The Story of Two
The Story of Two: The end comes first.
I am going to tell you that I am going to tell you a story.
Then, I’m going to tell you the story.
Then, we will recap the story.
That ladies, is your first take away from this narrative.
I just told you my short version of how to give a speech. Now I studied Speech in high school extensively and while some of you may think that speech refers to speaking and how to converse with others – what I studied was much more in depth. I studied communicator of the verbal form but also more. I learned body language, enunciation, tempo, tone and eye contact. I learned and practiced impromptu and extemporaneous speaking for competitions. One is a short rehearsal and the other is “off the cuff” or absolutely no time to practice.
So how do you give a speech?
Let’s recap. I told you what I’m going to tell you, then I’m going to tell you, and then I’m going to tell you what I told you.
While that sounds funny it’s the basic truth of it all. The more you repeat a point, the more likely people are to remember.
Well, that was my first take away for you and my introduction. On to the story: The Story of 2: The end comes first.
Ironically, the Story of 2 starts as a Story of 1. It’s my story and how I got where I am. Time jump back 12-15 years, I called a friend and said “There must be more to life than diapers, dishes and laundry.” Now I don’t recall what I had expected to hear from my “best friend” who was like a mom to me but I felt like I needed a pick me up. I felt down. So in my exhasperation I called her and that was the first thing out of my mouth. Now let’s see why I felt that way.
1) I was a stay-at-home mom six years at that point.
2) I was isolated.
3) No friends I ever got to spend “me” time with.
4) No “ME” time and
5) I had applied to every restaurant in town and got zero calls back.
NOTE* I have an Associate’s degree in food service and I didn’t understand a couple things.
1) It’s not what you know, it’s who you know and 2) being overqualified is a killer!
There are your #2 and 3 take away advice from me. Always make time for ME and being overqualified is a career killer. So now that you know where I was mentally, you may understand why the rebuttal I got hit me so hard…
So when I said to this friend in total exasperation, “There must be more to life than diapers, dishes and laundry or I’m ready to checkout". I was quite shocked with her response. Her response was
(Let’s take a second to consider what your response might be.)
Are you ready for this? “No not for you.” To this day those words echo in my mind. It felt like someone had pushed me off a cliff! So guess what I did?? I hung up on her.
I didn’t think about it. I just did it. Now maybe that wasn’t the right thing to do but it sure felt good to me. That was definitely not the right thing to say to me at that moment. Then my phone started ringing.
I answered.
She yelled at me.
I hung up again.
She texted me.
She told me how absolutely immature I was being, how childish such an action was, blah blah blah. So, I turned my phone off.
So, let’s stop for a minute and put this in perspective.
I had no friends. I didn’t like any of my in-laws because of “family loyalty” anything my husband did to me I thought was unfair was fine by them. #mentalabuse, is still abuse.
#4 Take away – build a network so you always have input. I couldn’t talk to my parents. I had no siblings. I’m not close to any family. I had in fact, reached out to the ONE person to share my thoughts and she either didn’t care or couldn’t empathize but the result was – I WAS ALONE. And felt like I was in the bottom of a 20 foot hole with no way out.
Let that sink in for just a minute – you’ve heard people say – “There’s light at the end of the tunnel.”
Take away #5. Perspective is everything. So let’s examine my perspective and compare that to the statement I just made. Consider being at the bottom of a well and looking up. You would see a round light the the top of of a long tube only by throwing your head all the way back and glaring upwards. Now consider a walk on a reasonably flat surface for a distance through a tunnel. While the tunnel is dark you can see in the distanc right in front of you a light. To reach that perceived light all you have to do is put one foot in front of the other. Which one seems easier? The light at the end of the tunnel does. It’s a cake walk compared to where I was!
So how did I come back from that??
- Tried a therapist and drugs for a while to collect myself, my confidence and create a plan. What was I going to do?
Take away #6 Have A Plan! Then execute it. It doesn’t do any good to “just think about it.” You need to put those plans and ideas on paper! Write it down/ organize your thoughts, create a goal, then execute the plan. Fun Fact – if you have a thought and don’t act on it in five seconds – you probably won’t because each second you wait gives your BRAIN an opportunity to talk you out of it! Watch Mel Robbins on YouTube on TedX.
So, what was my plan??
I had to be able to support my kids and myself. As it was, I had a degree in Food Service but already tried to get hired by applying at all the local restaurants. No one wanted me. Not one single call back. I look back now and wonder if someone was erasing the answering machine. Since my husband at the time thought of me as “his” property, it’s understandable he might want to keep me isolated and dependent right? I did have some factory assembly experience and some shipping experience. While manufacturing jobs are prolific, shipping pays better but at the time still hard to find. Nothing happened quickly enough so I decided another avenue-more education! I knew I was a very creative person with lots of ideas but no clue how to capitalize on them. So after some investigation and getting completely confused I signed up for an Associate Degree with the Harrison College. They had been Indiana Business College. Now, knowing what I know now, the name change should have been a huge red flag. Add the fact the “admissions counselor” only compounded the confusion of how I was to be charged, when I would be charged and if credits did transfer to other colleges. It was a bad choice. So, with no one to really guide me in this process or even able to get straight answers, I plunged head first into my second term of college. I’m still 30k in debt!
Take away #6 here – you do not need a college education!
If college taught me anything it’s this –
Take away #7 –
It’s not what you know, but who you know that will get you the job and 2) “Business” is code for “lie” and they justify the lies with manipulation and call it “sales” which is nothing more than basic psychology.
Take away #8 So build that network, keep those contacts and reach out every so often just to wish them Happy Birthday. Now add up with a phone, text, recording and email it’s FREE to do so, SO DO IT!
So, you think if you have a college degree your chances of getting a job improve right? Seems logical, right? WRONG! If you can’t “sell” yourself, no matter what education you have you will never land a great dream job! Yes, you will always fall just short of where you COULD be.
I can’t tell you how many times I created a resume and asked for it to be reviewed by the employment officer at Harrison only to be told each and every time I submitted that something else was wrong. It was never “good enough” by her standards. I would get responses like “needs more continuity”. I would then ru double check all my placements, periods, and capitalization. I would check that all businesses were listed in the exact same way. Check my color choices. Needless to say, after four times of this I decided her advice was an exercise in futility since it was never “good enough” and she never had a positive thing to say about it. I plowed ahead and started applying before I even actually graduated.
I landed some contract jobs in experiential marketing. What is that? Also known as engagement marketing where you interact with the customer in a non-traditional more personal way. It’s about not just educating about the product or brand but asking questions of the consumer/customer and relaying that info back to the company. It meant I spent a lot of time repeating myself! And when it came to representing a cell phone company, I had to work extra hard to engage customers because they all thought I would try to sell them a phone, when in fact I was trying to educate on availability, options and added value perks so when they are ready they would consider “brand x.” I thought I had a great job! Work when you want, if you want.
But – no raises, no appreciation and I despised food demos at WalMart!
Add the need to constantly apply and train for positions became exhausting. So even though I made $12 to $20 an hour there was no paid training, no vacation, and no medical benefits. I applied for yet another part time job from Craigslist :that’s where I found all my gigs by the way. I found I liked working for Budweiser! What’s not to love ? I got paid to give away swag and hang in bars all night taking pictures of people enjoying beer and playing games.
It was at this low point in my life I was the most alone. My jobs took me out of the house on evenings and weekends (as I chose them to) and away from my husband; we just grew farther and farther apart. Now you may be inclined to conclude in a not so happy marriage there may have been some arguing going on, maybe a bit of physical abuse. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I smiled in all the pictures. I cut coupons. I tried to save money. We went out for dinner whenever HE wanted. From the outside looking in I bet it looked pretty good! Huge house that was beautiful inside. I drove a descent vehicle. But it wasn’t happy. We didn’t talk; if it didn’t involve paying bills, driving kids or feeding kids, we didn’t even bother to discuss it. That is how the end begins.
Now back to getting out of the proverbial hole I was in. Remember, the twenty-foot-deep hole that went straight up? I still wasn’t exactly sure how to get out and after the bank called to raise our mortgage it began to feel like a bottomless pit with only a pin hole of light at the top. I was doing all I could; I worked as much as I could, saved as much as I could. Clip coupons, buy in bulk, don’t drive unless you have to, make your own cleaning supplies. He did what he did – went to work and came home to play video games.
It’s about now I had settled on divorce. We had been married 12 years. So, after much discussion he had divorce papers drawn up. Guess what the settlement was? I got to keep my clothes and personal property and my car. When I questioned him about buying out my half of the house, he didn’t feel it was mine to ask for. So even though my name was on the house it meant nothing to him.
So let me get this straight. I am good enough to live in the house, clean the house, have your kids and raise your kids so you can work but that is how much you value me? I thought about it for a while and then packed my stuff and left. I refused to sign the divorce papers. So he didn’t allow me to see my kids. Now this development was an eye opener. Since I had nowhere to go, I could not take my kids. I had the education but still could not support myself. I left the kids with him because school was starting, I figured he needed time to miss me. He could feed the kids. He could shuttle the kids. He needed to clean his own house. After six weeks I didn’t want to go back but I HAD to.
1) I had a right to the relationship with my kids who were still small like four to six small.
2) I needed a better plan. So, I took a big step back and went back for my kids.
I have no idea how he explained why I wasnt around and to this day my kids don't talk about it. I have no idea the trauma they must have felt when I left HIM only to be told then rhat I cant see the kids. I have a feeling his story was quite different than the truth of it.
We ended up losing the house. It was so bad we were selling personal property to make the payments and using credit cards to buy groceries. That can only go on for so long.
So, we were “counciled’’into doing a “deed of lieu” of foreclosure. Big mistake! They told us it would look better on our credit report. It did not. Still appears as a foreclosure seven years on your report.
Take away #8 Remember “business” means “lie”, we borrowed 10k from his parents, bought a foreclosed property that should have been condemned. I will detail the poor living conditions for the next few years.
Take away #9 sometimes we learn the same lessons over. We have to
1) read and
2) see patterns.
We lived in our 25ft camper trailer in the driveway for months. Yes, two adults, two kids and two big dogs. He worked when he wanted to and I discovered there was absolutely no way for me to motivate that man. Not with food, promises, encouragement, bribing, coercing, yelling, threatening or even sex! That was a huge red flag right there. You would think his provider instinct would kick in, right? Nope! He had a job and went to work and that was all he thought he had to do. So, I worked more.
Now here is where it got interesting. While I was gone he would do things. Now he had demonstrated this before in the other house.
Take away #9: 1) ability to recall is important and so is recognizing patterns. I found all kinds of reasons not to be home . I took evening jobs and weekend gigs. I spent hours at the Laundromat! (Remember, we were living in a camper!) Now let me take a minute to paint an accurate picture. The 25ft camper was not your normal “glamper” with small kitchen and bath. It was like a 1976 whatever that had been gutted and redone inside to maximize sleeping without plumbing or cooking.
It had no bathroom or shower. No sink. It did have heat and A/C and radio. The kids got a bath in a baby pool. I had to heat water in an electric skillet or just have in the sun for a day. We had gym memberships just for showering for the adults but the gym didnt allow kids under 13.I had no washer and no dryer, not even a clothesline.We had extremely limited storage space. But the light at the end of my tunnel was getting brighter, even if I still didn’t know how to “get out.”
Take away #10 remember I had no friends. But I had books and you can learn a lot from books! So, I spent a great deal of time reading. Boy were my eyes were opened! I read all the marketing books – “Who Moved My Cheese?”, “Ten Things Successful People Do.” But the book that had the greatest impact on me at that time was “Think and Be Rich” by Napoleon Hill. Now I think it’s chapter 11 on transmutation that my mind just exploded. Everything fit. It was all crystal clear because at this point, I was having some great sex with myself! It was about this time that I started to hear things inside my head. I got ideas as if someone was whispering to me. No, I wasn’t crazy. I didn’t feel crazy. It wasn’t VOICES (plural) it was one voice that was more of a whisper. As time went by that whisper became undeniable and relentless “He had to go.”
Now I still didn’t have a job that would support us. So, when I told him I wanted him to leave, he did so: almost immediately. I figured it might take 30 days for him to find an apartment in the vicinity. Nope. I don’t think he even tried because the next day he packed his stuff and left for his mother’s. I hoped they would be very happy together. Again, I was left feeling like he felt I was worthless. He did not value me enough to even fight about it. He just left.
Here’s take away #11. True colors show in times of stress. Watch carefully what someone does when your opinion is different, when your perspective is different or you told them no. He showed his true colors and that didn’t fit in my rainbow.
Now most people would think I’d be crying in a corner. I have been with this man twenty years by now. I was 43 years old and spent half my life with him. No, I was at peace inside.
Take away #12. That’s how you know the choice is right for you. It will bring you inner peace regardless of how chaotic the rest of life is.
On the third day he was gone, he stopped by and had some really valid questions.
1) How would I support myself?
2) How would I support my kids
3) How would I pay my bills?
To all of these questions I had only one statement. “God will provide.”
Take away #12 God will provide if you have the faith.
So, at this point you have at least twelve take-aways so far.
1) How to give a speech
2) It’s not what you know, it’s WHO you know
3) Always make time for Me
4) Build a network
5) Perspective is everything
6) How to plan: Write it, refine and execute: Reevaluate
7) It’s not what you know, but who you know so called isn’t required.
8) Business is code for “lie” if you study anything let it be Psychology.
9) Look for patterns
10) Always learn: books are your best friend
11) Know yourself and how to make choices for You.
12) Have faith: in yourself and in God - if you have one.
End of 1st story.
