Welcome to Listen and Learn with Leisa. This is my first introductory post to you give you some insight on the vision for this Blog. I’ve been a business owner for 30 plus years, experienced divorce(s), the death of several loved ones both family & friends, worked with emotionally disturbed children, managed properties (condos, malls, commercial portfolios), real estate licensee, spent some time working within security and law enforcement, raised two children as a single parent the majority of their lives, managed healthcare for loved ones and was the primary care giver, worked with estates, held a position as Bankruptcy/Legal Officer at a local financial institution, managed collections, developed and copy righted various items, experienced abuse, made presentations in Washington and participated in a National Conference with a presentation in front of 500 plus people and I can tell you the verse I learned to live by is “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.” – Philippians 4:13

You may think that I am going to force feed you religion. But, I am not. I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and whether you have one with Him or not is strictly between you and the Lord. You see the church has failed the past several generations in their legalistic teachings. Instead of teaching on the word of God and about your personal relationship with Him, they were caught up in the dos and don’t(s) instead of planting the seeds, allowing God to flourish them, send Christ followers to water them, to teach them and to help you grow in your relationship with Him. It turned a lot of people away from the church, including myself for a while and it saddens my heart.

With that being sad, God has blessed me with a lot of life’s challenges to walk through. And KNOW that I was not always as close to God as I am today. We are all sinners and fall short of the glory of God. However, God does forgive as long as we seek Him and ask for His forgiveness and grace. He knows how many times He has forgiven me and He will keep on forgiving me daily as I ask & seek Him. There is only one perfect person and that is NOT me. 🙂 It is God.

God has been after me for the last 3-4 years to reach out Online and help others. I want you to know that what He wanted me to do, did not fall on deaf ears. I did not ignore him. I participated in Online Mentoring and discovered that my reaching out was really helping people and this was confirmation from God that this area of media was to be my new opportunity to reach out and try to help others.

Then I watched other bloggers and you-tubers start their sites to help others and learned how evil some people can be. There was one you-tuber who was trying to help those with learning about their stimulus checks during the onset of the pandemic in 2020. There were people writing in and telling him, they wished him and his family would get Covid-9 and die. How sad is that. Typically, I’m not a shy person; being a business owner and raised with 6 brothers, I learned to hold my own early on. Well, I hesitated because I was not sure I could hold my tongue once the enemy starts to attack as I just try to help people. This was my fear. (Did you know the word fear is used in the Bible 500 times and the phrase “fear not” is mentioned 365 times?) I had to begin to overcome this fear and receive a peace from God to know that He will help me to love those that do not believe as I believe, that love the way I love, and that have hate for my trying to do good. So I’m telling the enemy right off the bat, a song I learned as a child “Get thee behind me Satan, get thee away, I want to be a Christina soldier and I want to learn how to pray…” There is another song (and yes, God brings songs to my mind on a lot occasions, which I am grateful for – because it helps remind me that He is always there) “The devil is a sly old fox, I’d like to catch him and put him in a box. I’d lock the door and throw away the key for all the mean tricks he’s played on me. Glad that I’m a Christian and trusting in His word…” Don’t quote me on the exact words as it has been awhile since I was a child. 🙂 So, I’ve made the commitment and I’m putting on the amour of God and starting this blog as He has asked me to do.

The desires of my heart is to help others by sharing many, many, many, many life experiences that I have faced both personally and in business and to try to shed some light on how I made it through it all. (There is a song “Through it All” which is another great song…lol)

Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, I am not a lawyer, I am not a psychologist, I am just me, someone who has lived through A LOT, who wants to share what she has learned over the years and maybe, just maybe, others will be helped and inspired to see there is hope and there are endless possibilities in this world if we open our minds and hearts to them. There is always light at the end of the tunnel. Even when we cannot see it. God is ALWAYS working. Even when we cannot see it and even when we cannot feel it. I do not have all the answers. But, I’ve always maintained my faith in God. I will always be honest and I will try to share what I did when I was going through various challenges of life or if I were in your shoes right now at this point in time, what I would do.

We will always face life experiences. It is how we go through them, around them, under them, or above them and if we keep getting up that matters.

Thank you for taking the time to read this blog and I hope that you come back and read more as I share things I have experienced and as I answer questions from those who send me an email and are seeking some guidance or suggestions from myself and others who respond to this interactive blog.

REMEMBER: My mom used to tell us if we did not have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all. Be kind in your responses and remember the Golden Rule: Treat others the way you would like to be treated.

Tributes: I would like to Praise God for seeing me and my children through everything. There were some rough roads, but we are here today to say we made it this far. My children have been my rock on more than one occasion and they have helped see me through more than they will ever know. They had a front row seat through it all. I want to thank all of my prayer warriors, friends & family who have constantly been there for me and witnessed first hand a lot of my life as well.

(I want to thank all of the song writers, musicians, producers, publishers, etc. who help bring the word of the Lord to everyone through their lyrics and songs. To God be the Glory!)

Let the Blog Ride begin….lol 🙂