Crafting a Life You Love

Happy New Year!  How is everybody doing with their resolutions?  I don't usually make resolutions per se, but I have been working on a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG for short.  I don't make this stuff up!) of my own for a while now: designing my life.

I'm interested in A LOT of things.  This makes me a pretty well-rounded person, but also makes me feel like I have a bit of adult ADD at times, as my interests shift all over the place in a relatively short period of time.  Sometime last year, I decided to finally try to turn this into a strength by capitalizing on my various interests to devise a life that is better suited to my personality than something more traditional involving a 9-5 job.

One of my first steps towards this BHAG was to start Red Porch Co.  As I get older, I find myself wanting more and more to be in control of my own circumstances.  I don't really expect to ever not have to work for somebody else, at least not until my student loans are paid off, but this small little business gives me my own platform to try out new things, learn new things, and sink or swim based on my own efforts.  There is something incredibly empowering about that!  Contact me if you're interested in the possibility of your own small businesses and we can talk about if it's right for you.

So that was my first step, but I didn't have much of a plan for the next, and I realized I needed to be more deliberate in my choices than I have been in the past.  THEN it occurred to me that being deliberate requires deliberation.  In other words, a whole lot of really tough thought!

I've enlisted a few tools as I guide myself through this process and thought I'd share them with you.  =)


First, a failsafe.  

All this deliberation and thinking about moving on in life requires a little something to bring me back into the moment.  My dog is huge for this.  Dogs are masterful at living in the moment! Sure they have memories and build associations (positive and negative), but mostly they are perfectly content to just enjoy life as it comes to them.  She is my role model.

I found another idea to help with staying in the moment on Pinterest: the 5-year journal.  There are printed/bound versions for sale at your local bookshop, or on Amazon, but I just opened a Word document.  For reflective sorts of things I generally prefer to get myself a nice pen and write by hand, but I want the opportunity to keep it going for more than 5 years, so a Word doc seemed to make more sense.  This is not pour-out-your-heart journaling.  Simply jot down something of note from that day, and move on.  I miss a day here and there but just fill in as I go.  I've been mostly consistent about it, and I look forward to being able to see the same date a few years in retrospect.


Now, the tools.

A website I'm loving right now is Be More With Less, and the associated Project 333.  These help to re-focus on what's important (hint: it's not stuff).

I'm also making my way through the Unraveling the Year Ahead 2013 Workbook.  I'm taking much longer than the recommended hour with it but one of my personal lessons learned is to take things at my own pace, so I'm okay with that.

A friend just sent me this NYT article while I was in the process of writing this.  Self-reflection is the secret ingredient to success.


Then, the influence.

As I get older, I'm learning more and more how important it is to surround myself with positive people. This doesn't mean your friends aren't allowed to tell you about the awful day they had, but overall, I'm trying to have more positive people around me.

The flipside of this is to also attempt to BE a positive influence!

Some bloggers and their blogs I've found helpful include:
Cassie at Back to Her Roots (Loosely a healthy lifestyle blog, but pretty hard to categorize.)
Carol and Kathryn at In Pursuit of Pretty Things (These lovely ladies went to my high school before my time, so we are acquaintances in real life, but I think I'd like them even if that weren't the case. They manage to strike a difficult balance between writing about fashion and similar forms of expression while being wonderfully intelligent and thoughtful about the big picture in the process.)
Kimberly at Poor Girl Eats Well (I like to eat, and she's got budget-friendly recipes that taste great and are often in smaller single-person-worthy portions (read: not a 6 quart crock pot recipe, not that there's anything wrong with that).  She's also had her fair share of ups and downs but (at least publicly) seems to always manage to land on her feet.)

And don't forget TED talks!  If you haven't before, do yourself a favor and set aside an hour or so, and watch a few of these.  They're typically 15-20 minutes long, but they are pretty much like Lays potato chips and you can't watch just one.  Whatever you're interested in, it's here.  You will walk away inspired, I promise.


Finally, the action.

Ah yes, action.  This is the part I really struggle with.  I get so excited and have so many ideas that I don't even know where to start.  I've always been prone to analysis paralysis, but all this deliberation is really kicking it into high gear.  The only thing that seems to help me is to take a break from looking at the big picture and just do ONE thing to move forward.  I just keep reminding myself that one thing every day has a snowball effect towards my goals.

So that's what I'm working on in 2013.  =)  What about you?  What have you found to be especially helpful or inspirational in achieving your goals and resolutions?

Life's an adventure...when you work from home!

Lately I've felt a need for adventure in my life.  This primarily takes the form of daydreaming about amazing places to move to and begin a new life, even though I already live in a pretty awesome place--I'm writing this post from an estuary overlook near Jack London Square, with an absolutely stellar view of the Bay right in front of me, and it is 75 degrees and sunny; basically perfect.  But that doesn't seem to matter much.  When the soul seeks adventure, sitting still in a beautiful spot doesn't get you there.  So I dream.  I've pinned a map of Costa Rica to my wall.  I've annoyed my friends and family with imaginary house-hunting in various locales.  I've plotted how I'm going to save enough money to make a big move.

Sunset at Jack London Square

But honestly, this new venture IS an adventure!  I haven't been at it for very long, but I am already finding it incredibly rewarding.  Connecting with all of you, sharing amazing products, feeling like I'm making a difference, learning some new skills, using old skills and/or those learned during business school.  It's fun!

That's not to say it's for everybody.  I happen to have a day job that, although full time, leaves me with enough energy and brain power at the end of the day that I can still be functional on my own time.  It IS work.  There is much to be done, and it's not going to build itself.  Even so, I've found that developing this business is much more adaptable than similar opportunities.  ONEgroup (the parent company of Miessence) is very supportive of representatives building a business entirely on the Internet, which means that folks like me who may have time, but only outside of normal business hours, can still build a business to provide additional income.  There is no requirement or expectation that you hold house parties and harass every single person in your address book to buy something or become representatives themselves.  Not that there's anything wrong with that, if you find that to be your strength and you have the time and resources for it.

It has also been amazingly fun to network with other Miessence representatives.  This group is so helpful and open when it comes to sharing best practices, asking/answering questions, and just being all around supportive.

I'm mentioning all this by way of introduction to my new series about working from home.  Whether you're interested in becoming a Miessence representative or not, I hope you'll find the discussion helpful to you in some way, and come along to join me for this adventure!