Be Your Own Boss

By De Wee Productions and Bohlokoa Mofoti

Be Your Own Boss is a journey that aims to inspire others to achieve more in life. Authored by a 21 year old Mosotho girl, raised by a single mother. Her best friend
and a partner in success. Bohlokoa is a basketball player who loves writing and aims to make change.

• Language: English
• Publisher: De Wee Productions
• Release date: Aug 17, 2018
• ISBN: 9780620815024

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

They say there are two most important days in our lives, the day we are born and the day we discover why! 11th July 1997 marks the beginning of my story; a day of which for many years after, I despised because I could not understand what the point of being born to suffer was. My childhood ignorance of how brutal the world can be was stripped away quite early on in life. You don‟t even know who your father is! my friend lashed out and teased! You will never amount to anything much in life...just look at your family and your poor grandparents! society scoffed angrily. You are and will always be nothing! my thoughts screamed at me! As a young girl, born and raised in Ha Soole - Berea, one of the most remote areas of one of the most impoverished countries in the world, Lesotho, I never saw much of a possibility of a better life. If anything, the harder I tried to be a little hopeful, the worse my circumstances seemed to get. The only logical thought at the time was to end it all. Yes, I was suicidal. For many of my primitive years, I struggled with low self-esteem and unprecedented challenges no child should ever have to face.

Just as I thought I had come to the end of my rope, I found a light that rekindled my soul. Writing became my solace and escape from the fiery and unmerciful world. Though it started helping, I trashed everything I wrote because I still felt unworthy to amount to anything at all. It has been a long and brutal journey, but I have come to a point in my life where I have stopped allowing my circumstances and socio-economic background define me. I have and continue to rise above my challenges in pursuit of becoming the person I now dream of and desire to be. In-spite of my challenges, the young woman I have grown into is fearless in every meaning of the word.

Though I went to a small primary school, in a rural village of Lesotho, I am proud of all that it made me avoid in my childhood so that I can appreciate life as it is now.

This is a memoir of my life experiences, and the invaluable lessons I have learned along the way. As part of a generation most affected by depression,

thoughts of suicide and other challenges, I hope my story inspires you to challenge and change your internal dialogue. I hope it becomes your reason to keep going forward no matter how hard it gets. My greatest desire is for you to indulge in these pages not in sadness or feeling sorry for me, but in awe and inspiration of how much potential we all have to change our circumstances and become EVERYTHING we were created to be. I am not my past...I am my ancestors‟ and grandparents‟ wildest dreams. I am my own liberation. I am my rescue! My name is Bohlokoa Mofoti and this is what I would like to share with all of you.

The Start of Something New

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You don‟t have to let people validate you. God has created each and every one of us perfectly as He wanted us to be. We are different for a reason, never try to change who you truly are because they make you feel that you are not good enough. You are capable of becoming all that you aspire for, just remember to listen to your inner self because it is never influenced by the circumstances and obstacles around you. The same voice overcame everything and made you strong enough to be still standing to this day. The way you are is amazing, your scars are beautiful, understand that they are a reminder that you had the courage to withstand all that was meant to break you. You are a rare gem, never underestimate your value and worth. - Bohlokoa Mofoti

We grow up in the world where we are raised to believe in certain things over others. We are brought up in a conditioned society because everyone believes they are best for us. We are never given an opportunity to really explore what we find important in our own lives. This has been a standard since ages ago. From our ancestors to the coming generations. The truth is, this only kills our uniqueness, and we then become duplicates of what has always been. All the potential is suppressed due to fears that when we try something new, it will be labeled inconsistent with tradition, immoral, as a disrespect and most importantly evil. We cannot always escape what is expected of us, but we can change that and make people understand the beauty of that change.

Below is the story about how one can do that:

There once lived a king in a very beautiful castle, everything was made of gold and he was convinced he had everything he needed. He could afford anything money can buy and like it is to most of us, we would think that he was the richest man in the world. He was married to the most beautiful

woman in the area, and they were blessed with three children, two girls and the youngest was a boy. The oldest daughter Paballo, followed by Mpho and then prince Thato. The king‟s name is King Sejela and his wife is Queen Mapaballo. The parents tried everything in their power to ensure that their children were happy, they had everything they needed. The biggest mistake was to forbid them from playing with other kids because they were never good enough and worthy to play with the royals. Although they were given all the instructions and everything, Paballo would sneak out and call some of the girls that lived in a shack in the neighbourhood. They had nothing to put on the table, they wore old torn clothes but they always seemed so happy.

They never had a luxurious life, but they seemed to be content at heart. Paballo would give them her toys, steal some food for them from the kitchen and some of the clothes that did not fit her anymore.

The girls‟ names were Bohlokoa, Relebohile, Mookho and Refiloe. It is obvious that they had nothing to offer Paballo in return for all she was doing for them, and so they always wondered how they could ever repay her for  her kindness. One night while sitting around fire, cooking beef from Paballo, a spark fell on Refiloe‟s thigh. They thought it was just an accident until Bohlokoa saw something that stunned her, she showed the other girls, a  small picture of what looked like an angel kneeling down. Since they were raised under Christian faith and never changed even after they lost  everything including their parents. They were still rooted on their faith, Bohlokoa immediately reached for her bible and a journal where she wrote her favourite bible verses and read the following: "when you give yourself to Christ and repent, he will remove in you a heart of stone and give you that of flesh. He will have the Holy Spirit guide you into the life that he has  prepared for all his children while we patiently wait for his second coming. Never feel insufficient to draw other people to Christ because you believe they can do better than you. It lies deep within each and every one of us to be all that we hope to be, for God has promised us that whatever we ask for in the name of Jesus Christ he will do for us. When Jesus left, he promised us we will be given the power to do all the things he did while he was still among us and even more than he did. He never said some people will be chosen to do, so never underestimate or suppress that in you. Remember to

always ask God for guidance and the right approach for different people."

They all read and this time understanding of meaning was like never before. It felt like they were in some sort of spiritual regime. They immediately remembered that while they play with Paballo, she is always troubled regardless of the fact that she has everything. She always told them that she feels something is missing and wish to have the same happiness as those four sisters had. They prayed so hard for God to give them the right weapons to fight the battle because it was not only between them and the family but everything else. The most important thing they realized was that the main enemy they had to attack was the devil because only he was capable of stealing, destroying and killing. He was also going to divert their attention from the real enemy by giving them other possible reasons for the unhappiness in the castle. As they were praying, the angel of the Lord came among them and showed them that a lot has happened in the castle and is yet to happen, in order to be able to stand tall in every challenge, first they  would have to change the management of the house. He also revealed to them that the only way to do that is by using Paballo as their main weapon to soften the hearts of the parents. A week after that visit, Paballo told the girls that her mother was admitted in hospital. The girls surprisingly told Paballo that she should be thankful because the situation could have been worse.

Alarmed by the response and a bit offended, she asked what could be worse than that, but the girls smiled and told her that God has it all under control. She left them and locked herself in a room.

While trying to close her eyes and think about what her friends meant, she had a vision of her mother being healed by her friends. She rushed to them and asked them what it meant; it was then that they introduced her to the secret of never ending happiness, a life that has a fountain of life that never dries out. They told her everything they knew and that she was chosen by God to change her family into what God wants for them. They told her that although her family had everything money can buy, they are actually the poorest because they didn‟t have Jesus as the center of their lives. They read her some of the best verses that their parents used to read to them and she felt a shift in her, like something has been lifted from her shoulders.

She knew her father would kill her if she said anything to him, so she decided to deal with the matter alone. She prayed whenever she was alone or visited her friends. They would visit her mother at the hospital just to pray for her. After two weeks of praying for her mother, she actually woke up.

The doctors a bit startled by what happened; they said she seems to have been miraculously healed. She told her family that when she was in hospital, she had the angels visiting her and praying for her. Only Paballo knew what really happened and told her mum that it was all because of Jesus that she was healed. Queen Mapaballo asked the girls to take her to church and she got baptized without her husband knowing.