Being human is quite challenging, if there is one thing we humans never ran out of is challenges. The one thing that amazes me about myself is the way I think. I mean if there is one trait that seems to be the foundation of every other trait I posses is my ability to think. The reason behind this is very simple, the more careful I evaluate my options through thinking, the more I know and the more I know, the more secure I feel.
That is the way my mind works, I was not born like this but when you experience enough hardship In a lifetime, it becomes normal for you to develop some habit. I used to be very simple person, whenever I want something done, I just do it and worry about the consequences later but the more I do this, I realised the consequences I had to suffer could have been avoided. Life can be cruel sometimes, the moment you feel like you have it all figured out, it takes it all away.
Speaking of times when I was low and I got back on top, I have had plenty of this to the extent I don't even know which one to pick from. The most recent one was during my clearance and NYSC camping.
Graduating from school is one thing every student anticipate but the expenses that comes with can be burdensome. The worst of all the expenses is clearance fee, schools have a way of sucking student dry, it is like they believe you have to pay parting fee. I went through it all and after that I started preparing for my NYSC. As a result of the amount I have spent during clearance, by the time I bought my NYSC kits, I had no money left.
For the first time in awhile, I had to seek financial help from my parents, they were surprised because I don't rely on them for financial assistance. By March 17 I was deployed to Oyo State In Nigeria for my NYSC service, An event I have been anticipating for more than a year. I traveled for about 5hours before getting to camp, while in the bus, I was in deep thought concerning my financial status.
I got to camp, finished my in camp registration swiftly just to make sure no time was wasted, at the moment it felt like everything was going according to plan till it wasn't. My first encounter was "drills" A compulsory military exercise every Corp member is expected to participate in. Since I was done with my registration and I was given my NYSC kits, I wasted no time in putting on my white on white camp dress code which was the first mistake I made. Immediately the soldiers saw me on white on white which indicates I was done with in-camp registration and ready for camp activities, I was matched down to the parade ground.
And that was how it all started, being introduced to the match practice was fun at first till we began to repeat the same steps over and over again till my legs felt numb. It is strange how something could be fun and hurt badly simultaneously. That was when I realised I have not given my body time to rest from the traveling but there was no going back. Even if there was, it was not known to me at the moment and that was how I discovered how much my laps could hurt. Nursing the pain and also going through the camp activities made me forget every other thing existed.
There is a level of pain you would feel that you will forget your financial issues. I was at my lowest at everything, my health, my business, finance, everything was just in shambles. At some point, I also had a toe injury as a result of wearing the white sneakers for too long. At that point, it felt like the universe was against me. Everything changed when a coin I was mining known as Notcoin was listed. I think I got up to $200 after selling off the coin I got, I used for the things I needed immediately and I was elevated a little.
A time I was super high but for some reasons I find myself at the bottom. It was before I started my Higher national diploma, I had this job at Duncan maritime limited, the job pay was good so I had a lot of leftover funds. My safest way of motoring my savings was making use of piggyvest an online saving platform, which later became an habit of mine and increased my saving attitude. When I realised that I will be undergoing my HND program at moshood abiola Polytechnic which has always been the plan before I started my industrial training.
I chose to safe lock my funds, which is one of the features of piggyvest app that allows you to safe lock some funds, in return you get an upfront interest before the due date. I was fine with just safe locking of funds till one of my colleagues at work popularly known as Sir K introduced another platform to me.
For weeks he kept lecturing me about an investment platform that pays a very High interest. I did not pay attention to him at first because I knew it could be another Ponzi scheme. Few weeks later sir k started getting returns from his investment which was very attractive but still I turned deaf ears to the news of the investment.
He knew about my plan to pursue my HND, so one day he walked up to me and gave me some advise which centred around taking risk, sir k is very much older than I'm so he usually treat me like I was his son. From his advise I decided to start little by investing 20k at first which in the pace of one month came back with returns of 25RIO.
Then I got greedy, because I realise I could save up faster by investing more funds forgetting that the business could crash at any moment, though I did a lot of research before I started investing, I knew of the company's Name, quintessential investment limited, I knew of there physical office at Lekki and the founder Joshua and a lot of other information but I guess that doesn't guarantee much.
While I was investing I only collected my profit twice, the rest I kept on renewing the investment capital and profit in order to maximise my profit. In the pace of 7months the company started having issues paying its investors, the moment I noticed I quickly requested for a withdraw instantly but it was too late. At that moment I have accumulated about 257k because I was running both 6 months plan and monthly plan.
When I requested for withdrawal, I got just 52k, I was extremely devastated. The owner of the company Joshua Kayode was arrested and charged to court for fraud, then I still had hope maybe he might release the funds but you know how Nigeria case are, the case died down and I never heard anything from him till today.
Sir k who introduced me to the investment platform lost more than I did, about 2m plus. He never recovered from the loss. at that moment I had some funds I had safe lock on my piggyvest app for my HND program but those were meant for after graduation.
The loss had a lot of impact on every area of my life, I was extremely devastated because I had plans I wanted to execute with the money. My HND 1 was rough because I was still recovering from the loss. My parents supported me especially my dad, he just kept on reassuring me that everything will be fine.
I learnt my lessons but the memory of both situation still lingers, I guess the proverb that says "all that glitters is not gold" is true after all, if I had the opportunity to make the same choices again I wouldn't. I will evaluate my choices my carefully before making any life changing decision.
This write-up was inspired by week 29 SciFi multiverse prompt titled "Navigating the ups and down" in SciFi multiverse community.
Cover image - 𝖣𝖾𝗌𝗂𝗀𝗇𝖾𝖽 𝗎𝗌𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝖼𝖺𝗇𝗏𝖺
Image 1 - images used are mine or else indicated other
