Women Starting Over and Moving Up (eBook)

Building Financial Success on Your Own Terms

Raymond Aaron, Nora Ellen (Autoren)

eBook Download: EPUB

2022 | 1. Auflage
186 Seiten
10-10-10 Publishing (Verlag)
978-1-77277-452-8 (ISBN)

Infos

Starting over is overwhelming. But it can also be the biggest adventure of your life. For women, moving up the career ladder is more often a case of falling behind their male counterparts. Worry, no more - here is the guide you need to get to the top without losing your footing by gaining the secrets for more earning power and purpose! Nora Ellen understands what it means to have to start over, by circumstance or by choice. Having remade herself a number of times over, she knows first-hand the plight of women who are financially strapped or broke because they are out of work, their business went bust, they fell sick, they underwent a divorce or were sadly widowed. Filled with timeless principles that act as your compass during times of turbulence, yet peppered with no-nonsense, practical steps that you can apply daily, Women Starting Over and Moving Up empowers you to dream and act greater with faith, hope and love. You'll turn on your own power and even discover the entrepreneurial mindset that will get you to the financial freedom you are longing for. You'll easily be able to connect with those that are waiting to help and support you to speed you along. You cannot redo the past but you can most certainly redesign your future, and Nora shows you how. Get a copy of her book today and get on your way!

Textauszug

Chapter 1

What Ever Happened to My Dream Life?

“Don’t be afraid to start over. It’s a brand new opportunity to rebuild what you truly want.”

—Andre Pascal

A string of traumatic setbacks—divorce, financial distress, broken dreams, becoming a single mom without a way of making money—was never part of my dream life. But my life did not turn out the way I expected. I was brought up in Colorado to be a wife, a mother, and to be of service to our community, because that was what my mom did and what our family valued.

So I was not prepared for two broken marriages, ending up as a single mom, and having to start over financially by myself to put food on the table for me and my two young children. But I did, and successfully too, on both occasions. The first reset was by necessity, as well as the second one. This one I am journeying through right now, is by choice. The first time I started over was driven by the need to survive and to make sure I had some financial security, and that I was not letting my kids down, as a single mother.

This time around, I am starting over myself because I am fueled by a purpose and a plan to help other women who may be walking in my old shoes. I am driven by a commitment to help as many women as I can, who may feel disempowered by money and income, and to give hope and to positively impact lives around the world.

Too often, women find themselves at the short end of the stick when their world comes crashing down in a matter of seconds. It could be any number of unfortunate and ugly events: faced with divorce, being widowed, out of a job, burdened by failed businesses, stuck with skills made obsolete by technology, facing gender discrimination or ageism.

What do you do when your boat is rocked so badly and so unexpectedly, and you are out of money, out of ideas, and out of options? Where do you go when that happens? How do you start over? Where do you go next? Who do you turn to?

I can help you get from where you are now, to where you want to be. I have been in this place before, where you are now, and I am fueled by a plan and a purpose to reach out and uplift women who need help starting over: to share with you my experiences so you can have hope, and to offer you an inspirational example to follow to avoid making mistakes; to elevate you with stories of other women who have come this way before and have achieved the success they have only dreamed of; to guide you in starting over, because you’ll be starting with a clean slate.

Why do I want to do this?

Because women deserve better.

You deserve better.

Because women are powerhouses.

You are smart, entrepreneurial, family-oriented, caring, compassionate, and creative.

Because women are leaders, savers, creators, keepers of societies, business geniuses.

You have untapped power within you.

Because by giving women more income-earning opportunities, they invest back into families and communities.

You just have to own it.

Here is my disclaimer: This is not to say men don’t need help starting over. I totally value men and the contributions they have made to our world, but in this instance, I am writing this book for women.

From Broke to Hope to Success

I never graduated from college. I did attend for 4 years to become a teacher, because I wanted to positively impact young lives, as my teachers did mine. I actually wanted to be a Physical Education teacher because, growing up, students always looked up to the PE teachers, and they greatly influenced the lives of their students. However, there was something fundamental I wanted to change.

When it came to divvying up the class into teams for sports, the PE teacher tended to rely on a popular student or the sports jock to select the students. I would always watch as the team leaders bandied back and forth on whom they wanted on their respective teams. Their top picks would be the star athletes, followed by those students with okay abilities, like me. Finally, the last group would be made of those students who were unfit, overweight, too uncoordinated, too short, too unpopular.

Did this happen in your school? Is this a memory you can relate to? I always felt so badly for the last group because they were always made to feel that they were the least of the crop. School was supposed to be an environment set up to motivate students to rise to their highest potential; instead, the least sporty among us ended up being humiliated. Watching this unfold time and time again, I resolved that I would be a PE teacher, and I would teach class in such a way that every student would feel welcomed, important, and worthy.

I first went to study at Covenant College, on Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, and then to the University of Northern Colorado, which was one of the top three in the nation for teachers. However, despite the four years of study, I didn’t finish college, because I chose to get married. My then fiancé was going into the military, and we would be frequently transferred around the country. I thought I would finish my education later, but that didn’t happen; we moved around a lot and I had two children. I sold some Avon products, and volunteered in community and church groups, but that summed up my work experience.

After getting divorced, I moved back home, and I prayed and asked God to help me get a good job and take care of myself and my children. I saw a great job posting and applied. I did not get the job and was so disappointed. But, knowing God and His goodness, I applied for another job and did get that job quickly. It was better than the first one I applied for. It was better pay and I had my own office looking out over the beautiful Front Range mountains. I was even able to move into my own place. Somehow, along the way, I discovered I was quite good at acing job interviews, so I ended up in higher-level jobs that I wasn’t qualified for. I believed if a company didn’t hire me, there would be another job somewhere.

I was 28 when my first marriage fell apart. I was no longer able to handle my husband’s anger. I remarried on the rebound, just one year after my divorce. I didn’t take the time to recover from my first broken marriage, but after 18 years, and when the cracks in my second marriage became irreparable fissures, I came to grips with the realization that I had regarding having a man in my life as the solution to all my financial and other problems, and the key to my happiness. I also had made a man my financial plan and had believed that a man would rescue me. I did whatever I could to save the marriage, but my second husband didn’t want to go along with me. I was willing to make changes, but he blamed the faults in our marriage entirely on me. It was when I went to counseling and recovery, after my second divorce, that this truth—that I looked to a man to make me happy and to save me—crystallized, because I had to look within myself as to why I ended up in two failed marriages. Along the way, I discovered the healing and changes I needed to make within myself, with God’s help.

After my second divorce, I was without a job. I had been a homemaker all these years, and there was no clear way for me to find work, but there was pressure on me to make money to take care of myself and my children. I knew I had to do something and, in examining my options, I came to realize that I didn’t want to work for someone, nor for a company. I did not want to go get a job, any job, like most people do.

After praying for more guidance, once again an idea sprang to mind. I had heard about people that were earning good money “flipping” houses, and decided to explore this further by reading books and joining a local real estate investors group. In those days, the Internet was not nearly as sophisticated or as easily accessible as it is now, where we can learn new things, join meet-up groups, download apps and, in general, get information in seconds, or at the very least, in minutes.

Nonetheless, being in groups of like-minded people who were involved in what I wanted to learn about, was highly motivating, and it spurred me to take action.

Here’s a tip: One of the best ways to be successful is to find like-minded people who are already successful at what you want to achieve.

Armed with new knowledge and purpose, I set out to find houses that I could renovate a little and flip, or do a lease option (like rent-to-own). This was the time (in 2003/2004) before the subprime loan crisis blew up, and I was qualified to buy a house using what was called a “no-doc” loan, which was a loan that didn’t require any income documentation on my part. I could also access what were called “hard money loans,” where a borrower could get a short-term loan at a very high rate of interest, with the house being provided as collateral.

So, I found my first house from a yard sign on the road. The owner, Jim, was from Nebraska, and somehow that made me believe that he would stand by his word on the price and terms we agreed to. In short, I bought the house on a handshake. However, the deal fell through soon enough. Jim called to say he just couldn’t get himself to sell his house then. He explained that he might reconsider his decision later, just not at that point in time. I was stuck—my first transaction was a bust. But I wasn’t going to let that deter me. And here’s another tip: You are bound to make...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 24.1.2022
• Vorwort: Loral Langemeier
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft
• ISBN-10: 1-77277-452-9 / 1772774529
• ISBN-13: 978-1-77277-452-8 / 9781772774528