"THERE IS NO PASSION TO BE FOUND PLAYING SMALL IN SETTLING FOR A LIFE THAT IS LESS THAN THE ONE YOU ARE CAPABLE OF LIVING"
- NELSON MANDELA
I like to think that the first factor that makes you an excerption in a crowd is the ability to see things differently.
Vox populi is not necessarily vox Dei. The very fact that the masses endorse something should to a superior thinker, bring a cause for rumination
It is being paraded that getting a PVC is the stamped act of creating a working system. It has never been so, at least not in Nigeria, but that isn’t even the point
What you don’t see is the littleness in thinking that your liberty and the permission to perform at your next level of superior exchange is tied to the struggle you pass through to get a PVC
This, in itself, is another form of disempowerment; waiting for a messiah to come to save the day
I’m not saying that you shouldn’t get a PVC.
I am instead reinstating what Solomon taught in the Ecclesiastes:
Divide your portion among seven, or even eight,
for you do not know what disaster may befall the land.
Here are the things I’ll advise you to pay attention to instead
Get involved in the SDGs (It currently stands as the number one thing to have in the volunteering section of your resume, and there’s a lot of travel funding for it)- but you must be vigilant enough to join a body that is small enough to need you, but big enough for your work to matter. Take time to meditate on this
Get an international passport, please. You’ll be shocked at how many opportunities lie out there for you by virtue of your being a student. I’ll be sharing tons of them with you in my subsequent letters
Learn to see the advantages in your disadvantage; now is a good time to reach out to Professors abroad and easily get on their mentee list. The hack to achieving this is by either paying your way into their circle (via their buying books, or affiliating their sales if you happen to have a community you preside over already), or should it happen you have none of the aforementioned, then your reason for sending a cold mail to them should be born out of a need to help others and not you. Never you! I would love to read the problems you’re considering solving in the comment section and would add some advice or two on how best to pitch your story
I suppose that is enough writing for one morning. My friends from Harvard need my attention (and yes they’re girls! insert winks)
Sorry I haven’t written you in a while, my research work has been coming up too slowly for my liking, but I guess I’m back in my full glory now, or I at least like to think so, HaHa
Here’s to becoming the captain of your destiny and the master of your soul
I won’t stop rooting for you
All my best,
DD
Thanks for this.
Thanks for this.