AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY II.

 A part 2 version of Sidney's retrospective journey at the graduate level.

Sidney Quartey, 2020

My life’s journey has been quite a bumpy one, this particular one of a higher education and leadership has not been traveled without losses.

It hasn’t been without pain and regrets and although now wrapped in meaningfulness, there were the times that it seemed rather blurry and gloomy. When I completed my first degree, I had very high hopes and expectations.

Like most of my colleagues, we wore our gowns with so much pride and fulfilment thinking to ourselves that we had finally arrived. The destination that pampers the elite class with luxurious living was almost in view. What could possibly stop us now? In our hands was the degree that we were promised would set us apart and land us our dream jobs without any qualms. Just like we did with our certificates, a good number of us had acquired drivers licenses in anticipation of our first cars.

It was rather amusing to learn that, while we were fantasizing about the future, life was smiling back at us and was even much eager to throw its unpleasant surprises at us.

We were yet to come to the realization that we were not prepared enough for what awaited us. We were not ready for the shocks, the disappointments, the betrayals, the failures and losses and nothing we had learned in the lecture halls had forewarned us of this.

We were yet to be hit with the reality that even with our first class honors and distinctions, we had to struggle to secure decent jobs, that although we know and understand jobs that would be assigned us, we were still going to spend months at home wondering why we were not retained after our national service.

We were yet to encounter what depression looked like, especially the profound kind that comes from not knowing what to do with your life, which direction to go, or the kind that comes from watching your colleagues topple over great jobs, ahead in life seemingly doing better and pursuing greater heights while you are still barely able to survive.

We were yet to experience the frustration that comes from trying over and over at reaching a goal with very little success and the helplessness that comes from being disappointed by bosses we devoted our lives to.

We were yet to figure out that as noble and commendable as it is, choosing to start a business comes with difficulties and challenges that scream tangible reasons why you should give up the moment you get an outstanding logo, stack of complimentary cards and your registration documents.

We were yet to understand that love was not enough to keep the woman that you love and soon someone richer was going to give our partners reasons why we were not good enough for them. Sadly, this epiphany would extend into our personal space and make us feel as though we’re not good enough for ourselves.

Life had so much in store for us and although we expected surprises to an extent, we didn’t think much of the extreme emotions and unpleasantness it would evoke and we were going to learn that the hard way.

I am writing this for my generation, for those who like me are still trying to figure out life and what to do with it, those of you who are still struggling to reach your goals in spite of all the reasons life has so far given you to settle.

This would be a memoir for successive generations who like us, are yet to be hit by life’s realities after school pending a review of the laxed approach by erstwhile governments at tackling teeming unemployment.

Before Leaving School and Completing National Service

Many of us left school with just wishes and dreams and that was going to be the first of our many regrets. Although we didn’t know for sure how our many wishes were going to happen, we were somehow very optimistic for happenstances but the world out there can be very cold and it has very little warmth for fantasies. Let me show you what I mean; when all you have to face life with are your hopes and aspirations, you don’t know for sure where exactly to seize the bull, if by the horns or the feet, you just want to seize it somehow but sadly, that is no way to survive in a world like ours. Life is not at all rosy and you can’t face the future as though it is waiting to embrace you because it’s not.

You don’t leave school to face the world with just wishes and dreams, you leave with definite goals and a clear sense of direction. You have to bear in mind that what lies ahead is an even tougher battle than any examinations you have written and so you can’t afford any indecisiveness.

Have a clear picture of where you want to end up and consider very carefully how you can reach there. Understand that you have not arrived yet as you are only beginning life and that requires all the seriousness you can muster. The only way you get ready to meet the future is to prepare for it and that is what the lots of us missed. Before we realized the truth, we had already ended up in places that we actually had no business being, we had failed to seize opportunities that could have taken us where we really wanted to be and we wasted so much time waiting for our wishes to be granted us when we could have been busy preparing and attempting to embrace our goals. Some of us were fortunate to realize this soon enough and we quickly picked up our broken pieces and set on course to pursue definite goals and for me, pursuing a master’s degree while working my first signed job was one such goal.

Setting Goals

How do you know you have arrived when you haven’t yet determined where you are going?

Life without clear goals can be as confusing, and that is why you have to take this part very seriously. Set life goals, what do you want to become? what do you want to be remembered for? what matters most to you in life and what do you want to do about it? what do you have and what can you do with it? Make sure to find answers to these questions and write them down and then think about how you are going to reach them, obtain as much information as you can on reaching your goals and make sure you are well fed to make sound decisions and then go ahead and pursue them. Many of us didn’t have any clear goals when we left school and we had to pay a price for that recklessness.

Financial Discipline

Another very painful regret was failing to set financial goals. We all knew we needed money and savings was important but somehow we didn’t really understand what that meant in its entirety and life was about to teach us the hard way. Ask ten (10) graduates who just completed their first degree if they have any clear financial goals and I bet nine (9) out of the ten (10) would have no definite answer to that.

No savings or investment plan and no financial discipline to guide them and prepare them for the future. I know friends who completed National service with no savings or investments whatsoever. All they had was the sheer optimism that life will get better but life doesn’t always get better for everyone, particularly not for the non-serious and unprepared: it gets tougher.

Set for yourself some finance goals, how much do you want to have in your savings account by the time you are done with your service? How much money do you realistically want to have in your account by end of the year? What investment package do you need to sign up for?

Set boundaries too, I know you can’t wait to live your dream life but surely some things can wait and they must wait, don’t rush them. Don’t pick a lifestyle that will always leave you broke and make you a burden on your friends and family. Focus more on the gathering and sowing, yeah, you are at the prime stage of your life and so now you can only sow.  Reaping will just have to wait.

Difficult Decisions

You will be faced with those and you must be ready to make them regardless. The thing about difficult decisions is that there’s always an opportunity cost to pay, something unpleasant you’d rather not have or lose but that’s just how it’s supposed to be. There’s no escaping difficult decisions if you want to succeed in life.

Sometimes it will mean, walking away from a cycle that you have known all your life, from friends that have been a part of your whole journey but you just know you have to let them go because that is the only way you can grow.

It could mean saying NO to persons you respect so much because you know it is the right thing to do. It could mean, challenging a system that everyone has gotten so used to, it could mean, choosing to live a much simpler life than the one you had hoped for in order to be able to have the future you want.

It could mean doing something you have never done before and it may scare you so much but you still have to do it anyway.  The beautiful thing is, every difficult decision you are able to make, gives you courage and the more courage you muster in life, the better you become as a person.

So don’t be afraid to make difficult decisions, you will be just fine.

The Naysayers

While pursuing my MBA program, and while nursing my dream of becoming a first time GRASAG President and a second time student affairs president, I had an encounter with a naysayers. He asked me if I was going to contest for the presidency and when I told him I would, he came out elaborate with his statistics and whys and told me to forget about it and that it would never happen. I smiled at him and told him to let time be the better judge, as has always been the case.

I had outgrown his kind of pessimism, and it was especially more worthy of note because it came clothed in sheer logic and common sense. The first time I encountered this, a close confidant sat me down and almost convinced to drop my leadership aspirations at the undergraduate level. For my good friend, it was about why I needed to focus and succeed in academics, the high budget I required but didn’t immediately have and the spiritual attacks the political arena came with.

I was grateful for my savior, but my instincts told me otherwise. I was made for this.

The triumph that I emerged with, the high vote of confidence thousands of right thinking students gave me to steer student affairs was the cocoon I had on, while this guy spoke to me on my second successful attempt. God includes the accessories and offers some push for every gift he gives and I am convinced mine is leadership.  I was going to do it again, and so was God!

A close family had told me something that I found very profound, everybody was going to graduate with a certificate in accounting, but my knack for leadership had to be the rare denominator for me. Sometimes, we need to weight our family’s genuine concerns against the gift we have to offer the world around us.

You have to understand that not everyone will believe in you as you pursue your goals, not everyone will support you and some may even fight you off your course but you have to be tough and resilient in your pursuit regardless. Do not give anyone the satisfaction of crippling your plans and goals, outsmart them if you can and don’t give in to discouragements no matter who is offering them.

A lot of us go through life avoiding naysayers and gossips, we get so tensed and frustrated when we hear people say bad about us but you should never let that break you, you are not the first and you are not alone. Focus on your craft and don’t get distracted by what you may hear no matter how troubling, there are a lot of people who admire you and are inspired by your life, don’t focus on those who don’t.

Leadership and People

I fell asleep while waiting anxiously in bed for the outcome of my first ever students’ elections, I was contesting for Senior Prefect at the time, and this was about 8 years ago. Just before I could fall any deeper in sleep, my roommates came running and cheering my name, before they’d get to my room, I knew it could mean only one thing, I had won! And thus my journey into leadership began from there. Since that time, I have pursued all of my educational career having to combine academics with students’ leadership. From Senior Prefect(Asst.) in Senior High School to SRC President during first degree and GRASAG President during my Second degree. I am not quite certain what the next feat is but one thing remains constant, I was born for others and where ever I end up, I will serve people.

Throughout the course of history, leadership has played and continue to play a crucial role in advancing the lives of people. As a society, we can only go as far as our leadership takes us and that is why we all need to prepare ourselves for leadership.

It is no doubt a difficult task and it requires a great deal of understanding and tact and that is why we all need to prepare ourselves to lead and to lead right and well so that we can make the world a much better place than we came to meet it. I have found that in any group or society, when we have good leaders, chances of chalking greater successes are much higher and the sense of responsibility that comes with the decision to serve others makes us better people.

So decide to be a leader and by that I mean decide to serve people, I believe that is how we can make the world a better place. Of course, you may not be able to solve every problem or touch everyone as a leader but you can still do so much if you are committed to doing your best.

Last weekend was our graduation ceremony but for me, it was more than that. The appreciation that kept pouring in from colleagues was such a humbling and fulfilling moment for me, I could never forget that. Whenever you can, serve people and do it the best way you can because people don’t forget, I could only win my third election because the first two spoke for me.

You are not alone

 No man is an island, you are never alone so never think like you are. First there is God inside of you. The source of all life is a part of you and He will always be with you to guide you through life so always reach out to Him. Second there’s help all around you, you may not recognize them at a glance but wherever there are people, you will find help so never feel left out. Reach out for help when you are down and broken, there’s no shame in that.

We have just been ushered into another stage of life, I do not know what lessons life is about to teach us and I do not know how unpleasant they may be but as students of life, we ought to be ready to learn and hopefully this time, we are better prepared than before.

I hope this has inspired you..  

You can reach the Sidney via email @ sidney_oko@yahoo.com or on social media @ sidneywins.