I would definitely consider myself to be a dreamer.

I have lofty ambitions and definitely take a leaf out of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s book where she said,

“The size of your dreams must always exceed your current capacity to achieve them. If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”

I won’t lie, I want to be very wealthy. Partly because I know that in order to achieve my goals, a lot of investment will be needed and I’d much rather do it myself. I don’t want to accumulate money for the sake of it, as having pieces of paper with assigned values means absolutely nothing to me but for the mere fact that money is a tool. I have sat through many lectures during my time in education, but the day I heard those words, my outlook on life changed.

Therefore, I am aware that if I am going to realise my dreams I need the capital to back it up. What I have realised in my short span of time on this earth, is it is much easier to get things done with a financial backing. In my field of bioengineering and medical technology, the money needed to get ideas off of the ground is often eye-watering. In a lot of cases this makes sense, you are developing devices that can alter people’s health thus the appropriate testing and due diligence must be done to ensure that safe and effective devices are made. I am aware that if I want to take the technology that I am currently developing to the market, I am going to have to go through these hurdles.

The analogy I would give is that of digging a 6 ft hole. Now eyebrows may be raised about why you would want to dig a hole that deep, I’m not here to judge but if I gave you a plastic spoon to dig that hole, the task becomes monumental, time-consuming and intensive. If instead the spoon is replaced by a shovel, that same task although still intensive can be completed in less time and hassle. If I however, give the person wanting to complete this task the keys to a JCB digger and asked them to tackle that same problem, apart from the initial learning curve to operate the digger, that task would take no time at all.

The most influential in our society are able to dissociate themselves from the value of money and manipulate it to work for them. There are times when they have less (after investing) and times when they have more, but there is no sense of attachment. People often misquote the bible verse and say that money is the route of all evil. That couldn’t be further from the truth. It is the love of money that is the problem.

When people are willing to put personal gain over people’s lives or compromise their core values for a lump sum, that’s where I take issue. There are countless examples of this, even in our own country, where billions of pounds has been gained from the sale of arms from the UK to Saudi Arabia, where many Yemeni lives have subsequently been lost or even closer to home, the shortcuts that were taken with the construction of Grenfell tower and other social housing apartment blocks. Having and using money is no problem, as long as it is used responsibly and beneficially but unfortunately many don’t abide by these sentiments.

Although, I am normally very quiet about my dreams and aspirations I would love to be a CEO of my own Med Tech startup, sell devices that actually have a positive effect on the health of thousands and potentially millions and then use the money I gain from that to address a lot of the inequality I see in our world, especially amongst countries in the african diaspora and the communities that have developed from there. The rest I will keep very close to my chest until they come into being.