Nadra again
100 Essays on FoundHer #96
It’s so funny how when you act before overthinking and then later feel embarrassed, but still decide to continue anyway, you end up with incredible results.
Different people. Different places. Same message.
Something I took a leap of faith on not even two days ago has already garnered interest. I didn’t go in thinking we could turn this into a reusable content piece or a continuous series, but here we are.
A friend who saw the post and responded to my WhatsApp status update wanted to join in and hold up a sign too. She lives in the central city.
Another of my classmates messaged me saying she would love to recreate this for her brand and asked what she needed.
Today, I reached out to my brother’s friend, who said he would reach out to his female friends who live in the north to hold up a sign.
I also messaged his younger brother, who my mum adores by the way, and asked him to hold up a sign. He was down.
Again, you often have to create the evidence long before people do it for you. Long before people notice. Long before they bat an eye.
You are the only one who (truly) cares about your product when you are early. No one will carry your product on their heads but you. So you have to make the best of it. And for me, that looked like reaching out to different people around Nigeria to tap into their Muslim women network on my behalf.
As well as get a repeatable format I can use over and over again. To make people notice. So they can’t look away. So they experience some form of FOMO. So they ask how they could also hold up a sign too.
Hey, I never said it was guaranteed to work. I just said I would try, and did.
Even when I thought to myself, “Okay, this feels cringe lol.” I still didn’t let it stop me.
Because confidence is built in action, not inaction. It is built through evidence, not emotions.
I also happened to get the hoodie hijaab wearing classmate I mentioned in Essay 95 to hold up a sign.
I enjoyed every bit of it.
Even when I heard: “ehn (oh), there she goes, Nadra again” from a different classmate. While asking the beautiful girl in the photo above if she was ready for her photo op mind you ;)
I ignored it. I made the best of it. That’s the whole point.
Because whether you hate it or love it, you remember it.
You kind of started a movement Samira, how cool is that??!!