My Two Awesome Staff Members “Pandy” & “Miffy”. Pandy and I had nowhere to live once and never again!
This article is one of the hardest I have written about myself and some of my own darkest moments. As a successful entrepreneur, who is very well educated from earning 6-Figures in my 20’s – I never ever thought these experiences would happen to me. None of us I am sure go through Primary School, High School or even perhaps University thinking one day “I may be homeless”, “I will be a single mother”, “I will be fighting for my life”, “I won’t have a job” and “I will have to ask the government for welfare support”.
During 2013 – which was the most awesome redefining year in my life, I saw many extreme situations. Some situations where an awesome person doing the right thing suffers from cancer and you think “Why did they deserve that?” to people that have made bad decisions and they ended up being caught in a trap of their own creation.
I am talking about myself in the latter unfortunately. Even though 2013 was when I turned it around, I was dealing with the fallout of some previous decisions. It was completely my fault – hence putting my poor decision making to the world is hardly an easy task.
In my experience there are many that choose “Poverty” over “Prosperity”. This may seem totally insane on the surface but in my time of working with hundreds of people and seeing many crazy things on the streets of Sydney – many have made their choice of which way they want their life to go. I made some massive mistakes before 2013 – and the fallout came to hit me that year.
I once made the choice for Poverty. I got complacent, became a fat cat, decided to take the “Easy / Comfortable” path and NOT do what I knew was right. Rightfully I did lose everything (except my health which was great). If you have read my other articles I totally stuffed up my life at the age of 29 / 30 (I am 35 as I write this article). In short, I didn’t treat my fiance too well, I took everything for granted and I was ripe for picking in the Global-Financial Crisis. Over the coming years as I rebuilt my life – even though today I have some great success, even in 2013 (which was the awesome turnaround year of my life) – I made some very bad choices.
Probably not quite really bad choices, but in 2013 – it was the year I “Payed” for the bad choices I started making some years ago. Even though my business was taking off, rocking and I was so lucky to be helping people and living the dream – there was some “Back Taxes” I still had coming. They weren’t like “Big Mistakes” – but I didn’t deal with problems in my personal life when I should have. I found myself and my poor cat (Pandy) without a home at one point – strangely enough while my business was rocking. I had days back to back with clients and I was using every mental technique / military discipline in the book to keep myself on track while I found a place to live that was awesome and safe for awesome Pandy cat and myself. I haven’t quite told this story till now – it was very painful and extremely embarrassing. Especially as a “Persian Man” who is very success proud who is in my position of leadership and training.
Put yourself in my position – or perhaps you have been in my position at some point. You wake up one day not having a place to live and you think “Say What? How did this happen?”
What I find interesting about this situation is that I was 100% to blame for what happened to me. It wasn’t anyone else and earlier in 2013 I was in some extreme situations as my relationship was breaking down at home. It was my fault in that instead of dealing with problems years ago, I didn’t do what I needed and found myself in a much worse position. I am not proud of what happened to me. Being Persian, Post-Graduate from Monash University (Caulfield) and my Government achievements – it is embarrassing to myself writing such an article.
However, my shame needs to come out in the open. I had many great friends that had high levels of training that found themselves between homes last year – sometimes questioning where they are going to be sleeping the day after like I was. One of my friends had children too! So she got it much worse than me when she had no where to live. I feel that telling my story in this public forum may give some context on others going through what I have had.
Many brilliant formerly 6-Figure income earners have been through what I have been through and much worse! I solved my problem quite quickly which was good – but it most certainly messed with my head and even to this day the pain of not having somewhere to live still sits with me (even though my life is rocking now).
It was a very dual-faced existence for some parts of 2013. On one hand I was this successful entrepreneur on the surface and in my own personal life, it fell apart at the seams. It took me some time to deal with what happened and I keep looking back thinking “What on earth did I do?” , “Where did I go wrong?”, “2013 was my best year – where did I drop the ball?”.
Hindsight with it’s awesome 20 / 20 vision told me something quite funny and liberating in a way. I didn’t make the mistake in 2013 that left me without a home. It happened several years earlier. 2013 was just the year my poor decisions in the past caught up with me. Instead of having some difficult conversions earlier and working out a plan that would have been great for everyone – I CREATED AN EXTREME SITUATION where snap decisions were made. This led to my poor cat and I with no stable housing! It’s 100% my fault I was in such a position – so I made it 100% my responsibility to get my life back on track in awesome style!
I found housing quite quickly of course – but I still look back thinking “Wow – that was a great learning experience!” – how did I choose Poverty over Prosperity and put myself in that position?
In short, 2013 was a great year for me and I was living in total Prosperity. BUT say 2009 to 2012 I behaved with a real “Poverty” mindset of “I suck”, “I don’t deserve a decent life” and “I am worthless” (especially after being unemployed for so long).
In 2013 I turned my thinking towards prosperity and started thinking “I work hard, I deserve to be paid well”, “I help people and I deserve to be helped”, “God Loves me and he isn’t out to get me”. This shift in thinking was instrumental in turning my life around and setting things on the right path.
I am so blessed with my life right now and it’s the result of tons of Prosperity / Team Abundance thinking and I love it! Your situation may not be as extreme as mine – or mine my pale into insignificance towards what you are facing. I am actually not complaining about anything that happened to me – I kept my health, my skills and even though it was hard for me – I know the awesome JC upstairs was sending me “Reinforcements” and helping me through the situation. I have heard some very good expressions in that “You take one step, God takes the next”. Seems to have some truth in it in my case.
Please, if you are making my own mistake and have “Poverty / Negative / You should be Poor Thinking” get rid of it ASAP! You may wind up fat, poor and homeless one day like a certain Persian Marketing Mentor once did! You will end up then a really fit, lean, ambitious Persian man who owns cats writing articles one day x x
So replace it right now with awesome “Can Do”, “I Deserve” thinking and back it up with tons of awesome hard work and a smart Business & Marketing Strategy. I promise that if you do that, the game will so more go your way and you will take yourself too awesome success!
Thank you from Edward Zia – Marketing Mentor who Loves Abundance Thinking and his 2 x Cats Now!
10 Responses
Nice one Ed – love your raw sharing.
Of course you created your homeless situation – I put it to you that you and only you have created EVERY situation you have ever been in – all the “good” ones and all the “bad” ones.
But was it your “fault”? Its easy to look back at a situation once you know more and say “oh my – I cant believe i did xyz all those years ago” – i suspect you did your very best with what you had at the time.
In my eyes it was no mistake – “Please, if you are making my own mistake” – it was perfect. Without the sour how do we know what sweet tastes like? In your own words you are changing many peoples lives – had you not been through what you have, would that be possible? You didnt “do” anything, you didnt drop the ball – you just lived your journey.
I LOVE that you are sharing this message with the world to help others through similar situations and completely agree that whilst it wasnt your fault – you need to take 100% responsibility for making changes.
Heres to the next major CATastrophe – which will undoubtedly lead to the highest high of all time for you.. .. ..
How does it get any better than this? What else is possible.. .. .. we’re about to find out!
You should have put the squeeze on Banana futures….
That is very funny! Wolf on Wall St here I come! Orange you glad I ain’t a Banana? 🙂
You are one great man and thank you Peter for making such a great response. It’s an interesting one and I love our debates.
I think there is certainly a line here – we say often “We Create our Own Situations”. I think in a lot of day to day life situations you can argue that, but this analogy breaks down in complex situations of an extreme nature. A child dying in a car accident, a poor woman getting assaulted when she was doing the right thing in a “Safe” situation. I do like what you are saying though in that “It’s not my fault” and it’s not a “Mistake”. I think in this case, I did make my best decision at the time and I lost out overall.
Where I 100% agree is on the responsibility part. Right / Wrong, Good / Bad, All is Equal = Stuff happens and unless you take 100% responsibility nothing rarely improves and you remain a victim and it’s very unlikely you will get control of the situation.
I love your thought provoking comments Peter and please keep them coming! You rock and love your generous heart. Go Peter Nelson!
http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html
Brilliant video you should take the time to watch Ed. 🙂
Quote:
“Empathy’s the antidote to shame. The two most powerful words when we’re in struggle: me too”
You are too kind Emma and thank you! So true – empathy get’s around Shame. Writing this article was quite liberating and it feels great!
Love it Ed! thanks for sharing this with us.
It’s a pleasure Kappy and thank you! Glad you enjoyed it and look forward to writing more compelling content!
Great read and very frank with generosity abound letting us all into your life, 100% NOT for personal gain. Thank you posting the link Edward, keep it coming please!
Why thank you Steve and you are just too kind. Appreciate your kind message and will do! Got plenty more to come as I totally love the blogging. Great fun and I find exactly that – the more honest and real I get the more people get out of it!