Ama Serwaa

When I realised that nobody was coming to rescue me, that was when I began to understand that God could not live my life for me.

I know that may sound strange coming from a woman of faith.

Of course I believe in God. I pray. I trust Him. I ask Him for direction and help all the time.

But somewhere along the way, I had to understand that I also had a part to play in my own life.

For a long time, I was looking outward.

I was looking at what was happening around me, what other people thought of me, what had not worked out, what I had got wrong and, perhaps most damaging of all, what other people interpreted as my shortcomings.

And when you hear certain things about yourself often enough, you can begin to believe them.

Without even realising it, you start making decisions from that place.

You don’t apply because you don’t think you’re qualified enough.

You stay where you are because you are not sure you can do better.

You accept certain things because somewhere inside, you have decided that perhaps this is all there is for you.

I have done that.

It was only when I started looking inward that I began to question some of those things.

What if I was more capable than I had allowed myself to believe?

What if some of the answers I kept looking for outside myself were already there, in the wisdom I had gathered, the things I had survived, my instincts, my gifts, my faith, even my mistakes?

I don’t mean that we have all the answers within us. I certainly don’t.

But I do think there is a great deal within us that we never discover because we are too busy looking outside ourselves for permission, validation or rescue.

And perhaps how we see ourselves matters more than we realise.

Because eventually, what we believe about ourselves finds its way into our decisions.

These days, I am learning to ask God for guidance, but also to pay attention to what He has already placed in my hands.

To trust Him, yes.

But also to trust myself enough to move.

I am still learning this.

But I know one thing now that I didn’t always know:

There is far more in us than we sometimes give ourselves credit for.

With Love

Ama Serwaa