Influential Women and Right decisions

These last 2 weeks have been a whirl wind of emotions.  First, I lost a wonderful influence in my life, my Aunt Sue. My Aunt Sue was in the restaurant business with my Uncle for a long time. When I was in my teens, I would work side by side with her every day.  She was amazingly strong.  I have been very lucky to have had some very strong women in my life as role models. My Grandmother, who was a wonderful business woman, she started Canino’s Sausage when she was a young woman and ran it until she had to retire. These influential women in my life weren’t all business owners, such as my mother  who worked hard all her life, they have shown me  the amount of resilience and determination you  need  to be successful, and they also showed me success isn’t necessarily  measured in dollar signs.   It’s measured in the people you touch and the mark you leave in this world.  As my Aunt was dying,  I sat and prayed for God to take her, which is a very hard thing to do, and no matter how hard we prayed, he took her in his own time, which showed me know matter how bad we want something to happen it will not happen faster that it is supposed to.  During this time, my phone was ringing off the hook with travel requests.  This was my sign that I made the right decision to start a new career at 52.  I will continue to look to the future, let things progress at the rate of speed God wants and I will continue to educate myself so that when this business allows me the luxury of doing it full time, I will have the knowledge to provide you my friends, family and clients the best possible service available.  I know I will make mistakes, so please bear with me, as this process progresses, and I hope that my resilience and determination will influence someone else into pursuing a dream.  So, please look back at the influences in your life and learn from them what to do and what not to do, (I know that not all influences are good ones).  Never give up on a passion, even if you are driven off of your path, find or create a new trail back to that path that leads you to your passion, so that you can continue toward your dreams and a feeling of success.  We are all stronger than we think and with family, friends and God at our side we can accomplish anything.

God Bless

Happy and Safe travels.

Love is in the air and reaching my goals

Well I guess it doesn’t matter how young or old you are, whether you are single or in a relationship, it’s the time of year for love.  It doesn’t necessarily mean romance; you can celebrate the never ending love for family and friends.  I hope that while you are reading this you think of someone that makes your heart smile, it might be your children, your parents, your siblings, your spouse. It might be a new romance, a new friend or a long lost love, no matter whom it is I hope that your heart is smiling right now.  Happy Valentine’s Day

Good news, I have booked a couple more trips, so slowly but surely my new career is building.  I know it’s not as quick as I would like, but to think in 4 months, I’ve started a business, GLK Dream Travel and Events, created a website, started a social marketing campaign on Facebook, LinkedIn, twitter and whatever other venues I  can find, taken numerous travel and marketing courses, started a blog, created a client base, started a newsletter, and  started arraigning a group cruise for family and friends in 2013, (who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks).  I also did all this while working a full time job, handling my empty nest syndrome (not doing that to well), being a wife a mother and continuing to spend some time taking care of myself.   A few posts ago I talked about goals; I continue to strive to reach my goals and looking back at what I have accomplished in such a short time, it gives me hope that I will. Someday I hope to be able to have a goal reaching party and you will all be invited.  I hope that this gives you a desire or a passion to reach for something you may have felt was out of reach.  Remember if I can do this at 51, anyone at any age can accomplish anything they set out to do.

All my love to you, please remember to share my blog with your family and friends, and definitely feel free to comment or leave me a question, I need to know that someone is reading, enjoy and maybe getting inspired.

God Bless

Happy and safe travels

Know what you don't know.

This weeks post has 2 parts. First, I got my first booking.  Yeah, I’ve finished a couple more trainings, and I am organizing a group cruise to the Caribbean for all my family and friends, I hope you all look into it here is the link to the event so click on it for more details, I so very excited, I hope you all join me.

Now for the second and most important part “Know what you don’t know” I heard that phrase this last weekend and after the last couple of weeks (which you may have noticed I have been off the grid) it really resonated with me.  After 51 years of life and 32 years as a mother, I thought I knew what I what I didn’t know, like I know I don’t know a lot about the travel industry, but I am seeking that knowledge, I know I don’t know how to speak Italian, I do know that love can be the best and worst thing you ever feel and I do know God is Good.  

What I found out recently was, I now know that no matter how well you know someone, your spouse, your child, your best friend you may never really know what is going on inside. Reality can me masked by an illusion of familiarity, just because you have seen the same thing over and over you believe it’s real and I have recently seen the masked removed and reality is scary, it is a feeling of guilt for being wrong and a feeling of the unknown, because you don’t know what to anticipate.  I’ve learned never to assume to know what the outcome of your life will be, or how a situation will turn out or how a person will react; you may and most likely will be wrong.

I also thought I knew how to listen but I learned that I really didn’t know how to listen, (I mean really listen). I listened to the words people are speaking, and yes I would hear what I thought was being said but what I found out was that sometimes I was not hearing the real meaning, I was hearing what I wanted to hear, because hearing what was really being said was too hard to hear. Lastly, I thought that strength was not being vulnerable, but I was wrong. Even the strongest person can be vulnerable and vulnerability is not a sign of weakness but a tool to use to become stronger.

So when you look into the eyes of someone you think you really know and listen to someone talk.  Look deeper, listen with your heart and open your mind. You might be surprised at just what you’re hearing and seeing.  Don’t let a preconceived idea of who a person is, mute what that person is saying. If you are the one not being heard have the strength to be vulnerable and open your self up to others.  You will be surprised at how much love will shine on you and the warmth that you will feel from that love will make you even stronger.  I now know more of what I didn’t know and I hope this will help you all to understand more of what you don’t know.

Tune in next week to find out more of what I at 51 am learning about life.

God Bless

Happy and Safe Travels