About Me — Spiritworth

Telling my story

It’s time for a bit more about me. A window into my world and its complexities.

What am I about?

I try to live by a few philosophies. Firstly, I don’t know the meaning of life. But I do believe we can always grow ourselves and live more intentionally. Boring and cliched but true.

That thinking has taken me down a well-trodden path. I’ve dined out on the self-help books, attended the courses, did the therapy, been a coach, and have been inspired by a range of experiences.

So writing as “Spiritworth” is my small effort to “raise the spirit and raise the (net and self) worth” based on what I know. And hopefully, highlight a few things not quite right in the world such as the gender pay gap in side hustles and freelancing.

That encompasses a lot about how my life has gone. But it also reminds me of a quote from Steve Jobs:

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward

My “About Me” may seem orderly to the reader, making perfect sense, in a hero’s journey kind of way. But none of it was linear, only parts of it were purposeful, and there were massive doses of luck along the way.

That’s normal. That’s Life.

I’m a global citizen

Growing up, I always felt there was more to life than the public housing I called home.

We had no car, no washing machine, and, for a time, no home phone. But somehow I knew the world was bigger than the limitations. And thankfully different encounters and a few Obi-Wans along the way have allowed for a broader perspective over the years.

Firstly, I was born and raised in the UK to a West African parentage. The cultures merged and clashed in equal measures. And that was a good thing, now that I can view it through second-generation eyes.

It kept me on the straight and narrow, winning a scholarship to a decent high school, and never looking back. It made me more conscientious about money. Something that’s stuck with me to this day.

Deep down, I still call London home, even though I haven’t lived there for many years. I’ve always said there’s no place better in the world than that city in the summer. A magnificent place. The trouble is, it’s not always summer…

I’ve always liked sunshine and I’ve had a thing about trying to chase perfect sunsets. The closest I’ve had to a never-ending summer was when I got to live in Miami for a year. One crazy city that I’ll leave for another article.

These days I live in Hong Kong

I backpacked around South-East Asia after finishing university, over land and water from Bangkok, Thailand to Lombok in Indonesia. I ultimately developed a fascination with the continent. I guess I always wanted to return one day to live and work. An opportunity eventually knocked.

When my employer offered a secondment to Hong Kong, I raised my hand and got lucky. I was in the right place at the right time. It was meant to last for a year. Fast forward more than a decade and a half and I’m still here.

It’s been an incredible life experience. It’s an amazing place to have called home.

But the last few years have been challenging.

Firstly, there was civil unrest against a security law that was to be introduced. We’re talking tear gas, violence in the streets, standoffs with the police. And major paranoia.

Then came Covid. Cases were manageable at first. Single-digit daily infection numbers for close to a year — we’re talking Covid cases, not deaths. Not bad for a city-state of more than seven million people.

But the policies that got us there (e.g. 21-day hotel quarantine for all arrivals; interned at government facilities if you got infected) weren’t going to get us to where most of us wanted to be — properly reconnected with the world. And when a full-on outbreak did finally rear its head, Hong Kong’s complacency came home to roost. Too few vaccinated led to too many deaths — at one point, Hong Kong had the highest Covid death rate in the world. The restrictions went into overdrive.

The constraints and undue expense made it just too difficult to travel, and tough at times to live here.

Plenty of my friends got angry. A lot ended up leaving. Things are easing now and I’m preparing for my first flight out of Hong Kong in December 2019. But it’s been challenging.

I’m all about the hustle — I had to be

“Following my passion” wasn’t a privilege I felt I had when I was growing up. I just wanted to escape that world. Plus, back then it wasn’t in the vocabulary of first-generation parents who simply wanted the best for their offspring.

This is how I ended up — and stayed — in banking. It was what got me out to Hong Kong. The field has been kind to me over the years, even if I did fall into it by accident.

But long before it became fashionable to talk about side hustles, I’d always liked the idea of multiple streams of income. I wanted a portfolio career.

I guess my childhood made me more sensitive to choices people make in personal finance and their careers. At the end of the day, I didn’t want to return to a world of poverty of thought and resources.

So that was my focus.

Some years ago I got inspired by Nick Loper’s Side Hustle Nation podcast, followed by his recent book Buy Buttons. Check them out.

I started with a few testing gigs, such as for companies like Respondent. Not regular work but income, nonetheless.

But when I found myself between jobs a few years ago, I knew it was time to go harder. And the good thing was that I was able to stack my different interests and expertise on top of one another:

• Coaching. Years earlier I trained as a coach at the local university and pivoted what I learned into different forms of coaching around finance, careers, and life. I initially got most of my clients through word of mouth around the ex-pat community.
• Resume writing. I decided to leverage my career coaching to do some resume writing. I found a gig freelancing for a UK-based resume writing firm. They target high-end clients (bankers, accountants, and the like) willing to pay eye-watering fees. Pity I only received the crumbs.
• But they did train me to write a mean resume, LinkedIn profile, and cover letter. It was like day and night when compared to my earlier efforts. And based on that and the coaching, I got gigs working with local universities and an international school. I also consulted at a finance professionals global conference.
• Freelance writing. Because of those experiences, I managed to get writing gigs around careers and finance, in addition, to resume writing on platforms like Fiverr, PeoplePerHour, and Upwork.
• eBooks. Based on all the above I tried my hand at a few eBooks. It was fair to say I was writing about what I know. Check out two written under pen names: Craft a Winning Resume and Personal Finance: More Than Just Numbers

And all of this is exactly why I’ve written about finance, careers, and personal development in my Medium pieces:

Recession-Proof Your Life — Work

Recession-Proof Your Life — Money

Recession-Proof Your Life — Life

It looks all very linear but it wasn’t.

So that’s it for now

We’re all a collection of narratives. And my “About Me” is as much about what I’ve put in as what I’ve left out.

I’ve plenty more stories to tell but I’ll save those for another day. And there are some goodies…

I’m a finance guy by trade with an extra background in career and life coaching.

Essentially, I created Spiritworth with the ambitious goal to help others “raise their spirit and raise their (net and self) worth.”

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