I’ll either Fall or I’ll Fly

During a recent interview, I was asked if I have always been a risk taker. It’s a little funny that I don’t think of myself as one but I get how it can look like that from the outside.

While I have never been a fan of roller coasters nor had the desire to bungee jump or throw myself out of a plane, I seem to have no hesitation at leaping off cliffs in my life without much hesitation – or sometimes even consideration. (I’m sure it’s related to my Empowerment in the south and Possibility in my east in my Divine Coordinates!)

I took one such leap eight years ago today on my last day as an employee.

I had been coaching and training part-time for nearly two years and circumstances in the construction industry presented me with the perfect opportunity to take the leap into coaching and training full time.

My sales had not decline a single dollar but as a whole, our company was scaling back proportionate to the reduced demand. Our labor force in Colorado had already been reduced by almost half.

I remember it like it was yesterday. It all started at my annual review that spring when I said to my regional manager, Penny, “if you are going to lay anyone else off that it should be me.” This was tough for her to hear because I was the first person hired in the entire state and for awhile it was just the two of us gals blazing a new trail together.

I told her that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if they laid someone else off that wanted to keep the job another ten years when I knew eventually I would be leaving to pursue my dreams.

She and I were both in tears.You see I was the last person on their list. I was great at my job, a top performing sales person and my customers loved me. I would have been the last person they would have laid off.

This was March and she and I were both thinking the next round of layoffs wouldn’t come until around July. That would give me time to get things in order for the guy she and I had tapped to take over my territory.

Well, we were wrong….

April came around the corner and it turned out that she had been ordered to lay off more people. Unfortunately the fella that I had chosen to replace me was among them. You see he had been hired just a few weeks after another guy and mostly they were laying people off based on seniority – or lack there of.

When Penny called me to tell me that it would not be Ben who was replacing me, let’s just say I was less than pleased. It was important to me to hand my customers over to someone I had confidence in to take care of them and to get the job done right. After working together for over a decade, many of my customers had become dear friends. A few of them even attended my wedding reception!

She said to me “This is still your job! You don’t have to go. You know I don’t want you to go!”

In that moment, I had to make a choice……..

• Move forward toward the life that was calling me?
• Or stay put with the familiar, albeit great, life that I had?
• Would I play it safe and stay or would I take the leap?

I remember saying to her “I’m afraid if I don’t go now I never will.”

I figured if I leapt I would either fall or fly.

One thing I knew for certain was that I wasn’t ever going to reach the life I was being called to if I stayed in place.

People were genuinely confused by the fact that I wasn’t leaving because I hated my job. Far from it! I just knew deep down that there was something more that I was meant to do.

I am not going to pretend that every step has been easy.

The truth is that I have flown AND I have fallen. And I wouldn’t change any of it!

Regardless of which occurs – and you are guaranteed to experience a bit of both in your life – you will still be required to take that first leap.

You know how my story ends, at least the end of this particular chapter 😉 How will yours end? Will you stay put or will you soar?

I know one thing for sure, it is far easier to take those leaps, big or small, when you know without a doubt who you are and what you are here for! I am grateful every single day that my leap led me to Divine Navigation, to my life’s work and to you!

A fall can always turn into flight…..but you’ll never know unless you jump!

P.S. Where in your life is it time to take a leap? Like I said, any leap is far easier when you first know who you are, what you stand for and who you are here to be. All of those experiences are available to you through your Divine Coordinates! Isn’t it time you discovered yours?!?!?!