All That I Am: Becoming the best you before your Boaz

By Patrice Amoaye

"A great expression of love is to

become the best version of yourself."

The joining of two lives is a lifelong journey and anyone who dares to embark on this journey should first travel alone to prepare, heal, grow and discover their purpose in God. All That I Am presents a holistic picture of what one may want to conside

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resolved Woman
• Release date: Feb 25, 2020
• ISBN: 9781922381903

Book preview

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to my son. You are a testimony of God’s faithfulness …

And to my Boaz.

I am grateful for the man you are and for the woman I have become because of you.

I thank God for the journey we have been on for many years together. I am grateful for your love and your kindness through which I have grown, and from which I have learnt so much. You inspired the writing of this book through the revelation that rather than wait, one should prepare oneself for a man like you.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

As Paul says in Philippians 4:13, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

This book has been written by the grace and strength of God.

Prophet Richard Amoaye my husband, you are a great source of inspiration. When I wanted to give up your words of encouragement kept me going.

Prophet Victor Kusi-Boateng and Mummy Anita, this book is the fruit of a word sowed and now coming to pass. I am grateful for your prayers, support and love.

Eugenia Marembo, this book should actually have two authors. Your commitment, dedication and the investment of countless hours of work is incredible. May the Lord remember your labour. I am forever grateful and I pray that God will bless you.

Eva Batsilas, thank you for your contribution to the final stage of the editorial process, it has brought an additional depth to this book.

Amanda Mayengehama, thank you for working tirelessly on the graphics from the onset.

Rumbidzai Mapira, thank you for your time and dedication to looking after my son. You gave me the freedom to concentrate and I am grateful.

My parents Ps Chris and Vida Bonsu, I thank you for your love and prayers.

‘Preparing Before Your Boaz’ class of 2016, thank you for your openness and honesty during the sessions. You inspired me and led me to the realisation of the need for this book.

My GPM church family, I love and appreciate every one of you. You make GPM a wonderful place to call home.

CONTENTS

DEDICATION

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

IMPERFECT

The truth about Ruth

BECOMING YOUR BEST

Preparation

Why Prepare?

Benefits of Preparation

YOUR SPIRIT

In Him

Broken Pieces

YOUR SOUL

Winning the battle of the past

He Said, She Said!

YOUR MIND

Mental Health

In pursuit of …

YOUR BODY

Cleanliness is next to Godliness

The X Factor

LET’S TALK ABOUT SEX!

Temporary pleasures and  permanent regrets

The art of sex

YOUR POCKET

75k Salary

Money Personality

My Value of Money

Financial Goals

YOUR CONNECTIONS

YOUR MR RIGHT

The Truth about Boaz

Your Boaz

The no good — The Bozo

CONCLUSION

PREFACE

G

rowing up, romantic relationships intrigued me. There was always a pull towards anything to do with love and romance because for me, the notion of two individuals, from diverse backgrounds, cultures or religion, coming together to form a union of great connection, was fascinating. This fascination meant I was always on the lookout for the connections between people in relationships and I made it a habit to watch how they interacted.

My observation of relationships that I was exposed to growing up was that there seemed to be ‘something’ lacking or missing. I was unsure what that ‘something’ was until I was old enough to watch romantic movies. These movies then presented what seemed to be as the missing ‘something’, simplicity and effortlessness. The essence of relationships and love in these movies was presented in a very simple and almost effortless way: boy meets girl, boy loves girl and she loves him right back and they live happily ever after. This was a far cry from the relationships I knew which seemed to require hard work and great effort. So I formed my own internal ideal of love and my own picture of a perfect marriage relationship.

I realised that over time what I had learnt from the movies and media created expectations that would later conflict with my reality. I determined to find the ‘effortless and wow factor’ relationship in my world as portrayed in the movies. However, as the years went by I had more questions than answers because my personal relational experiences left me with much to be desired and hence no closer to making sense of my internal conflicts or finding this ‘wow factor’.

Relationships remained puzzling to me, especially the marriage relationship. I realised that a large number of the married people I knew wanted to get out of their marriage, while a great majority of those who were unmarried like my friends and I longed to be married. I couldn’t help but notice another great disparity which was that, some people seemed to be enduring their marriage and others appeared to be content and enjoying marriage. I wondered what made the difference in these contrasting experiences. What made one relationship different from the other and what made an ordinary relationship different from an extraordinary one?

I was in many ways consumed with these questions because I had known for a fact when I was younger that I would get married and have children one day. In my mind, it was never a question of whether it would happen but rather a matter of when it would happen. I had heard many narratives about women having to be ready for marriage, however, I rarely heard about the idea of preparing oneself for marriage in any detail. Truth be told, I wanted in my own way to be prepared for marriage. I was waiting for someone along the way to pull me aside as I was growing up to offer some teaching and guidance on my inevitable fate as a married woman.

Unfortunately, that was never the case; no one ever went into detail about preparing for marriage. I always thought, if marriage was such a significant part of my future, why wasn’t there someone intentionally guiding me through any form of pre-process? Was it someone else’s responsibility or was it my own? Was I meant to be doing something to better position myself for the relationship dynamics and complexities I had to overcome in order to experience a successful ‘wow factor’ marriage?

Soon enough, I was married and I carried my unanswered questions, conflicting expectations and ideals into the relationship. I went in believing and expecting that my husband would fulfil every need and desire I had, in a nutshell, my happiness would be his responsibility. The expectations I had carried into my marriage did not match with my reality and I found myself in a place where I was quick to believe the fault lay with my husband. I would examine his actions instead of looking at what was happening within me.

One afternoon I was scrolling through social media posts when I came across an inspirational piece on a page titled, ‘Waiting for your Boaz’. The premise of the page was to encourage single women to wait for their God-ordained husband. In the weeks that followed two things kept playing on my mind. The first was ‘the idea of Boaz’ and the second was the idea of ‘your Boaz’. I understood from my knowledge of the story of Ruth and Boaz in Scripture, that the concept was about God’s choice of husband and the fulfilment of a life of purpose. I thought a lot about this idea of waiting and how it related to my interest in understanding how ‘wow factor’ relationships come about.

In the story, Boaz represented a man who knew God and who was living a purposeful life. He was a man who had been called and had been chosen by God to impact his generation. He was the man destined for Ruth so that together they could accomplish God’s purpose: the family line of King David and ultimately, the Messiah Jesus (see Ruth 4; Matthew 1). Many women desire to be with a man like Boaz. However, Boaz wasn’t just any man — he was specifically destined to marry Ruth. So I concluded that there was a difference between ‘a Boaz’ and ‘your Boaz’. If then ‘my Boaz’ was the man God has set aside for me and the man I am destined to live out my purpose with, I wondered whether just waiting for him to come along would be sufficient.

During a period of prayerfully considering the notion of waiting for a husband, the Holy Spirit inspired my heart saying, Your Boaz is not a man you wait for but a man you should intentionally prepare for.

It was a ‘light bulb’ moment that happened several years into my marriage. This revelation caused me to reflect and pray. I wondered whether this revelation was the answer I was in search of regarding what made a ‘wow factor’ relationship and why I was not witness to any of those kinds of marriages around me. I wondered whether the key to a wow factor marriage was this notion of preparedness. Or is the key to a wow factor marriage this idea of a Boaz? As I continued to prayerfully reflect, I began to realise that the wow factor I was lacking and in search of in my own marriage had much to do with preparation. Women are programmed to focus much more on the idea of a fairy tale through story books, romantic movies and television shows. We are trained to focus more on what our potential husband will do for us instead of looking at who we are first. We forget that the wow factor relationships we desire also depend on our state and what we bring into the relationships and marriages we greatly desire, and not just on the man we marry.

Through prayer, I profoundly understood that even in the best of circumstances marriage requires hard work. I now had personally experienced the complexities inherent in the joining together of two lives. That is, two lives of purpose set to accomplish much under the great vision of God. Although I’d gained a lot of knowledge and understanding, there were areas in my life where there were gaps caused by the previous lack of intentional preparation for my Boaz that had to be addressed. I have learnt through experience that marriage requires a great effort, a daily commitment to being diligent, transparent, and self-aware in a way that will ensure that the two continually work together as one.

The road less travelled

Maya Angelou once said, When you know better, you do better. With my new-found insight I decided to embark on a journey that would help me identify and address areas in my life that I had previously overlooked in the process of preparation. This journey would later involve a step-by-step process of self-evaluation by way of reflecting, journalling and praying. The purpose of this journey was to take a closer look at myself to better understand my actions, reactions and the expectations I carried into marriage. At this point, my desire was to understand how this was affecting me and the pressure it was placing on my marriage. Even though I knew it would be much harder beginning this process some years after getting married, I knew it was one better taken late than never taken at all.

It was after my journey that I understood the issues arising in the early stages of my marriage. I realised I had been challenged because I was not well equipped for marriage. At this point though I had come to a place where I was sufficiently emotionally, spiritually and psychologically aware of myself. I was now conscious about my experiences leading up to marriage and how they influenced the way I responded to situations. The insight gained from my own journey of preparation placed a burden on my heart, and a sense of duty to teach and to inspire other women not to walk the path that I had walked by waiting until marriage before embarking on this much needed process.

The burden I felt led me to develop a six-month ‘Preparing For Your Boaz’ course for the young women in our church. The program aimed to encourage women to engage and be actively understanding of who they are by way of self-evaluating and then building themselves with the objective of arriving at a place of wholeness before they married. The content we covered in each of the sessions was enriching and the young women shared how the program had shifted their mindset, expectations, focus and approach to marriage. I realised there was a greater need to share these insights with many more women, and it was from this program that the inspiration to write this book arose.

I am by no means an expert on the subject of preparing for marriage, neither do I propose that undertaking this journey will automatically lead you to your Boaz. However, I now know from personal experience that preparing oneself results in a far more enriching marital experience. One of the key things I came to understand after just a few years of marriage is from an old saying in my language and it is that marriage is a long journey and anyone who dares to take this journey with someone should first take a journey with themselves, a journey of self-discovery, self-understanding, self-healing, growth and so much more.

Therefore, rather than write yet another book about love, marriage and relationships in general I realised through my own experiences and challenges that there is a much greater need for a guide for individuals, especially women, that would help them to focus on themselves and this idea of preparing themselves before seriously considering the idea of marriage.

So this book is about that journey you take, for yourself and with yourself to find yourself before you join yourself to another. If like me you find yourself already married, it’s ok for you to still take this journey.

My hope is that as you read you will be encouraged and equipped for the journey of self-discovery and growth. Should you already