KAGOLA, Frieda

From Chaos To Clarity

Building Resilience, mindset and Purpose

I’m dedicating this book to my children and my extended family members for believing in me, and for their emotional support. My children challenged me to think about how to come up with something useful for young and middle-aged people who wish to take
control of their dreams and lives. Many other people, friends and colleagues, contributed to my decision to write this book. More importantly, my children make me think about the best way to mentor and coach them as young people living in a complex society. When I was studying social work, I wanted to educate myself and to empower other people. One of my goals is to be empowered and to pass knowledge to the next generation through books.

As a father, social worker, researcher and educator in social work, I’m happy to dedicate this resource to young adults and middle-aged people. If you want to work on your confidence, responsibility and well-being as well as your goals for life, this book is a guiding tool for you. It is a great opportunity for people to learn about challenges, and to be responsible for taking care of their lives. Like the seasons, life comes with many episodes. The important thing is to learn how to cope with episodes or seasons. Yes, seasons do come and go. This is how life is. It comes with challenges, but some challenges can be managed well, at an individual, family, community or government level.

Life is very difficult, and society is very complex socially, culturally, politically, economically, and historically. You need purpose, to give you meaningful ideas to guide you. May this book assist you to understand this and take responsibility, to prepare you for dealing with complex challenges or issues in society. Life is like a difficult game. You must learn to play this game smartly by making the right choices.

I chose to collaborate with Dr William Abur on this book project because I wanted to share some of my stories and education struggle with other young people. I believe every individual has a story to tell, and my own story is behind my contributing to the book. I was born in a small village called Oikango in the northern part of Namibia. I grew up with a single mother, but raised by maternal grandmother (her mother) both my mother and grandmother motivated me to focus on my purpose and work towards a better future. I want to thank my aunt, who has been my inspiration and source of support since day one. I am forever grateful for her support. Due to the lack of resources in my village, I had a slim chance of finding better opportunities. In a nutshell, I grew up in an environment with limited resources which could not propel me to thrive in the future.

The lack of resources and opportunities in my surroundings may have influenced me to accept less. However, I was determined that against all odds, I would strive for the best and aim high regardless of my background.

I have written about the importance of focusing on your purpose, to encourage young people to believe that they can achieve anything regardless of their background. I want to motivate young people to pursue the life they envision. I want to help them discover a framework in which to make choices, one step at a time, that will lead them to their best career fit in the long term.