHEF scholar (one of the top 100 selected scholars from top universities across Nigeria) and an ABC fellow. (For more on my NHEF experience check Linkedin)

For volunteering (I love doing this), I was part of DevFest Lagos 2024 Digital working group, twas really awesome working with awesome personalities like Geektutor, Omolere, Faith, Kruse, Drex and others! FYI: I had a serious burnout september-ish, Geektutor’s encouragement helped me through that season, Man’s gold frr!

I did not have a great start but boy! Looking back I am grateful. January was really tough and I am grateful to my good friend (Livingstone), mentor (Mr Wole), wonderful friends and my lovely family for the encouragement! ❤️

2024 turned out great! But there were uncertainties.

I posted this on my status recently because I was thinking through the uncertainties I faced and how I scaled through them. One very crazy one was coming to terms with the fact that the price I needed to make to transition into Web3 was turning down a Job offer and some Web2 gigs. (I had to write a rejection email to the recruiter, wow me sef no small o 😂)

This newsletter will be incomplete without me mentioning Web3bridge. This was the institution that helped me transition into the Web3 space for free while providing feeding, accommodation, very stable power supply and free internet! All of these without paying a dime! 🥹 If you’re looking to dive into Web3 also, visit the website and apply for the track that fits your expertise. The instructors are really superb! It’s by far the best I’ve seen in Africa.

You can also follow me on hashnode where I write cool technical stuff relating to Web3 and computer science.

I applied to Nethermind and a few other Web3 firms and got solid Ls. But we go again next year.

I also made quite a number of new friends, new communities, new lockin partners and many fun stuff.

You might not have the perfect match or perfect title, just do it! Do it scared!

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2025

2025 will come shortly and it would be another 365-day cycle. The year in itself means nothing than time wrapped together in form of seconds, minutes, hours and days. It is a medium to give purpose and expression to things. You need to be more intentional in your living. Existence is time-bound, Essence is purpose-bound, you need to Live (essence) not just exist.

Like every year we have people attending services in their respective place of worship in preparations for the new year. Do well to soak up energy as you will need a lot down the year.

The following will come in handy:

It’s not really what happens to us that matter but how we handle what happens.

Pick out lessons and move on, don’t waste your energy remember you’re a runner and it’s a marathon.

Focus on what you can control not things you cant

This has been my guide to tackling worry especially in uncertain times.

Have people that keep you in check, join communities, form communities where you bond and feel like you’re part of a family.

A lovely quote from late AGT star, Nightbirde. I love her song and this quote so much that it’s part of my watch word. Make yourself happy, find happiness in the right places.

Find love too … Cheers to we single pringles, another year of defending our championship title 😂🥂 We go again in 2025!

Equip yourself like an arsenal with weapons such that you have a weapon to counter the ones fashioned against you and if you get hit, there are people to help you stand.

Life’s not hard, don’t get it all twisted. Dream so big that it will take you x God to fulfill!

We say life is a marathon, but where’s the finish line? There’s none except death. So don’t give up, keep running at your pace, keep getting better, No skill you learn is a waste, keep pushing because soon it will marinate and come together. Trust God and trust the process.

This is not an attempt to tell you how to live your life, instead it’s a letter to help you see things differently. Writing this doesn’t make me better than you reading it, chances are that if you wrote yours, it will be much better than this (normally you be Idan 😂🤲). What I hoped to achieve was making you see that you don’t need to have it all figured out because most great people too never did they were mainly visionary who followed their vision through thick and thin. Things might not work according to your plan but stick to the blueprint. Zoom out and see the full picture.

Chances are that you have might have been oppressed through the year that’s because you compare yourself with others. Compare yourself with yourself and only draw inspiration from others, we all have different journeys and are in different seasons of our lives. Celebrate the wins of that your friend because by the law of attraction, yours would come faster.

Let’s wrap it here guys and we’ll see again by God’s grace in 2025! If you found a better title for this letter, I’d like to see it in the comment section. If you’re interested in the opportunites I benefited from please make your research (I trying linking some) and you can contact me for more, it will be great seeing that someone who read this letter became an NHEF scholar, or ABC fellow and transitioning into web3 also! I love my people winning frr ❤️

Cheers and God bless!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Humans are naturally ingrates. The true nature beneath the skin is really evil and very ungrateful. We barely remember the million and one good things a person has done but forever remember the bad things. We judge people against the bad things they have done because we are too blinded by our frailties.

Gratitude is a key to exponential growth and even abundance. We are barely grateful even to ourselves. You just went through a very tough season and you could not even appreciate yourself. If we aren’t even grateful to ourselves, how then can we be grateful to God and other people? We just keep chasing goals after goals forgetting ourselves in the process, forgetting God and others!

It’s good to be hard on yourself, push yourself, stretch yourself, do great things, etc. But be grateful. I know we are familiar with praying, but we aren’t with gratitude. We are always in a hurry to tell God the next goals, desires, and prayer points but what of the ones He has done already?

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My Dear, Be Grateful!

No matter how big or small, be grateful! Truly grateful! Take time in prayer to God to thank him, because thanksgiving is a key to getting more than you even asked! It works like maddd 😂, It’s not cap Fr!

There are days I thanked so much that I didn’t feel the need to ask anything.

Being thankful to God for life, your wins, your losses, your joy and many more is a way of Acknowledging his contribution, also be thankful to YOU.

Who did the interview? Who wrote that test? Who took that exam? Who did that coding test? Who pls? YOU!

Most times when you start feeling confused, frustrated, or angry, it’s all because you have been ungrateful to yourself and many times God!

I know you might ask, how can being ungrateful to myself affect anything? By being grateful to yourself, you are acknowledging yourself, your contribution, and your self-worth. If you don’t, you will keep doubting your worth and your abilities down the line.

After that tough season, learn to say “Thank you Jude for not giving up, We did it!”. Don’t skip to the next thing, even though you got an L, be grateful.

Be grateful! I cannot overemphasize this!

The world we live in is programmed to fill us with bitterness and ingratitude, we need to live without bitterness and with a heart of gratitude!

Be grateful to people also. Those who stood by you through seasons, those who watched over you and contributed to your growth. You can do better than “Tnks’, “HBD”, and “Ty”, be intentional about it.

“Hello friend, It has been a great deal having you in my life…” - make more intentional statements.

I remember my friend who bought a laptop for me because, in a season of my life, I couldn’t afford one. I am forever grateful because I learned like no other in that season and I am reaping the fruits today and he would too.

Then…

Then there’s the familiarity complex, “he’s my friend nau”, and “She’s my mom nau”, due to this unnecessary entitlement mentality, we miss out on gratitude perks. I know our parents have a responsibility, “Us” and then our friends would be willing to make sacrifices for us but, humans love to feel special and remembered especially for the contributions and marks they made in other people's lives.

I hope this helps someone reading this!

Till we meet again!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Yo! How are you and how have you been? How’s 2024? The shege and heat right?😂 I saw a meme about specific heat sapacity 😂 Nigerians would always cruise about everything. Crossing 2023 to 2024, I lost my major paying Job (non-tech) and survived. It helped alot because I wanted to get my mind off other things and focus on tech fully, you know that moment when you are both sad and happy at the same time 😂

Enough about that, I just wanted to catch up with you cos you aren’t the only one facing stuff. Now to the major!

16000fts Huh?

I happened to fly with my team to Abuja for a robotics competition (click for more about the competition). It was my first time flying and yeah the experience has stuck with me. The moment the plane took off the ground, my mind flew also. I just felt this numbness to all the problems that were on my mind while on the ground. All I could see was clouds, the sun, birds, and the beautiful views of nature. It’s really beautiful up there! But you need to get there in your mind.

I am writing this not to brag or prove a point, rather it’s strictly to enlighten you and you will get the message soon.

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2024, A year of suffering or pleasure?

I cannot answer for you because even if I do, you have your answer already, all I can do is provide plausible evidence that proves or disproves your answer.

When I saw this image, I got a message and decided that I was gonna share it with you. This is simply a young boy, and as you can see there are lots of other things in the picture but he chose to focus his attention on the future version of him.

I remembered saying I lost my job entering the new year, Many people would have called that bad luck or said “Omo this 2024 go hard”.

When a door closes, we are often blinded that we do not see another door open unannounced.

Just imagine I focused on the job I lost, I won’t even be writing you today.

Remember in my last article when I told you that this year you would need more than motivation, pats on the back, etc. Everybody went to their various religious places to get fortified for the new year and many times, fortification can be as simple as ‘information’. This information should make you a mindset (sort of like a shield) that you carry about.

This shege touches everybody! but how to respond to things is more important than the thing that happened. I learned this growing up. How the wealthy are reacting to changes in economic tides is different from how the poor do.

I want you to look in the mirror like that young boy and see yourself, not the present you but the future you! You can write it down in your notepad and make you daydream it for as long as you can because it must be more real to you than the heat, sapa, mosquitoes, hunger, etc that you are facing. Daily envisioning who you will become will help you get there faster! I can assure you. Aside from envisioning, the distance between the current-you and the future-you is transformation, there is a body of knowledge and experiences that can catapult your growth, this is your next line of pursuit!

My friend and reader, you need that delulu because the delulu sometimes can be the solulu.

delulu is a slang word for imagination, solulu is a slang word for solution.

Your words build your world

I don’t believe in mere luck, I believe in favor. I don’t think things happen by coincidence, there’s a divine orchestration behind certain things.

This year guys, They are gonna test us frr

We just entered Q2 and see all the things that have happened already! From the good to the bad and even the ugly.

Motivations won’t work this year, you need deeper things! You need INSPIRATION and convictions!

You need to speak positively as touching your life and everything you love. You need to have phrases that have been engraved on your mind, so when you’re going through tough stuff you can use it to inspire and remind yourself of where you are headed.

Speaking positively would not just improve your self-esteem but make you a better person.

Stop regrets! :- “I wish I was never born in Nigeria or this family sef”

Now that you are here what are you doing about it?

Speak: “I am a gift to Nigeria and my family, One day I will be celebrated for my contributions to national transformation”.

Stop insults:- “I am stupid and a simple idiot for making this mistake”

Great people make great mistakes, what separates them is that they learn from them.

Speak:- “I know my weakness now, and I will work on it. I am a work in progress and would avoid such mistakes in future”.

Don’t just speak, work too! Faith without work is dead! As you’re speaking, pursue transformation!

I hope you found value in this, and I hope you start applying these asap! I can’t wait to celebrate you in greatness!

See you in the next newsletter!

Your hotbreadly,

Youngancient.

Happy New Year in advance.

Writing you these articles has been a pleasure; I am grateful you find them helpful. Due to my busy schedule, I reduced to 2 articles per month, which might reduce to just one article per month from 2024. There might be no article in January (It’s an academically dangerous month 😂), but expect these articles from February!

Today I write with a burden as always, I advise reading every section because everything forms a mosaic. It’s gonna be a long read.

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How was 2023?

Some days ago, I was asked this question at a hangout with my inner-circle friends. It was an open-ended question, and hence quite hard to answer because I mean “Where do I start from?😭”

My focus here isn’t 2023 cos it’s ending in 2 days, but follow me.

Highlights of 2023: I made meaningful connections, I contributed value for free, Volunteered like never before, and I grew!

Phew! I went through a lot this year and a lot went through me. You too right?😂

2024 is your year of ??

It’s that time of the year when people are getting supercharged for the new year. Through attending camps, going to vigils, praying, sacrificing, taking pills, and other different means people use to supercharge. These people then begin to write crazy things down, they call it “Goals for the year”. Wow, goals for the year? some of them even go as far as writing one other crazy thing called “New Year's resolutions”.

Are these things bad? No! Different people have what works for them and I am also super pumped for 2024 but there’s something I want to point out.

Many people like fake phone batteries at 100% start out the year and in February, they already forgot the things they wrote down. Sometimes when they look at the things they wrote, it is like they were high on drugs when they noted them.

Some persons reading this are seeking motivation so they might go and write those crazy things, sorry boss! no motivation for you!

I hate motivations because they are short-lived. Imagine a smoker taking hemp, that brief time where he feels high, and then sometime later, it wears off. This is exactly how motivation works. It wears off! and then you are left with YOU.

You might read a book like “How to Become Elon Musk” and be motivated, then you go ahead and start doing crazy things, then when reality gives you 2 - 3 hard knocks, it wears off and you are back to the normal you.

Do you know why?

Inspiration is what you need first! Whatever inspires you should be taken seriously. Inspiration lasts longer and works more intrinsically. When you are inspired, it affects your state of being and challenges you to be a better version of yourself. When you are inspired, you think more deeply about yourself.

Do you want to do 2024 like 2023? Do you want to keep seeking motivation now and then?

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Chief, Pls cut soap for me!

“How do I get inspiration?”, this is the question you might be asking in your hearts, yes! I have an answer.

Remember when you were young and had to fetch water using kegs and containers? (if you’re a rich kid, you might not relate to this, but picture a young child carrying a keg of around 30 - 50 liters on their head or hands) Sometimes the distances were far and carrying those heavy containers, oh boy! can be painful!

Many times, from the place we fetch water, we picture our houses and with that picture, we start marching to our destination. Though the pain is there, we have something greater than that pain, the picture (inspiration!). On some occasions, it could be a punishment or there might be rewards attached to it. So we often picture ourselves with the end reward while going through the present pain, and that picture remains strong in our mind until the annoying wide drum is filled 😂😭

If you can relate to this, you have been inspired before! You had a vision of where you are headed, and this vision created a mental bandwidth of tolerance which made you withstand the pain you went through.

Do you have a life vision? Have you sat down to imagine your future before? What value would you like to add to this world? When you close your eyes what version of you do you see?

I know that you say “Delulu is the Solulu” but you need to imagine these things vividly. These questions are thought-provoking questions that would help build that mental picture that you need to get inspired for 2024.

Live like it’s the last you’ve got

I learned this from a friend in secondary school.

Do you want the best in 2024? Live like this is the last 365 days you’ve got.

Imagine the doctor says, “Oh you’ve got 365 days, to live”, how exactly would you spend those days? Making impact? Spending money and traveling the world?

To live to the fullest, you have to picture that you have 365 days only left!

Of course, for me, it’s all about building and making an impact! We are in different seasons of our lives, so make the best use of it! Keep connected to your source of inspiration because you would need motivation sorry, inspiration!!

I hope this has provided a guide on which you can pedestal to doing great stuff in the coming years!

Visions rule the world not Ideas!

God bless and happy new year in advance!

See you in 2024!

Yours Hotbreadly,

Youngancient❤

Shoot for the Moon. Even if you miss, you'll lang among the stars.

~ Norman Vincent Peale

I started with this phrase because it has been my guiding lamp in my pursuits this year. By the time you’re reading this, it will be December 1, I will have completed another 365-day-cycle and I have been thinking about what to write about because tbh there are lots of things but I settled for this because it meets the perfect timing.

“Humble beginnings with Pride” is quite a confusing topic yeah? You might be asking right now, what did this guy cook?

ou need to read till the end to get the point and I hope you do!

Happy new month guys!

Share Young & Ancient

“Am I a failure?”

Every birthday, I always set goals for the year that serve as a success metric for that year and recently I looked at it and I was quite disappointed. I barely achieved half of what I wrote but there were many things which I didn’t write but I achieved also. Some of you might have done better or even worse, my point here is that if you start feeling bad and comparing yourself with others, you are only weakening your self-esteem.

I sit down to write my accomplishments for the year what I couldn’t and why I couldn't. FYI, Self-analysis is more important than photoshoots.

When you fail, analyzing why you failed, taking steps to get better, and taking those steps is what makes you wonder!

1% per day

This isn’t a mediocre approach to success but a healthy way of pushing yourself to do more.

Imagine getting 1% better for a month, that’s 31% a month. In a year, that’s 365%.

1% Self-improvement every day is very powerful. Our problem is we want to do 100% in 1 week because we were motivated or challenged. This isn’t bad, but you need to be patient and understand that growth is organic.

For instance, in the tech space, we see people earning $12k and you are still on $50 per month. Those earning that high have years of experience that might be older than you 😂 and lots of difficult seasons too.

Last year, I took a course titled CS50, which is a Havard open course for those interested in software engineering. Prof David Milan always said something that has stuck with me; “What matters at the end of this course is how better you become compared to how you were at the beginning”.

Think of it this way, Compared to your goals, you might be far, but compared to where you are coming from, you have gone far!

1% improvement per day can change a lot about you!

Completion not Competition

I was talking to a fresher on campus one day and I shared something which I feel I should also share with you. Don’t fret, it’s not academic advice 😂 I stopped giving academic advice because I suck at it!

Remember Prof Viru Sahastrabudhhe's first speech in 3 Idiots, “Life is a Race”, so many people still have this mindset. They are of the school of thought that they need to be better than people because they see them as the competition. They always have a rush of adrenaline when they see their so-called rival or opponent getting better and hence they do all they can to get better.

If you are in that shoe right now, you are injuring your heart and judging your goals and fulfillment based on someone else.

Currently, they say I am the BGS of my department (I hate to write this but allow! I want to make a point😂), have a so-called high GPA and the truth is right from 100lvl till now (300lvl) I have never seen someone as a competition! Now, don’t get me wrong, some highly intelligent people are studious! (shey I dey read sef lmao😂) but I see myself as the competition! My goals challenge me!

Let people inspire you, let people help you! See people as ladders who help you get to your destinations and not stepping stones that you crush underfoot to rise!

When you see people excelling greatly in areas in which you desire to rise, learn from them and rise! They are here to make you complete and not compete! This is why most of us make enemies and rivals from the competition instead of strong allies and connections.

Humble beginnings but with pride?

Reading this article, some of you have different things running through your mind. “Have I progressed?” “Am I good enough?” “How far are better days from my current location?”, we always ask ourselves these questions and most times the answer is a heavy sigh.

I am here not to help answer those questions but to help you become an answer.

What are you doing today? What risks are you taking? What risks are you not taking? What decisions are you making? What decisions are you not taking? Is it worth it to think and think without actions? Are you facing your fears? Are you better than the You who started the year? How many percent did you increase by this year? What are you grateful for?

These are questions that I ask myself and the answer most times is not from your lips but your life!

FIY, The worst risk is not taking any risks and the worst decision is indecision.

I know most of us say ‘'Humble beginnings’ But hope it’s a beginning you are gonna be proud of! Stop giving up on every single thing! Your beginning counts, your process matters! Make humble beginnings that you would be proud of!

Be an answer to many questions people are asking, questions Families, Nations, and the world are asking.

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Some time ago, I read Simon Sinek's book "Start with Why." It was a worthwhile read and it sharpened my sense of defining the purpose of things. I now make it a priority to define the purpose of my relationships, the people I engage with, my projects, and almost everything I do – even watching Netflix 😂.

The ‘Why’ of anything is as important as the thing itself.

Why is one of the most important questions people ask, asking why means making an inquiry into the purpose of the existence of a thing or context.

Why School?

Today, I ask why school? A huge percentage of freshmen get into college without asking themselves or understanding the purpose of why they are in school. Please don’t expect me to say “to learn” or to do blah blah blah, I mean we are in the 21st century for crying out loud! I do not need a degree to learn, what happened to Youtube, Coursera, Udemy, and the rest!

If the purpose of the university was simply “to learn” then I think I would pick YouTube and the likes over it because there are no Wicked lecturers, no threats, no stiff-necked tests, and no uncountable slides 😂.

Chill a little bit, we are just getting our feet wet!

This article is not an argument to dissuade the idea of traditional schooling and support their online counterparts, if you are thinking so already, You are wrong.

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What Many people say

Many people may have defined the university as a place where you learn, but until you have your definition, you haven’t understood its essence.

I am writing this to you because I found my definition of ‘Why school?’. My definition is just ‘a definition’ not ‘the definition’. I will share it and then you can go on to discover what school is to you, that is my main goal for this article.

A little story

During my secondary school days, I was a bright scholar who aced every subject (as it should be 😎) but I had flawed thinking - ‘school was a place to get good grades and come out the best’. I really didn’t have so many friends and those who were supposed to be my friends were like competitors because I lacked good understanding. I was simply fueled by my desire to get As and did I get it? Yes! But am I proud of myself in general? for the results, Yes but for other things, No.

My typical school life was simple, I was the lab prefect so I was always at the lab. Stabbed classes but read the topics on my own at the lab, alone. I had 2 reading partners (girls) but I wasn’t the social type.

Pause…

If I had continued that life till now, I would be a nerdy first-class student, who sees any highflyer as a competition and still be a loner.

But, God did!😂

For real! God did! Apart from becoming a more devoted Christian, I began reading books and these books shaped my mindset for good!

Books like “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”, “Why the A students work for the C students” and many other interesting pieces.

Please note that I come from a strong academic background and due to lack of exposure, I never saw beyond certain levels. After the mind stretch and all, I changed. The change wasn’t instant but gradual.

• I became more jovial and more accommodating.

• I began to see myself as the competition, not people.

• I began to work on myself and build self-worth and value.

• I began to understand certain pivotal principles of life.

I shortened the list to not bore you. Lots of things changed and I am really grateful they did.

Coming to the university, I wanted to live a balanced life. Although, e never balance yet 😂 but you get, I wanted to have a mix of both a healthy social life and an academic life. But at this point, work wants to kill me and school is after my life 😭😂.

What school is to me

This shouldn’t be your definition but if you love it and see its importance, you can adopt it because I adopted it from someone else.

‘People’ are the center of attraction in my school pursuits. I am not the all-friendly type, but I am gaze-fixed on experiencing what I defined above.

Great minds connect on campus, future partners (business or marriage) meet on campus, and so many beautiful things happen!

The pressure to get a 5.0 died when I knew this and all I began doing was an off-shoot of that purpose.

So many of you reading this are under serious pressure from life, parents, friends, society, and even yourself.

The truth is nobody cares about you like you, take your life and decisions as a priority. Don’t let this external pressure kill you early.

Lastly

Everyone comes to the university for a purpose, whether you know it or not, believe it or not. All you have to do is discover it and begin to consciously live in that reality.

It’s all in your hands.

God bless!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

Today’s article is earnest and requires thorough reflection.

I am glad to write to you again! Thank you for coming.

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Let’s dive in

In the morgue, most attendants there barely know the names of the corpses. In fact, 1second after a person dies, he/she loses the title and name. You hear things like “the deceased”. Suppose Mr A went to the hospital ill, Doctors refer to him as Mr A but the moment he dies, he is called ‘deceased’ or ‘corpse’ not Mr A because the actual Mr A is now gone.

What does this mean?

The moment one dies, his mind which is the software that runs his system leaves the body. The mindset that runs the body is gone hence it loses it’s identity as who it was before death.

The difference between you and a thug, or terrorist is simply Mindset.

What is Mindset?

Mindset is the software of one’s life. Mindset is the combination of 2 words; Mind and set, which means the position of the mind on life issues.

Your mindset is the set of beliefs that run the vehicle of your life. Our mindset can be influenced by people and experiences.

So permit me to ask,

What do you believe?

Do you really believe strongly that you can make it?

Looking at how the naira is falling hard, do you believe you can break through financially?

Your parents aren’t the supportive type and you have to get everything yourself, do you believe you can be a better parent?

Do you believe in you?

Do you believe that you have potentials but they are just hidden?

Do you believe that your future would be better than your past?

I have so many questions you can reflect upon but let’s start from this. When I started writing this blog, I had 1 major goal, I wanted to enlighten people and help shape their mindset, and that birthed this blog.

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What you believe is powerful!

A belief starts from a thought.

Thought → Belief → Mindset

There are generally accepted thought patterns that do not go down well with me because I subscribed to a higher mindset. Here are some examples:

1. “Life no balance”: Life is balanced. Look at water cycles and life cycles. Life is a mirror that reflects who we are and the seeds we are sowing.

2. “Last last we go dey alright”: Bro, Sis, nothing go dey alright if you don’t work things out. Most people say this when they can’t do anything and I understand but are you really sure you have done all you can? Things don’t change by themselves, only changed men change things.

3. “Luck”: This is personal but I don’t believe in luck. In my mind, it doesn’t exist. I don’t believe things just happen by mistake or ‘luck’, it was thoroughly planned out by God. I have had close-to-death situations in my life and I know this can’t be mere luck.

4. “Money is wealth”: Money is not wealth! Wealth is character! A wealthy man can be broke ( without money for a period) but his mindset is what defines his wealth.

There are a lot more but maybe some other day. What you believe is really powerful, it happens who you are and what you become. Can you try to sit and analyze your beliefs? I know the hustle and bustle is really high but it’s just a strategy to make you less-intentional about your mind.

Think about life and you see that resources don’t flow to those who do physical hard work, rather, they flow to those who do mind-work.

Work on your mindset today, and have a productive mind!

God bless you and see you in the next blog!

Yours Hotbreadly,

Youngancient.

Starting this blog article, I do not know what to give as its title, but I guess before the end, I should have gotten one. I have drafts of real comprehensive expositions (which are yet to be completed 😂) but while having my bath today, I thought to give to write something inspiring.

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Take Note

My school will be resuming next month, hence, from October I will be writing twice a month. This is simply because I am involved in a lot of things (Work, school, programming, volunteering, etc.) so I need the first month of resumption to find a balance. If there are any changes moving on, I will surely let you know. You are really important to me, that’s why I am explaining to you.

Ok, let’s Gist 😂🚀

August was quite a lot for me. I partook in National and cross-border hackathons and came out as part of the winners. It was really tough you know, you don’t want to hear the story frr. September has also been a lot, last week was really exhausting for me and I have been on medication since this week trying to recover from the stress and getting prepared for school resumption.

Why am I gisting you? Oga I am a human abeg 😂 The message I am going to pass today is really simple and I love how I started.

Last week, I wrote about taking a break and I did. I have been sleeping for like 250hours per day and watching Anime. I also work but It has been shallow, I have bundles of tutorials to finish, and I even have 32 hrs and 24 hrs blockchain course 😂 that I plan on finishing but body no be firewood abeg 😂. I know some people are like why are writing like this today? Sometimes we tend to be so hard on ourselves that we forget we are humans and need to care for ourselves. I have a really mad work ethic, but when it’s time to play Omor 😁.

I watched an anime ‘Dr. Stone’ (pardon me Anime haters), it was really inspiring for me. I just want to draw a few lessons and ‘wrap it up’ (in Layi’s voice).

Story time!

Dr Stone

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Here is the goated prodigy of the story. The story goes thus: Modern civilization was wiped out by a strange alien force, and all humans were petrified and turned to stone when there was a strange rain of fluid from the sky. The world started again from the Stone Age and his father was part of the pioneers of that age. He (Dr. Stone) was a real prodigy skilled in scientific wisdom. He began to craft innovations and build inventions to solve problems using science. He had to build everything from scratch! because the world was in the Stone Age.

What lessons do we get from this?

I can’t tell you the full story, my point here is the lessons.

‘If you can think it, you can become it, you can build it

Dr Stone was a really good scientist in the modern world (before petrification) but even in the Stone Age, He was more than excellent. The basis of any invention is Imagination. There were things he could do in the modern age very easily but after their predicament, it took him years to do. But one thing never died, his thoughts, his gaze was so fixed on them so much that he never saw anything.

Just like him, here you are in a world filled with predicaments. You don’t know why you were born in Nigeria, or why your family is not rich like the Dangotes but what are your thoughts? Have you thought better than the predicaments to see solutions and things you can do? What do you want to become and is the world stopping you? Nothing can stop a man who has fixed his gaze on a thing.

Humanity is the hope of humanity

It takes a human to destroy, it takes another human to rebuild. It takes a human to kill, it takes another to cure. Humanity is the hope of humanity. As long as humans exist, no matter how bad things get, it would take another human to fix the mess. Yes we have God, but God won’t come down, he would send men.

Resilience is a key to lasting success

No matter how good you are at whatever you do, resilience plays a very important role. Our world today is filled with people who give up so fast. You see two people confessing love to each other yesterday and today they have broken up. You see marriages breaking, people in fear, and so many other things. To pull through this world, you need to be dogged and persistent. You could fail many times but because you have a vision at heart, your gaze is fixed.

Succession is key

Passing down systems and structures from generation to generation is a viable force in combating wickedness. We are where we are today because our parents didn’t play the succession game well but those bad guys take succession very seriously.

Succession is simply continuity while you are gone. In whatever good stuff you are doing today, stop playing god, and start thinking of how to pass it down to generations after you, else once you die, it dies also. Succession is a serious topic and I will write on it later.

Visions rule the world not ideas

I learned this from my spiritual father, but I have found this to be true.

Growing up, we thought that Ideas rule the world, this is a half-truth. Scientists who came up with inventions like the Bulb, cars, telephone, etc. weren’t idea-driven rather, they were vision-driven. For example, Thomas Edison wanted to conquer the night, and Karl Benz wanted to run faster than a horse. The same goes for the technologists in our time. Elon Musk wanted to expand consciousness to other planets, Satoshi Nakamoto wanted a system of transparency in transactions, and Vitalik Buterin wanted agreements to be trustless.

Vision is the ‘why’ which pushes inventors to the wall. Ideas come as off-shoots of vision, just like a tree has branches, Ideas are the branches of vision. So what vision are your ideas flaunting?

I hope with these few points of mine I have been able to convince you and not confuse you …😂

You learned a lot right? Yh I challenge you!

Think about these things, God bless.

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

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I started this topic with the intention of simply apologising and taking a day off writing articles, but this is a message I felt I could touch on a little.

Are you feeling burnt out? Have you subjected yourself to so much pressure and you are beginning to break? Is your code not working? Are your steps leading to more misery? If it seems like each action you take is getting you deeper into more mess?

You need something, A day off!

Take a day off.

Before losing you, save you! You are the most important, be reminded that your emotional, spiritual, mental, and physiological well-being are your top priorities and when you begin to lose it, please take a day off.

You are not a mess! you are just in a mess. You need to time out to appreciate how far you have come and gather yourself to go through the stormy days.

Take a day off.

A day off your problems, off that thing that keeps pissing you off. Ignore it! Assume it’s not there, You do not need alcoholic substances or any illicit substance for this, you can do this intentionally.

If you don’t know, you are important, yes you! you are not as bad as you think you are.

To be honest, taking a day off works like magic for me because when I resume, I always attempt the problems from a different perspective and it turns out the issue was that I couldn’t think straight at all because I was getting all worked out by the circumstances.

Take a day out, rejuvenate, restart, reboot!

I am especially rooting for you!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoiungAncient.

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(Please note that from October there will be a change in schedules, the newsletters might come in two-week intervals especially because my school will be resuming, please bear with me )

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Fix that bug 🐞

Person: “Why do you keep doing this bad thing?”

A guy: “That’s how I am bro, it’s my attitude, I can’t change it so get used to it”

Person: “Is this how you behave?”

A lady: “Yes, I have been like this for a long time, you have to manage me”

The fact that you have remained untransformed for a long time doesn’t make you correct. Every bad attitude is a defect in society and you need to fix them.

So many people have lots of excuses for keeping and nurturing bad things in their lives such as toxicity, abusiveness, rudeness, uncleanliness, pornography, etc.

There are bugs in your character!

Let’s talk programming

As a programmer, after writing code, I expect it to behave in some manner but many times, I get errors, these errors are usually called ‘'bugs’. I fight tooth and nail to fix every single damn bug in my program till it attains 100% completeness! There were times I had to rewrite the whole thing from scratch or use debugging tools to find out where exactly the bugs were. There are times when I know where the bug is but I cannot fix it, I google it and many times find answers on the net.

This is how flexible I am as a programmer and I cherish feedback a lot! I always iterate on them to improve what I am building. But as humans, we become static and start taking feedback as insults. “Can you say this in a kind way next time?”, “Oh, so I am rude?”, “I cannot be kind because the world isn’t kind to anybody” - These are examples of how stiff-necked people can become and find quotes, wise sayings, and facts to back up their lack of transformation and character deformity. If you are one of them, You are wrong!

You are damn wrong because you were not always like this and this is not the best you can be (I challenge you). Fix that bug!

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Debugging

This is the art of analyzing a piece of code to discover the main cause of a bug.

I do this all the time when I run into bugs while programming.

There’s a real-life bug and you need to apply this skill. You don’t have to be a programmer, all you need to do is think carefully and do a few things.

Sit down with yourself one Saturday morning and analyze the defects you have, the negative effects it has, and your resolutions to fixing them.

You don’t need to be Omni-knowest, you can consult friends, mentors, family members, or anyone you trust, share your bugs with them and they might prefer solutions that work. You can read books on subject matters touching the defect, listen to podcasts, watch YouTube videos, and many more.

When my program bugs are not fixed, I get really desperate. I persist! Although some bugs take weeks to fix don’t expect immediate fixing of the bugs, some take months too, Take your time!

The main thing is that you are not coming to terms with this defect and making it ‘yours’, rather you are seeking and trying to fix them. When they are beyond your power, take them to God, He created you so He has the upper hand.

Don’t settle for less, Persist!

Your’s Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

(Sorry today’s blog came late, I traveled to Lagos for an event. I had written it a night before but I just got to publish it now! Thank you!)

Discussion of the day

Why are you not thankful?

Do you think? Can you sit down one Saturday afternoon to reflect? I realized a long time ago that many people barely think. They just go about their daily activities and do not reflect. This is bad. Wealthy and most influential people think! They are thinking tanks.

I barely cry to life situations and it’s been a while since that happened. But many times when I take time to reflect, I am always moved to tears. The reason is that we don’t know how far we have come from where we are coming from, we are too busy measuring up to social media advisers, social media standards and statuses, and achievements of people who you know nothing about their down-times. We are so occupied with that that we lose ourselves.

You see, the way this world works is such that everyone keeps looking to become like others. Nobody cares about the process again talkless of gratitude. Speaking of gratitude, I am not just saying someone gifted you 5k and you thank the person and God, I am talking about gratitude as a lifestyle where things don’t work out as planned and yet you are grateful. Things are bad and yet you are grateful. You are to be thankful to God, yourself, people, systems, and structures in general.

The endpoint of gratitude is that you will receive more!

Be grateful to YOU! I know many people don’t do this. Many people wish they could take up some other person’s life, I have been there before right, and I know how it can be but you are breaking yourself and will soon lose you. But do you know one thing, you can lose everyone but will always have God and You. Friends leave but you cannot leave yourself. If you understand this, your self-esteem will seriously increase because you see yourself for who you are and appreciate the gift that you are without seeking external congruence. One day (start today), take a timeout off your busy schedules and think about yourself, how you go through difficult situations, how you pulled through when nobody believed you or was there, in fact, you will hug yourself I promise 😂 Many things will happen and one is that you will begin to appreciate the little important things you have been missing. (Note: This practice is best done before a mirror, start with “Jude, I just want to say thank you …” - but your name and don’t rush, just think, it will flow!).

Be grateful to God.

This goes more than literally saying “Thank you” in prayers, it is more of like a posture you take. The truth is we receive many things some people were denied, and many times it’s not because we are somewhat special but because of God! Any small thing “God abeg😌. God when 😫” and then all your prayers are you bombarding God with your requests. Think for one minute that you are Him, and analyze how grateful you have been for your life and others, would you still bless you? (reflect without any biases).

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Be grateful to friends

Don’t just keep collecting and collecting, get them things, send them lovely messages, and appreciate the good they have done, and what they represent in your life. Complement people! Contribute to them (don’t think of money first).

Be grateful to systems and structures.

In life, we get grafted into systems and structures majorly as a platform to be trained, to serve, and to work. I have been through training systems myself and would keep getting immersed in more but many of us take these things for granted because we don’t understand what it takes, the resources involved in organizing things like that. Be grateful because someday, you might pioneer one,  and having a changed mind about it now would help you when the time comes.

In all things, give thanks. Be grateful!

Start today!

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.

It’s Friday!

Before we go into the topic of discussion, I noticed that the email open rate has reduced over time. This is because many people don’t check their emails, so I implore you to share links to the article, your statuses, and stories, and tell a friend about this blog.

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Today’s topic is an interesting one because it touches everyone. We will be talking about relationships and before you help me conclude, there’s no emphasis on romantic relationships 😂 because when people hear the word ‘'relationship’ what comes to their mind is two people, a guy and a lady doing lovey-dovey.

In this first part, we will be talking majorly about relationships while the second part will do justice to the *winning with relationships” part.

Relationship huh?🤔

There are many ships in life, they are; companionship, situationship, companionship, friendship, relationship, etc.

Relationships are the building block of society because a family today started as a relationship between a husband and a wife.

A relationship is simply the state of being connected with a person or people.

Lonely at the bottom, lonely lonely lonely!

On the issue of forming relationships, people are failing woefully.

Notice how everyone wants to associate with those who are now successful. If you think like this, you are not bad, you are only plagued by the problem we want to solve today.

Most people want to make friends with those in higher ranks than them, once you become popular, you now have a large number of people who want to be your friends. But when you were at the bottom, you were lonely! Clear studies have shown that 90-95% of people who come to you after you become successful are after your success, your wealth, etc.

When the purpose of a thing is not established, abuse is inevitable.

This often leads to abusive relationships where one party uses the other or exploits the other.

See in life, there will always be 3 kinds of people in your life:

1. Those above you.

2. Those on your level.

3. Those under you.

You need to be able to form relationships with these 3 categories to maintain balance.

Most of us ignore numbers 2 and 3 and are so focused on 1!

1. Those above you: These are people who seem to be in your future now. This means those who have exceedingly advanced or gone ahead of you. They usually serve as mentors, investors, and role models. They are the most sought-after.

2. Those on your level: These are people who are in your now! They are the most neglected. There are people who are going through similar struggles as you, those in your current season of transformation. Those here are capable of friendship. Examples are co-workers (in the same department), classmates(note: some of them may be in the first category), etc. Different people have different specialties and talents so you can excel better in an aspect where they don’t and vice-versa.

   But why do you neglect them?

   The Bible has the story of a man Joseph, who was in the dungeon for a certain season of his life and from a prisoner became a prime minister! Damn!

   This is the perfect person to use because some of you had people like this in your life who were on the same level for some seasons and suddenly they rose to the first category but you never built a solid relationship with them.

   Imagine that you were one of the prisoners with Joseph in the dungeon, would you have treated him differently? would you have known that he would be a prime minister? if you knew, how would you have treated him?

   The answers to these questions are a reflection of how you treat this category of people in your life now. Instead of you to force yourself to be valuable, and be friends with those who have their gaze so fixed on the future that you can almost see it through their eyes, you keep pursuing those in the first category because you do not have a sense of recognition.

3. Those under you: These are those currently in seasons you have gone through. They face challenges you have gained mastery over. Many of you look down on them and this is wrong. The fact that they are under you does not mean they cannot rise! It is a good thing to contribute to their rising.

To understand how to win with relationships, you must master these 3 categories of people and how to relate with them.

Have you been blinded by your desperation for a higher level that you do not discern people beyond their current circumstances?

Take time to reflect on these things, God bless.

YoungAncient.

I am glad to be writing you again, it’s a pleasure. Today we will consider something which is quite trivial but very important.

Dangers of success? What do you mean?

Success is who you become as you get to where God has made for you ~ Tobi Biyi

I know this definition is not what you are familiar with but this is truth. Success is who you become*. I know in Africa, we have been trained to be consumers hence we tend to judge success from the lens of materialism, while that is a possibility that is not what success is about. Success is about *becoming and not *possessing. Becoming who is needed or relevant for solving problems. This does not mean you should not aspire to perspire and maguire but the main drive of your pursuit shouldn’t be materialistic. The world's richest man, Elon Musk, more the billions he has, is pursuing a cause and that has been his drive.

What do I mean by dangers of success?

In past blogs, I have talked a lot about failure but I haven’t talked about success and if this is the first time I am blogging about this subject, why do I start with a not-so-good tone? (What are my aims and objectives? ~ in lasisi voice 😂)

Ok, I agree Success is good, happy now?🤐

When I mean dangers of success, I am not *totally insinuating that success is bad, I am only saying as you pursue to obtain there are some things to keep in mind. You get right?

I support love this quote because it puts it in the right way.

Success does one thing, It makes you happy and gives you a sense of satisfaction. This quenches your desire and thirst for more and hence makes you complacent. Failure unlike success, keeps us fighting, with sleepless nights, praying hard, and that hunger remains at an all-time high but the moment success trickles in, we start having sleepful nights, less prayer, and much complacency. You might say “nah, that’s not me” but this is everyone! Even me 😂

I am not castigating you, I am only pointing out an area of ourselves that we need to work on.

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Do you know why we start becoming complacent?

Maybe we didn’t dream big enough? Maybe all you wanted was money for yourself and your family but If you would have $ 10 million would it be just for your family? Would God give you such so you can buy cars, houses, host parties, etc., and enjoy life, is that not the definition of what most of us have as what a good life is? Don’t you have a sense of contributing to national development and transformation?

I know there are lots of things you believed to be success as a child but let’s grow up. We weren’t called to live life for ourselves alone. The fact that you have believed something for long doesn’t mean it is true! It could be wrong!!

What if?

What if this wasn’t the best of you? What if you could be more? What if you could do more? Will an African somewhere someday be grateful they came in contact with you? Will you be a blessing to someone someday? What if you have been belittling yourself? What if you didn’t dream big enough? Will $1 million be enough to quench your dream or vision?

Watch world wealthy men, the more they have, the more impactful and busy they get. The dangers of AI and the digital economy are people losing their sense of vision and capacity to be human. People would become so lazy, do anything for money and not think anymore.

“Ise kekere, 1 billion” this is a popular phrase and many have turned this to prayer, but my problem with this is that as a highly productive human, the more money you get, the more leverage you get to solve more problems, hence there’s no room for being slack!

Now what’s the balance? I am not against success, celebrating Wins and all, but that complacency that comes with it, bro! Never stop pushing, this is not the end!

Say to yourself “(Your name instead) Jude, This is not the best you can be!”

Yes, there’s more to you than you have seen! This version of you is a Joke compared to what God is making you into! Press on! Travaille!

God bless you and have a lovely weekend,

Yours Hotbreadly✌

YoungAncient.

This month is one of shedding weight and getting things right! Just wanted to remind you that your win is coming.

How do you learn?

As a secondary school student, I hated Organic chemistry with passion 😂 It was my most dreaded topic. Firstly it was too wide and the teacher who introduced us to the topic did a bad job.

This haunted me throughout my secondary school days and even in my final exams.

I often said to myself "I hate this topic" but I never defined why I hated it.

I found it funny that I enjoyed complex topics even in further maths but organic chemistry was a serious issue.

Later, I took time to define why I hated it and it was simply because I didn't understand it and then it was so wide a topic. And we fear what we don’t understand. Also, Such wide topics could be so overwhelming, especially for newbies or olodos like me 😂

Fast forward, I did my  UTME, and funny enough my Chemistry was the highest 😂 here it is:

Chemistry: 88

I expected maths to be the highest but it was chemistry, what I dreaded the most.

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If you think this article is about chemistry, UTME, or even academics, you are wrong but is it applicable to different sectors of life? Yes! Keep reading you LL see.

Organic chemistry sat me down one Saturday morning and said “You… I will kill you”😂

I decided to do an analysis as to why I hated the topic. It was simple, I hated it because firstly I didn’t know it and secondly, it was too large, not knowing it is too obvious as there is little to how cramming can help. So I had 2 reasons, hatred, and its volume, but I needed to pass the course regardless of whatever reasons I had. I decided to fix it. I drew up a 2-month plan breaking Organic chemistry into simpler units that I could study and evaluate per week. Then I got a handbook that totally changed my psychology toward this topic and instilled in me the enthusiasm to learn it. So my solution was simply reasoning from first principles and changing the wrong narrative I already had.

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The point is where am I going with this?

There are certain things you have tagged as impossible or too hard. You think you hate it but you haven’t understood why? You have shied away from it for too long. Don’t you think an analysis would do?

We live in an ever-learning world hence comes the need to *Know how to learn. There are certain things people say are difficult and this exists in all spheres of life, “Oh React is difficult”, “MAT 223 is difficult”. We are usually told this before trying and as they predicted, we reached a blocker but then we think this blocker is a validation of what we were told and then back out.

You need a different school of thought. These people are correct because the subject is indeed difficult, and most times some of them failed at it and accepted it. But this should not kill your zeal for exploration, the innovative drive we see in this world is a good example to note. These innovators and inventors explore subject matters which their predecessors failed at and as a product of zeal and hard work, they pushed through and broke records.

You are the limit of your mind!

The human mind is the most powerful asset every human has. The mind can learn anything but it faces the limitations defined by its owner. You are to wield the power of your mind to achieve greater results. I have been in situations where I had to learn technologies and apply them as quickly as possible, and the process did not change. I split the topic into achievable bits and begin to attack each fundamental piece. I ended up mastering something which I was a newbie to some weeks ago! Trust me when I say You are your own limit!

To the great man or woman reading this, You don’t know the capacity to which your mind can reach until you stretch it. Stretch it!

I will see you at the top!

YoungAncient.

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“There’s always light at the end of the tunnel,” Someone dear to me said this and it really sank deep. This line has refused to wear off my mind.

Recently. I have been trying to transition career-wise from academia to tech fully and it has been hectic frr. I got so many Ls that it got me thinking about what I was doing wrong 😂. The funny thing is that some companies won’t even reach out, they will just ghost you!

Apart from that, the current situation of the country is enough to downcast one’s emotions, I know right? But as we have learned before, The best of humanity is human. The government has disappointed us in many ways but the real challenge is when You disappoint you. Just walk on the road and see how frustrated and agitated people are, These times aren’t easy I tell you. But adversity is where leaders are made! Leaders are not born leaders they were made through situations and choices.

Can you see the light at the end of the tunnel?

I want you to know that you aren’t alone. You are loved and cherished by God. Yes you are young and trying to breakthrough, you need that Win terribly! I totally understand because I feel the same. You need to see the light at the end of the tunnel!

Have you been thrown down by so many Ls and failure? See that light at the end!

Petrol prices are increasing, university tuition fees increasing, foodstuff prices increasing and inflation has been crazy! But you don’t need to go crazy, see that light!

You need to impregnate your mind with this light and let it furnish your reality such that even in the face of adversity, it is too real than the situation.

I tried this and it worked! Daydream you need to! Envision the final destination while still far away because if you ask every runner, the secret to focus is setting your eyes on the finish line.

Some of us are hard workers, which means our problem is not laziness but then the darkness in the tunnel could be really intimidating. See that light!

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My Advice

Travel to the future with your mind and return with that light. Embed it in your mind and let it be too real than the present!

Please take a moment to Imagine! Travel to the end of the tunnel with your mind before your body gets there!

Don’t do things based on your mood! Be disciplined stop waiting for the right mood!

Be consistent, and keep on grinding! Don’t stop!

Be prayerful!! We do not succeed by our own strength, take God seriously!

Behave well and stop using the situation of the country as an excuse for your character deformity.

I believe in you and I am rooting for you.

(Special thanks to the beloved person who rekindled the subject in my mind, you are loved ❤)

Yours Only,

YoungAncient.

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Hmm, Failure?

I have constrained myself as a writer who writes by inspiration and the result of my constructs is to Liberate your mind and rid it of the damage it has been through. One of such damages is thinking “Failure is bad”, or “Mistakes are bad”.

Are you saying I should keep failing? If I keep making mistakes is that good?

I understand that you have many questions but trust me, as you read through, they will get answered. Read with your mind!

Research shows that those between the ages of 1 - 30 years are the bravest, most adventurous, and record-breaking in any sphere of life.

Life doesn’t end after 30, the issue is many things change like your taste for conquest/challenge, your enthusiasm for adventures, and many more. But we have been plagued while we were young.

A typical example is in our schools. While growing up, our parents scolded us for failing maths questions, our teachers even made a mockery of many who failed exams. Even those considered the best students, when they fail go through this trauma.

What trauma?

The state of thinking you are perfect and will never make mistakes.

This oftentimes leads to being overcareful, worrying, giving up quickly, or not even trying at all.

The funny thing is our society has acclimatized to this state because we now see that many of us want to associate with and create time for those already successful while we desert our friends who are still faced with the ups and downs of life.

If you have been deserted, don’t worry those who left were never meant for you in the first place. Move on with life and keep battling like a soldier.

Failing is good. Come to accept it. Take responsibility, analyze what you would have done better, and fix up.

The fear of failure kills faster than failure itself

Many of our dreams and visions have been choked by the fear of failure. Let me ask you, what really would happen if you fail? Is it what people will say that scares you or??

It is better to fail that not try at all

Not trying at all not only makes you a coward but adds regrets to it.

Allow me to say that You failed but you aren’t a failure. The difference between the two is that one after failing, does thorough cross-examination and gets back on his feet while the other accepts his failing as regular, doesn’t do anything about it, and remains down.

Remember my caveat is that you shouldn’t be foolish and jump at anything. Of course, be wise and apply wisdom in doing things, but don’t be so wise and think you can account for everything. Some of us haven’t launched our businesses, taken that scholarship, or proposed a hackathon project because we want it to be 101% okay. Even the military when planning an invasion of territories knows that not all plans/strategies work as expected and the main thing is knowing what to do when that failure sets in.

Even the apps we use like Twitter, and WhatsApp (pls don’t say thread 😂) have older versions and we are always asked to update to the latest because there are ways in which the former failed that’s why the latter was released, and trust me the latest version still has its failures too.

I once watched a discussion between a 7years old boy and a 70years old man, and one remarkable thing the man said which I will remember like forever is (paraphrasing) :

See yourself as an app that has versions. Even if the whole world hates you and curses you for your failures/mistakes Love yourself, love the version that you currently are, and do all you can to upgrade to a better version of Yourself.

Yours Hotbreadly,

YoungAncient.