Unscripted Odyssey

a human, a road, a step, a destination... src: ChatGPT

15 years in school and I've never taken a final exam this bad. All questions have D. all and E. none. There wasn't a single question I confidently answered. I passed over each question in the hope of getting one with an answer, but didn't get any. It still amazes me. It is the kind of thing you experience only in your dreams.

Modesty has beauty.

I am feeling bad about how I treated Cursor AI in the past, after I used up all AI credits mid-month. It was not kind of me to make it check GitHub Actions status or change user roles in the database. I shouldn't have made it change a simple color with a "this doesn't look right" prompt. It is like the friend you take for granted is no longer with you.

Prior to 1954, doctors claimed that running a mile under 4 minutes was biologically impossible. Then Roger Bannister came and did it in 3:59.4. He was healthy. He proved that the barrier was more psychological than physical. Just 46 days later, John Landy, another athlete, broke the record. Healthy. That is what is happening here. We believed we had to cross seas to build something great. Now you see that it is possible to go this far from here. I am going to be prophetic. There will be billion-dollar tech companies that operate from Ethiopia in our lifetime.

I almost lost everything this year. Not “stressed about deadlines” losing everything. My dad. My family. Everything I’ve been building. There were nights I genuinely didn’t know if RAVN would survive the month. But my cofounder and I kept building anyway. Through the doubt, uncertainty, and nights when nothing seemed to work. Today, I’m incredibly grateful to share that RAVN has been accepted into Antler. $400K in funding, backed by one of the world’s leading venture builders, alongside companies like Lovable, Airalo, Reebelo, and Tactiq. To everyone who watched us build this from the beginning, thank you. This wasn’t luck or a guarantee. We kept building long before there was anything to celebrate. Most importantly, I’m grateful to God. He never left us. We’ve come a long way. We’re just getting started.

ዶሮ ማይበላበት ዘመን መለወጫ ት ባይለወጥ ቢቀርስ

Happy New Year!

For one year, I tried to carve my path as I wanted it. This is a long post, but I promise it is worth your time. Last year at this time, I was in Medicine, but my mind was already elsewhere. I wanted to get into tech. I wanted to be a programmer. I had been learning it online for about a month by that time. However, my hatred of Medicine had already closed the doors. My results weren't enough to get into Computer Science or even Information Systems. Coding has a ton of resources on the internet for self-teaching. I put my trust in that. I decided to be a self-taught developer. However, it was easy to get distracted. Without focus, you can't master anything. The only time I engaged with tech was on my PC. My classes, classmates, dorm mates, and friends were social science and medical students. I would waste months exploring random philosophy or psychology topics on the internet. To remedy that, I joined developer channels, attended developer events, and got close to CS and SE students. I participated in hackathons when I had no confidence in my skills. I was afraid of people judging my ability. But I kept going. I left my first-ever marketing job when it was paying me well. I closed my door to new shiny opportunities. I tried everything I could to make my efforts add up. When there were a dozen languages to try, I learned only one language and its frameworks: JavaScript. In programming, there is always something to learn. As a result, you won't feel ready or at home easily. So, I started building real products. Bringing an idea from my mind into existence, into something I could interact with, gave me the courage to continue. Towards the end, I realized one thing. If my skills don't make money, I will fall into perpetual learning. So, I had to make money off this coding thing. However, I didn't want to get into internships or waste half of my day committing to work. I wanted to work with clients on a contract basis. That would allow me to work on my schedule, at my convenient place, and would allow me to add other projects easily. I am delighted to say I achieved that. I am getting paid for the skill I started learning just a year ago. I work from home. I do not wait in bus lines. I have enough time to expand my work to other clients. It feels amazing to see life working out as you intended it. I challenge you to live intentionally for the coming year. Try to imagine a destination you would like to reach and work towards that with patience. Give it your effort and give it time until you see the fruit. Something good will come out of it. @Unscripted_Odyssey

Number of unread messages on my Telegram accounts. 😭 I don't know what to do at this point.

We are only warming up, guys. What did you learn this year? What did you achieve? What do you regret from it?

I know people who read lots of self-help books who are addicted, poor and filthy. Seriously. So why do we read books? We gotta be careful about that. Remember I told you, I found myself reading to hide from the real work? Yeah, books can also ruin you actually. Reading isn't a sacred act by itself. We should examine why we are reading. That being said books broaden your perspective, and lets you borrow principles from far-away people. So, read but read intentionally.

I want to make one thing very clear.

BOOKS WON'T SAVE YOU.

I don't struggle to read books anymore. In fact it has become my way of procrastination. When I don't want to do sth, I would find myself reading some interesting book. I have read lots of books. I have learned a lot about myself and my surrounding from them. I didn't force myself to finish any book except for a few cases. I read a few pages and decide from that. As a result, I didn't finish many of the books I started. Also, looking back I I haven't some books I feel like should have read. I was more of doubling down on where inspiration is. I was inclined to psychology and philosophy. Not a single book had a major effect on my life this year. It seems I read the Greats last year. Some books that stuck with me - The Brother's Karamazov - The courage to be disliked - Ready Fire Aim - The way of the superior man - Surrounded by Idiots I have read some weird books I won't let anyone know.

Safaricom is being generous. የአዲስ ዓመት ስጦታ! በሁሉም ሳምንታዊ እና ወርሃዊ የቴሌ ደቂቃ እና ዳታ እጥፍ ያግኙ! ስጦታው እስከ መስከረም 2 ብቻ ይቆያል።

I am only scratching the surface when it comes to life. Growing up in the countryside gave me the privilege of getting introduced to many things at an adult age. I have a lot of things to entertain myself with. great movies I haven't watched, great books I haven't read, great songs I haven't listened to, cool places I haven't visited, mind-blowing ideas I didn't know before, perspectives I didn't know existed, and potential I haven't yet realized... I am grateful for privilege. I have a large arsenal to cope with life's ordeals.

This song is designed for my ear. 'Maybe you could sing it with me' 🎧 https://youtu.be/78Ex_vru4SU?si=pgJEaZ0KHgD-CKMa