The Thirty Day Year

Creating Change to Achieve Success–The Achievers, Part 7

photo credit: Zest-pk

 Ed. Note: This is Part 7 in the series, The Achievers.

Suzie Cheel. is an artist, an internet entrepreneur,  and has recently become a Certified Law Of Attraction Facilitator. Suzie writes at The Abundance Highway, Art and Beyond, Thinking Home Business and each Sunday in Beach Notes at Successful Blog.

 The Achievers: Creating Change to Achieve Success

When  Jennifer asked the question “what has had the most positive impact, made the biggest difference, in your life?”

I thought of 2 specific times when I took a risk and stepped out of my comfort zone, both times have changed my life’s direction.

Risking The Safe Secure Path.The first time was about adversity generating change and I chose to really get out of my comfort zone and give up the security of a salary, superannuation, paid holidays and more.

This was 20 years ago when I had been acting for two years as a Head Teacher in Childcare at a college of the State Department of Technical and Further Education (TAFE). I enjoyed the job, I liked the college and liked and respected the Principal and had good staff to supervise. When the position came up for a permanent appointment I applied and expected to get the job.

But I didn’t get the job. I remember that it was during the holiday period and I was doing a retreat, an MSIA retreat when I had to make a phone call to find out what was going on and I discovered that I hadn’t got the job. Another teacher from another college, who did not have my experience, had been appointed instead.

Also, I was told that I wasn’t going back to that college that I liked: I was being transferred to another college.

At the time, I was devastated.

But when I look back now, I see that experience of not getting the Head Teacher job as in some ways like a gift. It also changed totally the direction of my life.

At that time I had applied to do a Graduate Diploma of Social Ecology at what was then the Hawkesbury Agricultural College and is now part of the University of Western Sydney. I was planning to use that to help me in my leadership role, with my staff and the child Care students we were training.

I had always been involved with textiles,  tie dye, weaving) and had started, about a year before missing out on the TAFE promotion, and while on a Club Med holiday with a friend,  the wonderful art of hand painting on fabric. I then was commissioned to make some banners. I had planned to build this as a hobby.  That all changed with the news about my TAFE career.  I then applied what I had started to do with my art and turned that into a business.

The postgraduate course helped me with this change of direction and I had my very first exhibition at the “Feed Shed” center at the college, “Hawkesbury Ag” as it was known.

Out of doing that course also came a book of poems and art on the theme of self-esteem and the emotions of change, a book I have yet to publish. It is called emergings and I am planning to self publish  and have it ready for launching at Blog World in September this year. Another getting out of the comfort zone

I created a successful textile business, Suzie Cheel Handpainted Originals, which I ran and which sustained me for about fifteen years. I have recently re-launched my art-as-business in a blog, Suzie Cheel Art and Beyond. I later went on to do a Masters degree in Social Ecology which relates closely to the next story.

My Big Hairy Audacious Goal

The second taking a risk and getting out of my comfort zone is more recent. This time I deliberately chose to get out of my comfort zone. This has created both change and success and has me building a new business. I decided to use my blog tagline Law of Attraction in Action and put it to work. Using the law of attraction is something I now realize I have been using for many years of my life.

Since the late1970’s when I first bought Creative Visualization by Shakti Gawain, then Louise Hay’s You Can Heal Your Life, I have been involved with Personal Development on one level or another. I have  read Wayne Dyer, Catherine Ponder, Robert Kyosaki and many others, attended seminars too numerous to mention, watched and listened to The Secret, and more.

Last year I was shown Michael Losier’s Law of Attraction Book, sub-titled The Science of Attracting More of What You Do Want and Less of What You Don’t . I couldn’t buy the book at that time here in Australia and as we were going to the States later that year I put it on my Amazon list to order.

Since reading this book, then joining Michael’s tele-classes and listening to him on Voice America, I found myself drawn to the simplicity of his message.

Michael came to Australia earlier his year and we went to hear his 3 hour seminar. I got excited, I thought this is the “how to guy” -  he walks his talk. There was no hard sell that is so often the case with similar seminars. I came away from the seminar with the tools to use to, all from a simple handout and

I knew Michael was having his first Master Law of Attraction Facilitators program in Vancouver in June 2008. He mentioned on a tele conference call in April that he was going to doing this program in April 2009, in Malaysia. I thought, that’s great, I can fly to Malaysia from the Gold Coast for $300. In the meantime I kept using his simple system and I found I was experiencing more joy in my life and attracting more of what I did want in my life.

Something then changed for me and I decided I wanted to go and do the program in Vancouver in June this year. It was now May. I needed $7000-8000 to get there. This was a real stretch: as I mentioned at the time in my blog post “My Big Hairy Audacious Goal” (BHAG), I didn’t have a hidden reserve of cash to draw on for the purpose.

I launched my BHAG on May 3, asked for help from fellow bloggers and went into action. We sold domain names and a website. I finally launched my art blog and sold scarves and art quilts, some of which I had previously intended to keep. Many were designs and styles I no longer produce, and as everything I make is a one-off, they were truly irreplaceable. I organized a Tweetathon with Glenda “The Left Thumb Blogger” from Vancouver.  We established the Team World, Be the Law of Attraction in Action community on Ning, which will become a fund raising site for various causes.

When I reached around $4,000, with only ten days to go till the course started, I took a deep breath (several actually) and bought the air ticket and booked to share a hotel room with another participant. By the time I stepped on the plane to Vancouver I had raised close to $5,000, some from supporters who wished to remain anonymous. I was still $2,000 short of what I needed, but I remembered from a personal phone call I had had with Michael that he was going to teach me how to build a successful business, so I had every confidence that I would effortlessly attract the balance of my target very soon.

I flew out on June 3rd, did the course and am now back home. And yes I feel I made  a great decision. The program was awesome, as is the after support Michael is providing, not to mention my 70 fellow LOA facilitators.

I am  very excited about the new business I will build as a result of stepping outside my comfort zone. I am also very excited that I now have a powerful platform which I will use to satisfy my long held passion for making a difference by inspiring others and empowering people to live lives full of joy, freedom and creativity.

 Share your taking a risk, stepping outside your comfort zone stories in the comments below.

 Ed. Note: Next week’s edition is the final one in the series.