Focus Friday: Why You Should Learn A Skill

 

Focus Friday: Why You Should Learn A Skill 

Written By Haroun Muhammed

I am not an epistolary poet, but I am a man of letters. Sometimes, I do the talking. Other time, I will prefer communicating with letters. For the unusual days, I prefer having internal conversation with myself — or, arguing in the council of my mind. A friend once told me that I have an overactive power of imagination. Whatever that means, I don’t know. 

But then, what God seems to have denied me in oratory, He compensated me in words. That’s God almighty. Fifty-fifty, life na dice, says Bella Shmurda in the Rush. 

You know, no one is immune to love letters (rejection letters). In my delirium of joy, I was celebrating a small win weeks ago. This particular win even before the arrival of the final mail. I was overconfident by the application I put, thinking I overdid it. 

The mail arrived. They said, my efforts weren’t enough. Thus, I got a rejection mail (A warm love letter). I was really taken aback. What next? You know, the average daydreamers are like the blind Bartimaeus in the Bible crying for miracle as Jesus walked by. Many of them (us) aren’t often lucky. They don’t always get their miracles (acceptance mail). 

A day after, a friend vouched for me. It’s an engineering project and he told the client that he knows someone that can do it. See liver o. He sent a message. Told me about the project.  You see, 3 months ago I wasn’t familiar with a certain skill (Designing and sizing analysis of integrated RE system). When I learned this skill, I didn’t know I would use it sooner than I expected. This particular project requires an application of this certain skill that I just learned.

Through the guidance of the Almighty, I finished the work. I forwarded the project to my friend to forward it to the client. The client was wowed. His supervisor also. This looks great to me. Well done. You can improve the formatting and remove the graphs. The supervisor said. Forgot to feed you, the client lives in the West (Oyingbo land o), and initially, I was pretty much skeptical about the project delivery. In the end, I pulled it out. 

Yesterday, I got a fat alert; five good digits; the reward of my work. Hehe... I went back and opened the work. And, your guess is as good as mine, it ended in praise. 

Moral of the story: While keeping your eyes on the bigger goals, empower yourself with skills. Let your friends know what you are capable of doing. Some skills mightn’t make sense to you now, but in the later stage of life, you can tap something from it. No knowledge is a waste, says a wise man. 

Know what you want. Focus. Learn. And even through the dark nights, do not stop learning! 

30.04.2021

Credit: Haroun Muhammed