I’m the Camel.
I got fired last month (a stark contrast to 'I got flowers today') due to my incompetence. Wait first, let me just google that to make sure I'm not cursing myself
Incompetence [ɪnˈkɒmpɪt(ə)ns]NOUN
inability to do something successfully
Yup, sounds about right. However, my former employer believes it was due to my unseriousness towards the work. I was treating it like just work, and not like I was a part of the business, and it was no fault of my boss'.
Unserious [ʌnˈsɪərɪəs]
ADJECTIVE
not serious; light-hearted.
It had been a long time coming, but she (my boss) tried to make it work for the sake of our personal relationship. Nevertheless, I kept flailing, wrongly interpreting clear messages and trying to avoid confrontations or disappointments. Look where that got me.
The final thread (this is a pun) was when I uploaded a reel, which looked amazing! But on the cover image, I put a small art of a shirt... a lady's shirt.
It's a MEN'S Fashion brand. But what made it worse is that she didn't find out herself. A friend of hers told her about it when they saw the post. Yeah, just hang me already.
I didn't know 😭. Just goes to show more of my incompetence. And I was struggling to improve it because... I have a secret.
This is my deep dark secret. Are you ready? I'm a coconut head. This is the first time I've ever been fired, and I can only be disappointed in myself. I tried to have it all, but now it seems I might end up with nothing.
But Bayo, what do you mean "have it all".
Well, I was unfaithful. I was in bed with other jobs and I honestly thought it wouldn't affect my productivity, and it didn't... at first. But creative work is far more tasking than anything else (in my humble opinion) and having to juggle creative work in like ten different directions (might be more) none of which are my personal work... well, one would wonder how it all went wrong.
I got fired because my productivity and creativity dropped drastically, and I literally had one job, create and push out content (well, two). I messed up, because Fashion is not my niche and I require more time to create the content. However, I took it like most other content, believing I could wing it to great effect. Now, it's not that I was being unserious, but winging it always works for me. God gave me a brain that connects creative dots easily. It's knowing your process. For some, they need to have it all planned out or else.
But I was wrong. In a way, it reminds me of how I thought I was such a genius because I spent days before my common entrance exam playing games, only to pass in flying colors. But in almost no time, I realized that what I grasped without studying could only take me so far (a concept University further knocked into my head).
Seems like it was a lesson that needed relearning. But I'm angry at myself for having to learn it this way, and I'm saddest about the relationship I have with the person. She's an amazing individual and she won't hold it against me, but honestly, it sucks.
She was my first (salary payer), and I'll never forget the lessons I learned. Her professionalism, drive and everything else (even the way she handled my sack) are things I hope to replicate and build upon someday.
That's one job lost. Let's see how many I have to lose before this is engrained in my head! The other jobs I'm doing require deep research, like I can't even pretend to wing it, and it's exposing my fraudulence on an entirely different level. But people have put their trust in me and I can't let them down, not again.
Then again, that mindset is exactly what got me into this multi-project dilemma in the first place. I need to stop trying to fulfill everyone's needs, I don't have the capacity and I was wrong to think I'd get it by stretching myself all at once.
This has been another maybe incoherent entry in Bayo's Bants, Broodings and Brilliant Somethings.
I'd love feedback and any specific tips on how best to handle this situation. Like, tbh, I'm a mess (God's mess 😔), and I dey go ask my maker for help now because... because.
You can also insult me in the comments too, it's allowed.
PS, my grandmother (God rest her soul) helped me prep for the common entrance months before, but me I was raising shoulder like I never read. Sigh.
Definitely a brooding.
Pele. We're all learning in this life