Shame cannot buy Garri🤷🏽‍♀️

The Art of Being 20-Something 💜

If there is one thing adulthood teaches you early, it’s that pride is a terrible financial plan. It pays zero bills, covers zero subscriptions, and will actively leave you starving in a corner while the people who have completely given up on dignity are out there thriving.

In your twenties, shame is a luxury item. And frankly? We just don’t have the budget for it.

The older I get, the more convinced I am that the true secret to life isn’t talent, connections, or hard work. It is delusion. Raw, aggressive, unprovoked confidence.

The kind of crazy faith that makes you look at a wall, decide it’s a door, and just walk straight through it hoping the universe moves out of your way.

Think about Adekunle Gold in the early days. Before the polished vocals, and the global arenas, there was just a guy with Photoshop and a dream. Man was literally photoshopping himself into pictures with Rihanna and posting it for the world to see. People laughed. It was absurd. It was border-line delusional. But you know what? It worked. He edited himself into the narrative until the narrative became real life.

He simply refused to let embarrassment get in the way of his destiny.

Because here’s the thing about puting yourself out there: the window between “Who does this person think they are?” and “Wow, they really did it” is surprisingly short. But to cross that bridge, you have to survive the part where you look absolutely ridiculous.

Look at Nigerian skitmakers. These are people who will voluntarily put on a torn house dress, wear a neon yellow wig backwards, roll around in actual mud on a public street, and scream into a smartphone in front of confused bystanders. To anyone watching, it looks like a psychiatric emergency.

But three years later? That exact same mud-rolling is buying a duplex in Lekki.

They looked shame in the eye and traded two minutes of public embarrassment for lifelong freedom. Or think about the sheer audacity of upcoming tailors😂

They tailor will sew an outfit that looks like a tragic disagreement between fabric and thread. The left sleeve is longer than the right, the zipper is throwing hands, and the neckline is gasping for air. But when you put it on, this tailor will turn you toward the mirror, clasp their hands together, and shout: “Awww! Look at that fit! Fire! You bad, girl!” They will hype up a disaster with so much conviction that for a split second, you actually start believing you’re the problem, not the dress.

That level of shameless marketing is an Olympic-level skill. They don’t have time to be embarrassed by a bad seam they have a business to run.

Doing anything new in your twenties is basically like doing stand-up comedy for the very first time.

You walk onto a dark stage, pull the mic out of the stand, and stare into a crowd of strangers who are actively waiting for you to fail. You tell a joke. Silence. Crickets. Sweat starts rolling down your back. You tell another joke, and someone in the front row just sighs and checks their phone.

It’s the kind of mortifying experience that makes you want to pack your bags, change your name, and start a quiet new life farming yam in the village.

But the comedians who actually make it aren’t the ones who never bombed. They’re the ones who stood in that cold sweat, took the L, went home, ate a bowl of warmed eba, and came back the next Thursday to do it all over again. And somehow, two years later, they’re filling up theatres and people are paying thousands just to hear them breathe into a mic.

They didn’t win because they were perfect from day one. They won because they were too stubborn to stay embarrassed.

Being 20-something is inherently embarrassing. You don’t fully know what you’re doing, your life plan changes every three working days, and half the time you’re just guessing your way through adulthood. But if you’re waiting until you’re completely ready, completely polished, and 100% guaranteed not to look foolish... you’re going to be waiting a very long time.

Shoot the shot. Post the terrible first draft. Pitch the crazy idea. Sell the outfit with the crooked seam.

Honestly, the world is already loud and chaotic. Nobody is remembering that slightly embarrassing thing you did three Tuesdays ago anyway they’re too busy worrying about their own life.

So please, go out there and make a glorious fool of yourself. Post the draft. Shoot the shot. Wear the weird outfit.

Pack up your shame, put it in a box, and trade it for pure, unadulterated delusion. It never bought garri, it never paid rent, and it’s certainly not invited to your success story. 💜