The hardest question I was ever asked was, "Laurie, are you in extreme dream training?" The answer in response to my personal coach was, "No, sadly I don't think so."

You see, the name of my company is Extreme Dream Training and Coaching and what my coach was trying to say is that he felt I was not living my own game...the game I believe is the greatest one will ever live. This is a game where you are the referee, the shot-caller, the coach, the fans. It's a life of risk, sacrifice, unwavering faith, and unconventional living. So, what my coach was saying was that I was not living up to my brand and he even went so far as to say he did not think I was capable of doing so.

Session ended. Long drive home. Tons of thoughts swimming through my brain: Did my coach just call me "glib," "fake," "incapable?"

I arrived home and just sat...and sat...and sat. I began to ask myself what it meant to live up to my company name. What would it take to be a true Extreme Dreamer, that very thing I was training and teaching?

The first thing I discovered was that I needed to have a system. Four steps, 14, I didn't care; I just knew I needed one.

Then, I knew I needed to work my own system, truly believe it and put it to the test every single day no matter how difficult.

Hi-ho, hi-ho, off to work I went. While I did not have the name to my system I began to implement some regular "forward movement" patterns and I worked them daily. And, life delivered me some very tough blows; here are just a few:

~Fiance lost his job making me the breadwinner, and what a doozy this was!

~My new renter in my property five hours away turned out to be a professional scammer who is not paying rent; I am now having to find a way to pay the mortgage when I was relying on her to do so

There are others but you get the point.

By going through these low and dirty times, my system surfaced but I believe it is because I chose to pay attention. I chose to observe myself and see what I was doing that was working while abandoning what was not working.

Now, I've got a 4-step system that I utilize when life wants to play some pretty cruel jokes. I don't throw this system away no matter how much I want to and as a result, I sit before you working only three days per week from my home as a full-time self-employed Motivational Speaker and Coach living the greatest game...my Extreme Dream!