Favvy_Okwans🖤

The highlight of my day was coming across an old write up I wrote sometime in August 2024. It was titled Profound Lessons from Drum Lessons. It was hilarious, but also beautifully written. While reading it, I noticed I had mentioned someone I no longer talk to. Somehow, whenever I hear that person's name now, the only thing that comes to mind is our last memory together, and it wasn't a pleasant one, it was a fight. So stumbling upon that write up and being reminded that my experience with this person wasn't always horrible was surprisingly refreshing. It made me realize how easily we reduce people to one experience. Here I was, convinced this oga was a completely terrible person, only to be reminded that it wasn't always like that. There was a time when he was a source of inspiration, a good friend, and a solid support system. Sometimes, one painful ending becomes so loud that it drowns out every good memory that came before it. We let one chapter rewrite the entire st...

"It's either they get the message and they change, or they don't get the message, but they stop abusing you." ~ X To that one person who feels that speaking up about what makes you uncomfortable would get you misunderstood or ruin the friendship, hear me out. Not talking isn't protecting the relationship, it's empowering the behaviour that keeps hurting you.  Read that axiom again. Most times, we're so scared of how people will react to our feelings that we choose silence instead. We convince ourselves that enduring it is easier than having an uncomfortable conversation, but silence rarely solves anything, more often than not, it teaches people that your boundaries are optional. The truth is, it can only go two ways; They either get the message and make an effort to change, or they don't fully understand it, but they become aware enough to stop doing the very thing that makes you uncomfortable. Either way, you've been heard, and to me, that's a...

"It's not the action, it's the person." ~ X We all have exceptions. People we hold in high esteem, people we admire so deeply that even if we'd never do a particular thing for the rest of the world, we'd do it for them without thinking twice. We'd give an arm and a leg, simply because it is them. Now, here's the crazy part. Betrayal only feels like betrayal when it comes from the people you've made exceptions for. When they do the very things you never imagined they were capable of, it hurts in a way that words struggle to explain. Because not everybody can hurt you. The people who truly can are the ones you've given permission to, the ones you've trusted enough to get close, the ones you've loved enough to let your guard down around. That's why they say love and trust are like handing someone a knife and hoping they don't stab you. They are the exceptions, they have access, they have the capacity to wound you in ways strangers ...

Just because you're considerate doesn't mean you'll be considered. One of the hardest lessons adulthood teaches is this: people don't always love the way you love, think the way you think, or show up the way you would. Sometimes, we make the naive mistake of expecting people to do right by us simply because we would if the tables were turned. We assume our kindness will be mirrored, our loyalty reciprocated, our consideration returned. And when it isn't, it hurts, but growing up is realizing that people will be, well,,, people. There's a saying that goes, "You cannot control what people do, you can only control what you do." I'd like to add something to that. You also cannot expect people to treat you the way you would treat them. The only thing you truly have control over is how you choose to respond. That's why I love this quote by Eric Guaga, "Don't put yourself in a position where you are at the mercy of someone else's intentio...

There is something called the illusion of competence. It is the tendency to overestimate how good we are at something because we do not know enough to recognise how much we do not know. Sometimes, I think there is a similar thing with importance. The illusion of importance. The belief that we are more significant in people's lives than we actually are. That people are thinking about us as much as we think about ourselves, that our absence is being noticed, that our opinions are being carefully considered, that everyone is watching, analysing and remembering. But most people are busy living inside their own heads. They are thinking about their own problems, their own insecurities, their own mistakes, their own futures. They are worrying about the things you probably never noticed about them, just as you are worrying about the things they probably never noticed about you. You think everyone noticed that awkward thing you said, they probably forgot, sometimes, nobody even noticed you ...

“Onto Him who is able to keep us from running mad...” ~ Eric Guaga I came across this line yesterday in a video by Eric Guaga and, omor, it made so much sense. Like, mahd because I could virtually relate. There are seasons you go through that feel like the universe is actively testing your sanity. Seasons where you are almost losing it, where you are hanging on by a thread and wondering how much more you can take. Yet somehow, even in the middle of the storm, even when everything feels like it is going crazy, there is just this Guy upstairs, quietly ensuring that you do not completely lose yourself. And that is such an epic advantage. To have a God who keeps you grounded. A God who allows you to go through fire without being consumed by it, a God who lets you experience tribulations without allowing the tribulations to completely destroy you. Because life is already tough. Every day comes with at least a thousand things competing for your sanity. There is always something to worry abou...

You know what pisses me off so much? People knowing that you're a certain way, choosing that with open eyes, and then waking up one morning to decide that you being what you've always been is suddenly a problem. Now, this isn't talking about the extreme where people refuse to grow and stick to "take me as I am" or "this is who I am," but the sudden having an issue with parts of people they never hid. I would always say, the purest form of love is letting people be themselves, the messiest, craziest, cringiest versions of themselves. Just allow them. My roommate loves music like her life depends on it. From K-pop, where you don't even hear or understand what the singers are saying, to rap and trap. I don't fancy music much, but I've always known that coexisting means signing up for certain not-so-much-my-kind-of-things, so we let each other be ourselves. Now, imagine I wake up one day and I'm like, new rule: I don't want to hear any K-...

I was recently gifted Canva Pro, and you wouldn't believe that I've been having a hard time creating designs. I know it sounds crazy, but as a Canva designer, one of my greatest dreams was to get Canva Pro. I imagined that since I already did fairly well with the free version, having access to Pro would completely transform my designs. I would have access to better templates, finer elements, and more creative freedom. No more restricting my ideas because I couldn't access a particular template or feature. But that wasn't exactly what happened. The moment I got Canva Pro, I became utterly indecisive. Suddenly, I had access to an overwhelming number of templates, elements, fonts and possibilities. Instead of making magic, I panicked. I couldn't decide where to start, I would scroll through template after template, searching for the perfect one, and somehow end up creating nothing. I couldn't figure it out. Why was I suddenly design paralyzed? The more ...

Not Every Story Goes the Way We Think It doesn't always end with a happily ever after. The people you believed would be there no matter what could eventually turn their backs on you, and it's totally fine. If anything, it's just life. Life happens every day, and each day comes with its own surprises. I have always been big on friendships. My bubugaga would say I carry them on top of my head like government work, and she would always warn me to protect myself because friendship breakups can be the most painful, especially for people who are deeply invested, like I am. At the time, I didn't get it, I believed I was the exception, “Not my friends", “We're going to be forever” that kind of yada. But the thing with shortsighted is that you learn quickly, and if you're stubborn like me, you'll fight for the friendship with everything you've got. You'll chase the “Why us?” and ask, “We're supposed to do life together na”. And maybe that's the h...

“What you want to do is overrated.” ~ Eric Guaga I was watching a YouTube video by Eric Guaga today when he made the statement above, and I had to pause. In a world where we are constantly told to do what we want and pursue our dreams, he was saying the opposite. Do what you have to do. Leave what you want to do for later. Oftentimes, what we want to do is subjective. It is shaped by our environment, conditioning, exposure, and a lot more. As we gain more insight and acquire more knowledge, our perspectives can change. The things we once wanted may no longer appeal to us. So perhaps we shouldn't be in such a hurry to do what we want to do at the expense of what we have to do. Most times, what you have to do is annoying, tedious, uninteresting, not your thing, or simply not your preference. But in the long run, if you stick with it and do it well, it may take you exactly where you want to be. Growing up, I wanted to be so many things at so many different points in my life. And every...

After such a crazy weekend, Monday also came with its own wahala and in between losing my shi, my bubugaga called and an hour later I was all smiles. Sometimes, you need a really good conversation. Sometimes, it doesn't take much to feel better because after that call, all that was bothering me wasn't exactly solved immediately, but I felt so light. Dearest reader, it gets hard every now and then, hence it is necessary to have people you can unravel to, people you can come undone to and before saying a word they know exactly how you want to be comforted. I like to say, life is already hard, imagine doing it alone? You'll just craze, no jokes. My bubugaga re echoed something during our call and it was, "You can't figure it all out by yourself." Man was never designed to do life alone. You don't know it all, and sometimes strength looks like asking for help. So cherish your people. Call them back. Let them hold your hand when the road gets rough, and don...

 “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.” — Proverbs 13:12 There's nothing more annoying than being given false hope. You know that moment when you eagerly look forward to something, hold on to the possibility of it, and then it doesn't work out? In that moment, it honestly feels like the world should just end. That's exactly how I felt today. I was actually doing okay, content, even. Then I was given the possibility of getting my phone fixed today. I was genuinely excited because, low-key, being phone-less sucks. The moment I believed it could actually happen, I suddenly had this extra spring in my step. It's funny how hope can instantly change your mood. Well, at the end of the day, it didn't happen. Omor, I was so sad, sadder than I had been when the phone first got damaged. That's what hope does. It lifts you up, and when it's suddenly taken away, the fall feels even harder. Please don't sell me false hope. The...

 You can’t fall below the ground ke? You don’t even know that rock bottom has a basement. Just when I think, "You know what? I’ve seen the worst of it," boom, the universe unveils another level of it. It’s actually crazy. Tell me why I was being grateful that my tragedy was finally small enough to fit on the tip of my tongue, and then boom, my phone decides to go blind out of nowhere, a week before my exams. At this point, I don’t even have the strength to be sad, cry, or get angry. I’m just like, "Dear universe, Migwor" It’s not even funny, but I can’t help laughing. The craziest part? I don’t know how, but somehow I’m sure I’ll be fine. Dearest reader, this is merely a vent from an apparently heartbroken girl. I have no profound insight to share with thee today. Better luck next time. Anyways, if you think you’re going through a lot, just remember, it really can get worse. Like, mad worse. Things can go south so fast the contrast feels like day and night. Ciao. @f...

"Not every battle is between good and evil. Some are between good and what merely looks like it", ~ X In the words of Pojomatics, there's evil, there's good, and then there's pseudo good. We all know what evil is, but let's look at it from the Hebrew perspective. The Hebrew word often translated as evil is rah. Depending on the context, it can mean evil, disaster, adversity, harm, or ruin. On the other hand, the Hebrew word for good is tov, which describes something that functions as it should and promotes life, beauty, and well being. These are two extremes. But what if I told you there's another side? The Pseudo X. It could be pseudo good or pseudo evil. I find this concept fascinating because pseudo good seems to exist somewhere between good and evil. It appears to be a middle ground, but it's a false one, and that's exactly what makes it dangerous. So what is pseudo good? It is that which wears the appearance of tov while being rah ...

"You're always the victim or the hero in your own story." ~ X One of the most fascinating things about human beings is that we rarely experience reality as it is. We experience it as we perceive it. When we look back at a situation, we don't always see what actually happened. We see what happened through the lens of our emotions, assumptions, experiences, and blind spots. Your perception of what happened is not always what happened. Maybe that's why we're almost always the good person in our own narration. We tell the story in a way that makes our intentions obvious and our mistakes understandable. We explain away our actions because, to us, they make sense. I offended a friend recently, for days, I was upset that they hadn't reached out to me. In my version of the story, I was the one who had been wronged, then we finally had a conversation. That was when it dawned on me that I had been the villain, not by intention, but by my actions. The impact of what ...

For the past few weeks, I have been dealing with an issue with my WAEC date of birth. One tiny error meant I had to update almost every official document I own. It has had me moving from office to office, getting lost and finding my way again almost every Eke market day. The frustrating part is that everything had to be sorted before my exams. And if you've ever tried correcting an error in Nigeria, you already know the drill. It takes time, the process is tedious, and by the end of it, you're stressed out. I had already gone through several major stages of the process. Today was the final one, my JAMB change of data. Now, I had heard all sorts of horror stories about the JAMB office in Benin. Stories of people arriving by 7 a.m only to leave by 8 p.m, stories of endless queues, frustration, and wasted days. Naturally, I dreaded going. It didn't help that I woke up around 6am, when I should have been leaving by 6:30. To make matters worse, I almost got lost agai...

"I have a terrible habit of leaving things unsaid for the sake of peace." ~ X The fact is, this is completely unnecessary. Often, when we leave things unsaid for the so called sake of peace, what follows isn't peace at all. It only breeds loathing in the one who had so much to say but chose silence, and oblivion in the one who assumes everything is fine simply because they were never confronted. I hate confrontation. Truly, I do. But if I do something wrong, please confront me. It'll be a hard pill to swallow, but I'd rather swallow a bitter pill than unknowingly keep hurting someone I care about. In the same vein, if you do something that hurts me, I'll tell you. Not because I want to fight, but because I don't want resentment to find a home in my heart. I've learned that the quickest way to let go of hurt is to bring it into the open. The conversations we avoid today often become the bitterness we carry tomorrow. Peace isn't the absen...

"You need more than enthusiasm or motivation." ~ X Dearest reader, they say when the going gets tough, the tough get going. One day, the enthusiasm will fade, the motivation will wear off. Eventually, it will be just you and your dreams against the world. And in those moments, life will test whether you truly mean business. Starting is difficult, incredibly difficult. But truth be told, it's the simplest kind of difficult you'll ever experience. A friend of mine recently complained that his head felt like it would fall off because of the amount of planning he's doing for a project he's working on. The first thing that came to my mind was this: one day, he'll look back and realize that planning was the easiest part. The deeper you go, the harder it gets. Every new level demands a stronger version of you than the last. There will be days that test your patience, shake your conviction, and make you question whether you know what you're doing at all. Those...

"If you saw the greatest in me and chose to stick with me, then it was a privilege for you. You didn't do me a favour." ~ X One of the strangest forms of entitlement is believing that believing in someone automatically makes you indispensable to their story. Somehow, we've convinced ourselves that sticking with people, supporting them, or seeing their potential means we've done them some extraordinary favour. That without us, they wouldn't have become who they are. But that's such a narrow way to see relationships. If anything, walking alongside someone as they grow is one of life's greatest privileges. You get front row seats to their becoming, you witness prayers turn into testimonies, you watch discipline become excellence, small beginnings become remarkable stories, and dreams slowly take shape. If you're paying attention, their growth should spill over into your own, it should challenge you. Inspire you, propel you towards becoming better your...