It all started at a Southern California swap meet…or so the story goes…
When I was about nine months old, my big sis took me to a local swap meet.
At some point, while cradling me in her arms, she was approached by a Native American woman, who placed her hand on my head, spoke to me in her native tongue and, at which point, I spoke back. She then warmly smiled at my sister and said, “This child will do many great things for many people during her lifetime.”
I did not learn about this story until the age of 14. I was standing in a phone booth in Beaver Crossing, NE, sobbing and frantically calling my sister collect, in an attempt to garner some support with the experience I had just encountered. I felt lost, alone and helpless. Most of all I didn’t feel loved, welcome or wanted by any of the people placed in my life who were responsible for me.
What my sister shared not only provided hope and comfort during my time of need, but it set the foundational footprint for my life: a navigational goal of pointing my career compass to Arizona, where I felt a huge spiritual pull to establish roots, and a passion-filled philanthropic pursuit of leaving people in a better place than before I found them.
Ultimately, it gave me the will to do more and aspire to be more – in spite of chronic illness, financial destitution, and having to be my own caretaker and cheerleader growing up.
When you find your purpose-driven life, there is absolutely nothing that will stop you!
Flash forward thirty-eight years.
Since then, I’ve been privileged to have spent the majority of my life with a “mission-minded” mentality, and a heart of servitude, where numerous non-profit organizations, worthwhile causes, as well as a few of our own community efforts and outreaches are concerned. And, I’ve been blessed to do so, despite endless mistakes, mishaps, losses and setbacks encountered along the way. Although I cannot change the past, I can reset my course, and endeavor to demonstrate a life of redemption and gratitude by the choices I make each day.
God has not only taken my blunders and allowed them to become blessings to others, but he has placed amazing friends and folks in my life, that intimately know my “shadow side,” and yet willingly link arms and walk the trenches of this ministerial mission field that chose me (while candidly whispering words of encouragement, ever-so-graciously wrapped in truth and light).
I look forward to sharing some of these stories with you as we get to know each other better in the near future.
Thank you for joining our “Flea Market Advice” community.
May we have many more swap meet moments along the way!
In Friendship & Faith,
-NH
(This post is dedicated to Luke Turner and Carrie Camino: Two precious peeps with the patience of Job, who believed in me most days, more than I believed in myself.)