I submitted the following to a magazine for publication, so it’s a little longer than most of my blogs, but I wanted you to be the first to see it. .
It’s about falling down and getting back up. I imagine you can relate, even though your story is different… let me know. 💜
I was 58 years old, sitting in my convertible Mustang in the beach parking lot Googling “Homeless Shelters for Women.” And not because I was searching for good causes to donate my time or money to.
I’d had ups and downs financially before, but this was next level! I’m a single mom with four kids. I unexpectedly became the breadwinner for my family when I got divorced. Up until then I never imagined I would provide financially for my family.
In my thirties I went from being a stay-at-home mom to working part-time in real estate to needing to support a family of five. And let me tell you, the shoes, clothes and braces that four kids need adds up in a hurry!
I rose to the challenge. I found the ambition and desire to succeed I didn’t know I had. The kids and I were happy. I bought the clothes, shoes, braces and occasionally even took us on vacation. Life was good.
Then I fell down. I had just returned from my oldest daughter’s destination wedding. At this point in my career I was a minority owner in a real estate office. Things were going really well. I had wiped out my savings contributing to the wedding but I was confident I could replenish it and I wanted to contribute to the wedding expenses.
My first day back at work my business partner told me he wanted to sell our real estate office immediately. I didn’t have the money or desire to buy him out. In less than two weeks I was out of work. Because I was a minority owner, I didn’t qualify for unemployment.
This wasn’t the first time I had fallen down, so I gathered all my courage and resources. I doubled down on my affirmations and appointments with my therapist. I trusted that something would come through before I maxed out my credit cards and ran out of the small buy-out I got from my partner. I was in my final days of rent and grocery money when I got hired by a large real estate company. Whew! I had fallen down, and once again, I got up.
So you see, when I was sitting in my car Googling homeless shelters, I had a lot of experience in falling down and getting up.. But this one was different. I was pulling out all the tools I had used before and no matter what I did, nothing was working. I couldn’t seem to get any money flowing in. I felt like I had exhausted my “couch surfing” resources. I house-sat for friends, I stayed in inexpensive Airbnb’s, usually sharing a bathroom with a stranger. Which is a big “yuk!” in my book! I couldn’t seem to get up, no matter how hard I tried.
It took me almost three years to make enough money to get my belongings out of storage and move into my own apartment. I had been falling down for almost three years.
How did I get back up?
Along the way I noticed I was using a process on myself and clients. I used this process like a faithful friend that stays with you when the going gets tough. I didn’t get an unexpected check from a rich uncle that I used to get up after falling down. I had the four elements of this process I was using that kept moving me forward, inch by inch.
I call these four magical elements, The Solve It Method™ because let me tell you, I’ve used them to solve every issue I faced! I found it worked equally well with clients and all the issues they were facing. These four elements are not linear, so using them is more of an art form than a formula. By working all four together I was able to get the guidance, courage and tenacity I needed from my inner guidance.
The four elements of The Solve It Method™ are desire, thoughts, feelings and action. I’ll show you how it works. Think of something that isn’t working in your life right now. It doesn’t need to be a big thing, like Googling homeless shelters, it can be a conversation you’re dreading or a situation you’re frustrated with.
As I sat in my car that day I thought about my desire to have a thriving coaching practice. I had to ask myself, is that still my desire? Our desires shift and change all the time and if we don’t reexamine them, we’ll keep moving forward as if they are true, when they aren’t. Anytime we try to pursue something that we don’t desire, we’ll fall down. Because our inner guidance is trying to protect us from getting out of alignment with our desires. My desire was still strong. I wanted a thriving coaching practice.
Next I thought about the action I was taking. Remember, these four elements don’t go in any special order, but I like looking at my actions early on. Are they congruent with my desire or not? It’s a great insight to have before you move on to your thoughts and feelings. In my case, I was taking a lot of action towards my business, I just wasn’t getting the results I wanted. Whether you are taking action that isn’t working or you notice you aren’t taking action that is congruent with your desire, it’s time to examine our thoughts and feelings. I always find there’s some sort of sabotage in there that needs to be cleared up before revisiting action.
Thoughts and feelings are like two sides of a pancake. You don’t have one without the other and it’s hard to know where one stops and the other starts. These two require a lot of attention. Now, keep in mind, at this point in my life, I’ve been obsessed with my personal and spiritual growth for almost 20 years, plus I’m a certified life coach! I’ve also fallen down and gotten up several times in my life. I’ve done my work. I’ve examined my thoughts. I’ve gone back to my childhood traumas, all of it!
And yet… During this exceptionally difficult time in my life, I kept finding more. More diminishing thoughts. More feelings of fear and condemnation. So I kept working on them. It wasn’t glamorous. I was tired. I got angry that I still had all this ugly stuff buried in my subconscious when I had worked so long for so many years to be free from it. And, I couldn’t deny there was still stuff there, so I kept working on it.
Little by little I experienced the freedom you feel when you truly let go of a thought that holds you back. A thought like, I’m not good enough. Or, it’s time to give up. I experienced the joy you feel when your feelings transmute from diminishment and condemnation to pure love and infinite possibilities. That’s what getting up looks like.
And so, I got up. I’m writing this from my living room, two blocks from the ocean looking at the palm trees out my front door.
Wherever you are, however you’ve fallen, you can get up. I did, you can too. I love having The Solve It Method™ as a process I can grab hold of, like a life preserver, to help me get back up. You can find out more about The Solve It Method™ on my website, www.BrendaFlorida.com.