“BE COMPLMENTARY – When properly used, a compliment is a fantastic tool to make others grow and strengthen their self-image.”
Have you ever needed something; or been at a place in your life when you felt as if the entire world was crumbling underneath you? Well, I certainly have. In the fall of 2008,
I found myself having to rebuild my entire life‐my career was in shambles, I was going through a divorce, and had become a single father, in a matter of months. I kept wondering why bad things happened to good people. More specifically, I questioned why this all was happening to me; after all, I was a good person. I was questioning
my faith in God and in myself. I felt that all Hope was lost. I was miserable, mad, and angry. I was looking for
answers. I remember how someone on Facebook, trying to
comfort me, posted that if I had faith, then God was going to see me through. This was the last thing that I wanted to hear. My anger was infused by the fact that I was experiencing one of the worst times in my life, and the
only thing this individual could offer was a cliché. I WANTED ANSWERS! I NEEDED ANSWERS! I felt lost, abandoned and betrayed. I felt that God lead me down this particular road in my life only to embarrass and humiliate me. I was disgruntled and ashamed.
To top it all off, two days before Christmas, that same year, after spending the entire day cleaning my house and completely oblivious to the Ice Storm that had swept through the area, I walked to my car with the intention of driving to Indianapolis to spend time with my family; but instead, I slipped on a patch of ice. I didn’t know that the fall had torn my rotator cuff; all I knew was that I was in really bad pain. As I look back now, I am not sure what
hurt worst, my torn rotary cuff, or the fact that I was spending my first Christmas without my daughter. I was at my wits end. I was so upset all I could do was to go to bed. In the still quiet of the night, while I was lying in my bed, I heard audible voice saying, “NOW FAITH IS THE SUBSTANCE OF THINGS HOPED FOR, THE EVIDENCE OF THINGS NOT SEEN”. In my mind, I found myself arguing with that voice: I had faith and faith had let me down. In frustrated desperation, I yelled, “God I do have faith!” As this dialogue continued, the tone of the Infinite became more profound, “Faith is the substance of things Hoped for the evidence of things not seen”. Then at that moment, something happened to me. I experienced something that can only be described as an outer body experience in
which I was taking back to various snapshots of my life. It was like a scene from Charles Dickens’ The Christmas Carol, in which the Ghost of Christmas Past took Ebenezer Scrooge through multiple past Christmases. I observed that during specific the times of my life, I did not operate in faith; instead I relied on my talents. I woke up with
several questions: WHAT HAPPENS WHEN TALENT IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH; OR WHEN LUCK RUNS OUT? WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WHAT YOU NEED IS BEYOND YOUR OWN ABILITY? WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WHAT YOU FEEL INSIDE, IS GREATER THAN YOUR CURRENT REALITY?
I wish I could tell you that I immediately discovered the answers to my questions in a fantastic epiphany experience, but that was not the case. It took months of grueling soul searching that led me to discover what I had been lacking all these years: INSPIRED HOPE. After that discovery, I made a conscious decision to embark on a life long journey to unlock the mysteries and power of iHOPE.