I sat looking at the blank page on my laptop; that blinking cursor was relentless, almost mocking me as if I could not put pen to paper. At 24, one would expect me to have ideas racing through my mind, gushing with all the ambition and creativity that marked my generation. All of it was actually a shamble, a fraud; quite at the other extreme, still only a shell of the person I had ever wanted to be.
My early adulthood was all contained within that shabby, crumpled résumé that lay beside my laptop. Patched with part-time jobs, internships, and short-lived attempts at a career, it had all led up to this moment: jobless and clueless about what came next.
It had not always been this way. I had grown up as the ultimate high achiever: the straight-A student, the extracurricular overachiever, the first-class graduate, the pride of my family. I dutifully followed the path that was set before me, checking off all the boxes society had deemed requisite for success. College degree? Check. Internships? Check. Networking events and career fairs? Check, check, and check.
And yet, sitting here amidst the remains of my professional failures, I couldn’t shake the feeling that in some fundamental way, I had just fallen short. That corporate world, tinged with colour and full of promise, now felt foreign and unforgiving—a scene into which I didn’t fit.
I had tried. God knows I had tried. The research writer position I was fired from in under six months—it was just “poor body language,” my boss had said. My brief career as a sales assistant? There, I had quietly quit after two weeks, unable to feign the necessary legalese-loving enthusiasm to push product after product onto disinterested customers. Now this role—gone in an instant, after a year, the brand manager position was downsized by the company.
The weight of my failures threatened to suffocate me as I sunk deeper into the cushions of my second-hand couch. Where had it all gone wrong? Haven’t I done everything right, following that well-trodden path they all laid out for me—one leading to a stable career, financial security, and respect from peers?
To be frank, I had never felt all that at home in the world of corporate culture. The competitiveness, constant pressure to fit in, and putting profits before purpose due to my introverted creative sensibilities, consistently created a kind of friction.
The more I looked at that résumé, reviewing the words strung together, the more I wondered if my problem all along was that I’d been on the wrong path. Could my problem have been not that I couldn’t hack it in this traditional career but, rather, that I never really should have been there in the first place?
And then it all dawned on me; a rush of self-doubt and regret washed over me. Had I spent the valuable years of my early youth chasing a dream that was never meant to be? Had I sacrificed my passions and real self for the sake of what was supposed to be the dictates of society and financial stability?
Read – A Fleeting Moment – A Creative Non-Fiction by Ayogu Chidimma – Nigeria
My hands were shaking, but I still managed to reach for the pen and a clean sheet of paper. I was determined to finally face those questions which had been haunting me; what did I really love doing? What turned on that spark in me, apart from the drudgery of a 9 to 5? I started writing, and the answers started flowing in. It was that kind of falling into place, piece by piece, one under the other’s fit of a puzzle.
Drawing. Painting. Writing. Those creative outs I used to revel in as a child before the ‘real world’ had told me to put away my crayons and pick up a calculator. Activities that used to, at one time, make me feel so very full of joy and purpose before I had buried them beneath a mountain of résumés and cover letters.
With every word I pounded into the keyboard, it felt as though I was shedding one pound from my shoulders. This was it, the key to unlocking my real identity, the missing piece that had been eluding me all this time. That isn’t to say I was made for being a gear in a corporation, grinding away in some cubicle. I am an artist, I am a storyteller, I am a creator, and the very thought sends shivers down my spine in exhilaration and trepidation.
I did know one thing: it wouldn’t be easy. Turning my back on the “respectable” career path and steeping myself within the unknowns of a creative profession would be an extremely daunting task. There would be financial woes, judgments from society, and that constant fear of failure. Yet as I looked at the resume once more, the words no longer seemed to taunt me.
It was my chance to break free from a fractured identity, finally accepting it, and shedding the expectations of the outside world to find the person whom I was all along. It would take courage, resilience, and an unwavering belief in myself—things in which I had once held so much faith but had gradually been whittled away by disappointment and rejection in the corporate world.
Read – Monday Evening, 1950 – A Creative Non-Fiction by Carla Chait – South Africa
I took the résumé out, tore it, and watched it fall into pieces on the floor. In its place, I jotted down a new plan: building a great portfolio, getting in touch again with creative people, and taking the leap of faith into the unknown. It was scary to the point of paralysis, but staying on this course meant a career that would slowly dry my very soul.
Of course, as I set to work, the doubts and fears still lingered, whispering in the back of my mind. What if I couldn’t make it as a freelance artist? What if I never nailed down that same degree of financial stability and security again? But those I swept aside, focusing instead on the thrill of finding once more the things that set my passions afire and a chance to finally exist in a life that felt authentically mine.
In the weeks and months that followed, it wasn’t an easy journey. There were times when the fear threatened to overwhelm me when the responsibilities of adulthood—rent, bills, and the ever-present need for a steady paycheck—loomed larger than my creative dreams. But with every commission that I won, every piece that sold, and every positive feedback received, this flame of my new identity burned bigger and brighter, burning away doubts and insecurities that used to hold me back.
But, standing now in my tiny studio—colours and textures littered all over the place, my own creations—what was there to do but smile? That was it, the life I always really longed for, that which was missing in me, which I couldn’t get hold of all along. It wasn’t perfect, and the future still had its share of uncertainties, but for the first time in years, I felt alive again. Finally, my fractured identity was whole, once again.
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Angel Joanne Okonkwo is a Curriculum Developer in Accounting at a University in Abuja and a Fashion and Culture Journalist for KLAT Magazine (UK). Her work has been featured in a range of publications, including US Newsweek, Zikoko Magazine, and TEDxMaitama. Angel is known for contributing insightful pieces on fashion, culture, entertainment, selfhood, career development, women’s empowerment, and leadership.
