i don’t want a 9-5 job.

you probably don’t either.

Mar 28, 2025

The moment I knew that working a 9-to-5 wasn’t for me was back in 2022, when I was barely a week into my mandatory 6-week internship.

So I studied Mass Communication back in university, and after our 200-level session, we had to do this IT thing.

The training period was meant to help us “gain industry experience” and “prepare for work life”, but for me, every single day just felt like a slow, exhausting march towards a future I wanted no part of.

I would sleep at 4 a.m., wake up at 6, do my best to get ready, and travel a fairly long distance just to show up and do… nothing.

The part that annoyed me was that I was getting there before 8am, hours before the paid staff would even arrive, and even more annoying, there wasn’t even “real work” to do.

I had to create tasks to keep myself busy just so that my logbook wouldn’t be empty and completely full of lies.

After a long, sleepy day of doing absolutely almost nothing, I’d return home late (around 6pm or 6:30pm), take a 2-3 hour nap, wake up in the middle of the night to do some stuff I actually enjoyed, and then repeat the cycle again the next day.

That’s how most days in the five weeks of my internship were, and I HATED every bit of it.

“Well, why don’t you just sleep early, so you won’t be tired during the day?” you might ask.

Very valid question, but you see, that’s beside the point.

The point is that I became acutely aware of that structure, that routine, that many, many people have signed up years of their lives to, and it scared the SHIT out of me.

Dozing off in the bus or in my father’s car on my way back home, I would ask myself questions like:

“So I have to do all that again tomorrow?”
“Is this really a profitable way of living?”
“How do people do this for 20, 30 years?”

The responses I was giving myself did not sound good to me at all, and that’s when I just knew that “Nah, Ebun, this 9-5 is not for you, my guy.”

And you can bring objections and say that it’s because I wasn’t enjoying the job or because I wasn’t getting paid, or you can say that I was just lazy.

I agree with you on all three counts.

However, you see, we’re all different people.

We live and act and do things differently, and many of these life patterns do not let us view and tackle life in the same way.

For example, I am an avid night owl.

It’s when I work better, write better, think better, and create better.

I do almost all my “productive” tasks in the middle of the night.

In fact, it’s 04:12am as I’m writing this.

This singular habit of working all night and sleeping during the mornings already makes it difficult for me to envision working at any job that demands that I be present and signed in by 8:00am on the dot.

“Well, can’t you just do the work during the day?”

Maybe I can, but like I said, different life patterns.

I’m tying all this to the conclusion that this letter or essay or post, whatever you want to call it, is my personal opinion and my view on the way I want to work and live.

It’s not an attack on anybody’s job or source of livelihood.

I’m not condemning or berating a structure that has been in place (and worked well) for centuries.

I’m writing this to just explain why it doesn’t work for me.

And I know that as you read this, you might probably relate too.

I think that a lot of us, new to this “adulting” thing, feel the same way.

I think that’s a good thing.

It’s a good perspective to have.

The beauty of humanity is that we’ve always been able to evolve over time, adapting to changes and restructuring our lives based off of our needs per time.

And if the time is now for more young people to ditch the 9-5 job system and forge their own paths, then sign me up!

I’m more than happy to be a part of it.

The Illusion of Stability

Like I said earlier, all of the conclusions and statements in this post are my personal opinion, and they are based on the things I’ve seen, heard, and read.

So on that note, I want to start by saying that I don’t think that 9-5 jobs are evil.

NO.

In fact, many of those jobs tie together the fabric of the society that we live in; i.e., those jobs are very necessary for our survival.

You think of your banker and your civil servant and your teacher in school.

All of them play very important roles.

You also think of the people that work round the clock with loosely defined shifts, i.e., your policeman and your doctor and your favourite shop vendor.

All of them play critical roles.

On the same side of the coin, there are also people who thrive in these jobs.

They enjoy doing them and succeed really well at them.

We have people that find meaning and purpose in “structured” work, and that’s great; I think it’s awesome.

And I also think that purpose is critical in whatever work path you decide to embark on.

It’s in this same vein of finding “meaning” and “fulfilment” in work that had led me to conclude that I just can’t do it.

I can’t.

I can’t imagine spending 10, 15, or 20 years trapped in a cycle that doesn’t serve me.

Because let’s admit it, unless you’re in the top 1% or 5% or maybe even 10% of these traditional job roles, you probably won’t be recompensed fairly for all the years of work that you put in.

(I don’t even want to get into the stories of people who work for decades just to be owed their rightful pensions for decades more.)

And yes yes yes, I know that there’s more to work than making money; I do.

But you see, money is not my biggest concern here.

My biggest concern is the time.

Time wasted and Time lost.

It scares me.

Because I want control over my time.

I want the freedom to wake up and decide what my day looks like.

I want to travel, to build, to create.

I want time for family, time for faith, time to just be-

Without selling every hour of my life to an organisation that will replace me in a week if I drop dead.

That’s what I want, and gosh, I pray to God every day about it.

Now, some say that working a 9-5 job gives financial security, a guaranteed paycheck at the end of the month, you know, something tangible for you to hold onto.

And that’s a valid fact; I agree that having a job with a salary is “safe”.

But let’s bring the whole picture into context, and we’ll use our blessed and beloved nation, Nigeria, as a case study.

I don’t need to talk about the state of the economy; we all know how that is.

I want to talk about something else- The Job Market.

In case you’re still an undergraduate and you think the horror stories are exaggerated, let me just tell you that they are not.

Nigeria’s job market is an absolute mess.

To be fair, it’s like that in many countries worldwide, but Nigeria’s own genuinely makes me laugh.

And this is not to say that we don’t have people who have gotten great jobs as soon as they graduated, by the way.

Those are common outliers; I’m taking a generalist view.

So, I finished school back in August 2024, which hasn’t been up to a year now.

I’ve been at home for the bulk of the time, just chilling, eating, sleeping and doing “nothing productive” (at least that’s how most people might see it).

But in reality, I’ve been pretty busy.

I started up this newsletter, and I’m growing an audience.

I’ve been working on not one but TWO short story compilations (more on that later), been growing my LinkedIn presence, and I’ve been learning- learning a lot of practical stuff about a lot of practical things.

So, I don’t think I’m doing too bad for myself.

Now, while this has been going on, I’ve also been keeping an eye on “job updates” and “calls for application” and “Urgent! We’re hiring” messages.

I barely pay them any mind unless I see the word “remote” in them, but when I do take time to look at some of these jobs, it’s either I burst into laughter or shake my head in pity.

Many of these jobs will offer a salary that’s way below minimum wage (77,000 per month), but the attack job roles will be that of two and three DIFFERENT positions combined.

It’s absolutely crazy.

And don’t tell me there’s more to work than money.

Won’t you eat? Won’t you survive? Don’t you want to buy yourself nice things? Exactly.

The funny thing is that as “bad” as some of these job propositions are, job openings are still scarce, and since people are genuinely frustrated and tired and desperate, when the applications come out, guess what happens?

Hundreds upon hundreds apply almost immediately.

It’s wild, and I don’t fault anybody for it.

It’s just the state of the nation.

What pisses me off the most is that because they recognise the “desperation” of many job seekers in the country, these employers will always take advantage of it.

They’ll combine 5 different jobs with different skills together, and ask you to bring 5+ years of experience, and a Masters degree, and your “proficiency” in this task, and your “ability to effectively handle” that task, and some will even ask you if you can drive a truck or fly a farking rocket.

Then after reading the long list of “job descriptions” and the longer list of “job requirements”, you’ll see something like this:

Salary - 30- 40k per month.
Work - Full time (on-site).
Hours - 8am - 5pm Weekdays (Saturdays too, as required).

Then if the option is there, you can see:

Over 200 applicants in the last 24 hours.

More than two hundred people are applying for that slave job? How naw?

It’s quite sad.

And if you think I’m exaggerating, just ask around, or join a job search group/board to see for yourself.

That’s why we have young, vibrant people that graduated with first-class degrees from courses like Electrical Engineering and Law, having to settle for 20k per month jobs.

So what happens to people like me that graduated with second-class upper degrees from courses like Mass Comm and Fishery?

I’m not course-shaming, by the way; I love the course I studied.

I’m just painting the stark reality of the picture I’ve clearly seen.

Not to be a constant complainer, but I hate seeing and imagining how much potential this country has killed.

And is still killing.

Which brings me to my next point.

The Sad Reality of Our Society

I also think it’s very sad that many people don’t even realise that there’s another path.

An alternative to this “traditional” method of making a living.

You’d think that with the continued advent of the internet, social media and Artificial Intelligence most people, the youthful ones at least, would no longer be ignorant of certain things that can benefit their lives.

But no, that is not the case.

The ones that do know probably shy away from it because of how difficult and uncertain it can be.

Or because of a lack of belief in themselves or their desperate desire for instant gratification.

Or because their “independent” dreams are critiqued or mocked, and they are discouraged by family members from “chasing shadows”.

This latter sentence is my focus for this section.

Stay with me.

There’s a deeply rooted obsession with traditional career paths in Nigeria, so anything outside the standard “doctor, lawyer, engineer” route is often deemed as unserious.

It’s not as bad as it was decades ago, but it’s still very prominent.

If you are to tell an older person from an earlier generation that you’re a “content creator” or a “digital marketer”, they’ll probably look at you in confusion.

If you are to say that you’re a writer or “travel vlogger” or a TikTok “influencer”, they’ll probably ask you if that’s a real job.

Now, I’m not generalising here.

I know many of us have parents that are not so “out of touch” with current trends, but more often than not, this still doesn’t shake their belief in this “established” way of doing things.

Many of them don’t believe in remote work or freelancing or creative careers, because to them, the definition of “work” means you must be physically clocking into an office and collecting a fixed salary.

Even more absurd, some of them label things like cryptocurrency trading and FOREX trading as “fraudulent” and “scam”.

It’s ignorance, and this one even goes all the way to government (allegedly).

That’s one thing I’ve noticed about the members of this older Nigerian generation.

They can be so resistant to change, and anything that doesn’t align with what they’ve known for years.

Imagine calling AI a “fallen angel” or saying that one day Opay will just “run away with all our money”.

It’s just sooooo frustrating.

Because the truth is, there are so many ways you can build a career today without sitting in an office from morning till night.

You can create, you can teach, you can build an audience, and you can leverage the internet in ways that weren’t possible before.

It’s limitless in potential.

Yet many people (“young” and “old”) just don’t see it, and I don’t know why.

That’s one reason I’m writing this, to bring more people into a realistic enlightenment.

So if you’ve been wondering how to convince your parents to let you sit at home so you can be recording and posting videos on YouTube every week,

Or so you can start learning graphic design from your phone, then you can just send this article to them.

And pray that God touches their heart.

You’re welcome; there’s no need to thank me.

If there’s a river in front of you and a billion people pass and say there’s no river, it doesn’t change the fact that there’s still a river in front of you.

That is to say, ignorance is not an excuse.

It is not bliss, and what many people don’t know will probably kill them someday.

If you’ve been feeling like a 9-5 job or an “office” job or any other form of traditional work is not for you, then your feelings are very valid.

As long as you’re talking from a place of drive and purpose and ambition and not sheer laziness, then I’m on your side.

There is a more excellent way.

Many people don’t believe there is.

But you do, and I do.

We see them on the internet all the time.

Real people making real impact and earning real money from real sources.

Nothing illegal. Nothing magical. Nothing impossible.

Just sheer determination mixed with talent and applied knowledge.

There is a more excellent way.

And if people don’t believe that it’s possible, then the best way to convince them is to make it work.

Success is the only language people will ever understand.

You think your parents won’t suddenly become interested in understanding how your “pressing phone from morning to night” and “dancing in front of camera” really work when you start earning a living from it.

People only pay attention when there are results to back it up.

That’s when they’ll turn around and be like-

So, you too, maybe you’re talking too much.

If this is the path you want to take, go for it.

Build, create, and push through, even when everyone (including yourself) doubts you.

Your success will speak for itself in the end.

This “Excellent” Path is So DIFFICULT

By now, you’re probably gassed.

Excited. Pumped. Electrified. Energised.

Ready to block all those job sites, delete those applications, and start building your own empire.

However, before you do that, I have some news:

Suceeding this way is much, much more difficult than you can imagine.

Sorry if I’ve over motivated you o.

That’s the honest truth.

The good news is that there are so many things you can do.

So many skills you can master, so many industries you can venture into, so many trades you can learn.

Plus, you can get started for free and start building up yourself for free.

I’m not going to get into any specifics right now, but my point is that this path?

This path of time freedom and financial security and unlimited creative expression?

This path is HARD.

It’s much harder than spending all your hours in an office.
It’s much harder than applying to 200 jobs and getting rejected.
It’s much harder than waking up by 6am and getting home by 9pm every day.

If it wasn’t hard, then everybody would be doing it.

The reason for this difficulty is the lack of a “safety net”.

A 9-to-5 job comes with structure, predictability, and a guaranteed paycheck.

You show up, you do the work (or don’t, if you like), and you get paid.

It’s straightforward.

It’s safe.

But when you choose to build something for yourself?

You’re walking down a very, very uncertain road.

It’s waking up every day with no financial guarantees.
It’s learning, failing, experimenting, and starting over, multiple times.
It’s constant problem-solving, constant self-discipline, constant reinvention.
It’s probably working at ALL hours of the day- perfecting this process or testing that system.

Trust me, I’ve seen this thing play out, and I’ve experienced a lot of it for myself since 2022.

I don’t want to deflate anyone’s bubble, but it’s not an easy road.

Especially since you might be embarking on it all by yourself.

It’s hard.

It’s a hard, and difficult, and lonely path.

People will mock you.

People will criticise you.

You will get rejected (a lot!).

Your friends will laugh at your “cringe” TikTok videos.

You will sacrifice all your “outing” money to buy courses and pay for mentorships.

Your parents won’t understand why you’re “wasting away your life”.

You will have moments where you hate yourself, and you doubt all your abilities, and you wonder why you even listened to a random guy on the internet named “Ebun” and followed the things he said.

All of this will probably happen.

It’s just part of the process.

But you see, I’d rather struggle to build the life I want than to settle for a life that I don’t want.

That’s my perspective.

I don’t want to be 80 years old and dying and looking back on my life to see that I never had the time or the courage to go after the things that I wanted.
I don’t want God to look from heaven and just shake his head at how much of my potential is going to waste.
I don’t want to live a life of “mouth-to-hand”, constantly only focused on work and hustle, and worrying about paying bills, with nothing else going on for me.

No.

I refuse.

So I repeat, I do not want a 9-to-5 job.

Not for a life. Not for a career.

If you feel like me, that’s awesome.

But if you don’t, and you feel like the 9-5 path is for you, that’s awesome too.