Welcome Back, Good Life Divas!

You’ll see many updates in this month’s issue of the career guide. The common thread that runs through this month’s articles is listening to your life. Each of the expert divas shares her own experiences with listening to her life. As we prepare for a new year, if you’re like me you’re reflecting on last year’s lessons. Therefore, I get really transparent right here in the Editor’s spot about my own life and the circumstances surrounding my decision to start this business.

My goal is that this month’s issue will challenge you to start this year optomistic concerning your ability to live the life that’s been calling you.

Why Me?

A few years ago my husband and I began investing (on a really small scale) in real estate. We were able to experience average level success at this. We entered this arena before the housing boom started. As the market got hotter we – like most Americans – were eager to invest more. We also encouraged friends to partner with us. It seemed almost immediately after our friends got involved our bubble and their bubble burst. In 2007 we watched slowly but steadily all the due diligence, time and money that we all had invested dwindle away. This was probably one of the most discouraging times of my life. It seemed as if no amount of prayer or hard work on our part could change the situation. We prayed that our friendships and our investments would not deteriorate – fortunately the friendships didn’t, but unfortunately the investments did. Even though our friendships haven’t deteriorated, they have definitely been and continue to be tested to the limits. It’s difficult to have people put their trust in you and then see them question you and your motives when things don’t work out the way any of you anticipated.

During this time I would continually question God and ask why He would allow this to happen. Why didn’t He stop us from going through with these deals? Why couldn’t He at least change the outcomes for our friends, even if He wouldn’t change them for us? When was He going to change our situation and bring us out of this mess?

I consider myself to be quite optimistic and this was new territory for me. Everyday I expected that today would be the day we would wake up from this mess and it would all be over. I just knew that by the end of each month our situation would be different. It wasn’t. Nothing around me seemed to change. In fact it seemed to get worse. I was looking for God in our situation and I couldn’t seem to find him.

Deciding to LIVE the Good Life

One day I was reading a devotional by Pastor Joel Osteen. I read Ephesians 2:10 from an amplified version of the bible and it came alive to me. God has actually planned a good life for you and me. That scripture meant so much to me, because this time in my life didn’t feel like a good life. I purposed at that moment that if God had actually planned a good life for me, then I better start living it. This began my determination to live my life as a Good Life Diva. A Good Life Diva is not a woman whose focus is on the car she drives or the house she lives or even what people think about her. A Good Life Diva is a woman whose confidence comes from knowing that she is God’s own handiwork. She is doing the good works which God planned for her and she’s taking paths which He prepared ahead of time. She is living the good life which He prearranged and made ready for her to live. I made a decision that I was going to have joy in my life no matter what my circumstances looked like. If nothing in my life changed, I knew that everything would be different if I changed.

Towards the end of 2007 my husband and I made the decision that for the first time in the ten years we had been married I needed to get a job to get us back to where we needed to be. We calculated that my income would help escalate us paying back the mounting credit card debt and the home equity loan we had accumulated trying to finance our real estate investments. This was a difficult decision for me. Working outside the home for me had always been optional. We had always lived below our means, in order to ensure that one of us could be at home with our children. I had gone back to work briefly a few years prior to earn money to start a business debt-free. Once I earned the money I needed, I had transitioned back home. I had also worked outside prior to that, because my children were getting older and I wanted to explore my gifts and talents.

My Journey to the Good Life

My husband and I spent a long time discussing and praying about our decision. This time I decided that it was important to me to have a career. I always liked working outside of the home and had always pictured myself as a career woman and a mom. It was never my desire that I would have to choose one over the other. I wanted to be very purposeful about this decision. I did my research and truly went through a discovery process of finding out what I valued, my unique calling and my skills and passions. If I was going to spend 40 hours a week of my life away from my family, I wanted to be doing something that was in line with my calling. Part of my calling involves entrepreneurship. The process that I’ve gone through to get here has solidified this in my mind.

Here I am a little over a year later from when I began my journey towards making a daily decision to live the good life. I believe that no matter how puzzled you may be about your life or I may be about mine at the moment… it can and will get better. HOPE lives big on the inside of me. I want this stop on the web to be a place for you and me to be encouraged and supported on our journey through life. But I also desire for people to be real about who they are and what’s really going on in their lives.

No phonies allowed.

No pessimists either.

Welcome to the Good Life!

Living the Good Life,
Kendra Tillman
Chief Diva
Good Life Diva Communications
www.GoodLifeDiva.com