#EndSars is trending all over social media and oh well, I have mixed feelings about it. Nope, I am not supporting that SARS be totally scraped off. Yes, I have seen these people chased a young man wildly and even though I didn’t know him, I was so scared they might hurt or worse, shoot him down. I was once in a cab with three other guys that I didn’t know from Adam and we were stopped and searched and accused for no tangible reason whatsoever…but yes, I still maintain my stand. There was a motive and purpose behind the existence of Special Anti-Robbery Squad and we should not forget what their original mission and purpose is, even though some of them have completed deviated from their mission and turned to Special Advanced Robbers Squad. Rather than scrape off SARS altogether, I say we join hands and end careers of the corrupted ones among them. If you are harassed for no reason whatsoever, make sure you go to any length to fight for your right and protest your innocence.

Too many people have lost their lives from being irrational with these irrational people. Stand your ground with common sense. We all know how many Nigerians will sit behind their laptops and phones to form ‘Jagunlabi’ but when it comes to action, they will hide their coward faces. It is not every time you fight violence with violence. That is why they have put numbers out there that you can call if you are harassed or you see anyone being harassed by them SARS, I mean the ones that are Special Advanced Robbers’.

Let the ones that are doing their jobs in a sensible, professional way, do their job. Call the ones that are plainly going out of line of their job, to order.

Let’s not forget that another security force can and will always be created, even if this one is scrapped off. All it takes is just a change of name and uniform…Criminal acts still needs to be curbed, remember?

*drops pen

© Lydia Oladejo

Lydia Oladejo is an Editor at Women Of Rubies, a writer, and a Fashion Designer.

Facebook: Lydia Oladejo

Instagram :@lydiaoladejo

Email :lydiaoladejo@gmail.com

Depression

Depression is that persistent annoying voice in your head that tells you all that you are not 

It fills up all your thoughts and consumes you

It is the lies of the enemy 

Blinding you to all that you are and your potential 

It is the half truths that voice whispers to you 

Pointing towards all your failures

Distorting and concealing the true picture  

It is suffering in silence 

Your world surrounded in darkness 

Depression is sleeping in all day and staying awake all night 

With the demons in your head fighting for your attention 

It is alienating all your fiends sometimes 

And believing that no one cares about you 

It is holding on to resentment and heartbreak like a shield 

This supposedly protects you from further hurt 

But also stops you from healing and experiencing true love 

Depression takes different shapes and forms 

It could be laughing, dancing and having the best time with your friends but dying inside 

It could be achieving success and by society’s standard you should be happy 

But the emptiness inside is unexplainable 

Depression is a world filled with empty people barely making it through the day 

It is thinking there isn’t any point to life 

And failing to see the beauty in it 

But depression is not a weakness 

It is not something to be ashamed of 

Rather it is a disease of the mind 

A symptom of a much deeper rooted void in your life 

Depression is something only the one who created you can completely heal 

Author: Chidinma Chukwuma

Chidinma is a final year law student at the University of Sheffield. Check out more of her work at chidinmachukwuma.wordpress.com

Photo credit: Gettyimages

The most common jobs in Nigeria right now are ones gotten from a third-party company that is signed to provide employees for various employers. While I worked at one, I found that, the reason employer companies choose the option of contract staffs is to reduce its expenses and improve profitability. So, while a full-time employee may get a 50% raise from your salary, including HMO benefits. This is even more annoying for Contract Staffs because they do more of the work but have less benefits, up until the length of days to go on leave. However, there’s always a way to have the life you want regardless of the situation presented to you.

KNOW WHO YOU ARE: This is nothing about your desires or visions (at least not for the purpose of this post). What makes you thick? Deep down your heart, what’s the core of your strength. The real test to enjoying your job, hence your life, is to know who you are. When no one’s watching, and you have nothing, there’s a core of you is the strength of your existence. It is what you will be regardless of the amount of wealth you amass. Although the search of identity may be an ongoing process, there’s a core of you that reveals your truth in whatever situation you find yourself. Everything you believe yourself to be should not be dependent on anything else but you. Once you can identify who you are, it would facilitate the emergence of what you’d like to experience.

CHANGE YOUR COGNITIVE EXPERIENCE: The natural cognitive of man is attracted to negative situations that appeal to his senses. So for example, you get to find out the extra benefits due to full-time staffs in your company and it freaks you out (well, you should), it is only normal that you begin to take it out on your daily routine, colleagues and even your line managers.

Two years after my experience as a contract staff in a financial institution, I was appraised and suggested to be converted into a full time staff.  I was excited when my line manager hinted me on this new development and was waiting for the big announcement. To my greatest disappointment, when my appraisal form got to the office in charge, my group head was summoned and asked, “Who would you like to be retrenched in order to approve Adesewa’s conversion?” Confused, she responded, nobody. “Well, because the company cannot afford the cost for another full time employee,” they disclosed.

It was great consolation to have known that the reason for the default was a lack of the company’s capacity, not mine. If this happened to you, I know you would freak out, and probably drop your resignation notice to go somewhere you’ll be ‘celebrated, not tolerated’. Just calm down! LOL! The quality of the delivery of your duties should be influenced by positivity. Contract jobs hardly come with motivations. Thus, you must always find a way around it. While you have a plan to quit, be deliberately positive about your daily dealings. The more positivity you exude, the greater the attraction for more. If it doesn’t happen for you in this job, it would somewhere else.

CREATE VALUE FOR YOUR PERSONALITY: One of the many reasons people want to be in the full-staff cadre is so that the company can place value on them. The true value of your job however is not dependent on your position, but your personality. Quit thinking the reason you’re not doing well right now is because you don’t get so much pay. Your pay may not equal your plan, but it does not necessarily influence the core of you except you want it to. So, during a knowledge sharing session at your company or a proposal pitch, you have the platform to ‘show yourself’. Yes! Flaunt the stuff you’re made of! This is not PRIDE; it is PURPOSE-ON-DELIVERY. Always look for opportunities to reveal who you are asides from being the Front Desk Officer or Cashier. Profer solutions to problems. That’s what employers want to see. Even though it may likely not buy your conversion as a staff, it would increase your value as a person. You are first a person before being someone’s staff. Work at it!

WORK EXPERIENCE IS IN PHASES, ENJOY THIS ONE: A young entrepreneur who also works as an employee reached out to me one day. She shared all her frustrations as to how she was not getting fulfilments with her job. She mentioned how she knew this was not want she signed up for her life and all. The truth is, at every point in life, we get bored. This is not just a contract thing, stop blaming it on the job. Because, guess what, even if you were full time, you would still get bored. All days are not the same. So, here’s what you need to know. This same way with life, all work experiences are in phases. You have to learn the art of enjoying the phases by creating systems that work for you.

At the financial job experience I told you about, every week became annoying because there had to be something new to do – things that were way out of the initial job description(JD). Whichever way I felt did not matter to the company, the job had to be done anyway. And the only way to be happy with your job is to be happy with you, knowing that this is only a phase. You would get involved in better things and greater opportunities, so if you want to make your life count, you have to do it right.

ALWAYS WORK WITH THE END IN VIEW: You know, many times, we are motivated in the present by having a vision of what’s to come. Doing your job with the end in mind is one sure way to enjoy what you’re doing currently. So, pending the time you find something more ‘ghen-ghen’, let the ‘ghen-ghen’ thing inspire the not-so ‘ghen-ghen’ one. The vision you have for yourself should drive your passion for what you do now. You may not like what you do now, but when you look at the experience later from the inside in, you’ll see it was necessary for your journey. See the end in mind, Live the present, Create your future!

Adesewa Greg-Ighodaro is a certified leader and media enthusiast. She loves to inspire through writing and speaking. Asides from being a published author, she enjoys content marketing. Connect with her via social media @adesewainc