In a digital-driven world where perception is influenced by social media trends and influencers, and where decisions and opinion even at a corporate level are driven by what the trend is on social media, it is easy for you to worry so much about what others think – to desire validation. While getting validation is not a bad thing on its own, worrying so much about it so that it seems that all your action and the satisfaction you derive is based on the validation you get from other people, colleagues, your spouse, your siblings, your followers on social media, and your friends is negative. Worrying so much about what others think about you and what you do takes objectivity out of your actions and decisions, because other than worrying about empirically measurable set objectives, you become subjective and worry instead about how someone or people would feel about A validation seeking mind is an emotion clouded one, and an emotion clouded mind is not a successful career ...
You never enjoy the value of the health, freedom and life you have until you are at the verge of losing it. There is always something to be grateful for. While it is noble to pursue career development and growth, to be a responsible family member and a model citizen, and a role model too; at the end of the day, we are all living life in the pursuit of happiness. For some, happiness is more money in the bag. For others, it is achieving set life goals and objectives. For others, it is raising a family. Whatever it is for you, try to enjoy it. Try to find happiness in it. Try to savour all the little pleasures life has to offer – within the borders of reason and common sense of course. If you don’t, when you have become much older, and your ability to enjoy life becomes much diminished, you absolutely would regret not enjoying life more when you could.
9 Years after my sojourn into advertising and marketing communications, the economic meltdown in my country Nigeria ensured that my office could not sustainably and profitably run with Fat Cats (figuratively and literally speaking) like me on the payroll, I resigned, took a sizable severance cheque, and in my ‘infinite’ wisdom, decided it was time I put in all my years of experience into starting my own business. I looked at the Marketing Communication “Red Ocean” in Nigeria, and identified a “Blue Ocean” and leapt into it, putting every other project in my life on hold. Some offers came occasionally, almost on a monthly basis, but I did not accept any, claiming it did not excite me enough, or that the pay was not good enough (Though I did do some consultancy ish for a couple of months) . But in my heart, the main reason I did not acceopt a full-time 8-5 gig was because I badly wanted to own and run my own business. I had some savings, but 6 months down t...
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