Life Happens For Us — Not To Us

The other night, the unthinkable happened. I kept saying to myself that even though my business was closed, things would be okay because my Husband was still working. There was still his pay cheque that would cover the mortgage, groceries and part of the bills. But that thinking got shot down in an instant.

My Husband came in the door. I was sitting at the dining room table, reading a business book while also keeping an eye on supper in the kitchen. After taking off his coat and boots, my Husband came up behind me, gave me a hug and dropped a letter in front of me.

I looked at him and said “what’s this?”

“It’s a lay off notice from my job. They are laying me off in two weeks.”

I felt instantly sick. Now how would we survive?

Now one thing I haven’t mentioned is that I have a really rough marriage. I’m not the number one person in my Husband’s life. His Mom and Sister are. His family is mad at me for moving up to Northern Alberta — 12 hours away from them. But moving was a joint decision my Husband and I made together. His Sister told me once when I figured my Husband had become diabetic that he wasn’t diabetic — all his problems were my fault. They want to keep him a perfect little boy who can do no wrong. It’s frustrating to say the least. Even when I was in hospital away from home a few years ago (while I was on a speaking tour) and doctors didn’t expect me to survive, my Husband flew to the closest city but instead of coming to the hospital, he chose a night out with his family at a Garth Brooks concert and then flew home the next day. I was in hospital for 8 days. I realized then where I stood and how little my Husband cared about me. This spring, I was just getting brave enough to end the marriage. Then COVID hit and my businesses were forced to close. So I stay in this marriage for now. For any of you stuck in a similar situation, I feel your pain. I get it and I sympathize with you.

I often think I’m the only one in this situation. But I know that’s not true. We often think we are the only one’s struggling with a certain issue or thing. But then when we open up, we realize there are many more just like us. That we aren’t alone.

Getting back to that night… I knew I couldn’t go back into that dark place I had just crawled out of a week ago. I couldn’t go back to not wanting to get out of bed. I refused to let myself sink back into depression. When I first received the news of my Husband being laid off, I’ll admit that I was devastated. I cried. I reached out to a friend about my fears of losing the house in the middle of winter. My friend was nice enough to give me a virtual slap across the face that I needed — “but you aren’t homeless, cold and starving yet now are you?” He also reminded me that we often need to leave these things to a higher power (in my case God) and ask for God or the Universe’s help — what ever you believe in.

That night, I sat in my office and prayed. Something I hadn’t done in a long time. I laid it all out in front of God — my fears and all my frustrations. It felt good to get it off my chest. The neat thing was that God answered the very next day. Our income tax returns were finally deposited in the bank account. It’s enough to last another two months. Also, I received a cheque for my business that provided enough for one more month of business expenses. That allowed me to breath a little easier.

But I realized I also needed to change my focus on the current situation. I remember Tony Robbins saying “where focus goes, energy flows.” I was focusing on the future based on my current situation. Instead, I needed to see the present situation as it is, but remember to take each day one day at a time. Not worry that the future so much. Did we have enough money for today? Yes.

I realized that I needed to work hard on figuring out how to save my businesses. With the world going virtual, I needed to figure out how to take my businesses on-line and offer virtual trainings and seminars. I had no idea how to do this. On a zoom call with my brother one afternoon, he gave me the answer. I just finished pouring out my heart to him about my businesses being closed.

My brother sat back on his couch and said “okay, this is going to be a real shameless plug but it sounds like you need the company I work for. It’s called clickfunnels.”

I responded with “click what?”

“Clickfunnels. You know all those Facebook ads that you see, you click on and they ask for an email and phone number? Then you have an option to buy something? Those are sales funnels. You can sign up for a free 14 day trial and if you do the onboarding call, they’ll give you an extra 30 days to try it. Oh, and make sure to sign up for the One Funnel Away Challenge.” My brother then told me all the videos I should sign up for and purchase.

I’m hopeful this will the thing that saves my businesses. It’s going to take a lot of learning and planning first but I love the training so far! It’s not only training on sales funnels but some of the best business training I’ve ever taken.

The neat thing is that they have an affiliate program. So if you enjoy the product, you can promote it and earn commission if someone purchases. A neat idea. In the future, I have the option to offer an affiliate program for my business funnels and others can promote my business alongside me for commission.

If you are searching for a way to take your businesses online, then I invite you to join me on the One Funnel Away Challenge. The link is: https://www.funnelchallenge.com?cf_affiliate_id=2412630&affiliate_id=2412630

While it can be hard and slightly uncomfortable to learn something new, what keeps me going is something I heard in a virtual conference recently: most of the world is pounding on the one closed door in front of them saying “open up!” But the ones who will be successful during this time of COVID are the ones who are willing to pivot — the ones who are willing to go knock on the other doors to see which one will open.

As Wayne Gretzky says: “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”

So instead of sitting back and crying, I’m going to give it my all. Pour myself into this training and look forward to having something exciting to offer to you all soon!

Amanda Oling is a motivational and impaired driving prevention speaker in Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada. Her book “The Impact of One Decision” is available on-line through Chapters, Coles & Indigo Bookstores, Amazon and Kindle. You can find out more about Amanda, purchase her book or send her a request to speak at your event or in your community through her website at www.AmandaOling.com. Follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AmandaOlingMotivationalSpeaker, Instagram @impact_of_one_decision, Twitter @impact_of_one and on Linked In by searching Amanda Oling.