Читать книгу My Freedom Flight - Peggy Caruso - Страница 4

Boarding a Boeing WWII Stearman bi-plane: the engine starts….coughing, sputtering, then smoothing out to a purr. Departing on a grass runway, feeling the increase of the speed, bumps, and the air rush, then departure. Gaining altitude and flying out over the valley into the morning fog and reflecting at that very moment, the pilots who flew in that same aircraft…70 years ago. It is the most rewarding experience one could ever encounter. How could this be so rewarding?

All of my life I’ve been afraid of heights. My husband is a pilot and when I met him I wondered how we could ever have a relationship given that his passion is flying and I have a fear of heights. He is also the owner of a vintage restoration business so I realized that airplanes and flying would play a vital role in my life. Well, that’s part of my story and how flying aided in my success. I no longer have a fear of heights and flying also became my passion. It’s where I learned to utilize the resources that were in my possession my entire life, though I was totally unaware of what they were. It was my journey to personal and financial freedom. Traveling and stumbling for so many years attempting to discover “the key” or “the secret” to it all and encountering the tiresome obstacles of failure, neglect, betrayal, abuse, and financial burden. I raised two children without a father, was in numerous “failed” relationships, had many jobs, owned several businesses, and was financially challenged through a portion of it all.

There was always a sense of “knowing” there was a secret to settling my internal conflicts and have “success” be the ultimate outcome. I knew I had the capability to produce results, but was unaware of how to obtain financial freedom. With constant setbacks, I managed to find a way to “FREE” myself from all the negative displacements and motivate myself with positive perception.

The knowledge and insight that I’ve accumulated helps me to understand that it really all begins in your childhood. Your parents play the key role in the messages that are planted in your subconscious mind. My parents were faced with their own challenges that came with raising a family of five children and only one parent working. I’m sure in that era, finance was a key factor as to the direction in which they could move. Not realizing it until now, my parents played a vital role in the positive outcome of where I am today. As with all people, there are times we hold our parents accountable for our negative behavior and our setbacks (the blame game.) However, I have come to realize that anyone who is a parent has both positive and negative influences on their children. It is how you take the negative and find a way to educate yourself and turn it into a positive outcome. There were particular times when I would look back and hold my parents accountable (in my mind) for something that was going wrong in my life. However, imagine for a moment they were responsible for the temporary displacement (even though they were not.) It is you and only you who can create that image. Once you’ve attained knowledge, as it progresses with advancement in society, you must attempt to comprehend circumstances between the time-lines. To elaborate for just a moment: there are those episodes where we all encounter the syndrome, “I can’t believe my parent’s did….; I can’t believe my parent’s said…; I would never do that to my child…”

As I previously stated, “advancement in society” is an enormous statement, because if we can come to the realization that times are different from generation to generation, then hopefully we become additionally educated in the evolution. Just a little “food for thought:” if you should ever encounter “blame” toward your parents, take two minutes and walk toward a mirror, and in that reflection, please note where you are in that particular moment. Knowing your immediate circumstances will affect your unborn children — who contemplates that theory?

My father’s perseverance, dedication, and work ethic encouraged me to align my vision with action. I used to think he was “tough” on me, but if he hadn’t instilled that quality I wouldn’t have taken the initiative to discover my own self-discipline. While attending high school, there was a particular year where I was encountering difficulties with one of my teachers. For some reason, he found my weak area and selected to constantly create unfriendly situations. Fear of attending that particular class started to overcome everything else going on around me, which created the desire (or at least I thought it was the best scenario at the time,) to quit school. My father’s tenacity wouldn’t support that decision. Thank you Dad! If he would’ve given in to a “child’s” wish, my life would have become even more difficult. He used his parental instincts to make the best decision by having attained the knowledge of foresight, which would have caused problematic situations and missed opportunities due to lack of education. We don’t always possess that foresight in adolescence. If the decision-making process of a parent is not the desired outcome of the child, he/she experiences short-term resentment. However, if the parent can maintain control of the situation and remain firm in their decision, the child will comprehend the reasoning in adulthood.

My parents are total opposites; which is a great combination for the creation between balance, strength, sentiment, and ambition. My mother has been extremely influential in my success. As a child, I spent most of my time with her because my father was the sole provider of the family. She raised five children of her own, cared for her father-in-law as if he were her own father, and played a significant role in raising her grandson. With her father-in-law’s medical ailment, it caused him to be bed ridden for three years and my mom was his primary care-giver. That in itself, is an outstanding quality of self-worth. As a “stay-at-home” mom, with her scenario, what are her qualifications? She is a medical practitioner, coordinator of events, accountant, psychologist, nutritionist, chef, and attorney. Moms are amazing, and when they do not have a career outside the home they are unaware of the qualifications they possess. The qualities she possesses are very rare. She has accomplished her own success in life and doesn’t realize it: she is utterly flawless. Her encouragement and pride generates my energy for enthusiasm and determination. To replicate her inner perfection is my objective and a way to demonstrate the unconditional love, gratitude, respect, and honor that I have in my heart for her.

Fear:

I became pregnant, got married and had my first child at the age of 21 without realizing I was a child myself. I was instantly forced with financial burden, and in a marriage that I wasn’t ready for. It was instilled in my THOUGHTS that it was the “right” thing to do because I was pregnant, but it was not. My second child was born when I was 24, and the financial burden grew more rapidly. Getting divorced and raising them on my own, without child support, placed an even larger burden upon me. In addition to that, my son battled severe asthma and allergies from the age of eighteen months through adulthood. When he was in kindergarten and first grade, he was continually hospitalized and had to receive medical treatments throughout his life, with a specialist who was two and half hours from home. I had no vacation or sick days at my place of employment so I had to find a way to work, take care of my daughter and be at the hospital for my son.

I had a position as a Customer Service Representative, making $7.50/hr. That was definitely an insufficient amount of funds to raise 2 children and support myself, so I decided to start taking educational courses. I couldn’t afford to quit my job and attend college, so I continued that route of education over the next twenty years. I was promoted to Office Manager, and then started to search for better employment. Since that time, I had two administrative assistant positions, and then received a small break. I accepted a position with a company as office manager and through a lot of self-taught education, discipline, mentoring, and internet studies, I taught myself database management/programming and was promoted to Systems Manager. I was so very proud of my accomplishments at that point. As soon as you begin to experience a positive outcome, it compels you to excel additionally.

Relationships passed, fewer burdens remained (surpassing so many obstacles, I was learning something very valuable about myself,) and I knew there was an answer….a key to it all. I just didn’t know how to find it. I left that company to venture out and start a business of my own. This turned out to be the most complicated, stressful, and strenuous position I ever placed myself in. However, it was also the start of understanding the “Law of Attraction” and it was my first business success: my greatest success. This is twenty years later, but a chance for a new beginning….the beginning of opportunities that everyone should have from childhood.

Let me take you back to childhood:

I was definitely a child who was extremely shy and had absolutely no self confidence. I could not stand in front of the class to speak or demonstrate projects. When I was in grade school, we were required to build a musical instrument and give a presentation. My oldest brother assisted me in building a drum and it was a good one, at that. I was so shy and the fear overcame me so I gave it to a friend who hadn’t completed the project and she got an “A.” Needless to say, I received a failing grade. Why couldn’t I get up there and why couldn’t I receive the credit I deserved? Where did this lack of confidence come from?

I contemplated those issues and questions for many years. I was faced with many wonderful opportunities and lost most of them because I could not figure out what I was doing wrong. I allowed friends to control me, and as I became older, I made poor decisions even though I knew they were going to be detrimental.

There were times when I allowed superiority within my career to influence me in performing actions that were contrary to my beliefs. To elaborate on that, it was their dominance that indicated how I would handle situations with employees and in making sound judgments. There were times that their personal emotions about an individual or circumstance would interfere in the decision making process, and that was unjust. I realized back then that personality differences can be settled. However, they would take it to a level that was unfair to the employee. Their work performance was up to standard, therefore, with my current understanding of behavioral patterns, I realize now, that job positions could have been saved. I wouldn’t allow myself to create any opposition for fear of losing my position, and becoming financially destitute. I actually have an intuitiveness that could have made me successful at an earlier stage in my career, but my inner fear of dealing with the possibility of being wrong or failing was my lack of ability to make a sound judgment based on my intuition. With age, I accumulated enough financial stability to start wealth building. I’ve always carried guilt and fear even though I knew within my heart that I was right, therefore, punishing myself. I am a very giving person with a big heart. Actually, my sentiment was too overwhelming and until I learned the balance, I attended the school of hard knocks.

I started my first business (a restaurant,) in 2002 and sold it in 2007. It was the toughest five years of my life. Being open 7 days/week and working start to finish (breakfast, lunch, & dinner) made it difficult to balance family requirements and business ownership. All meals were prepared from scratch and I tried to do most everything myself. You just want everything to be perfect, but with that mindset, there are enough stories and information about the restaurant business to fill ten books. Anyway, I began listening to inspirational speakers and started researching the law of attraction. The restaurant was very challenging at the beginning, in all ways, but finance and marketing had proven to be the most challenging. However, I started to discover a way out. I was about to lose my home and the business appeared to be going in the direction of financial failure. With minimal time to research and listen to motivational speakers, I attempted to apply a few of the techniques I read about. Everything from that point on started to change and business took a major turn for the best. It was like someone flipped a switch.

The remaining two years were phenomenal. It was physically exhausting, but financially rewarding. Upon realizing that the physical exertion was affecting my health, I made the decision to sell it. There again, I utilized the skills I had acquired relative to controlling my subconscious mind and it worked. I visualized the individual I was going to approach about purchasing the business and set a non-negotiable price. Then I planted the seed, nurtured it, and released it. When I approached the individual, it was exactly how I visualized it in my mind. The entire scenario was exact and low and behold….it worked!! Everyone thought I was “crazy,” but I wasn’t because it worked out exactly how I knew it would. I wish I could convey how I felt the day the sale was finalized. I was filled with a sense of accomplishment and gratitude, as if I were standing on top of the world, knowing that if anything tried to knock me down, I would always find a way to climb back to the top…just to encounter that pleasurable experience again. Debt was eliminated, time was free, and I was happy. I started to see how the application of what I had learned could open many doors of opportunity. I was now experiencing success. Struggling through the years and then encountering success is a very rewarding experience.

After the sale, I decided to further explore the law of attraction and I hired a coach. I wasn’t getting the results I had hoped and it seemed very expensive. I started to focus on the financial investment and my expectations for instant results, weren’t happening. I decided to try and figure things out for myself - WRONG. First state of realization is knowing you MUST either coach or mentor with someone who has achieved success and wealth. The most imperative point that an individual must realize is that it’s not about money, but all the principles that you have to master to get there. To overcome negativity and change your life completely is a very difficult task. It is essential that you have integrity, forgiveness, and generosity, for it will come back to you in greater abundance.

Meeting with individuals who already acquired “millionaire status,” impelled me to read Napoleon Hill’s famous Think and Grow Rich. Well, that book alone educates you in every facet of what principles you need to have a successful career and create eternal happiness. However, I must have read that book eight times before I retained what I needed. I continually read it and always walked away with additional insight. If only I had learned to focus on the basic principles instead of getting “caught up” in disbelief. I have made numerous attempts to get family and friends to comprehend that there really is a “key” to success. However, it is amazing the refutation of belief. That was my biggest detriment….there again, allowing negative influence.

Two additional businesses found their way into my life: a real estate business and another restaurant. I decided to do this restaurant differently than my previous one and “I” decided that a partnership would alleviate the complications I previously encountered. Needless to say that no-one should make a decision like that without utilizing the skills of an entrepreneur who has already accomplished success and can provide coaching skills to educate in legal areas of that type of entity structure. My health took a complicated turn and the partnership fell apart, but I refused to allow financial burdens to knock on my door again. I would have been my own demise. However, my skills and intuition guided me enough to realize when and how to sell it and save my financial status. So, it didn’t go totally wrong this time because of my ability to legally dispute problematic challenges within the entity structure, develop a strategy to arrange for the sale, and recover my investment. I was utilizing the skills I had acquired over the years, and applying the principles I had learned. When you reach the desired outcome, you are filled with a sense of pride. Once again…a successful outcome!!

So you see, I had learned and applied many principles that I hadn’t realized. I have always compared realistic ideals to that of what I had read about the law of attraction with fears of financial burden. I should have realized I was past that stage. However, once you’ve encountered those detrimental areas, fear is your worst enemy.

I remained in control of my financial situation, started another real estate business, continued my education, and assisted my husband in his business. He was equally affected by the decline in the economy and also shared in employment complications. However our combined skills, structured strategies, and perseverance started us on an educational, excitable, and spiritual journey.

With reading that brief synopsis, it is evident that I have encountered many adversities throughout my life, with fear being the primary cause. However, producing the most gratifying results creates an inner repose. It is such an excitable, strengthening inspiration, which provides the encouragement to help others attain equivalent results. Follow me and hopefully it will offer you the insight you need to find personal and financial freedom.