Aligned Community Often Means The Difference Between Depression And Well-Being
When I was thinking about going to college, my parents desired me to follow the exact same path as my brother did. Which was to go to community college for two year, live at home, and then transfer to a bigger University to graduate with the degree. My parents were clear with me that if I did this path they’d not ask me to pay rent, food, and most of the college tuition, but if I was not in agreement with this path, I was on my own.
If I went to college outside of the state my parents were also clear with me that they will not support me or hardly talk to me if at all.
I have no resentment for my parents on this, yet strongly feel I will handle these situations uniquely to what I feel works best for myself and my child.
I was raised in a more of a way of throwing us to the wolves and we come back leading the pack mentality.
Which is great too in many ways.
As you can imagine, I made the inevitable choice to live at home for 2 years and transfer to a bigger University to graduate.
I became very depressed in the first few months.
Why?
1 – Well, it did not really feel like it was completely my choice.
2 – Most of my friends from high school went to four-year Universities, and were getting settled into new lives, and new friends, new communities…
3 – I basically got up early, packed my lunch, headed to the community college campus (which there are multiple ones, depending on the day my classes might be at a different location), I tried to have all my classes at the same campus…I’d be in class, have a break between classes and re-write / highlight, mark up my notes from the previous class, then have lunch, and proceed to all of my classes in this order. I barely talked to any of my classmates, there was no sense of community.
Finally I had the courage to talk to my parents about being completely depressed, and not at all feeling as myself. I had no more motivation, yet was somehow pulling it through in my courses because I strongly desired to transfer to a great University, in which I needed amazing grades for this.
My mom agreed to go with me to look at some Universities in the area to see if I could transfer mid year.
I found one where I felt a huge sense of community, a warmth and general friendly-ness on campus, small class sizes (generally engaged professors) and applied.
I was able to gain quite a few academic scholarships because of my grades coming into the school from community college, and I had to maintain a certain GPA or higher to keep those scholarships.
Also, I tried out and made the swim team that semester too.
I was given leadership positions in various committees on campus, and offered an on-campus job in tutoring because of my GPA too. To be a tutor at my University your GPA had to be a certain amount and maintained also, since I was already having to do that for my scholarships, this was a breeze to meet this standard.
I slowly made life-long friendships, yet I was still doing exactly the same tasks I had been doing at community college. Going to class then re-taking notes, then lunch, then more notes and class, and studying mostly all night in the library or my room.
The main difference was I felt part of an aligned community, I felt a sense of belonging, I knew when I walked to my classes I’d probably see at least one person to smile too, say hi, and maybe even have a short conversation with. Most of my professors knew my name, I was able to ask direct questions to them in lectures, I was able to go to their office hours and get direct answers too. My professors knew when I was not in class, and some actually cared.
Now, I know not everyone needs a sense of community in college or friends or engaged professors, yet I did.
These all combined super scaled my success, to have an even higher GPA than I’m sure will have been possible to stay in the previous situation I’d been in.
My parents were temporarily very angry with me, and felt I had betrayed them, because I had changed my mind.
Eventually they understood, with me making the Dean’s List, and getting into an amazing postgraduate school…and eventually being on the board of directors of this University as I am now.
Last year I was voted to be the President Select of this University’s board of directors too!
Meaning I’ll be the President in a few years, it feels great to give back in this way to this incredible community.
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With all of this said, I learned above how life changing and impactful the loss of community and gaining of community can be on our lives.
Through these years of having Empire Life, a business coaching and mentoring company, I have seen many horrible communities and great communities. I have been involved in both types as well.
At some point, in 2018, I had been told enough times I needed to start a mastermind, and have a Facebook community for founders…and honestly I’d had enough too of seeing horrendous communities and listening to other female founders feel the same way about those communities…I knew in my heart strongly beyond knowing how to do it, that I had to create the community I desired for myself to grow too.
A community where every person feels valued, can promote themselves, can find everything they need to scale their businesses…and we’ll be opening our Empire Life Mastermind for super successful high earning and intuitive female entrepreneurs in November too.
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Come join us in our incredible complementary Facebook Group here, join the powerhouse women here supporting one another and find all the support you desire in your business!
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The cool amazing thing about being involved in a REDEFINE Series book is we, the Empire Life Team, do all of the above for you in the process of becoming a published author, or second time or third time published author…check out more information about this here.
If you have picked up my best-selling book REDEFINE, here, you already know that taking my finances seriously was a process for me, and you can connect more with my why there! My chapter is all about money mindset, and I highly recommend it. Money can work for us, yet we need to know how it can work for us while in business.
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If you would like more help with this, we guide our clients in Empire Life on how to turn your expertise and know-how into a profitable membership, all while being guided by a female-owned business, where we are also advocates for women! We are the #1 go-to team when it comes to membership sites, facebook ads, and guidance on scaling your business, definitely don’t want to miss this opportunity to learn from Empire Life!
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“Finally I had the courage to talk to my parents about being completely depressed...”
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Onlne communities have transformed my life.
Aligned communities make all the difference. For sure.
Excellent blog here.