The Nigerian Reader Strikes Again!
I have come back from my self-imposed exile to say I'm back
People of the internet! People of the internet!! People of the internet!!!
Hear my cry, your favorite reader and reviewer is back!
That’s right. Despite spending the better part of last year and the last two months of 2024 in a self-imposed exile, I have decided to come back to the world of newsletters. And since I’m begging for forgiveness and a chance to right my wrongs, it’s very important for me to be honest with the little community I started growing through this platform last year.
Dear community,
2023 was a year of firsts for me. I graduated from university in August 2022, only to have my convocation ceremony in January 2023. The details of the delay is something I want to blot from my memory so we’ll leave that aside. Anyway, the point was I had graduated and it was time for me to enter the job market.
As many people in my country had done before me, I registered for the NYSC program, got my primary-place-of-assignment and started a crash course in being an honest citizen who works for the food on her plate.
And if going through those changes weren’t enough, I had gotten my first 1000 followers on TikTok, I was starting my Bookstagram account and what I didn’t know in January was come June/July I’d want to start my Youtube channel. We’ll discuss that later in this blog but anyway I had big plans for myself and I was also going to blog.
I have always wanted to be a blogger which should have clued me and my family that maybe studying an engineering course wouldn’t be right for me and I should focus on the arts but I digress. With my passion to share things about myself and talk about the only thing that brings me joy other than my faith, my family, a few friends, dogs, art, (wow, a lot of things bring me joy) which is BOOKS.
But you see, I was also doing something in 2023, I want to be a published author, and not only published, I want to be a TRADITIONALLY published author. If you’re wondering why I put the ‘traditionally’ in bold, it’s because it is a big passion of mine and it is also elusive. When I get the first part of the chalice, I’ll share what really happened to me in 2023 when it came to my publishing goals.
So, to recap, I had a lot of plans at the beginning of 2023. But as the days turned into weeks and they became months, I became overwhelmed by all the plans I had.
My BookTok fell to the wayside. I’d make videos, only to never edit them and ultimately give up on it. Bookstagram, let’s even not talk about that and the YouTube account that I opened, that one to developed a comma but the one that suffered the most was my blogging.
I stopped blogging. In fact, I forgot I even had a substack all because I got overwhelmed and couldn’t prioritize the sections of my life.
Now that we’ve gotten the past out of the way (I would have loved to not bore you with my past but it had to be done) let’s get to the present and the future.
What’s going to change in this newsletter/blog?
Me. I’m the one going through my metamorphosis. While I was younger, I watched this animated movie of this caterpillar who desperately wanted to be a butterfly and couldn’t but did and it was a weird movie. I feel mostly sad that I can’t remember the name but I watched it like eighteen years ago, I don’t even remember most of what happened in January, so HOW would I remember that?
The point I took away from the movie is that changes have to start from within, and it was only when the caterpillar changed his outlook on his importance as a caterpillar that he became a butterfly.
I can’t do everything at once, even though I wish I was a spider-monkey so I would have more hands. It’s very difficult managing everything with only two hands and I don’t even have kids yet.
Kudos to mothers, I don’t know how you do things.
But my focus is on not giving up. Even if I can’t post 4 times a month, I’m going to try and post once a month.
And I’m going to be focused on what I can and can’t do. It’s not by force to be master at all things, let me master one thing and try another thing later.
P.S: I noticed that I can’t give advice to save my life, so instead of trying only to fail and then get angry, I’m going to stick to what I do best, read and review.
Final note: Maybe I’m not cut out to be a blogger. I can definitely see this failing and me crying because I didn’t succeed. But you know what? (Please tell me the what cause I feel like I set myself up to make a motivational quote but I have no idea what the landing is supposed to be)
Anyway, I’m going to keep trying.
Sincerely yours,
The Nigerian Reader