Three Types of People: Which are you?

Dear Friends,

Over the past eight years of owning and operating CELBANPrep I have discovered that there are three types of people who come to CELBANPrep: each with their own intent, needs, and expectations. Which are you?

Dreamers

The first group of people who come to me are the Dreamers. Dreamers are people who have come to Canada/ are planning on coming to Canada, to start a new life here. They come filled with hopes and dreams and ambitions. Having learned of the CELBAN as a requirement to become a registered nurse in Canada they happen along CELBANPrep. Most often this comes as a result of a search online, using various search engines.

Dreamers know nothing about me: about Kim. Dreamers don’t know about the benefits of CELBANPrep; nor do they understand that CELBANPrep was always about so much more. Dreamers have no idea that I created and honed a very successful program that resulted in IENs passing the exam IF they dedicated themselves to their studies, IF they trusted the process, IF they practiced.

Many Dreamers simply want to pass the exam as one of the steps towards becoming a registered nurse in Canada.

If you are a Dreamer, then the CELBANPrep YouTube Channels are for you. Subscribe now:

• CELBAN Review Centre
• How to Prepare for the CELBAN
• CELBAN or IELTS – resources for both exams
• CELBANPrep Speaking
• CELBAN Writing Samples
• CELBANPrep Listening
• NOTE: This videos will be released starting January 2018

Wise IENs

The next group of people are a little bit more savvy, thus they are Wise IENs. Wise IENs have been in Canada for some time. They have learned about the system, have developed a network, and have created a support system for themselves. Either they have learned about me and CELBANPrep from experience, having subscribed to one or more of my courses offered over the years; or, they have friends or relatives who have. At different times these Wise IENs might have been Disillusioned Dreamers, or Busy Moms and Dads, or Strained Achievers, that I have described in The CELBAN Trap: 4 Ways IENs Fall. Regardless of their walk of life Wise IENs have come to trust me, to trust CELBANPrep, because we have become friends. Over time, by sharing struggles, in finding hope, Wise IENs discovered that CELBANPrep has always been about more than an English exam. CELBANPrep has been about both giving and receiving social support: informational, affirmation and emotional. These IENs have willingly shared information about CELBANPrep with their family, friends, and co-workers. The people in their networks don’t just search the internet for “CELBAN”, their searches include the word, “Kim”.

If you are a Wise IEN, you will be overjoyed to know of the changes and transitions that are coming in 2018 – where my audience is extending from IENs to include all other occupations. A thrill will run through your heart knowing that I will be providing the same social support, the same hope, to your family and friends who are not IENs! A smile will grace your face knowing that I plan on travelling across Canada and that we will meet, in person some day in the very near future (if we haven’t already)!

With the coming changes, starting January 2018, I will no longer be sending out e-mails.

So, if you want to stay in touch, knowing what I am doing there are three options:

• Subscribe to Dear Kim,
• Subscribe to the Dear Kim YouTube channel, and/or
• Follow me on Facebook (the Dear Kim blog and video releases will be posted here as well.)

If you have read this before, then you know how important it is to me to not lose people as CELBANPrep goes through transitions in the very near future.

Peers and Colleagues

The third category of people following me are Peers and Colleagues. Peers and Colleagues come to CELBANPrep with very different intents. Whether from a competing organization that offers CELBAN preparation, or from administrators involved in the registration process: Peers and Colleagues are interested in what I am doing, in what is happening with CELBANPrep for very different reasons.

In the past some people have stolen my intellectual property. In fact there is a woman in Mexico who misrepresents herself as being part of IEPC. She is not. Although I trained up both Writing Coaches and Speaking Mentors, she is not one of them; and, those that I trained up have a depth of loyalty to me that they would never even think of doing such a thing by misrepresenting me and what I do. Their internal Code of Ethics is too high.

I am certain that there have been others who have subscribed to CELBANPrep that have done the same: stealing material, concepts and processes. But, no one can replicate who I am, what I do, what I have created. The loyalty I have engendered is because I have taken Disillusioned Dreamers and infused them with hope. I have taken Busy Moms and Dads and given them both direction but also validation having learned how to balance parenting while running a business. And I have taken Strained IENs and provided them relief.

The thing is, CELBANPrep is no longer about generating an income for me. It is no longer about providing food and shelter for my daughter. It is no longer about the those things. And so, as I launch CELBANPrep 2018 I will be releasing all of it to you. I will be publishing Teachers’s manuals along with the Participant Handbooks. All of it will be made accessible to you.

All I ask is an acknowledgement as the creatress of the whole of it. Attribution will be required.

With the changes, and the fact that I will no longer be sending out e-mails it will be up to you to decide whether you want to follow me on Facebook, on Dear Kim, through the YouTube Channels or all of the above.

Final Thoughts

I contemplated, as I lay my head to rest last night, and thought of it again this morning as I awoke before planning my day, “Why am I doing this? Why am I taking all of this time to create resources without the intent of generating an income? Why am I dedicating the next two months to fulfilling this purpose?”

I asked this after uploading my first video to the Dear Kim YouTube Channel last night.

So many things have changed in the world of YouTube, many of them unfolded recently: as of September 2017.  In loading Who is Kim? (my favorite one) I discovered that my former plans are now null and void as programs and processes are no longer available.

So I returned to the question, “Why am I doing this?”

I am doing this for the same reason I became the research coordinator back in May of 2012. As a result of my daughter’s chronic lung condition. (She suffered from asthma, and allergies). We got involved with the University of Alberta’c Faculty of Nursing’s Social Support Research Program. There I headed up SOS~ Sustainable Online Supports for Children and Teens with Asthma and Allergies: a mentorship program where I worked with fabulous research assistants, peer mentors and some amazing children!

(This I did while being a parent, administrating IEPC and teaching CELBANPrep.)

It was a great project where I got to apply everything I had learned in creating CELBANPrep: taking research and creating a program that would be accessible to families across Canada and around the world, suffering/coping with allergies and asthma. Tears surface as I go to the website and see Allergy Pals, our program that has been adopted and re-branded for Food Allergy Canada.

The tears surface with the knowledge that I am making a difference in people’s lives, in the lives of children and youth and their families through something I created years ago. Tears surface knowing that their struggles are somewhat lightened as a result of the support they are receiving: informational, affirmational and emotional.

The same tears that surface knowing I have done the same for IENs across Canada and around the world.

The tears surface knowing that I did something that is really important to me. I was part of the process of taking knowledge that had been acquired from research at a university and I transcribed it/transposed it so that it is accessible to the public. Instead of it remaining within the pages of journals gathering dust on shelved in the library of universities around the world this light and knowledge is being applied to better the lives of families and communities as a whole. (What we were doing impacted the schools and the school systems as well.)

That is the answer. That is the answer to the question to why I am doing what I am doing. It is against my grain to allow what I have created to remain on my computer, in back-up files, in binders in boxes in storage. It is against every fabric of my being to allow something that I have created to remain as a light under a bushel.

It is against my grain to know that there are thousands of IENs who would benefit from what I have created: seeking, yearning, hoping….

Wayne Dyer is known to have said,

“Don’t die with your music still inside of you.”

If I allow all of this material, all of these resources to remain in boxes, archived away, isn’t that what I am doing? Letting the music die still inside of me?

But, I am not making money from this. No one is sponsoring me. I do not have government grants. I do not even have an income at this time. And, financially things have been strained as a result of everything that happened around the passing of my daughter.

So, I welcome your prayers that God will continue to support me in this endeavor by abundantly providing for my needs and wants so that I could ensure that I unleash the music within. Then I can go on to what He would have me do with the rest of my life!

So it is. Worlds without end. Amen.

Kim