ACTIVERAIN
This is my third entry for the November Challenge offered by Jeff Dowler, CRS. When I got started on AR, you could say my business was shipwrecked on the rocks and I was looking for something else, other than what I was getting locally. Nobody told me it would cost so much to get started in the business and there were no lines of people waiting to buy houses. Plus, there was no end to continuing education and fees, fees, fees. I guess you could say I was needing something more than what I was getting at the local level and ActiveRain sounded appealing. As soon as I heard about RainCamp in Houston, I registered. I confess, being a part of this group with colleagues, I learned a lot! For this and many, many reasons, I am grateful for ActiveRain.
FAITH & GOD
In the beginning of my career I toured many homes to get my feet wet. But I confess, seeing all those luxury homes and houses, so much prettier than mine I wanted to get more out of life so that I could have fine things like so many other people! I think it was around the time I went in for surgery and I was asked to bring in a copy of my Will and Power of Attorney that I suddenly had a paradigm shift and asked God to make me humble and to let me live with just the necessities. The prospect of owning a luxury home no longer appealed to me. I am grateful for my faith and God the Almighty.
LIFE
After my family members started dying one by one, year after year, I visited my Aunt, my oldest living relative in Florida for the last time. We sat on the swing and talked about her life and mine and shared our happiest and most challenging memories. It was then, that I realized my aunt was an infant during WW1, married my uncle during WWII, lived through Pearl Harbor, the Holocaust, the Great Depression and she never complained. As long as she had my Uncle and they were living in America, she was the happiest woman alive. She always wore a smile and had nice things to say to me. She asked me to promise her I would travel more and see as much of the world as I could because life goes by fast. I am grateful that I traveled to so many beautiful places in the world, especially to visit my son and daughter.
SKILLS
Before becoming a REALTOR®, before working at the Abbott Diagnostics Division in Texas, and before working at Abbott’s Pharmaceutical Marketing & Sales Division and Abbott’s Corporate Engineering Division in IL, I was a widow with two children. All I wanted to do was to run away with my kids as far away from home as possible and I wanted them to come with me. That’s when my prayer was answered and my kids went with me to live and work in Maine. I worked for five glorious summers, my daughter 8 years as a camper, CIT (Counselor in Training), and Camp Counselor, and my son 10 years as camper, CIT, and Camp Counselor. I am thankful for that opportunity to live and work at Wyonegonic Camps in Denmark, ME as a Bookkeeper while my children developed skills they never could have had in IL and it made all three of us healthier, wiser, more independent, skilled in outdoor activities, and develop problem solving skills we needed to survive.
FLAWS & IMPERFECTIONS
There are many different types of schools but the best education comes when you go to the school of hard knocks. If I don’t sell a home today, maybe I will help someone tomorrow. And if I have nobody to help buy or sell houses, it’s a test for me to help myself and to learn my lesson, that nobody gets a free ride in life and life is never to be taken for granted. Today, I give thanks for all of life’s blessings. I am very grateful for the hard times, and all the times I had to put the broken pieces of my life back together. I remember sitting in a very old Pottery Shop from ancient times making this pottery cup in Seto, JAPAN. That's the city where my daughter lived for four and a half years. It was fun using the pottery wheel but I felt inadequate compare to others when my finished product was far from perfect. I wanted to throw it out but the Japanese Instructor grabbed hold of it like she was saving a baby and cradled my pottery piece in her very old hands. My daughter, who was with me translated and said, the more you create, the stronger you get, more beautiful, more unique. One cannot achieve resilience without embracing your own flaws, imperfections, that’s what true beauty is all about. I am grateful for my flaws and imperfections.
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