The Journey Of Never Giving Up.

The Journey Of Never Giving Up.

How to never give up on your dreams and what you want for yourself.

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14 min read

Imagine yourself in a situation where whatever you are doing is not exciting anymore. It is no longer aligned with your goals or what you want for yourself.

What do you do?

Continue doing what you are doing, or do something else you are passionate about?

That was the situation I found myself in in 2018.

I had to decide whether I would continue with what I was doing and make everyone happy or choose what I wanted for myself.

Burning The Ships

I joined the school of engineering in 2016 to become a mechanical engineer, and there was nothing more exciting than that.

Unfortunately, after two years, I decided to quit. This is because;

  • I didn't see a value in what we were learning. So I didn't want to waste my life and my parents' money.
  • I thought we were there to do cool stuff. However, it was only theory to pass exams.
  • Even if I graduated, I knew I would take that paper, put it under my bed and do something that I was passionate about.

I had asked myself this question, "What is the point of staying here doing something I was not passionate about just to get a piece of paper that I was not sure if I would ever need?"

I had a chance to do soul searching and decide what I wanted for myself. This was after lecturers had gone for a 6-month civil strike to demand better wages.

In the process, I joined an organization called IEEE.

IEEE is the world's largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for the benefit of humanity.

Opportunities and events that IEEE offered made me fall in love with technology. Right away, I knew I wanted to do something in the field of tech.

Exciting things were happening in the tech scene. I could either watch it happen or be part of it.

To be part of it, I decided to become a programmer.

I didn't know how to convince my parents to allow me to become a programmer and abandon my engineering degree. I knew that there was no way they would allow me to do that. So I decided to lie because it is better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.

I told them that I wanted to defer school for one year, then acquire more skills that would boost my engineering degree in the job market. They were convinced, and they accepted.

However, I just quit, and I didn’t defer.

In Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, there is a story about a great warrior who had gone to war against a mighty army that outnumbered his men. He loaded his soldiers into ships and then sailed to the enemy's country. Once there, he unloaded his men and equipment then gave an order to burn the ships.

Then he said, "You see the ships going up in smoke, that means that we cannot leave these shores alive unless we win. We now have no choice, it is either we win or perish."

They won!

That is the story that motivated me not to defer. This is because I learned that every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to burn his ships and cut all sources of retreat.

Acquiring New Skills

After I decided to quit school, I started researching the best institutions that offered programming courses.

I knew what I wanted. What I wanted were skills that would enable me to work on my ideas to create products that solve people’s problems.

That’s why I decided to choose a coding institution that I felt would offer me a better learning environment and the support I needed.

The institution I chose offered a 4-month course where you would learn the basics of HTML, CSS, PHP, and Java.

In the end, you were supposed to come up with an idea for an app, build it and present it in front of a panel. It was a way to showcase what you had learned in those four months.

Starting to learn how to code was not a walk in the park. At the start, it was pretty overwhelming and intimidating.

Sometimes I felt like it was not my thing, and that really scared me. This is because I didn’t have a plan B since I had burned my ships.

That is when I decided to do a google search to find out if there are others out there who feel intimidated, the same as me when starting to learn how to code.

I discovered that it was a common thing and the best thing to do was to:

  • Keep doing the right thing.
  • Be patient.
  • Keep learning.

That is why it is important to make sure that in whatever area you get into, it is something you are passionate about.

If you are not passionate about it, giving up becomes easy!

Everything Going Down The Drain

I had acquired the skills that I needed. What next?

I decided to convert the idea that I had presented as an app to a product that people in the real world could use.

The idea was simple. It was about displaying apartments for rent on an app or a website, and then people would be able to book them online.

I needed to come up with an MVP (minimum viable product) to test the market. In that case, an MVP would be a website.

At the coding institution, we had only been taught the basics of coding. To build a website that people would use, I needed to improve my skills.

I took Udemy courses, watched YouTube videos while coding along with the instructors. Finally, I was done in two months, and it was time to build.

In two and half months, I built the front-end part of the website, making it responsive on all devices before taking a break.

In that process, a high school friend called me. He asked me if I could help him with my laptop for two days to work on a project. He said that his laptop had broken down. Since I was on a break and wasn't using mine, I agreed.

After two days, I called the guy to ask for the laptop, and he said he wasn't around. Days went by, and he continued to give excuses. That is when I realized I wasn’t getting my laptop back.

I didn't know where the guy lived, and even after reporting to the police, I didn't get much help. The most painful thing was that I had not backed up my project. Unfortunately, that meant that everything I had been working on had gone down the drain.

Do people think about how their actions might affect others before doing something stupid to them? I did not entertain the thought of starting over again, and I didn't know what to do next.

One morning, a friend called and told me about an opportunity that had arisen. It was a competition by the National Parliament. They were asking for the submission of ideas for an app that would improve public participation in law-making.

We applied and waited for a month to get results. It gave me a chance to concentrate on something else and forget about the heartbreak of losing my laptop.

A month passed by, but we didn’t get any word for our idea submission.

Since that was the only option I had, I decided to quit and go back home and tell my parents the truth. One evening after deciding to quit, I watched some videos on YouTube where I came across this video about Elon Musk.

It talked about how Elon Musk had faced some failures with his companies. When he was asked whether he thought about quitting, he said, "I never give up. I can only give up if I am dead or incapacitated."

That statement sparked a fire in my heart, and I have never felt more inspired or motivated than that before.

I knew it was time to start over again!

Starting Over From Scratch

I started working on the website from scratch. I used a borrowed laptop, and sometimes I used computers at the coding institution I attended to learn to code.

It had taken me two and half months to build the front-end part of the website before losing the laptop, but this time round, it took me only three weeks to complete the entire website. I was in beast mode.

It had been one year since I had quit school. Since I had told my parents that I had deferred for one year, they wanted me to go back to school. I didn't have plans of going back to school. So I went home and told them the truth.

I told them about my decisions, showed them what I had been working on, and it impressed them. Then I told them that all I wanted was their support. They were reluctant, but they had no options. It was my life, and I was the captain of my ship.

I was given everything I needed, including money for registering a company. After that, I went back to the city to prepare for the launch. I didn't have any experience running a business, let alone a company. So the only option I had was to self-educate myself.

I searched on the internet for the best business books. Finally, I found "Lean Startup" by Eric Ries and "Blue Ocean" by Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne. I read them cover to cover so that I could use their knowledge in running my company.

The website was live, but it didn't have actual apartments that people would book. So I needed to talk to property managers to allow me to display their apartments on my site.

I needed capital for the company to take off, but I was not getting much support. My parents were already providing everything I needed for my upkeep. However, they were not ready to invest money in something they weren't sure would work.

That meant without money, I couldn't make much progress. So I had to figure out ways to raise capital.

Hitting Rock Bottom

I felt disappointed and tired of everything after the company failed to take off.

Since I could not get any funding, I had no other option but to go home. I didn't know what to do, and I couldn't figure out how to raise capital.

There was a lot of pressure from relatives on me to go back to school, but I vowed that there was no way I was going back there. I was utterly done with schooling. I was determined to make my dream of becoming an entrepreneur come true. I saw going back to school as a form of giving up.

I was offered an internship opportunity in March 2020, and I was to report for work on April 1. The internship was a good opportunity for me because I could get time to work on my projects and still support myself. Unfortunately, two weeks before April, the country went on total lockdown. That meant I could not report for the internship.

I didn't have a computer where I could be sharpening my coding skills or even freelance. I could not ask my parents for another computer because I had already lost the one they had bought for me. All I had was my phone, and I couldn't figure out what to do with myself. The only thing I could do is read books. So then I decided to do something I had wanted to do for a long time.

Grow my Twitter account.

I became active on Twitter in May 2020, and within five months, I had grown my account to almost 10K followers.

In November, the account was suspended indefinitely, and I didn't know when I would get it back. So I decided to start a new one from scratch.

Now I was trying to figure out ways on how I could get a laptop. I needed to get back to coding so that I could work on my ideas and my projects.

One morning, I talked with my father, and he asked me what my plans for my life were. I showed him some emails I was receiving from a freelancing website. They used to send me emails of people who needed programmers to work on their projects. I told him that if I had a laptop, I could be working on these projects and get paid. Within two days, he surprised me with a new laptop.

Trying Something New

I started reminding myself of the basics of coding because it was almost a year since I had written any code. It took me a month to catch up.

I started to think about my next move. I didn't know which was the best course of action to take. I couldn't decide whether to apply for a job or freelance.

One day, as I was hanging out with some friends, one suggested that I give freelancing a shot. I researched what someone needed to be a good freelancer and discovered that you need a portfolio website where you could talk about who you are, what you can do, and show your work.

I worked on a simple portfolio website, hosted it, and it was up and running. The next thing was to get a client.

I decided to look for people with crappy websites, redesign them, present the redesigns, and ask if they were willing to hire me. I started looking for website links on peoples' bios on Twitter. I found a website that I felt I could redesign and do a better job.

I redesigned the website, took a screenshot of my redesign and the screenshot of the original website. I posted the screenshots comparing them both on Twitter, and the post blew up.

I got a lot of feedback, but it didn't materialize into a deal.

I didn't get disappointed for not getting a deal because my main aim was to show the world what I could do.

My plan worked, and I got many direct messages(DMs) from people asking how much I charged for a website and whether I could build them one.

I talked with a lot of potential clients, but I couldn't convert any to paying clients. I felt so disappointed and tired. I thought it was my time to win, but it was just failure after failure.

It was in December 2020, and the situation had already ruined my Christmas mood. In January 2021, I wanted to leave home so badly, but I still couldn't decide whether to get a job or continue to freelance. I started messaging some developers on Twitter for advice, and I decided to settle on freelancing completely.

I needed money to support myself as I continued to sharpen my coding skills. I got a small job on a contract which was like 6 dollars per day. It was so little, but at least I could afford data bundles to facilitate my learning.

I made some savings, and I bought a domain name for my portfolio website.

The small job I had got was paintwork for a local bank. In the process, I checked their website, and it looked old and crappy. So I decided to redesign it, present it to them and see if I could make a deal.

I wrote a proposal, sent it to the bank management, but the deal failed to materialize.

I was now used to failures and rejections, so that didn't even hurt anymore. You can say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

In the process, that's when I realized I was doing everything wrong. I discovered that I only knew how to build good websites, not websites that solved the customer's problem or helped businesses convert.

That needed to change.

I needed to be a marketer. Becoming a marketer would help me grow;

  • My brand.
  • An audience on social media in my niche.
  • My freelance business.

I started self-educating myself by reading books, watching YouTube videos, and reading online articles.

I discovered that you need to create valuable content that helps people solve their problems to be a good marketer.

The books that helped me were "This is Marketing" by Seth Godin and "Content Rules" by Ann Handley. I read them cover to cover, and they were ultimately a game-changer for me. I also needed to make a significant upgrade to my life, and "5 AM Club" by Robin Sharma came to my rescue.

It was now time to have a fresh start!

Fresh Start

On May 28, 2021, I left home and moved to a new place. A relative had called and told me that he was starting a business. So he asked me whether I was willing to be his partner in the business, and I would be tasked with running the business.

With such an opportunity, I didn't think twice, and I agreed.

I count the day I left home as my second birthday. It gave me a chance to move to a new environment where I could have a fresh start and grow as a person—something I had wanted for a long time.

After getting to the new place, I devised a plan to give myself six months to reinvent myself completely.

Here is what I planned to do in 6 months:

  • Upgrade my website to become a source of value to its visitors.
  • Grow my brand.
  • Grow my audience by adding value.
  • Make meaningful connections.
  • Improve my coding skills.
  • Market me and my skills.
  • Grow my freelance business.

So far, I am 3 months into my reinvention and am happy with my progress so far.

Conclusion

Quitting the School of Engineering and becoming a programmer was the best decision I have ever made in my life.

It gave me a chance to pursue what I was passionate about and gave me the freedom to work on my ideas.

I am not yet where I want to be, but the lessons I have learned through this journey have been worth it. I couldn't trade them for anything.

In words of Steve Jobs:

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.