I used these troubled times to commit to my dreams
How I finally decided to dedicate myself to be a full-time writer, freelancer, and podcaster
Allegue Wessim
Back in March, when the lockdown started, and like most of us, I found myself facing multiple choices: Either stay in Berlin and find a job, or changing my path to become a full-time nomad author and freelancer.
To be honest the first weeks, I didn´t do much of thinking or execution.
Instead, I purchased 7 different games of the ´Assasin´s Creed´ franchise. I spent 2 weeks wandering in those different words and historical cities.
But, when it was over, a couple of things were clear:
First I wasn´t much into gaming anymore and second, confinement made me realize that I wasn´t satisfied with the path I was taken.
So like every time I find myself in a picky situation, I turned towards the books that made me change perspectives about life.
From 12 rules of life to predictably irrational, I immersed myself in these books to clear my mind and find my answers.
To clarify this journey I am going to divide into 3 different steps:
1- Recalibration
Finding a way back can be quite challenging and especially during confinement times where most of us lost their landmarks.

Dan Ariely
According to Dan Ariely, the author of predictably irrational, getting rid of the problems directly from the roots and quick is the best way to proceed. It might spike up your pain and fear levels but in the long run, it can only benefit you. As an experience to demonstrate this, Dan used his own life.
The author was burned over 70% of his body and used the way that the nurses used to remove his pads as a variable. He found out pretty quickly that a short yet extreme pain level was way more manageable than a slow and medium one.
So I applied to the same principle to my life: I eliminated bad food from my diet, fixed my sleep schedule, and went back to the things that helped me clear my minds like meditation, music, and sports.
Within one week of fixing my schedule, amazing things started to happen: I regained my passion for life, and I was ready to take big decisions.
2- Opening up
I think that most of my problems came from the fact that I used to adopt a lone wolf mentality.
As humans, we tend often to think that the problems that we face are unique.
Truth is, most likely than not, there is more than one person out there that is facing the same problems and dilemmas.
That´s when I started to call friends and people that took the same path or that I admired.
It helped me so much in finding the answers that I was searching for that I decided to share those Zoom deep talks in a Youtube channel. Before even knowing it, a podcast was born.
Within a couple of episodes, I had so many people sharing with me those same fears and apprehensions that I was facing.
That´s when I realized, I just gotta keep executing. I was looking around for a long time, looking at others like they were doing everything right and I was the one on the wrong path.
And then I comprehended that nobody actually knew what they were doing. But the people that succeed are the ones that keep doing it.
3- To succeed you can only be yourself
As a long time fan of the Joe Rogan Experience, I tried to mimic his approach to podcasting.
Everything was going well but still, something was lacking: It was not me.
That´s when I used Cameo to ask successful content creators, creatives, and athletes to help me with this conundrum.
Almost everyone answered the same way: Just try different styles and find your own voice.
It was quite logical: Like the special Big Mac unique recipe or KFC special spices, I had to find my own secret sauce and blend it within my content.
And the moment I started being just me something amazing started to happen: A small community was founded and some noticeable guests started to accept my invitations.
Now step by step, I´m taking my time to find my voice while announcing loud and clear my intentions.
Having gained a small momentum, I thought that the ball was already rolling. But I forgot one crucial parameter: Like any other type of content, it is a game of context.
Once again I had to adapt my strategy.
4- Take a leap of faith:
If I never mentioned it, I´m Tunisian and English is my third language.
Although I have a C2 certificate level, most of my audience couldn't relate to my background.
Deep inside I always knew that, and I think I postponed this decision in my subconscious.
I would bring so much value if I started the same thing in my native language as so many of the youth lost their way and hope for a better tomorrow.
But I was fearing so much about how it would be perceived as so many subjects are quite tricky to talk about.
That´s when Daniel Davis from the TV show ´The Nanny´gave me one of the best advice that I got in life
We all have fear when it comes to big decisions, but I decided to follow his advice and took a leap of faith.
And I can´t tell you how much this changed my perspective:
I started meeting awesome entrepreneurs and creatives that were doing their best to improve their status.
That´s when also honesty and authenticity played a big part: As I was doing it only with passion and didn´t care about the results and focused on the process, more and more successful people wanted to come and talk freely about their ideas and dreams.
But don´t get me wrong I´ll continue also my podcasts in English as well as it doesn´t matter for me if I fail miserably.
5- Commit:
At this point everything became clear, I had to be 100% invested in my dreams.
That´s when I started improving my gear and decided to turn the page on my Berlin chapter.
I expected to regret or to be anxious, as living in Berlin was the most awesome period of my life.
But this time I had goals bigger than me, and talking with so many successful persons within my field made me my mind so clear.
So with no regrets, I took a plane and returned to my homeland to help out a bit focus on writing in here and other places and to freelance in marketing and innovation management.
I'll try to grow my podcast on the side, as until now I love to have the freedom to go wherever I want with it.
Maybe I missed some wonderful life opportunities, but I was never happier than this moment where I decided to follow my bliss and talent.
From today, I will publish at least an article every day to share with you my deepest thoughts, findings, and case studies that I worked on.
I want to take the time to thank Niklas Göke and Tim Denning who helped me a lot through their writing to finally embrace my path and just finally be just me.
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Allegue Wessim

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