Linda Gaddis wanted to see the path along which God wanted her to walk, but she was in a fog.
Early in life, Gaddis had felt the certainty of solid ground under her feet. A native of Chattanooga, she had graduated from Brainerd High School, earned a degree in office administration from UTC, married, and then accompanied her husband to seminary in Mississippi, where she took classes on how to be a preacher’s wife.
“I learned how to raise my children, how to keep a Christian home, and how to support my husband’s ministry,” she says.
This was to be her path through life. With that knowledge came the peace that comes with knowing one’s purpose. But after winding up in California with her husband and their three children, Gaddis was thrown off-course.
“I came home for a high school reunion,” she says, “and while I was here, I was served divorce papers.”
Gaddis says the end of her first marriage caused a traumatic shift in how she saw herself.
“I went from being a preacher’s wife to being divorced, which was hard,” she says. “I no longer knew the direction my life would take.”
When Gaddis had packed for the reunion, she hadn’t realized she was moving home. With two weeks’ worth of clothes, she and her kids moved in with her parents, including her mother, Kay Witt, a Realtor.
More help came in the form of a job offer from a company that did second mortgages. The work was clerical in nature, and although Gaddis “knew nothing about anything,” she needed the job, so she took it. She says her boss was “a Godly and understanding man.”
“That was a good place for me to work because I was wounded. I would cry all the way to work, then I would be okay once I was there, and then I would cry all the way home,” she says.
At the time, Gaddis didn’t know she had stepped onto a path that would lead her to a lucrative career in real estate.
As Gaddis worked with the company, she learned the mortgage business. After her boss quit, Gaddis accepted a job offer from American Home Mortgage, which did FHA and VA loans. While there, she processed loans, which taught her even more about the mortgage business.
One of the clients was a banker. Impressed with her work, he offered her a position at his bank. Gaddis thought she’d finally found the path along which she was to travel.
“I thought it was a great opportunity. I was going to progress through the ranks of the bank and become a vice-president,” she says.
Unfortunately, the job was more stressful than Gaddis had realized it would be. While buried under an insurmountable mountain of work, she accepted a job offer with a title company to which she had been sending files. This brought her one step closer to her true, but still unseen, calling.
“I had learned the mortgage business, and now I was sitting at the closing table, learning that business as well,” she says.
As Gaddis worked in the mortgage and title industries, her mother encouraged her to become a Realtor. Gaddis had admired and respected many of the real estate agents with whom she’d interacted, but saw something was lacking in others.
“I saw gaps in knowledge and integrity. I knew I would be different if I ever sat in their seat,” she says.
Twenty-six years ago, Gaddis did wind up in their seat when she took her mother’s advice and became a Realtor. The path was rocky at first, but her faith gave her comfort and direction.
“I didn’t take a day off for three years. I thought, ‘This can’t be what God had planned for me.’ I still felt out of place, so I did a nine-month study of the Bible. I believed that would show me what God wanted me to do,” she says.
As Gaddis studied the Old Testament, she read story after story in which God would call someone to do something, but the person would initially refuse. In each case, God continued to pursue the person until he said yes. Eventually, a realization struck Gaddis.
“I was making a good living, and taking care of my kids in a way I had never thought would be possible, so I figured if God wanted me to do something else, He’d tell me,” she says. “So I decided to rest in the knowledge that I’m where I’m supposed to be.”
Spurred to action, Gaddis hired an assistant and started taking Sundays off. Her business nearly doubled within one year.
Something more important than monetary success has happened, though: Through Gaddis’s experiences beginning with her divorce, she has accepted that change could be around the bend, and she’s ready to embrace it.
“At the start of each year, I ask myself if I’m where I’m supposed to be. No matter how well you did the previous year, you start over at zero in January. You might have had your best year, but you also might have sold your last house. So while I set goals for each year, I know my life could go in a different direction, and I’m open to that,” she says.
Although Gaddis experienced disappointment and heartbreak early in life, things are now going well. She’s listing and selling homes throughout the Greater Chattanooga region, including Signal Mountain, Hixson, Riverview, Ooltewah, Apison, and more. Even the streets leading to her home in East Brainerd are lined with “For Sale” signs bearing her name.
“I’ve been richly blessed in this industry,” she says. “I’ve built a clientele and established relationships I cherish. I feel honored to be entrusted with such an important decision. Because of their faith in me to guide them through a large purchase, honesty and integrity are important.”
Gaddis also remarried, finished raising her kids, and is relishing the five grandchildren they have given her.
She’s also learned to relax. “I like being home. I work in an industry in which I have to be extroverted, but I’m actually introverted. So I like to regroup and enjoy the things I’ve worked for,” she says.
Decorating her home and entertaining there are among Gaddis’s favorite things to do, but she’s never far removed from her work, as the frequent buzzes that emanate from her smart phone suggest. But she can handle the load because her feet are on sure ground, the fog that once obscured her view has lifted, and she’s found peace on the path she’s walking.