MY STORY OF DESTINY
PART 2
Originally Written: Tuesday, February 27th, 2018
From struggle to Success “You can lead a horse to the water but you can’t make them drink!!” This is one of my favorite old wise tales but it’s very much the truth. You can’t make people do anything they don’t already want or need to do. And neither will God force us to accept his way or his truth. Even though I had got to the root of my money problems, I was reluctant to taking the necessary steps to move forward. I was comfortable in my situation and I feared success. I felt like that dog who had been chained for years and once the chain was broke, the dog didn’t realize it was free, henceforth, I was stuck. I struggled with forward movement but I could no longer accept my life as it was because I knew there was more and so eventually I realized that I had to be my own change agent. If it’s to be it was up to me!!
I was dressing for success, wanting success, maybe even looked successful but not willing to step out of my comfort zone, even after knowing what I had to do, to be successful. If only it was true that you could get what you wanted with looks alone.
I guess I was waiting for my success to fall out the sky. Guess what, it does not matter how many people tell you how great you’re going to be, how successful you’re going to MY STORY OF DESTINY
be and how all your visions and dreams are going to be great, if you don’t believe in yourself and be willing to take action. I was thinking right but I had to figure out how to put my thoughts to action. It was impossible for me to see success through all my mess. I remember one night when I was still living with my mom, I could not sleep and I just began to walk and pray. As I was praying the Lord led me to go into the kitchen and peak out the blinds and I did. He asked me “What do you see”? I said, “Apartments, trees, cars…again God said “What do you see?” and I said nothing because I didn’t see anything in the spiritual sense of course. So this went on for a while not being able to sleep and me peeking out the window. Finally God decided to help me out, one night I was standing at the window, I peeked, nothing. I peeked again, still nothing, last peek and God said “I have more for you than what your eyes can see” Oh yes, I was standing at the window praising the Lord because I felt that in my spirit and I knew it was so and the scripture that came to my mind was Jeremiah 29:11 – For I know the plans I have for you, “declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you PART 2
and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” And right then and there in that moment, I knew that my current situation was not the end of me, even though the devil tried to convince me that it was. I knew that greater was coming but I also knew that I had a part to play in obtaining “my greater”. So yes I had been living with my mom a while, still working at the local company that I previously mentioned and I was standing in expectation of change. I had high hopes that at any minute my breakthrough would come and break me out of my situation. That day never came. Nobody came and knocked on my mom’s door and said here is a million dollars, go and be great, nobody came to me and said here you can have my company, everything is already set up for you, no one came to me and gave me a box and said here’s the life God promised you, enjoy. My knight in shining armor did not come and sweep me off my feet and tell me that “he” would take care of it all and make all my troubles go away. I had to look within, apply the tools and knowledge God made available to me and take action. Stepping Out On Faith
MY STORY OF DESTINY
I was sitting at my cubicle one day and I was thinking about my situation and I was still trying to figure out how I could make it better. I had a tendency to do that. (Selfsufficiency can be a good or bad thing). I knew what God was saying and I believed it, I just didn’t want to go through the process. And I started trying to put the cart before the horse and made a bigger mess. You know that car I was finally able to get after letting my truck go, well the low pay was really starting to take a toll on me. I was trying to use my little pay to fix all my previous money problems and so I had begun juggling my bills, expenses, needs and wants, creating more bills, more expenses, more needs and more wants, digging myself deeper and deeper in the hole. I was taking out loans through a local finance company using my car as collateral, I even got approved for a few Payday loans (bad, bad choice)!! Ms. Fix It just making a pure mess!! I ended up getting behind on my car payments and I had both finance companies calling me, the original lien holder and the second lien holder wanting there money along with other creditors and so I said “bump it” and was thinking just like I got this car, I can get another one. In the midst of deciding to let my car go, a close relative knew about my situation and decided to step in after some convincing from me and finance a “SUV” in her name for me to drive since my credit was poor. (Sounds like a blessing in disguise, Nope! But I learned!!) The same week I got my new truck my car was picked up by the repo man. I was like “Aye, don’t make me no never mind, I got something to drive and it’s newer”! Well wouldn’t you know shortly after I got “my blessing” God started dealing with me about my quick fix shenanigans and I knew that the route I was taking was not leading me PART 2
toward success. I knew what God had said, what he promised, what he showed me but I wanted it to just fall into my lap, with little to no effort from me. I ended up going around many elbows to never get to the thumb because I simply had to follow God’s plan, there was no way around it. Ok, so know I must revamp and do something I did not want to do and that was go back to school. And around the time the thought came to go back to school, a then co-worker of mine was telling me about the degree programs online and how easy it was to get approved for financial aid because of some “new” program. She gave me the information, I made the call and I was approved. That made my decision easier. Yep, I decided to go for my Master’s degree online. I was getting close to finishing my 2 year program and I knew I did not want to continue working a job that only required a high school education, holding not only a Bachelor’s degree but soon to be a Master’s and they were not willing to accommodate me because of my change in educational status either and so I had to take a leap of faith, besides my cubicle was closing in on me. (The just walk by faith and not by sight)
The Waiting Game
My Own Office MY STORY OF DESTINY
I put in my two week notice without having another job lined up and by faith I believed God and I trusted God to create the job opening for me. And I stood in faith, especially after finding a piece a paper in my pocket that was talking about “Stepping Out on Faith” (the paper was from a church activity about faith) Did my faith get a little shaky, Yes, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t but all I needed was just the faith of a mustard seed and I had that in my pocket. Four months had went by and my job search was unsuccessful. I had an interview here and an interview there but still no job. I had to wait on God to open the door of opportunity, so I was cool, I didn’t miss a truck payment, I was eating good and still standing in hopes and anticipation of the promises of God, my greater that was still yet to come. (Did you see how things shifted for me when I started trusting God’s plan and doing it his way, when I had money but wasn’t doing things God’s way my plans fail, here I was with no job, listening to God’s instructions and following His plan and my needs were being met and I didn’t want for anything) Here it was six months after leaving my last job and still no job but I was still trusting God. One day another friend of my mom’s called her and told her about a job that she thought I would be interested in and I was. (Sound familiar) I applied for the job and was hired the same day. Look at God! And on top of being favored, my educational achievements also helped me get the position because this job required that you have a Bachelor’s degree in a Human Services field and I had a Bachelor’s in Business Administration from Fayetteville State University and a Master’s in Psychology (Human Services) from the University of Phoenix and they said between the two degrees, I qualified for the position. Finally, a job that required some formal education, my going back to school was very much necessary, even though I initially didn’t think it was. Wow! Just like that I had PART 2
a career and was able to put both degrees to work. Talking about being better the second time around. There I was in my new office, yes honey, I had my own office and everything, holding an Administrative/Management position (Yep, God did that) and I proudly put both of my degrees up on the wall. No longer was I mad at myself for going to college due to my difficulty in landing a job in my field, not to mention I had added insult to injury by getting a graduate degree. A sense of peace came over me once I got settled in to my new position, my career, and I thought about God’s word where it says in 1 Peter 5:6-11, “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever.” Amen, Amen and Amen again! Starting Over Again “I had my own place again and we all know there is no place like home...”
I was working, had me a plan and working toward getting my money right so I could MY STORY OF DESTINY
clear my name “credit” wise and finally get my house built from the ground up. In the meantime, it came time for me to leave my mom’s place a second time, this time with a solid plan and the right mindset in place. My mom and I was out and about one day and she spotted an empty house, it wouldn’t have been my first pick but hey I needed a place of my own so I checked in to it and I was approved. It was a starter house, nothing fancy, needed some work but it was mine. I had my own place again and we all know that there is no place like home, nothing like being in your own living quarters. This was just what I needed when I needed it, besides I still had my desire for a newly built home in view, this was just a stepping stone. And wouldn’t you believe that just as soon as I was approved, everything else fell into place and in 30 days I had a fully furnished home. I was working good, had been able to take care of some past debts but still had a ways to go, not to mention the lasting effects of some of my quick fixes!! Anyway, I was still on my way!! In starting back over and having to pick up from the broken pieces I also decided that I didn’t need that SUV I was driving. I really was trying to get out the hole, fix my credit and buy my dream house. So I decided to let another relative take over the truck payments especially when I saw that I wasn’t able to financially handle both truck payments and a household and I refused to go back the hard road I had just come from so I didn’t have any problem asking for help and I didn’t care who knew it. After deciding that I needed to give up the truck I asked God to lead me to my next car, so I was driving one day down a main street in my local town and there it was, sitting right pretty in my eyesight for me to see. There it was, it was a car that I had before all my money problems started, the car I had traded in to get my first SUV. I mean it wasn’t that same car but it was the same PART 2
color, make, model and style of that car. The one car I should have never traded in and by faith I claimed that car as mine. It was hard getting out of the truck payment in the beginning but it all worked out in the end and I was able to get my “new” car, not really a new car but new to me. God gave me favor with the car lot dealers and in a year’s time I was able to get the car paid in full. Yep, I finally got a title to a car in my name!! (Delayed but not denied) So there I was with a career, back in my own place, car paid off, getting my money right (with a few bumps here and a few there) and I even became a Thirty-One Consultant, which tied into the direction I was headed in; I was simply living a good life. And I didn’t look like what I had been through financially, emotionally, mentally or spiritually. But, it wasn’t the life God said I would have, it was a better life but not my best life. There was more. I was having one of those sleepiness nights again and I begin to walk and pray and the Lord led me to look out the blinds in my front living area and he asked me “What do you see?” and I immediately begin to speak what God had spoken to me and shown me about my life. I did this a few more times and each time I would speak and declare what God said concerning my life and my business. A New Direction
Baskets and Things by Neil was my baby, I found out I had an ability that I didn’t know was there, it was near and dear to my heart, it was birthed during my struggle but God wanted me to change directions. It’s almost like he was saying to me I’m glad you found your ability and that you have been enjoying your hobby but girlfriend there is so much more in store for you, it’s time to change the game. And so I did, I changed the game. After seeking God for 12 months about the direction of “my business” he gave me insight and instructions and I put it to work. I found that though I loved making gift baskets, I had an even greater desire for information and knowledge. And during the many reinventions I had with Baskets and Things, I had my hands in gift baskets, gift ideas, gift wrapping, interior decorating, marketing paraphernalia, marketing ideas, photography, event planning, etc. I was doing some of everything trying to make up for the “Things” side of my business but I had too much going on and I needed clear direction because surely God didn’t want me doing all of that. He had unlocked my abilities and the ability to do this and do that were flowing. I knew I would have to change my business name but I wanted to still reflect my original name but I wanted the new name to be fitting to the new direction God was taking me in. I was sitting one day just brainstorming on some new ideas and out the blue the name came to me, BT Neil Consulting. And from that point I started working on taking the steps to launch my own online consulting company. I never saw myself having my own company, I was just happy that I found “my ability” but when God is in it, there is no limits. Stay tuned…
Game Changer
MY STORY OF DESTINY
PART 2
Food for Thought: Never let your dreams die. Even when it appears that you are at a dead end, speak life into that dead situation. The way you see it may not be the way that it is. Always be willing to look again and make sure you not looking at your problems but instead your promise. -Cornelia Malloy aka “Miss Co” Owner/Founder of BT Neil Consulting
MY STORY OF DESTINY
PART 2