Exactly one year ago, I resigned from my role as the Editor of a foremost online newspaper to become a freelance investigative journalist. Many felt it was a wrong move. A then colleague said I would “die of hunger”.
A note on why you should never listen to negative opinions about your dreams.
Resigning was a decision that came after many months of sleepless nights. It was a well-paid job, the ‘Editor’ is what many in journalism aspire to become, my boss wasn’t tired of me yet and, to worsen matters, I didn’t have another job waiting for me. Freelance! One friend said I was “mad”, another said I was “unstable”.
A colleague at the time told another: “If anyone leaves the job of Editor to become a freelance investigative journalist, he will die of hunger. Investigative journalists? They used to be respected when they were scarce; these days, there are so many of them.”
Of course, I dismissed that scathing comment with a wave of the hand. Someone who first set eyes on me in 2018 couldn’t be predicting the next phase of a battle-laden journey that had started decades back — from struggling with sciences in secondary school, to leaving a university of agriculture to go study Animal Science at the University of Ibadan where I could benefit from the Arts community, to having no life in uni because I was combining campus journalism with Agriculture, and working my socks off seven days every week since 2004 (no exaggerations).
There were times when I wondered if I could indeed regret that resignation, but I was sure the investigations I’d been eyeing since 2017 were worth pursuing. I was sure, too, that even though I loved editing, it was on the field that sky-high fulfillment awaited me. I knew the field was where I would be most useful to myself and my country.
One year later, I still do not have money but I am far from hungry too. Notably, journalism has never been this fulfilling. I first stepped into the Rutam House newsroom of TheGuardian in 2005, which means I’ve been in and around journalism for 15 years, yet I’ll pick the fulfillment of the last year over any of the other 14 years.
Some group recently described me on Twitter as “one of Nigeria's unknown but quietly emerging writing talents” and someone leapt to my ‘defence’ with a do-your-research-well reply. Others still describe me as a “young reporter” or “fast-rising investigative journalist”. Unlike my recent ‘defender’, I find these descriptions truly complimentary. That many think I’ve only just burst onto the scene is testament to the productivity of the last 12 months.
I almost didn’t write this because I felt it was probably too early to. The journey ahead is quite long if God preserves me, so there’s quite a lot of work to be done. I haven’t arrived yet. But I continue to push myself hard every day, then harder the next! Just that I didn’t want to pass up the first opportunity to encourage someone: don’t let your fears or any negative talker prevent you from taking that step you’ve always wanted to.
Get up and take the plunge! Take up that new job, launch that business idea, relocate to that city, walk up to that lady you’re dying for, get out of that unholy alliance. Better to do it and fail than not do it at all — because if you did it and you failed, you at least would never spend the rest of your life regretting and wondering “what if?” That alone is no victory to be underestimated.
Credit :Fisayo Soyombo
#Youneedtoknow
