I’m in my fourth state in five weeks as I write this, Kentucky currently. And I just finished facilitating/speaking at back to back leadership retreats — both for the hospitality/resort/recreation industry. But no matter what type of business, organization, association, or other group I speak to, I always come away reminded of one thing…

Human beings are human beings. No matter what their title, position, financial status, or any masks they may wear. People across culture and political affiliation still care about similar things and the decisions they make still create predictable outcomes — good or bad. My ultimate takeaway?

Human beings are absolutely worth investing in. 

By the facial expressions, body language, engagement, and occasional tears of the groups I speak to, it seems I’m not alone in my opinion. Grown women and men courageously cry when they care.

In preparation for the groups I just met with, I culled information from my years of experience as a leader and business coach to come up with what I called, Five Lessons from Highly Effective Leaders. But as I thought about it, I realized most of the leadership tips on this one sheet apply to anyone who wants to experience deeper happiness and an enhanced quality of life. We all lead someone, the question is, are we leading well?

Every person, including you, needs a reason to get out of bed each day: a purpose, positive plans, power to make a difference. If you lead no one else, to live a life of true happiness, at the very least you should lead yourself.

Anita Fresh Faith

Anita Brooks, CPT, CLTF, CCS, motivates others to dynamic break-throughs. Blending mind, heart, body, and spirit, as an Inspirational Business/Life Coach, International Speaker, and Common Trauma Expert. She shares hope and encouragement on the stage and from the page — reminding 21st century audiences, “It’s never too late for a fresh start with fresh faith.”

Anita is also a multi-published, award-winning author. Her most recent titles include Readers’ Favorite International and Florida Authors and Publisher’s Association Award Winner: Getting Through What You Can’t Get Over, Barbour Publishing, and Death Defied-Life Defined: A Miracle Man’s Memoir, Clovercroft Publishing. All of her titles are available at major and independent bookstores as well as from online retailers.

Anita is quoted as saying, “Reading is my obsession while writing is my compulsion.” Anita’s passion is inspiring others to transform life’s battles into lasting victories and an abundant purpose.

For pure pleasure, Anita’s favorite pastime is watching sunsets with her husband of thirty-three years, while they laugh and dip their toes in a Missouri river or lake. She adores her grandchildren, but she also wants to hear about those you love.

Follow Anita’s Fresh Faith Inspirations, to get your weekly dose of hope and encouragement. You can connect with Anita on Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Periscope, and Twitter. Email anita@anitabrooks.com to request information on having Anita professionally speak or train at your next event.

I’m on a whirlwind travel schedule as I write this. Five states in seven weeks. Crazy, I know.

So why do I put myself through this? Especially since the income is inconsistent, the investment costs are high, and tomorrow’s work is not guaranteed.

Because speaking and writing, not for personal gain, but because of the satisfaction I feel from helping others, is a benefit like no other. These past few years I’ve discovered why I was wired the way that I am, why my unique DNA mix matters in such a positive way, and how to finally live in my purpose. It’s difficult, audacious, and exhilerating.

But now that I’ve discovered this, one thing still makes me extremely sad. How few people are truly living alive — like I once was. The more I travel and speak, the more women and men I meet who are still hunting for that thing that makes them want to jump out of bed in the morning. Most confess to barely making it through the day. Some are looking for exhileration in all the wrong places. Many are dealing with consequences from decisions made in desperate attempts to feel better. This is not what we were created for.

One of the lessons I’ve learned through my own journey is the power of accepting the dare. Choosing to believe your dreams might be possible — even if only by a whisper-thin thread. Faith in action, by making one daily decision at a time that moves you closer to discovering and then living in, that special something you were created to do. Daring to trust that the gutteral moan inside your soul, telling you there is something more yet to be discovered, is the truth.

It takes awhile to figure out what your special purpose is, but I fully believe that each person is made with one wired inside of them. I’ve found that most of our gifts are so natural to us, we don’t consider them as part of a greater plan. And it is in that very discounting where so many evade the tug, ignore the call, and miss the greater plan for their lives.

Comparing abilities with someone else’s talent is another mistake many people make. Because if you look long enough, you will find someone against whom you don’t measure up. So if you are struggling with your purpose, your destiny, or your life plan, then take heart.

• My first suggestion is to listen to your soul’s whispers.
• Then consider those things you do that others compliment you for, but you think are no big deal.
• If your dream seems bigger than possibility, dare to believe God, who is in the business of making the impossible possible. Just be prepared for his own creative ways — how he makes dreams come true can differ from our expectations.
• Look in the mirror and tell the person you see that you believe in them. Encourage them. Give them a reason to keep going.
• Resolve to tenacious actions. Do not give up. Every day, do something intentional toward reaching your goals. Learn. Practice. Connect. Rest.
• Allow yourself to feel fulfilled in what you do. Every day, in some task, in some way.

It is a great gift to know what you are made to do, and then to experience the living of it while there is still breath in your body. Don’t settle for less — go for your best.

What more were you made for? 

Anita Fresh Faith

Anita Brooks, CPT, CLTF, CCS, motivates others to dynamic break-throughs. Blending mind, heart, body, and spirit, as an Inspirational Business/Life Coach, International Speaker, and Common Trauma Expert. She shares hope and encouragement on the stage and from the page — reminding 21st century audiences, “It’s never too late for a fresh start with fresh faith.”

Anita is also a multi-published, award-winning author. Her most recent titles include Readers’ Favorite International and Florida Authors and Publisher’s Association Award Winner: Getting Through What You Can’t Get Over, Barbour Publishing, and Death Defied, Life Defined: A Miracle Man’s Memoir, Clovercroft Publishing. All of her titles are available at major and independent bookstores as well as from online retailers.

Anita is quoted as saying, “Reading is my obsession while writing is my compulsion.” Her life’s passion is inspiring others to transform life’s battles into lasting victories.

For pure pleasure, Anita’s favorite pastime is watching sunsets with her husband of thirty-three years, while they laugh and dip their toes in a Missouri river or lake. She adores her grandchildren, but she also wants to hear about those you love.

Follow Anita’s Fresh Faith Inspirations, to get your weekly dose of hope and encouragement. You can connect with Anita on Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Periscope, and Twitter. Email anita@anitabrooks.com to request information on having Anita inspirationally speak or train at your next event.

This week, many are celebrating the romantic love associated with Valentine’s Day. Some of you may even have plans to share an intimiate dinner for two tonight. But for just a moment, I’d like to talk about love of a different kind.

Currently, I’m working on a new book. Well, I guess if I’m technical about it, I’m actually writing three new manuscripts right now, all in various stages. All on different topics. All connected to the heart in unique ways. 
From the Crime Scene to the Home Scene: Living Happy, Healthy, and Whole While Submerged in Tragedy, Trauma, and Death, is a project I’m co-authoring and self-publishing with my training and speaking colleague, Darren Dake. Darren and I co-hosted the Engaging Life and Leadership podcast, and he is the founder and host of the widely popular, Coroner Talk™ podcast, today.

Our goal in penning Crime Scene to Home Scene is to give voice to those who work in emergency services: law enforcement, firefighters, EMS workers, and death investigators in the field.

When I researched for and wrote Getting Through What You Can’t Get Over, I unknowingly stumbled onto a need for those who sacrifice and risk their lives for others every day. Shortly after that book released, my region was rocked by the Ferguson, Missouri crisis, which sadly, has now escalated emotions on all sides, fueling the need that conceived this manuscript.

Untangled: 15 Strategies for Helping Women Triumph Over Twisted Emotions, is another collaborative project. This time, I team up with Karen Jordan, author of Words That Change Everything, and Kathryn M. Graves, whose debut we are honored to share.

As women, we understand the challenges females face in their every day wrestlings with their own feelings. But we’ve also lived long enough on planet Earth, (do I dare tell you our combined life experience tops 150 years?), to have learned some genuinely helpful ways to comb through the knots our own emotions can get us into? Think practical meets spiritual, and you’ll have a good idea of what we are offering.

On Purpose, With Purpose, for a Purpose: Discovering the Real Reason You Exist, however, is my book where I’m writing about a different kind of love — three different types of love actually. But for now, I want to focus on the first. The reason I call this a different type, is simply because many are afraid to talk about this love in a healthy way.

I’m talking about self-love. Not the narcissistic version where you are self-absorbed, self-centered, and self-arrogant, but the kind of love that allows you to look in the mirror and accept what you see as a God-designed human being with talents, abilities, and gifts, and a potential to become what he had in mind when he knitted you in your mother’s womb.

Most people I’ve met don’t feel this way when they face the person in the mirror — even narcissists.

So on this week of highlighting love, I want to leave you with a challenge. Find a mirror, look deep into the eyes of the person you see there, and dare to accept them. Consider how they are reflected in their Maker’s eyes — then dare to believe he sees them, and loves what he sees. Now that’s something to celebrate.

Do you have a healthy relationship with yourself? 

Anita Fresh Faith

Anita Brooks, CPT, CLTF, CCS, motivates others to dynamic break-throughs. Blending mind, heart, body, and spirit, as an Inspirational Business/Life Coach, International Speaker, and Common Trauma Expert. She shares hope and encouragement on the stage and from the page — reminding 21st century audiences, “It’s never too late for a fresh start with fresh faith.”

Anita is also a multi-published, award-winning author. Her most recent titles include Readers’ Favorite International and Florida Authors and Publisher’s Association Award Winner: Getting Through What You Can’t Get Over, Barbour Publishing, and Death Defied-Life Defined: A Miracle Man’s Memoir, Clovercroft Publishing. All of her titles are available at major and independent bookstores as well as from online retailers.

Anita is quoted as saying, “Reading is my obsession while writing is my compulsion.” Her life’s passion is inspiring others to transform life’s battles into lasting victories.

For pure pleasure, Anita’s favorite pastime is watching sunsets with her husband of thirty-three years, while they laugh and dip their toes in a Missouri river or lake. She adores her grandchildren, but she also wants to hear about those you love.

Follow Anita’s Fresh Faith Inspirations, to get your weekly dose of hope and encouragement. You can connect with Anita on Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Periscope, and Twitter. Email anita@anitabrooks.com to request information on having Anita inspirationally speak or train at your next event.

It felt like forever when I envisioned what ten years ahead might look like, back in 2008. In late October of that year, I attended my first writer’s conference. I went in a 44 year-old body, but the 12 year-old girl inside of me was the one tingling with excitement and nerves.

For decades, I kept my secret dream locked up inside my heart. Not daring believe that I could actually do this thing that burned in the depths of my soul. If only I could go back and tell that little girl who would lay beneath white fluffy clouds and blue skies, breathing in the fresh, warm, summer air, imagining what it might look like to see her name on the cover of a book, that she COULD do it.

I would have saved myself years of mental paralysis, frozen by frets and fear. I just entered my nineth year of serious professional writing pursuit, hooked by a publisher who told me I had a relevant idea and he wanted to see a book proposal. (I had no idea how to write a book proposal at that time, so I set a goal to read 100 books on the craft and business of writing. It took me eighteen months before I accomplished my mission, and had not one, but two book proposals prepared.) As of this writing, I just finished a proposal for my sixth book — and will send it to my literary agent shortly.

Next week, I’ll tell you why I mentioned ten years in the opening of this post, and why it matters so much. I will hit this benchmark in 2018, if God is willing. But for today, I want to keep this short and simple. This post is not about me, it is about you.

What did your 12 year-old self dream of doing? Have you dared to take a step toward the possibilities? If she/he is sleeping, roust them out of the slumber in your soul, and ask them to remind you of those passions you covered so long ago.

I did not truly believe in myself in 2008. If I could have seen what year nine in my professional writing journey looked like, I would have shaken my head in disbelief. But today, I know this is what I was meant to do all along. God made me for this.

So don’t take your talents, abilities, and gifts for granted. When people compliment you, don’t say, “It’s no big deal, anyone can do it.” Don’t believe the lie that your opportunity passed — there’s a reason you hear me say so often, “It’s never too late for a fresh start with fresh faith.”

I am walking proof, our 12 year-old inner selfs sometimes know more than the adults who squash their visions with doubt.

Today I want to challenge you. Take courage. Take action. Take your dream back. 

If you allow it, today could be the first step in your journey to a life full of more than you can possibly imagine. You were hand-crafted for something very special — dare to believe!

I believe in you,

Anita Fresh Faith

What is one thing, only one, you could do today to tip-toe into the possiblity of making your dream(s) come true? Is it a little research? A phone call? Creating an outline or budget? Do something today!

Ephesians 3:20 (NIV)

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us….

Anita Brooks, CPT, CLTF, CCS, motivates others to dynamic break-throughs. Blending mind, heart, body, and spirit, as an Inspirational Business/Life Coach, International Speaker, and Common Trauma Expert. She shares hope and encouragement on the stage and from the page — reminding 21st century audiences, “It’s never too late for a fresh start with fresh faith.”

Anita is also a multi-published, award-winning author. Her most recent titles include Readers’ Favorite International and Florida Authors and Publisher’s Association Award Winner: Getting Through What You Can’t Get Over, Barbour Publishing, and Death Defied-Life Defined: A Miracle Man’s Memoir, Clovercroft Publishing. All of her titles are available at major and independent bookstores as well as from online retailers.

Anita is quoted as saying, “Reading is my obsession while writing is my compulsion.” Her life’s passion is inspiring others to transform life’s battles into lasting victories.

For pure pleasure, Anita’s favorite pastime is watching sunsets with her husband of thirty-three years, while they laugh and dip their toes in a Missouri river or lake. She adores her grandchildren, but she also wants to hear about those you love.

You can connect with Anita on Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Periscope, and Twitter. Email anita@anitabrooks.com to request information on having Anita inspirationally speak or train at your next event.