SEASON 2022

As is an annual ritual for me, I start each new year with written goals, of what I want to accomplish in the year. So in January this year, I got started with my first quarter goals until I couldn’t. I became sick, I WAS PREGNANT!

What a detour, I thought. I was going to spend the first 9 months of 2022 being pregnant. I was really happy that we were having a baby, and had conditioned my mind that even if this gets to be the only thing I’m able to achieve this year, then I’d be more than satisfied.

….

I believe you may have heard a lot about how terrific being pregnant could be. Some people even have a fear of it, it is called tokophobia. Any woman who has witnessed a terrible pregnancy or childbirth is more likely to have this fear. In my case, I wasn’t afraid of pregnancy, but I was terrified of childbirth. In my book, where I shared my pregnancy/childbirth experience, I asked “How can something so beautiful be laced with so much pain?”. I also shared the root cause of my fear.

My pregnancy experience negated everything I had heard about pregnancy in the past. God took me by the hand and helped me overcome my fears, and he gave me my own pregnancy and childbirth experience, just as I asked of Him. If you’d love to read about my experience, please click on this link. I had the most amazing pregnancy and childbirth story I know of, and this is my testimony.

I recently started a Youtube Channel where I’m documenting some of my experiences as a new mum + career person. I have one video up, kindly watch, like and subscribe.

My career took a significant turn this year, as I left Sourcegraph to join Consensys mesh as a Developer Community Manager sometime in July, immersing me into the world of Web3. I was 7 months pregnant when I took this leap, and how scared I was of the timing? Was this the right time to take on a new challenge?

My new role made me delve into the rabbit hole of decentralization, web 3 and decentralized identity. I got to work with the Veramo community — Consensys Mesh R&D Identity team, and I’m so proud of all we were able to accomplish this year.

In the 8th month of my pregnancy, I launched Community Chic, a newsletter/blog through which I share some of my lessons as a community manager. In the space of 4 months, we’ve had ~2,000 subscribers and I’m so excited🎉.

I’m currently working on migrating the newsletter, as getrevue (one of the platforms it’s hosted on) would be shutting down soon. For now, you can follow us on Twitter to know when this happens.

Earlier this year, I relocated to Cameroon to be with my husband, and it’s been a slow journey of adapting to the new environment, culture and of course, learning french. The tech community here is pretty young when compared to that of Nigeria, and there’s the language barrier too. If you have any idea of someone who runs a technical hub facility in the capital city of Cameroon — Yaounde or has some connections with the tech community here, kindly point me to them. My DM is open.

I travelled down to Nigeria to attend the Open Source Festival, both as a sponsor (Sourcegraph), and as part of the team (Social media community lead). There was something spectacular about that trip because it came just at the time when I craved Nigerian foods that weren’t accessible to me in Yaounde. So, I took some time to visit my family and got overfed with all my cravings. Good times 😃

I read a couple of books, and although I couldn’t read as much as I wanted, here are some of the books I read:

• No Excuses by Brian Tracy
• Atomic Habits by James Clear
• Making Marriage Work by Joyce Meyer
• Developer Marketing Does Not exist by Adam Duvander
• Small Business Big Money (Reread) by Okoye Alabi
• This is Marketing by Seth Godin

In the coming year, I hope to read more books, including fictional books and novels.

I recorded a lot of wins this year, but I’ve learned to draw a thin line between braggadocio, boasting, “putting myself out there” and testimony (Please don’t ask me the difference 😀), when to share, what to share, and how not to overshare. Here are some lessons that stood out for me in 2022:

1. God can be trusted, never underestimate him. He hears us even when we think He doesn’t. And our wishes, are clear to him as much as our prayers.
2. Everything adds up in the end — the courses, volunteering, boot camps, random hobbies, books, and networks built. It may not make any sense right now, but it will eventually and you’d be glad you passed through all those processes.
3. Give it time…and a pinch of grace. I remember how naive I was about Community Management as of 2020 until I was offered the opportunity to manage the community at She Code Africa. Looks like a short time, but a lot has happened since then. Thank you Ada of She Code Africa!
4. Build relationships…Invest in relationships…keep relationships…water relationships.
5. Excellence is a lifestyle. And when you show yourself excellently in small things, you’re most likely to be excellent in the big ones.
6. The most important lesson which I got from my mentor Ugochi Obidiegwu, is on the concept of times and seasons. You see, we are all at various seasons in our lives. Some of you reading this will spend your next year pregnant (Don’t say God forbid, it’s not a bad thing😀), some of you will have to travel abroad, or fly around the world, some of you will take some time off social media, or reduce the number of hours you spend mindlessly scrolling through social media, and bury yourselves into deep work, some of you may undergo therapy next year, for some of you, this would be your last year as a single person etc. But what happened this year or would happen next year does not summarize your entire life. There are other years in front of you to get into another season of your life. Hence, I’ve learned to be comfortable with the various seasons of my life. This year it was pregnancy, next year it’ll be motherhood (I would have a toddler pursuing me around), and he won’t be a toddler forever. It is important for us to appreciate every season we find ourselves in, and draw the lessons meant for that period. It doesn’t make sense to try skipping your preparation season while trying to jump into the period of enjoyment without doing the work involved; Calm down and learn. It is not also necessary to beat yourself up because you were not able to travel the world because you got pregnant; that is your season of pregnancy, relax and enjoy it. Seasons come and go, and what you make of them depends entirely on you.
7. Lastly, as you make your goals for the new year, CREATE A SPACE FOR GOD. He can decide to allow some twists and hurdles on the way, but at the end of the day, trust that His plans for you are definitely for good and not evil, and you’ll surely get to your expected end.

I’m grateful for the blessings this year came with, both in material and spiritual things, for my friends and family, and most importantly, for my best gift of the year… Jay(Jnr) 😊

May season 2023 be beautiful for you 🥰