Twenty Twenty One: Great Oaks From Little Acorns Grow.

10 min readJan 12, 2022

In 2019, I started this culture of documenting my yearly progress, wins, failures, and whatnot in these “year in reviews” I write. I almost did not write one for 2020, but looking back, I think documenting my growth this way is a very very good decision and I am going to keep it going.

I just finished reading my reviews for 2019 and 2020, and reflecting back on those years and how much I have grown just makes me incredibly happy. The years of hard work, dedication, relentlessness are beginning to get teed up. They’re like little acorns, over time they grow to become a great oak. My little acorns are growing, and they’re onto the path of greatness!

One of the best things I have done for myself in my career is volunteering for tech communities. Yes, you read that right! Volunteering! It has opened me up to a network of brilliant and talented minds, impacted my growth in ways I can’t fully comprehend, connected me to jobs, opportunities, lifelong friends and partners, etc. Leading and actively volunteering for communities was something I found pleasure in doing. Seeing people grow and knowing that I facilitated part of that growth just makes me happy. This is why my year in reviews always starts with my community engagements.

Community

Since Covid hit in 2020, not a lot of things have been happening in the community space generally. It just isn’t the way it used to be. The lack of physical events and interactions makes you feel this partial void when connecting virtually.

After I graduated as a DSC lead, my major focus drifted from DSC activities to that of the Google Developers Group in Abeokuta, a community that I co-lead. To be honest not so much has happened in that space either, a whole lot of other things have been taking up the majority of my time and these days I barely have enough free time to do community stuffs the way I used to. Nevertheless, I and the organizing team managed to put together a few events.

In July, we had a Google I/O extended event with about 40 people in attendance. That’s the first physical event we’ve had since Covid struck and we didn’t expect so many people to show up. Getting over 20 people to gather together at a tech event in Abeokuta is a really big deal!

We didn’t stop there. In November, we hosted the biggest Developer Conference ever in Abeokuta(DevFest Abeokuta) and it was nothing short of amazing! We had over 360 RSVPs and over 200 people in attendance(see photos)! For a community that struggles to get 30 techies in the same physical space, that event was a major success/win for the community. We had several experienced speakers talk to us about different diverse topics, both technical and non-technical. A big shoutout to everyone on the organizing team.

Career

I had a pretty interesting career this year. This is undoubtedly my best year yet! I was way more comfortable than I was during the pandemic for most of the year, but I somehow was a lot busier and had a lot more things to do. I evolved from being a software engineer, technical writer, and a community person to being a co-founder of an early-stage startup — Fidia. I’m super proud of what I and my amazing folks at Fidia have been able to build! The world is not ready for us!

The year started with me still working at my old job. I wasn’t happy working there, but I had to keep it going till better opportunities came my way. The pay was 2x what I was previously earning but I literally had to work around the clock and my boss just kept gaslighting me and refused to sign me an actual contract. He kept downplaying how much effort I put into the work I do and at some point, despite burning out, I felt I wasn’t doing enough. I honestly feel he did all of that so he could maintain low pay since an actual contract would mean that I’ll earn more at his company.

Despite working, I was still actively building Fidia. We had been building it for months before then, but a lot of things changed regarding the team structure and I had to rebuild a lot of stuff from scratch. I was the only software engineer and technical person on the team, so it was quite overwhelming. I decided to quit my daunting job and focus fully on building Fidia. I was tired of my job, it didn’t give me time for anything else, and the mundane work structure and non-existent company culture were just quite ridiculous and difficult to deal with.

It was still January and I had just gotten paid by Google for my GSoD internship in 2020, so I had enough money to run me through a few months before I went completely broke. Luckily for me, I got referred to a new job by a friend — Habeeb Kehinde Shopeju. It was a part-time backend engineering role with an early-stage startup. A more structured work environment, great company culture, and about 2.5x my previous pay. This means I have more time to focus on building Fidia as opposed to working 24/7 with little to no time for anything else.

The next couple of months was bliss, bliss, and of course severe burnout!

Got into Google Season of Docs again

I had previously participated in GSoD in 2020 where I interned at Wikimedia Foundation. It was an amazing experience, and I got to learn a whole lot of interesting stuff alongside getting to contribute to a global platform, building tools and software used by millions of people all around the world. I wanted to experience that feeling again, the feeling of making meaningful contributions to something being used by a lot of people and learning while at it. So I decided to apply again, and luckily, I got selected by ChaosNative to work on the LitmusChaos Project.

It was very challenging, I was to write tutorials for an SRE tool but I wasn’t an SRE 💀. Spent the first couple of months learning K8’s and Litmus itself, then started making proper contributions to their documentations afterward. Learned quite a lot during this period tbh. Unlike last year(3 months), I spent about 6months making contributions this year. All of this amidst working, building Fidia, and schooling. It was the real ghetto!

Eventually, GSoD came to an end by November and I’m hoping to write more about my experience soon.

December

December was the spotlight of 2021 for me, it felt like all the good things I had been hoping for all through the year were waiting for December to come. A lot happened in December alone, so much that it deserves its own separate section. However, I’ll keep it short and mention only the important ones.

I lost my job. While I enjoyed working at the company I did a lot, it was quite unfortunate that they did not have enough bandwidth to continually accommodate everyone. It was an amazing 11 months for me and I learned quite a lot within those months. The upside was that it happened at a time where other really interesting things were beginning to come up.

I’ve been having loads of Interviews in the last month. In November alone, I had close to 10 Interviews. That’s about 2 Interviews per week! It was exhausting, but amidst everything, one seemed to have clicked! It’s a company in the US with a global platform and ecosystem that serves millions of developers and businesses all around the world. I made it past all the Interviews and would be extended an offer soon. It was quite exciting for me.

Fidia got into On Deck Accelerator(ODX) and raised $125,000 from them! This means we’re now a part of the diverse On Deck community and have access to a pool of founders, advisors, industry experts, investors, etc. Read our announcement here. This is particularly exciting for me considering how much work and effort I and the team have put into building Fidia over the last year.

Social Life & Friendship

Not a lot has changed, I’m still that 100% indoor and omniverted dude who rarely even steps into his own compound, and spends 80% of his time in front of a screen lmao. How do you make new friends when you don’t even step out? 😂.

I was a bit more intentional about going out this year sha, I think I made a lot more friends, got even better at communicating, and went out more than I usually do.

So while my social life is still non-existent, with no work-life balance. I’m improving. Baby steps 💃🏻.

Schooling

At the start of this year, I was so close to dropping out of school. In fact, I had decided to do so at some point. I still do not understand how I managed to remain a student till now but nothing regarding school interests me again.

Now, I just want to graduate and move on with life. I’m not the type that goes around screaming school is a scam. I do not think it is a scam, however, I have some opinionated ideas about what we call education.

I do not see myself ever working with my degree. It is not even on my resume lmao and I’ve never had to speak about my course of study or if I’ve ever been within the four walls of an institution in any of the interviews I’ve had. I’ve had quite a lot of them lol. My career and my degree are like two parallel lines that do not intersect.

So yeah, I’ve not been doing so well with school. My grades got really really terrible this year and there’s no other person to blame for it other than myself. I have valid reasons but they’re not great excuses. I didn’t expect it to be this bad, but I could have done better if I was very intentional about it. I was simply not just interested.

L’s and Failures

I failed at a couple of things this year, applied to more jobs than last year, got aired, got rejections, failed woefully in school, didn’t exactly meet my goals, etc. I’ll highlight a few major ones.

In last year's review, I mentioned that I was Interviewing for an Open Source Community Management role at The Linux Foundation and had made it past the first 2 interview phases. It is a role I’ve always wanted and well, I made it to the fourth phase and got rejected. It hurts to start a new year with such heartbreaking news. It was so so painful because I was soooo close. But we mueeevvvvveeddd.
I was really looking at getting an SWE Internship with a big company this year since it is my penultimate year. It seemed like a good way to get hired by a really big company post-graduation. Applied to tons of SWE Internships and made it past the CV review stage for most. But well, hackerrank has a way of humbling you lmao. I still suck at DSA. None of them worked out, while some are still ongoing, it wouldn’t matter much if it works out. Fidia won’t build itself!
I mentioned last year that I want to do more for people, travel, and create as many beautiful memories as I could. The traveling part never happened, I did more but not as much as I wanted, created memories but still not as much as I envisaged. Baby steps!
My grades were poor before, but they got really really terrible. I laugh when people think my technical expertise means school will come easy peasy to me and I’ll ace my exams with little to no stress lmao. If only they knew!
Burned out, severally. Had a mental breakdown and at some point, it got so bad that I was having an existential crisis. I literally phased out of everyone at this point.

Wins

Launched Fidia and built it from an MVP to an actual product. 🚀
Fidia got into ODX and raised $125,000 from OnDeck.
Got into GSoD the second time!
Made a lot more money than last year.
Organized the biggest Developer Conference in Abeokuta.
Finally got a mini comfy workspace setup(I’ve always wanted to do this).
Found Love. Somewhere in my review last year, I mentioned that I was friend-zoned. Well, she eventually saw the light and came to terms with how irresistibly charming and amazing I am😂😂. Okay, enough of the pride. I finally got to be with someone who we compliment each other and who makes me extremely happy. I’m not sure of how this year would have turned out without her in the picture, a lot of important decisions I made this year were driven by her advice and support including not dropping out. Even at my weakest moments, I was only able to make it through them because of her support. I’m extremely grateful for having her in my life, and I look forward to we creating more beautiful memories together.

2022 — Me, Myself & I

I’m still young, very young, and if I do not make the most of my youthful age because I’m “chasing the bag”, I’ll reflect back on these moments in the future and wish I had made the most of it. See, I want to chop life😂.

While it’s extremely important that I keep developing myself, honing my skills, and growing my career, it is also imperative that I take good care of myself. I have not been doing so well in that regard. I want to do more for myself.

I do not give myself enough credit, I want to appreciate myself more in 2022 and reward myself for my littlest of wins. Travel, go on dates, go shopping, visit a spa, get myself that expensive thing I want without holding back, take care of my mental health, invest in skincare, etc., and generally live a baby boy life while still remaining extremely hardworking.

Simply put, I do not want my whole life to revolve around just work and career.

If there is anything I learned this year, it’ll be that hard work and consistency pays off eventually. It might take a while but hang on tight, stay true to your ambitions. E go gem eventually.

This year was a roller coaster of emotions for me. I had my highs, had my lows, and burned out a lot. I do not want that to repeat itself in 2022. Overall, it was a good year and I hope 2022 is a lot better.

Cheers to an amazing year ahead 🥂🥂.