sundries641

Insecurity is a wasted emotion.

Be Confident

Insecurity is a wasted emotion. It’s a waste of time and energy. You can’t get to know anyone, you can’t accomplish anything worthwhile, you can’t even have fun if you’re all sticky with insecurity. Insecurity means you’re only thinking about you. Believe me, I have known insecurity and I’m so over it.

I’ve been to parties where I was afraid to talk to anyone. I married a guy who’s very socially confident. The first few times we went to large gatherings, I hoped he was going to stay by my side and help me finally feel comfortable at parties. He did not. He abandoned me as soon as we entered the party, at least that’s how it felt to me. I later explained to him that I didn’t want him to abandon me at parties. I wanted him to stand right next to me and keep me safe. Basically, I wanted to crawl under his skin and have him absorb me. Luckily, he didn’t oblige.

I’m no longer that person. I can hold my own at any party. I can stand by myself pretty much anywhere, even without a phone in my hand.

I learned to be confident at parties and have the most fun I’ve ever had.

How? By learning to ensure the people around you are having fun. Not in an annoying, people pleasing way, but I play a game with myself to see if I can make others feel more comfortable. My favorite is to see if I can make people laugh. The magic to confidence is: stop thinking about yourself.

Be confident in who you are.

Become a small talk master. The best way to enjoy small talk is to get the other person talking. Mary kay Ash says, “pretend every person you meet has a sign around their neck that says, make me feel important”. I have friends who ask how I’m doing and then ask follow up questions. After we say goodbye I always feel like we have the greatest conversations. Not until later do I realize that I never asked about them. It sounds selfish on my part, but it’s amazing to watch how their curiosity and interest in others is so energizing.

Uncategorized

Ask yourself these 3 questions to find your purpose

Ask yourself these three questions to find your purpose:

What am I good at
What am I curious about
How can I give back

What am I good at? If this is a difficult question for you, think about what comes easily to you. You might not realize what you’re good at becuase it comes so easily. Look around, you’ll see things that other people struggle with that you don’t have to work as hard for.

My strengths: consistency, discipline, determination, energy, hard work.

2. What am I curious about? When you have a free moment to steal away, what do you do? When you get to relax, what do you do? How do you love to spend your time when you should be doing something else?

My interests: Reading. If I had no responsibilities, I would sit on the couch morning, noon and night and read books.

Learning. I love to learn so much that I have to check myself to make sure I’m not just reading interesting things, but that I focus on learning things that will get me to my goal.

Science. I love the human sciences, I buy anatomy books and read them cover to cover. I follow neuroscientists on social media.

Business. I love the business world more than I ever thought I would.

Food and health. I love nutrition books and learning what foods are going to give me a sound mind in a strong body.

3. How can I give back? Your interests and strengths will point to how you can give back. Get creative, if you can’t give money, give time, teach, write, build.

How can I share my strengths and interests: Share what I’ve learned, I could be a teacher, or go into the medical profession. I could enroll in teach for America or Doctors without borders. I could open a wellness center that treats people and teaches them about healthy foods. We could have a farm there with organic gardens. We could teach people how to build systems that replinish and clean the earth instead of robbing it of every resource.

At the intersection of your strengths, your interests and how you can give back is the answer to where you should devote your precious time and attention.

All the best,

Rachel

You set the course

Uncertainty is your friend

I don’t know what the future holds, but I know who holds the future. Oprah Winfrey

Five years ago my husband lost his job. I was a stay at home mom of 10 years. We had money set aside to invest, but instead of investing like we thought, we held onto that money because our future was uncertain. Despite having money set aside, I was a ball of stress and uncertainty. I cried myself to sleep at least 3 times a week. I had a pit in my stomach at the grocery store wondering how long the money we had saved would last. I feared the most for my kids. I remember fearing for the uncertainty of the future we could provide for them from this position of my husband being unemployed, and me being out of the workforce for so long.

We ended up using that money to buy a business by the skin of our teeth. There were so many things that had to line up to make this happen, and it was a miracle that it did.

We’re now 5 years into our business and we’ve had some crazy financial ups and downs. We’ve had to borrow 30,000 from family in order to keep the business going. We’ve had to use a line of credit that we had set aside for emergencies. We’ve gone for months multiple times without taking a paycheck. But we’ve also been able to pay off a $200,000 loan to our seller, and we’ve been able to buy a second location and pay off that loan early, making it so that we don’t have to have a loan payment on one of our businesses.

As the Coronavirus hit, interestingly, we have the same amount of money saved as we did 5 years ago. We’ve had to do a temporary lay-off of almost all of our team. We’ve had to ask our landlords if we can defer our rent payments. We have to ask the government if we can defer our mortgage payment and ask for money so we can pay our team when we have enough work to bring them back.

But this time around, I’m not crying myself to sleep, and I don’t have a knot in my stomach. I am sorrowful for everyone who is in pain right now, but I am not under the same mental duress I was the last time I was in the middle of my own financial crisis, and I’ve been thinking about what the differences are between then and now.

One of the biggest differences between then and now is I have been through this before, and have come out the other side. Resilience comes from experience, and experience comes from trying new things.

Let me just say that business has been hard for me, and has toughened me. I’ve built a resilience through all these ups and downs, and all this uncertainty. I’m comfortable with uncertainty, and confident in the skills I’ve built. I know that whatever we have built, we can build again.

I’ve made changes in my life and taken steps to toughen up. Through all of this, I have built confidence, in me and in my ability to make it through hard times. I know that good and bad times come and go.

In my adult life, I have lived through 911, the housing crash of 2008, and now the Coronavirus epidemic. All of these have had huge effects on the economy, and they’ve all happened within the last 20 years. Events in our world are happening faster. We’ve got to learn to be nimble, be quick, light on our feet, move with our changing circumstances. We’ve got to build our skills and resilience.

What do we have during the shut-in? Time.

What are we going to do with our time? Use it. Don’t waste this time just waiting for this to be over. Build something, create something, reconnect with someone. Use the amazing online resources available.

Below is a list of things I have learned and changes I have made that have propelled me forward in my journey:

I already worked out regularly and tried to eat well before we got into business, but In the last 5 years, I have started to:

Read a ton of business books and listen to empowering podcasts:

Impact Theory with Tom Bilyeu

Women of Impact with Lisa Bilyeu

The Tim Ferriss show

The Marie Forleo Show

Chase Jarvis Live

Take vitamin C and D daily

Taken up meditation

Learned how to live with an abundance instead of a scarcity mindset – This is huge!!

Reentered the workforce and learned more about technology and how to be professional, how to give back as a business leader, how to really care about my customers, and strive to help them the best I can.

I’ve learned how to build systems at work

Learned how to train people

Learned how to manage a team

Learned to ask myself, “What do my customers want?”

Learned to ask myself, “What does my team want?”

Went through so many hard things, like people not liking me, key people quitting, not being able to fill a position. Upset customers, vendors not meeting promised timelines.

Other Resources:

Books:

Health:

Kelly Brogan, A Mind of Your Own

Dan Barber, The Third Plate

Finance:

Robert Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad

Andrew Hallam, Millionaire Teacher: The Nine Rules of Health You Should Have Learned in School

William D. Danko, Thomas J. Stanley Ph.D. The Millionaire Next Door, The Surprising Secrets of America’s Rich

Ray Dalio, Principles

Business:

Tim Ferriss, The Four Hour Workweek

Ed Catmull, Creativity Inc.

Chip Conley, Peak

Online Resources:

Health: Dr. Terry Whals, Minding your Mitochondria

Finances: Ray Dalio, How the economic machine works

Take care of yourselves. Start building skills and resourcefulness. Use what you have and build from there.

Self Improvement

Start small: How daily habits improve our lives

When you take care of the little things, you’ll be pleasantly surprised to find out that the big things often happen much more easily. Sophia Amoruso, #girlboss

It’s funny how starting one practice compounds and makes a huge difference in outcomes. Once we master one area of our life, we can dust our hands and move on to the next. Of course, we don’t let the area we have mastered backslide. We maintain that area.

Don’t tackle multiple areas at once. You’ll get overwhelmed and each area will suffer.

Rachel Hollis, in her book, Girl, Stop Apologizing, says, “When it comes to personal growth, (people) often approach it like a buffet. They want to work on a little bit of this and a little bit of that. They reason that all the areas of their lives are important, and so they should try to fix them all at once. Maybe that’s possible for some people, but I can tell you what’s worked for me, in contrast, is focus.

It’s hard for first-timers to commit to only one area when they’re passionate about growth. What they don’t realize is that a goal is like a harbor. When the tide rises in the harbor, all the boats rise. This amazing thing happens when you start to grow in one area of your life: other areas improve with it”.

I’m always looking to improve, up my game, and adding little daily habits are definitely one of the ways I do this.

We set up systems, routines if you will.

Here are three practices to get you started:

Make your bed every day. Doing this one thing will make a huge difference in your life. You are more likely to pick up the rest of your room if your bed is made. It amazes me that I went for years, for most of my life, without making my bed. I HAVE to make my bed now, which isn’t a problem, it’s not a task I come back to. I make my bed as soon as I get out of it.

Making your bed will reassure you that you are on top of it. You’ll get a sense of satisfaction when you come home and see your bed made. Plus, my bed is so much more comfortable to climb into if I’ve it’s already made.

Put your keys in the same place every time. I know this sounds simple, but I hear women complaining about always having to rifle around their bags for their keys. Why? Tuck your keys into the same pocket in your bag every time. It is so frustrating to spend time looking for keys.

When you get home hang your keys up, or have a plate in your entry to place them. Don’t waste another minute looking for keys.

Clean the room when you are done using it. Set the room so that is ready to use the next time. If you watch a movie, put the blankets away. If you make a meal, clean it up. If you do yard work, put the tools away.

You’ll be amazed how in the words of John Maxwell, “Consistency compounds,” and you’ll start to see real progress by starting with small actions. These actions take energy and time, but they also save us time, and it’s more likely that your space will be clean if an unexpected guest pops by.

What daily actions have you made routine that you love?

Uncategorized

Coincidence? I think not: The story of how we got into this business in the first place

High times, hard times, something the living is sweet, and sometimes there’s nothing to eat, but I always lands on my feet. -Newsies

When I say God in this post, I mean whatever higher power you believe in, even if that is your inner voice, your intuition, or your conscience leading you in your decision-making.

It’s funny how things work out. When we moved to Seattle from Utah, we kept our Salt Lake house. We moved in 2007 and couldn’t sell our house for what we wanted, so we decided to keep it and rent it out. We then used the house as a line of credit. Fast forward 7 years to 2014 and we had $40,000 saved in this line of credit, but the line was about to close and the money would be unavailable to us.

We had been looking at some investment opportunities and decided to take the 40k out to invest. Then things spiraled. I was a stay-at-home mom, and Damon had made it all the way through the great recession without losing his job. But in October 2014, he lost his job, and instead of investing that money, we kept it to live on while we planned our next move.

Things lined up in such a way that we used that money, along with Damon’s retirement to get into the business we are currently in.

We’ve had flush times and we’re-not-taking-a-paycheck-this-month times. We’ve paid off loans, and bought a few more businesses. And now we’re in a position where we can put some money away again. Whew!

But I started to get nervous and a little resentful toward God, and I couldn’t figure out why. I trust God. I’ve always had a good relationship with God, and I feel her love very strongly in my life. Over the last year, I’ve come to love her back immensely and trust her unequivocally. Pretty much I dedicate everything I do to her.

I am really excited about the investment we are working toward. Part of me, the part that remembers how hard it has been at times during the past 5 years of business ownership, is a little resentful, and fearful that the money I’m saving for our next venture is going to be taken away, or need to be used for something other than what I have it earmarked for.

Then I came to realize that the money isn’t mine anyway. Just like blood, air and water, money needs to move. It can’t stay stagnant or it becomes diseased, and I know and trust that the universe sees things that I can’t. I’ll continue to save that money and build toward the investments I’m so excited about, but if the universe has other plans for that money, then so be it. I’m up for those plans, whatever they are.

Actually, I’m excited to see how it all turns out.

Health

Sound Mind in a Strong Body

The 2 most important things to me are having energy and clarity of mind. I work hard every day to achieve these two things because I know what it my life is like when I don’t. It’s rough. I have brain fog and feel like I have to peel myself off the floor.

If I have energy, I can do anything. I can maintain my house and yard, I can help my kids with their homework and soccer practice. I can be on top at work, making my customers happy.

If my mind is clear I can see my problems clearly. I can think through multiple solutions and structure a best practice for dealing with challenges. I can set-up systems for problems that arise to ensure I don’t have to deal with that problem again, which will free me up to solve bigger problems.

I know when I start getting tired because I’ll start to take shortcuts in my work. Shortcuts used to be my normal. When I have energy and clarity, I don’t take shortcuts. I make sure the job is done right. I make sure everyone down the line from me at work will have all the details and tools they need to succeed. It’s a way better feeling than feeling like I’m sacrificing quality.

So how do I achieve high levels of energy and mental clarity? Eat right, exercise and meditate. Effortless ease.

Hustle, Recharge

HIIT – Hustle and Recharge

I have come to understand that these little breaks from the competitive intensity of my life have been and still are an integral part of my success. Josh Waitzkin, The Art of Learning

You cannot reach the heights you want unless you take a recovery. Courtney, A cycle instructor

You don’t get stronger when you’re sprinting, you get stronger when you recover. Aubrey Marcus

What does HIIT stand for? High intensity interval training. I’ve read different time intervals for high intensity interval training, but essentially, you work as hard you can for a burst, and then rest and repeat. The simplest formula I’ve found is in Dave Asprey’s book, The Bulletproof Diet. He says, go as fast you can, like a lion is chasing you, for 30 seconds and rest for 90 seconds. Do that for 15 minutes once or twice a week. Easy formula to remember.

When I was a stay-at-home mom, I used to work out a lot because I had the time to. I worked out 6 days a week. I would go to the gym for an hour Monday-Friday and then do a long run on the weekend. I ran half marathons and did weekend relays with friends. I could have worked out longer, but I felt guilty about taking more time. I loved it and really missed it when we bought the first shop and I had to work so much.

At one point during my early days in the business I felt like I was too busy to work out. I was working all the time, like 6 a.m. to 9 p.m., but I got hit hard with the winter blues. With some help of an honest family member decided that for my own sake I better start prioritizing my health.

I started running again, but had to learn to optimize my workout time. I ran ½ an hour 3 mornings a week before work and would do arms and yoga for ½ hour on the weekends. On the mornings I didn’t run, I still made sure I moved for a few minutes in the morning to get my heart pumping. And guess what I found: I didn’t have to spend all those hours working out. I could work a little harder and not have to devote so much time.

Although I still missed working out because I love moving my body and making it stronger, I liked that I could get the same benefits with less time commitment. I thought I was just maintaining, but people started to ask what I was doing and saying that I was looking really fit.

Then I tried HIIT.

One of my goals is to be a hustler AND be able to relax and enjoy my family and friends. I want to be able to get to full-on hustle during the work day, and be able to turn that off and not stress about work after hours. I want both, but that is a struggle for me. I haven’t always known how to go from one to the other, I could either relax and not get much done, or I could hustle like a mad woman, but I didn’t know how to do both. I’m still working on this because I believe both are important. I want to challenge myself to learn new things, to work, and accomplish my goals, AND I want to read and hike and nurture my relationships without always feeling like I should be working.

I love HIIT for the on/off switch. It helps me remember that I can push as hard as I can in life, and relax and enjoy the simple pleasures. It helps me practice the on and off of a busy, productive life with the peace of self-care.

How do you achieve turning your hustle on and off?

Grit, Uncategorized

Beginnings, middles and endings

Beginnings

A master is someone who was once a beginner who kept beginning. Mastin KIPP

If we are going to see anything through, we need to realize that there are beginnings, middles and ends to travel through. Beginnings can be hard, especially if we are trying something new, or really challenging ourselves, like if we are starting to exercise regularly or eat healthier, or if we are starting a new job where we don’t know the things yet that will only be gained with experience.

As I’ve learned about having a growth mindset, I remind myself of what Baron Baptiste says in his book, Journey into power, “Don’t hate beginnings”.

I love that, I’ve tried to embody this as I challenge myself and try to “stay comfortable with discomfort.”

Middles

If you’re tired of starting over, stop giving up. Anonymous

I trust tenacity. Rosanne Cash

I took a writing class once from a woman who has published over 20 youth fiction books. She said that every book she wrote, she would get to the middle of the story and get stuck. She said she would come out of her office and cry to her husband that she was a fake, that she was a phony, and everyone was going to see right through her. Who did she think she was?

The middle of your journey can seem like the movie Groundhog Day where you’re repeating tasks but may not have the skill or mastery that you truly want. You’re past the excitement and adventure of just starting out. Things can get a little dull or seem to not be progressing.

Here is the secret of all masters, keep choosing the same thing. Conversations with God Book 2, Neale Donald walsch

When we’re facing a beginning, or a middle, we have to keep choosing our path instead of jumping ship or choosing a new path. Every path will have peaks and valleys, sun and rainstorms. If we want mastery, we can’t keep switching paths.

Endings

There is no end. Every journey is about the process. Once you accomplish the goal you set out to accomplish, you will look for the next mountain to climb, but if you keep the end in sight through your beginnings and your middles, you can achieve mastery along the way.

Financial Literacy

Making my kids proud

It does not matter who you are today, the only thing that matters is who you want to become and the price you’re willing to pay to get there. Tom Bileau on Mindvalley talks

Get comfortable with discomfort. Tim Ferriss

No woman steps in the same river twice. It’s not the same river, it’s not the same woman. Heraclitus

Life is about growth.

As a young adult, and even into my early 30’s a good bit of my drive was that I wanted to make my parents proud. That changed for me when my kids were small. I stopped working to make my parents proud, and started working to make my kids proud, which is when my personal growth took off.

Early in life, I had an aversion to learning about finance. My husband was a banker, and I let him manage all of our finances. It stressed me out to even talk to him about our finances.

I was the person who craved homeostasis. I never wanted to be too warm, or too cold, I sought comfort and avoided discomfort at all costs. I was like a child who peeks out the window but is too afraid to go outside and play. I don’t like remembering that version of me.

My hubby would come to me with business ideas and I would fight him on them. We built a mother-in-law apartment for his mom when she lived with us and Damon suggested that we rent it out when his mom moved out of state. I declined. I thought it was weird. I was worried about what my friends would think.

He came to me with Amway once, which I whole-heartedly refused to do. My parents and some of my siblings had tried that, and I did not want any part of it.

Then something changed

When our kids were young, my husband decided to go back to school to get his degree. One of his classes was a finance class and required him to read a book from a provided list. Damon asked me to read one and write his essay as he was working full-time and I was staying home raising babies at that time. I read Rich Dad, Poor Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki, and it lit a fire under me. I couldn’t get enough. I immediately started reading financial and business books.

My parents

There is an expiration date for blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction. JK Rowling

I love my parents, they are amazing people, but rather short-cited about financial planning. They never progressed financially beyond a certain point. Neither of them graduated from college, for which I was very angry with them as a child. My dad hated his employer, and eventually got laid off because he was so grumpy. My mom worked part-time off and on.

They didn’t talk to us about college, or help us plan for the future. They didn’t encourage us to take the ACT, or practice tests. I only knew about the ACT because my older sister took it and bragged about how high her score was without having studied, so I thought I better take it. They didn’t encourage us to apply to multiple universities, or do any kind of research, No lie, the summer AFTER I graduated from high school, I thought, “Well, I guess I better apply to college.” I applied to the local community college and went there.

This story shows lack of foresight on my part too. I get that, but some guidance would have gone a long way.

I don’t fault them, you can’t teach what you don’t know. The flip side of this beautiful coin is that my parents were very hands off when I became an adult and got married. They did not try to involve themselves in my doings, and have NEVER interfered in my marriage.

A few investment attempts

My folks bought a condo in the college town where me and a few of my siblings went to college. The deal was we could live there on the cheap if we were going to school. I lived there for a few years. A nephew of mine lived there and stopped paying my folks rent. Not cool. After that they sold the condo. When I asked my mom why they sold it, she said, “it got to be too hard.”

I have a rich uncle who told my mom to tell us that if we could save a thousand dollars, he would invest it for us. I had no idea what that meant, so I didn’t take him up on his offer.

I have a few more stories of my folks’ financial mishaps, but I won’t go into those here. I will say that my siblings and I have been very worried about their financial wellbeing for a while now. As far as I know, they don’t have any retirement savings to live on.

Making my kids proud

When my kids were still quite young I decided I never wanted them to worry about me like this. I want my kids to be able to look at me and know that I have taken care of myself financially, that they are free to take care of themselves and their loved ones, because I have taken care of myself.

And so, I started learning about finance, and business. I still have a long way to go, but I so enjoy the learning and growing. I love the journey.

Education, Food

Book Review: The Third Plate, by Dan Barber

I start with the premise that nature is smarter than I am and try to let nature teach me how reality Works. Ray dalio, principles

Feed the soil, and let the soil feed the plants. Dan Barber, The Third Plate

Dan Barber is a chef in New York. He owns 2 restaurants, Blue Hill, in Manhattan and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, a working four-season farm and educational center, 30 minutes north of Manhattan.

I watched one of Dan Barber’s TED talks a few years ago and it struck a chord in me. He talks about a fish farm in Spain that raises amazingly tasty fish and cleans the surrounding ocean in the process. The talk and the farm gave me hope that we can not only live sustainably, but can live in a way that benefits each other and the environment.

Recently I checked out Barber’s book, The Third Plate, because I wanted to learn more about sustainability in our food system. Is Barber’s book, he writes at length about mono-culture farming. This is the most common current practice in American farming: Massive farms that plant fields and fields of one crop, which depletes the soil of nutrients, then rely on chemical ferti

lizers and pesticides to maintain plant health.

Industrial farming is not a sustainable system. We’ve known this for a while, but keep using more chemicals instead of looking to nature and past practices for solutions. Barber talks about “dead zones” in our oceans, whole areas where no fish or plant life can live because of the pollutants in the water.

In traditional farming, farmers learn what a crop takes from the soil, and what a crop feeds the soil and rotate crops to continually nurture the soil. Just like we exhale carbon dioxide and inhale oxygen, while plants do the opposite in the beautiful give and take of nature, certain crops will support each other and soil life if we learn about crop rotation.

We hear, “you are what you eat,” but Barber says, we are what our food eats. We get minerals from the minerals in the soil that our vegetables grow in. Dan Barber is the chaser of delicious food and believes that the tastiest food is also the healthiest food. He says, “Truly delicious food is contingent on an entire system of agriculture.” Barber quotes his farmer,

“The development of the flavor, and the health of the plant, are the same freaking thing. You don’t get one without the other”. Farmer Jack in Dan Barber’s

So what can we do? What can I do? Start small, start with one change, and then make another. Support your farmer’s markets. Learn about and stop supporting industrial farming as much as you can. I have a microscopic garden plot that I ignore most years, but this year, I’m going to learn to garden and to enrich the soil first Plant a small garden and learn how to feed the soil.

Because our planet’s health is our health.