» Would Sandra ever give up modelling?
Sandra Omo looks back on a year in modelling with no regrets, no surrender
A good friend of mine surprised me this week by announcing she was giving up the modelling business for good. Boy, the news came as a big shock to me. I mean we had just finished an LFW show and having a celebration back stage when she popped in the news. Even as I write, I am still trying to come to terms with it.
Why is she giving up something as wonderful as modelling when there are thousands of people out there dying to become one? Well her reasons are that it has not been an easy ride for her (my dear friend, which profession is?), she has not achieved the things she expected she would have by now as a model (isn’t that why you should keep trying?), and she wants a family and modelling has not given her time for that. This last excuse I buy. After all, it’s responsible for us giving up a lot of things.
However, when I talked to her later that day, she candidly explained to me that she fears she would not make it as a successful model so it’s better to pursue something else now before it’s too late. I see. Her fears have had me thinking about things I have taken for granted. I mean, these are things that I have completely forgotten, or have not crossed my mind for long.
But as I think on them consecutively for days, I wonder how it was possible to not think on them. Now what things am I talking about here? They are none other than the successes achieved (these I constantly think about but not like I have the past few days), opportunities missed – especially the ones never given (these I have not thought about for ages before now), and dreams still yet to achieve (now, these are the ones that have mostly occupied my mind the past few days). Thinking on these things, now that Model City column is one year old, makes me smile with pride.
Nonetheless, it has not always been a jolly good ride, but I draw my strength from the fact that there is nothing I go through as a model – whether good or bad – that another model has not experienced before, will not experience, or better still did not experience with me at the same time. When you attend a casting, no matter how gruesome or enjoyable it is, you did not experience it alone- every model there experienced the same.
But at the end of it all, every model has a different tale to tell as the outcome is not always the same for us. Some get the job and others do not; some make a successful career out of it while others do not. So what is the deciding factor here? Well I think it all comes down to what one really wants plus what you make out of your experiences. Looking back at my career the past year, I am glad I chose this route, not because it has earned me a million pounds – for it has not.
Rather I have earned fulfilment, self-respect, and faith in my ability to become a successful model so that I am even more determined to pursue it more than ever before. But then I ask myself, will a day ever come when I will say to myself its better to bail out now before it’s too late? No, not for me.
