12YEARS OF HARDWORK__ SHE STARTED AGAIN AFTER LOSSING EVERYTHING ___#122

Starting again is not easy, especially when you have given everything to something.

I want to share the story of my friend's mother. She is like a mother to me too.

For more than 12 years, she has been selling wrappers and lace materials inside Main Market. That shop was her life. She used to wake up by 5am every morning, cook for the house, then rush to Main Market before 7am. That shop is where she trained all her children. That shop is where she paid school fees. That shop is where she built her small house. Everyone in that line in Main Market knew her as "Mama Lace." If you want quality wrapper, na her shop you go go.

She loved that shop so much. It was noot just a shoop, it was heer identtity. Her happiness. Her investment. Twelvee yeaers of sweatingg, savingg, borrowingg, and buildingg.

Then one day, government brought news. They said they want to demolish part of Main Market for reconstruction. At first, we thought it was just rumour. Market women were shouting, crying, doing meeting. But nobody believed it would happen so fast.

One morning, they came. Bulldozers. Soldiers. Task force. They started demolishing. And my friend's mother's shop was among the shops they demolished.

I will never forget that day. My friend called me crying. She said, "They have demolished my mother's shop." When I got there, her mother was sitting on the floor in the market, in front of where her shop used to be, holding her head. All her wrappers, her laces, some her goods scattered, some people carried, some destroyed by the bulldozer. Twelve years of work, turned to dust in one morning.

For weeks, she did not go to market. She stayed at home, depressed. She would sit and be looking into space. She kept saying, "Where will I start from? At my age? I have put all my life inside that shop. I cannot start again."

It was painful to watch....... Because she had invested so much, letting go felt like failure. She kept holding onto the pain, hoping they would call them back to the market. But nothing happened.

This is what many of us do. We stay in toxic places — toxic relationship, toxic friendship, toxic job, toxic business — because we feel we have invested so much and we don't want to start again. We sacrifice our happiness, our peace, our self-respect, because we are scared of starting over. Just like Mama Lace was scared.

But after about a month, her daughter, my friend, sat her down and told her, "Mummy, they demolished your shop, but they did not demolish your brain....... They demolished the building, but they did not demolish your customers, your knowledge, your experience. You still know how to sell...... You still know where to buy quality lace."

That word changed her.

Slowly, she started again. She started selling from home. She would carry small bundle of wrappers, go from house to house, call her old customers on phone. Some laughed, some supported. It was frustrating. From big shop owner in Main Market to hawking small small. But she did not give up.

Today, she has gotten a small space again in another line in the market. It is not as big as her former shop, but she is back. She is smiling again. And she told me, "I thought I could not start again, but I did. I am not starting from zero, I am starting from experience."

That is the lesson of starting again. It is painful. It is frustrating. People may laugh. You may cry. But if you don't start again, you will remain on the floor where life left you.

Sometimes you have to let go of what you have invested so much in, if it is no longer giving you peace. And start again. Because you can. Becausse you are strongeer than you thinnk.

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Image source AI