Be Encouraged

It is my story, I’ve told it many times and I’d continue to tell it cos for me, that was the point where I got my first big breakthrough from something I’ve desperately wanted. Before I go any further, I’d like to establish that as humans that we all are, life’s vicissitudes is something that we’d always have to contend with, and what might seem to you as not so important might mean everything to someone else at a different time. There’s really no small challenge or big challenge, it all depends on who is facing what at what time. Anything bigger than you at a particular time troubles your mind so much even if it seems so easy for others to achieve at that time. So here is my story; like most teenagers in secondary school I’ve always imagined myself in a university studying my dream course - petroleum engineering. At the time, owing to the knowledge I had, it was the one course I wanted to study. In retrospect, I can now say that I was more naive than I imagined, cos the only factor that I considered before choosing the course I did was the monetary gains that it potentially holds. Just so I don’t deviate so very much, coming back to my time in secondary school, I use to be a very sound student, within me, I believed I was going to ace my final exams and make all of my papers in one sitting, I never thought otherwise. So it happened, I sat for my first O’level exam and unfortunately, I didn’t make my paper in English. English? How? I mean this was a subject I thought I could write and pass even if I sat for it unprepared. How did I not pass it? The disappointment I felt at the time wasn’t just regular, more so cos it was English that held me back. A subject I thought I had mastery of. What I didn’t know was that, that failure in English was just the first of three more to come. Yes! I sat O’level exams for five different times. Something I thought I knew, a subject I speak and write so well humbled me for four years, kept me grounded such that I could not proceed with my educational pursuit since i don’t have the requirements to. In those times, it felt like I’d never grace the four walls of a university to further my education. Maybe I wasn’t destined for it after all. Maybe it isn’t for me. I remember the last time I sat for the exams before I finally made English, my dad in his exact words to my other siblings; this is the last time I’m going to enroll him for this exam, if he doesn’t make it then maybe he should go and learn a trade. You can imagine how much of a hindrance this was for me at the time, the mental block, it humbled me. I watched my peers got admission and left for the university while I was still battling to make my papers. For me at the time, I’d give up anything to make English language in my exam. I didn’t know exactly what I was doing wrong but I kept failing it year after year. Until the fifth year after I had passed out of secondary school was when I made English, it finally happened and you can only imagine the joy and fulfilment that I felt. At long last it happened. I don’t know how ordinary this story sounds to you, it is not just in the ordinariness of the story but in the triumph and victory that come after a long effort, desire and strive for something. However long it might take, as far as you still draw breath, don’t stop trying. Now, I look back in those times of having to write an O’level exam and I just laugh at the ordinariness of it too. That time has gone, now the one that seem like it is taking long is a visa. Try as I’ve, it hasn’t come but I’m optimistic. Like I said before, there are persons who visas doesn’t mean anything to, they’ve flown to several different countries and could go to even more if they so wish, but for me, it is a big deal now. Humans will always have challenges and yours might seem considerably small to another man, but it doesn’t take away the fact that it is something you so very much need. My message to you this day is, be encouraged. However long it takes, however much effort it requires, it’ll come. Stay positive, stay believing, it’ll come.