Life is hard… a great life is even harder.

Something to Prove

Ever since I was young, I had something to prove. I always had a fascination regarding money, even though we were living on government cheese and I had the yellow lunch ticket ( free lunch), I don't remember ever being hungry. I remember many times my older brother and sister would eat an entire loaf of bread after school.  My mom would get so angry... Although angry for my mom was to yell about it and then give up in futile desperation. I'm pretty sure she escaped us kids whenever she could. I understand now that I have kids. It’s hard to be a woman too and not just a mom.

Who knows... All I know is that I had the best mom ever. I was an astute observer. I saw how my mom would handle things... Money, food, birthdays, cars, bikes, dating... It had to be so tough being a single mom. But she did it all. .. Okay, so I walked to school or I had to wait an extra 20 minutes after track practice. Watching all the other kids get picked up.. Watching their cars and their parents. I don't remember my mom ever attending a parent-teacher conference. She did come to a few of my track events. She never had to leave work to pick up a delinquent child. I actually hid in the bathroom at the age of 12 for 2 hours after that time of the month came and I wasn’t prepared. No-one told me about it.  My mom would never wait outside the school an hour before classes got out to pick her kids up like we see today. But I knew she was working. She was always doing something and she was always tired.

So, I learned early that a woman can do it all, but I was also so mad at the men in her life that didn’t appreciate her and treated her like crap. It gave me a bad view of men which I had to relearn over the years. However I am so independent mostly due to not having the stable father figure to rely on. I always had to prove to myself I could do better. I couldn't afford UCLA but I applied and got in. I was too afraid to take the risk, so I went to the local college - University of Northern Iowa. Only choosing business after realizing that a degree in psychology alone would get me nowhere. Psychology was what I wanted. I got a 4.0 for those classes and a 3.4 for my business classes.. Mostly micro and macro economics, two accounting classes... Well and then that stupid tennis elective where I got a C ..how do you not get an A in a tennis elective!... While dating a collegiate tennis player? Only me.

I loved art. I loved writing. To be honest I totally slacked off on those classes because my business classes were so damn hard! I would write a story for creative writing the morning the assignment was due... Race to turn it in.. And then be surprised to receive an A. I would just make something up... My art teacher in high school kept urging me to go to art school. He wrote me a recommendation for a scholarship, but I was so concerned with proving that I wanted a different life. I was going to make money. I was never going to go hungry and God forbid I was never going to let my kids go hungry. So, I needed a business degree. What's an art degree going to get me?

Being from Iowa, not well traveled, well read.. Mostly the classics.. Not biographies unfortunately at the time.. I was naive. I just needed a way out. Little did I know that pursing my passion instead of college at an early age may have given me what I always dreamed of ... But I decided to muddle it all up with distractions of what I thought was good for me. Don't get me wrong.. I learned  A LOT. A lot of stuff I just relearned when I started my own business, but let's just say it gave me a good perspective. A $150K perspective. not sure it was worth it. (That is both undergrad and graduate MBA at Colorado)

So, why do I still have something to prove? Why is life still so hard? I have everything a woman could ever want... A family... A business.. Multiple businesses... I'm home schooling my sensory kid and still working on my new businesses. I have an awesome ex-husband who loves me for me (we are back together-story for another blog). The whole independent me. The whole make my own decision me. The whole " I have something to prove " me.

Why can't I be happy being the best at Project Manager of a Fortune 100 company? Some people do this job for years and retire. I guess I am just wired differently. When I was just out of college.. a job was a job was a job. It was a step to another job. It paid the bills so I could live. Living meant paying the bills.. Rent.. Car.. Food. And then doing it all again the next month. I knew it wasn't where I would be at 34 or 44, so I worked. I worked and I learned.

Looking back at the jobs I held, the meager wages, and the pressure to perform... I was always wondering what would happen to me if I lost my job. I had to be the best so that would never happen. So I was the best. Even when I was fired from the arrogant commercial broker assistant job because he couldn’t micromanage me liked he wanted, he asked me to stay and train his new assistant. I was so worried about the paycheck that I actually agreed! Well… until I got there the next week and was like what the hell am I doing!? So, I said, “I had enough.” And walked out.

My whole life has been hard.. One difficult time to the next. I'm sitting here now, asking myself…what is hard now!? Nothing…compared to that time I literally picked up change from under my car seat to buy my dinner at Taco Bell. Or Nothing... Compared to that time I was in the hospital on my deathbed with a blood infection. Or Nothing.. When I sat through the first physical therapy session with my daughter then cried during her nap.. knowing what a future holds for a child with a disability. Nothing.. Compared to the time I almost left my husband (or the time I did leave him, then the time I divorced him, and now the time we got back together… that is a whole different story to tell)

What's left to prove? I did it. I survived.. I thrived.. My kids have no idea other than what I tell them... And believe me I tell them all the time how rough I had it. They don’t see it though.. I sing.. I laugh.. I love.. I'm not scarred by my life.. It's made me who I am. I have only a few regrets but nothing to lose sleep over. So why do I still miss the challenge? it's like I’m not living without a challenge… I purposely take on way too much for any one person to accomplish and force myself into hustling to get there.

The cool thing is that I always get there. I’m not afraid of work. I will never be afraid of working to get what I want. I think I learned that from my mom. She was a hard worker and a single mom. She had a difficult life, but has been relaxing drama free for years now. I’m sure the relaxing part is so much sweeter now. I’ve learned over the years that the work is the most important part. If you keep at it, you will get there and if you don’t get exactly where you thought, maybe you will get where you are supposed to be or somewhere even better. The work is the key. Not the IQ. Not the degree. Not the money. If there is no hard work, then the result is not the same. Figuring out a way amidst all the obstacles. That is the best part of reaching any goal! To survive you must work. To reach the best life you can live, you must work so much harder to get there these days. Believe you can do it and take risks. Don’t be afraid to reach for your best life. Keep working. You will get there.