Abena Serwaa Ophelia has encouraged her fans to take their dreams seriously.

The Gospel singer had been asked about taking on fashion designing.

She spoke to Taller Dee on the No.1 Gospel Showbiz programme on No.1 FM, 105.3.

“Your desires and dreams come to you through your heartfelt thoughts. There are some dreams you cannot shake off no matter what. You need to focus and follow those dreams. Getting distracted from them will not profit you,” she cautioned. “No matter how far you stray from them, you’ll backtrack to them.”

She emphasised how seriously she took her dream to pursue fashion designing.

“I was convinced and determined, and, thus, serious,” she said.

She said “while learning the fashion trade,” by apprenticeship, she would walk a great distance to work covering areas like “Arena, Kantamanto, the train tracks, CMP, Graphic Road and Adabraka” in Accra.

Ophelia said she learned frugality and living within her means, in this period and also because “I lived with my strict grandmother”.

She urged people who want to escape cycles of hardship to consider their past and their future and push forward, “diligently learning a skill or trade” to aid their progress.

The singer underscored the importance of prayer, also.

“While I applied myself to learning, I was also fervent in prayer,” she said.

Therefore, “in a year’s time, I had acquired the skill and learned how to do the fashion work,” she added, thanking her skilled mentor “Ma Cecilia” who was greatly impressed to the point “she confronted my Aunt who took me to her accusing her of bringing her an already-skilled individual disguised as an apprentice”.

Ophelia emphasised before she took up the fashion design apprenticeship, she was a genuine novice but learned quickly due to her diligence. She added, after “finishing school” as a girl, she helped her grandmother with her petty trading.

“My grandmother loved me because I was smart and hardworking,” she said.

M'aseda Dwom (My Song of Thanks) is Abena Serwaa Ophelia's latest song.