I was born 5th of 6 children into a working class family, but knew from a very young age that I was born to be RICH. As a young girl, I was forever telling my mom that the stork dropped me at the wrong house (something I truly believed was possible thanks to Disney’s movie Dumbo). She would simply chuckle at me and continue on with whatever she was doing. I never lost this thought; it stayed with me throughout life even when reality showed me something different.
But life tends to happen and that knowingness can fade. A sequence of events happened in my life that changed the way I saw the world. At 6 months I contracted salmonella poisoning and nearly died. Our farm well was bad and so it killed of our livestock. My parents ended up bankrupt from this and about 2 1/2 years later we moved, losing all of our friends and family. About a year or so later we moved again. A few short months after that my brother was killed on his bicycle…May 22, 1972 – the day of my 5th birthday.
It seemed as though a theme was taking over our lives – loss became a recurring event. The day my brother died I made a pact with God that I would be good and NEVER ask for another thing as long as I lived if he would just please keep my family safe. Life became very different for me. My dad worked day and night and my mom slept for 4 years straight. I would sit beside her and care for her, putting cool cloths on her head and playing silently next to her.
On good days I would sit and daydream about all the wonderful things in the world and then I would have her sign cheques (really a blank deposit slip from the back of her cheque book). She would sign with an X because that was about all the energy she could muster at the time.
I had also created an imaginary friend to help me get through the sadness and fill the time during those years. I was not very imaginative…Her name was Helen and she had long, dark, wavy hair just like me BUT she was beautiful and always wore the most gorgeous white dress. We did everything together. She was my best friend, confidant…and my sanity (and of course now I would say she was my Angel) I loved her deeply and I don’t know if I would have gotten through those years without her. When I wrote my first book, she ended up on the cover but it took me months to realize who she was. I had fallen in love with the image the moment I saw it.
I had always been drawn to the finer things in life but as child 5 of 6 I was destined to a life of hand me down clothes. We always got new shoes and boots though. As a young teen I asked my mom to sew my clothes so that I could have the clothes I wanted at an affordable price. My mom was the Queen of stretching a dollar. Once I started working, at age 14, I began buying designer clothes and beautiful shoes. I still LOVE a great pair of shoes and have a closet full of them…I may have a bit of an addiction to this day! This was short lived though as I was married at 21 and we had our first baby at 22. We went on to have 4 children in 4 1/2 years.
In out child rearing years (which lasted for 25 years I swear) I became incredibly talented at finding a deal, buying on sale, and dare I say it – stretching a dollar. I never paid full price for anything. Even when I was earning a very nice 6 figure income I continued to be a stealthy shopper, always scoping out deals and never paying top dollar – even when building the addition on our house. It had become a way of being and there was a certain pride in my ability to get the best deal!
A few years ago while working with my first coach he challenged me to go shopping and buy something for myself at full price, no deal searching, no sale items, and no outlet shopping. I had to find something just for me that I loved and I had to pay FULL price, no questions asked. I was shocked by how hard that was; how uncomfortable I felt spending full ticket price on something for me just because I wanted it. I had hired him because I knew that I needed to change my money mindset but I still couldn’t believe how hard this actually was.
Money mindset has been the toughest piece for me. I have done so much internal work and I simply can’t begin to tell you all of the changes I have made in my life but the money part…that took some serious attention and work to bust through the chains of poverty and loss created through many generations.
A lot of miracles have happened over the past few years but perhaps the most valuable of them all is the realization that miracles are common place and they can happen anywhere, anytime, for anyone. Now don’t get me wrong – I have always believed in miracles and my youngest daughter is living proof that miracles happen (but that is another story for another day). But I had no idea that miracles could happen all around us, day and night…with no strings attached. This has been my biggest miracle and the one that changed everything for me.
2018 was quite a year…my mom had bowel cancer surgery and ended up with a bowel blockage that darn near killed her in January. My father in law passed away in February after months in hospital suffering from Alzheimers. My sister got sick shortly thereafter and underwent testing for the next 6 months. My dad suffered a series of strokes on July 30th and was admitted to palliative care, later that same day my sister was given a diagnosis, an inoperable brain tumour and was given 2 years at most. Dad passed away that Friday, August 3rd.
That was a tough year and yet it had been the best year of my life both personally and professionally to that point. I found my inner peace and happiness during one of the hardest times of my life; the death of my dad. I had been on a quest to find happiness consciously for about 3 years, but subconsciously since 1997 (the year I bought a book titled “You Can Be Happy No Matter What”) at least and probably since the day I turned 5.
Finally, I chose to stop seeing the world as a scary place. I stopped living life always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I revoked all the pacts I made in this lifetime or any other. I chose to start living an abundant and prosperous life in all areas of life no matter what! I also began charging more for my services and expecting that people would want to work with me.
So this time, instead of creating a life in spite of all the things that happened, I chose to create my life because of everything that had happened. I am a WOMAN OF WEALTH because I choose to see things differently…because I choose to believe in myself, the innate goodness in the word and the laws of the Universe.
I broke through the chains of poverty mindset, for my lineage, forwards and back, so that the women in my family can be prosperous if that is what they choose. I do what I do so that I can help other women break the chains of poverty mindset that are holding them back from living their best life.
I created a Wealth mindset where I am pushing my limits every day, and where I now earn in 1 day what I used to earn in a month and it is full of ease and joy. I had been making a beautiful 6 figure income with a full benefit package, bonus package and full expense package, however, the job was killing me and I was too stubborn to admit it. I believed in working hard for your money.
So the only question there is now is…where to go from here…how to use our time here on earth in the most valuable way and how we can create the life we truly dream of for ourselves and for our cause…no matter how much money you have right now!