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Sometimes the change we seek might not come in the way we expected it and the way we expected might not be the change we seek.

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The Nigerian community has been growing at an explosive rate and I must say when we look back, we are forced to ask ourselves, how did we get here?

The story of growth did not happen overnight and it was a step by step process , from the trenches till this point. A lot of things surely happened along the way and I must admit, some were good and some were...not so good.

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The main story is we survived as a community despite all that has happened and we came out stronger, those who read their bibles are conversant with the popular "Paul planteth and Apollo watereth phrase in the Bible.

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But who is this Paul?

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I'll give you a hint, he's not a Nigerian by birth, but is more Nigerian than most. His race, color of skin, nationality, gender etc does not matter, he has shown that it is the heart that truly counts.

Imagine a scenario where the bond holding Nigeria isn't even Nigerian?

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When we started blogging here, most of us knew there were lots of talented bloggers and vloggers on the platform, the main problem was the competition that came with it.

Of course, a site like this with almost half a million members will definitely have some one or two downsides.

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I remember when I recently joined, my posts payouts reminded me of some people's CGPS in the university. You will see 0.03, 1.25, and the legendary 0.00 which was the most hilarious of all. I remember back then, seeing 0.00 was not as painful as seeing 0.01 and you begin to hope and pray for someone else to do something amazing in your life.

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If you got a dollar on a post, you'll be feeling like you won the lottery and trust me, even a lottery winner was not going to celebrate as much as the individual. Most people saw a "trending" future and I admit at some point, I belonged to that category. It was with honor we showed our friends a post of one dollar.

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It was not as if one dollar was going to do much anything, because the average cost of transport from my house into the main town and back is about three dollars and the amount of data I use with MTN monthly while blogging is roughly over thirty dollars monthly, but even when the bills were more than the gain initially, something gave me joy, that was the prospect that somebody somewhere could read and tip me for having a good read.

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Initially, I just dumped a few memes and so Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V for a couple of days, I felt maybe this was just some random blog, after a few warnings from cheetah and steemcleaners and an advice from @raymonjohnstone, Oh I forgot I just felt I should give it a try, I decided to start writing, actually using my head.

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Imagine my joy when I met some people and started linking up one or two people, before I knew it, I had a thing going. Funny enough, before I went further, someone told me to carve my niche and I instantly related to that and before you knew it, I had a plan for a mag (STEEM COSMO). Funny enough, I met a whale then who ran a mag and I instantly felt like I had an epiphany.

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I initially saw this place as a place where everything fixes itself and I was like I did not need to put in any effort, just relax and post. All that changed when a post I made about quality vs quantity made about $30+ and I felt something in me. Actually the post was inspired by an advice I got from someone on the blockchain. I felt I needed to step up and promote the platform and voila SIN was born.

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Like I said, this story is not about me, so I will stop derailing the post. This is an appreciation post to thank a father figure, mentor, friend, great listener and someone who has dedicated so much time, love, energy, steem power...did I mention time, energy and steem power? Yes I did.

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Someone like I said, who is not Nigerian by birth, but has been toiling day and night to see that Nigeria succeeds. Someone who believes so much in steem/it that he changed his bitcoins to steem (I guess you can start guessing). He never talks even when you try to get him to...lol

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He is the kind of person who sees past the bad in you and focuses on the good. Can you tell me who he is? A quick hint, think about someone who is rarely present, but never absent. He is the silent guardian who does the heavy lifting but takes no credit and this is a story NOT about me.

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Thanks to @camzy and @elyaque for the animated art and badge

Images frompixabay

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