Ultimate Freedom

Unlock the Secrets to a Life of Passion, Purpose, and Prosperity

Vickie Helm, Mia Bolte

• Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781630479862
• eBook ISBN: 9781630479879
• Topic: Développement personnel
• Subtopic: Leadership

"Truthful and direct! . . . The field guide to having it all and creating the life of your dreams. If you value success and freedom, this book is for you" (Joel Comm, New York Times–bestselling author).
 
In this groundbreaking work, Vickie Helm and Mia Bolte mine their more than thirty years of consulting experience to share with you the tools and secrets to unlocking a life of passion, purpose and prosperity.
 
You will discover the tools you need now, to move you through your future with more certainty and personal ability. The authors show you how to protect yourself and thrive during these uncertain times.
 
Within its pages are the six most important freedoms you must protect or they will be seized out from under you without your knowing it, but with your permission.
 
Vickie and Mia also share the potency of knowing when and how to slow down, reflect, and evaluate in order to discern and grow the life of your dreams. Unlock your inner genius and discover how to rethink, reimagine, and rediscover a life of passion, purpose, and prosperity.
 
"An energy drink for the mind! Vickie and Mia offer an honest and direct approach to finally living life on your own terms; stunningly simple ways to understand your power and embrace confidence in who you are." —Lori Ruff, Forbes Top 25 Social Media Power Influencer, brand influencer & strategist

PART ONE

If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time or die by suicide.

—Abraham Lincoln

Chapter 1

Unlocking the Ultimate Freedom

A hero is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom.

—Bob Dylan

It’s never an easy decision, and it wasn’t for this woman either. She felt scared to leave and stuck without choices. Hers was a dangerous decision that had to be planned carefully for the safety of everyone involved. She sat at the kitchen table, crying her eyes out, frustrated and scared, wondering what her next move was going to be. She didn’t have much of an education and had been a stay-at-home mom for ten years, with no real work experience.

In that era, leaving her husband meant losing everything—all her money, all her things, a lot of friends, respect from others and even family—but mostly it meant being alone with no one to help or even talk to. She had nowhere to turn because turning to others would have put them in jeopardy as well. She was sobbing and feeling helpless, wondering how to free herself and escape from her abusive husband, when I suddenly bounced into the house looking for my mother so I could tell her about my happy day at school.

I peered into the kitchen and was shocked to see my mother hunched over our kitchen table, weeping so hard she didn’t even look up at me. She had her head in her hands, and her shoulders shook uncontrollably as she sobbed out loud.

I dropped everything in my hands, ran to my mother, and threw my arms around her, hugging her and patting her back as I tried to comfort her. She knelt on the floor and hugged me back, but she was crying so hard that she couldn’t respond to me in that moment. She was letting all her tears go.

I kept asking her, “Momma, what’s wrong? Momma, what’s wrong? Momma, what’s wrong?” I had never seen her cry so hard and so much. I was worried and afraid; her sobs sounded like those of a woman who had snapped. I hugged her as we rocked each other on the kitchen floor until all her tears had emptied out.

I asked her again, “Momma, what’s wrong?” I could tell by her disheveled hair and the red welts on her small body that my father had something to do with this.

She picked me up and set me on the kitchen counter so we could see each other eye to eye. She looked at me in a way that I had never seen her look before.

“Vickie, I want you to listen to me very carefully,” she said, her eyes filled with tears.

Something in me sensed the seriousness of what she was about to say.

“Vickie, never ever let yourself get stuck. Never let anyone keep you stuck, not for money, not for security, not for anything. Always take care of yourself. Never let yourself get stuck with someone you don’t want to be with.”

Although I didn’t completely understand all of what she meant, I understood the core message she was sharing and it became a defining moment for me. I could feel the importance of those words settle into my bones, my heart, and my soul. It was as if those words echoed through every part of my being. I would never forget my mother’s words that day, because even at six years old I knew my mother was stuck, enslaved by an abusive man’s wishes. She had no freedom or easy way out.

My mother had snapped because of the loss of her freedom, and now she would have to fight hard to get it back. We made a pact that day. I would never let myself get stuck, and she would get us out of the abusive hellhole we were living in. There was no turning back for her. We both knew it was time to break free.

This meant living in fear of my father finding us and threatening her—and us—with more violence. But when you have suffered as much as she did, you are willing to do just about anything to get out of a bad situation and seek a new life. Tired of the abuse and knowing she would have to hide out with three young girls, my mother took the bold step of leaving my violent father.

She had to plan carefully to sneak out before he got wind of what was happening, and then we would hide out for a while until he calmed down or forgot about us. She couldn’t pack any of our clothing or toys or do anything that would tip my father off that she intended to leave him. This was in the 1960s, when there were no strong laws protecting women. There were no safe houses or women’s shelters.

The morning of her independence day, she took $500 from the bank and left my father with the remaining $10,000 that was in the account. She threw a bunch of our clothes in laundry baskets, tossed them in the car, and never looked back.

Although I did not have a name for it then, this is how I began the search that led me to the Ultimate Freedom. At first it was because those words my mother spoke echoed through my brain and infused themselves into everything. I did all I could to remain unstuck and be as free as I possibly could. But because I did not have any understanding of what real freedom was, as an adult I often stumbled and fell before I recognized my misperception and delusion.

Like many other people, I was thinking of freedom as a right. This is where I started to get confused, and without realizing it I silently sabotaged myself and my efforts. Eighteenth-century British statesman Edmund Burke once wrote, “But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint.” I understood this because I was succumbing to this madness and folly. When you think of freedom as a right and not as something you pursue, this madness begins to take over without you even knowing it, and it becomes your silent saboteur.

I thought I was free but I was actually becoming a madwoman. “None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free,” wrote German author Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in 1809. The kind of madness I experienced will enslave you if you don’t understand what the Ultimate Freedom actually is. You will think you’re free when you’re not. Instead, you are enslaved to the passions of the mind and the whims of others’ wishes without even knowing it. You harm yourself by confusing enslavement with freedom.

Because I didn’t understand what being free really meant, I thought freedom was about being a renegade and getting my way all the time. Freedom meant “sticking it to the man.” I didn’t see this behavior as unethical or unfair because I was screwing over the mythical man who screwed me over. What a convenient excuse.

Confusing freedom with this growing madness meant making sure no one had any power over me. It also meant being able to do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted—sometimes in a way that hurt other people or proved to others that I would buck authority. I could walk off a job when things weren’t going my way. I confused having the Ultimate Freedom with having no feelings for myself or anyone else. I did not see freedom as simply an inner ability to authentically feel my own fragility.

I wore many masks and disguises that made it look as if I were free, but actually I wasn’t. Things that projected success and freedom—like career, money, lifestyle, and possessions—were my favorite disguises, so as not to let anyone see the real me. Believe it or not, I really thought I was free. The truth was that I was trapped in my desire to remain hidden and inauthentic because I thought it was helpful in some way. But I was just spinning my wheels.

When you prop yourself up with material or emotional masks, you reach a dead end where there is no freedom. Instead, you are stuck and don’t realize it. Masks can be heavy and burdensome because they rule your decision-making process and detract from your natural ability to be discerning. Masks keep you from facing who you have become, what your life has become, and what you will need to do to change.

I had to learn that freedom wasn’t a narcissistic, self-indulgent mindset that thinks, “You can’t tell me what to do. I’ll do whatever I want. I’ll drink what I want, smoke what I want, eat whatever I want, as much as I want. I’m a free person. I’m an adult. You have no authority over me.” This is confusing freedom with self-abuse, something I did and a lot of people do every day.

For many years I confused freedom with being sexually free and not being tied down to any one person. It meant playing the field. Committing to a relationship looked like being stuck with the same person, so cheating was acceptable behavior. I could do whatever I wanted with whomever I wanted, whenever I wanted to, because this is what I thought sexual freedom was.

I also confused freedom with entitlement. I either wanted someone to do some unpleasant task for me or simply didn’t want to do anything that was hard. If something wasn’t easy and I would have to use some ingenuity or navigate a huge learning curve, I felt stuck, and when I felt stuck, I would often quit. I had confused freedom with things feeling or being easy.

If things were not easy, then I did not see the freedom within them. I couldn’t see that “hard or easy” wasn’t even truth or reality. Instead, it had to feel easy. So I became a chronic quitter, and this threatened my self-esteem and eventual success. I’d have meltdowns and arguments with loved ones because I wanted to avoid anything that was hard. I wanted to have control of everything.

Freedom is not having power or control over something or someone. People who believe this often resort to violence. Real freedom is not the power to dominate another in order to always get your way. It’s not about being verbally abusive, manipulative, or unkind while believing it is your right to free speech that allows you to speak to another human being with anything less than the dignity you would want in return.

Someone who is truly free is never at war with themselves or the world but is resourceful and peaceful. I began understanding freedom a little more as I read something that Nelson Mandela wrote: “For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”

It took me a while to learn that real freedom was not about having a superior intellect either. Being smart does not make you free, nor does knowing Jesus, Buddha, or Krishna. Freedom is an action, not a religion or concept. Knowing about religious leaders or what they teach does nothing for you unless you take an action and apply it to yourself.

So the action I chose to take was to search for the truth, because all the teachers I just mentioned told me that the truth would set me free. My finding the Ultimate Freedom began when I started to look for the truth as if it were hidden in a cave or on a mountaintop in Nepal. Okay, I thought it was hidden in a bookstore in the self-help section, so I went there and read voraciously.

I began researching and nailing down where the confusion started, and after some thirty years of investigation and learning where and how we mistake manipulation for real freedom, I found the secret to unlocking the Ultimate Freedom.

Some of history’s greatest teachers give us clear direction about how to achieve the Ultimate Freedom. Buddha said this: “Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.”

Jesus said, “You, my brothers and sisters, were called to live in freedom. But do not use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love” (Galatians 5:13 NLT).

Krishna said, “Free from anger and selfish desire, unified in mind, those who follow the path of yoga and realize the Self are established forever in that supreme state.”

These teachings made it clear to me that if I wanted to have the Ultimate Freedom I had to claim it for myself, knowing I had the calling to be free within me, and so do you. The confusion over freedom is that many people think it is only one thing, such as financial freedom, and those who work only on a single type of freedom expect this to end all their ills and give them a sense of the Ultimate Freedom. Then when they become financially free, they can’t figure out why they are still miserable.

Why does this happen? Because they have addressed only one aspect of freedom. Over the years I have identified six key areas of freedom that produce the Ultimate Freedom. When you address and embrace all six of these keys, you have an opportunity to experience an extraordinary life full of passion, purpose, and prosperity. This Ultimate Freedom becomes your life and who you are in every moment.

Some people who live(d) the ultimate freedom are Oprah Winfrey, Eckhart Tolle, Byron Katie, Jack Canfield, Richard Branson, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Jr., and Lisa Nichols. In fact, Lisa Nichols has an affirmation to express her Ultimate Freedom: She says, “I have nothing to hide, nothing to protect, nothing to prove, and nothing to defend.” When you ponder this, you will realize that this is the Ultimate Freedom. This is the opportunity and gift of your birthright.

We promise to deliver this Ultimate Freedom process in easy-to-understand terms and share with you the secrets to claiming it and growing it. We will share the biggest roadblocks to freedom and how to move around them effortlessly to create the ultimate freedom for yourself and your family.

To clearly understand the Ultimate Freedom, it helps to see it like the Constitution and its amendments, in that your Ultimate Freedom includes six amendments to freedom, which when claimed and lived well will give you the Ultimate Freedom. Let’s look at those six parts. Later chapters will explore these in-depth, but for now they are:

The right to pursue:

• Financial freedom

• Emotional freedom

• Spiritual freedom

• Time freedom

• Social freedom

• Creative freedom

These are the six freedoms that everyone, from your boss, to marketers, to advertisers, to bankers, and so forth, must fight in order to own you or entrap you into indentured service to them. If they have usurped any of these freedoms from you, they own your mind, your money, and your choices. They will tell you how to do everything, and if you are not living in real freedom you will comply.

When they own you, they will tell you how to think, where to live, what school your kids will go to, what neighborhood you will live in, how you will vote, what you will buy, what your yearly income will be, how much debt you will have, who your friends will be, whether you can buy a house, how much credit you qualify for, what vacations you will have, when you can go on vacation and how often you can go, what kind of car you will drive, what clothes you will wear, where you will shop, and essentially how you will live.

I know—it was hard for me to believe this at first too. However, let’s see how this happens by taking a quick look at the importance of financial freedom. The average college-educated American made roughly $50,000 a year in 201...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• About the Authors & Smart Group Firm