The Ultimate Guide to a Stress-Free Annual Performance Appraisal: Top Strategies Revealed

Do you dread the looming shadow of your annual performance appraisal? The sleepless nights, the racing heart, the fear of judgment? It's time to put an end to this cycle of stress and anxiety. In this article, we present the ultimate guide to a stress-free annual performance appraisal, unveiling the top strategies that will transform this dreaded event into an empowering experience.

Imagine feeling confident and well-prepared as you enter your appraisal, knowing that you have the tools and knowledge to showcase your achievements, address areas of improvement, and set actionable goals for your professional growth. With our comprehensive guide, you can conquer your appraisal with ease and emerge as a true star performer.

Throughout this guide, we will delve into the purpose of performance appraisals, offering you a clear understanding of why they matter and how they can contribute to your career advancement. We will unravel the secrets of setting clear goals and expectations, equipping you with the ability to steer your appraisal conversation toward success.

Furthermore, we will explore the crucial art of documenting your achievements and areas for improvement. Armed with this skill, you will have tangible evidence to support your performance and present a compelling case during your appraisal discussion.

But preparation doesn't stop there. We will guide you through the essential steps you need to take before your appraisal, ensuring that you walk into that room with confidence and poise. And for those difficult conversations and challenging feedback, we have expert strategies to help you navigate through them with grace and resilience.

Finally, we will reveal the key to setting actionable development goals that will fuel your growth and propel your career even further. By incorporating these strategies into your annual performance appraisal, you will emerge stronger, more confident, and ready to take on new challenges.

So, if you're ready to bid farewell to stress and embrace a rewarding appraisal experience, dive into this guide. Let us empower you with the wisdom and insights that will transform your annual performance appraisal into your moment to shine. The time for stress-free success is now!

Understanding the Purpose of Performance Appraisals

To embark on a stress-free annual performance appraisal journey, it is vital to have a clear understanding of the purpose behind this process. Performance appraisals serve as more than just a routine exercise or a box to check off; they are invaluable opportunities for growth, development, and career advancement. By comprehending the true purpose of these evaluations, you can approach them with a positive mindset and make the most out of this valuable experience.

At its core, the purpose of performance appraisals is to provide feedback on an individual's progress, productivity, and contributions within the organization. This feedback serves as a compass, guiding employees towards areas of improvement and acknowledging their strengths and achievements. By understanding how their work is perceived by others and aligning it with organizational goals, employees can hone their skills and shape their future performance.

Additionally, performance appraisals serve as a platform for goal-setting. They allow employees to collaborate with their managers and establish clear objectives for the upcoming year. These goals are not meant to be arbitrary or insignificant; they should be challenging yet attainable, motivating individuals to go above and beyond their current capabilities. By setting clear goals and expectations during performance appraisals, employees can measure their progress and have a roadmap to success.

Moreover, performance appraisals foster open communication and dialogue between employees and their managers. This exchange allows for the identification of any obstacles or barriers hindering performance and the opportunity to address them constructively. It provides a safe space for employees to voice their concerns, seek guidance, and receive support, fostering a healthy and collaborative work environment.

Finally, performance appraisals lay the foundation for recognizing and rewarding exceptional performance. By acknowledging and celebrating achievements, organizations motivate their employees and create a culture of appreciation. This recognition not only boosts morale but also encourages individuals to strive for excellence and reach their fullest potential.

Understanding the purpose behind performance appraisals is crucial for embracing them as opportunities for growth and personal development. By recognizing their significance, employees can approach these evaluations with a positive mindset, ready to embrace feedback, set clear goals, and leverage the support and recognition provided by the organization. So, let us dive deeper into the strategies of setting clear goals and expectations, where we will guide you through the steps to transform your performance appraisal into a stress-free, empowering experience.,

Setting Clear Goals and Expectations

Understanding the purpose behind performance appraisals is crucial for embracing them as opportunities for growth and personal development. By recognizing their significance, employees can approach these evaluations with a positive mindset, ready to embrace feedback, set clear goals, and leverage the support and recognition provided by the organization. So, let us dive deeper into the strategies of setting clear goals and expectations, where we will guide you through the steps to transform your performance appraisal into a stress-free, empowering experience.

When it comes to setting clear goals and expectations for your performance appraisal, communication is key. It's essential to have a clear understanding of what is expected of you in terms of job performance and the goals you are working towards. This starts with open and honest conversations with your manager or supervisor about your role, responsibilities, and the organization's expectations.

During your performance appraisal, take the time to discuss and clarify any uncertainties you may have regarding your goals and expectations. This is an opportunity to seek clarity and ensure that both you and your manager are on the same page. By having these conversations, you can align your goals with the organization's objectives and create a roadmap for success.

In addition to communicating with your manager, it's important to set your own goals and expectations. Think about what you want to achieve personally and professionally and how it aligns with your organization's goals. Set SMART goals – specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound – that will help you track your progress and showcase your accomplishments during your performance appraisal.

Moreover, don't forget to document your goals and expectations throughout the year. Keep a record of your achievements, challenges, and any adjustments made to your goals. This will not only help you stay organized but also provide tangible evidence of your efforts and growth.

By setting clear goals and expectations, you are setting yourself up for success during your performance appraisal. You are demonstrating your commitment to personal and professional growth while aligning your efforts with the organization's objectives. With this foundation in place, you can now move on to the next step of documenting your achievements and areas for improvement, where we will explore how to showcase your progress and set the stage for a constructive conversation.,

Documenting Your Achievements and Areas for Improvement

By setting clear goals and expectations, you are setting yourself up for success during your performance appraisal. You are demonstrating your commitment to personal and professional growth while aligning your efforts with the organization's objectives. With this foundation in place, you can now move on to the next step of documenting your achievements and areas for improvement, where we will explore how to showcase your progress and set the stage for a constructive conversation.

Documenting your achievements and areas for improvement is crucial in preparing for your annual performance appraisal. Keeping a record of your accomplishments throughout the year not only helps you create a comprehensive summary of your contributions but also provides tangible evidence of your efforts and growth. This documentation will serve as a valuable resource during your appraisal discussion, allowing you to confidently highlight your accomplishments and areas where you have excelled.

Start by reviewing the goals and expectations that you set at the beginning of the evaluation period. Look for specific examples where you have surpassed these expectations or achieved exceptional results. Think about any projects or tasks where you have demonstrated innovative thinking, exceeded targets, or contributed towards the overall success of your team or department.

Similarly, take note of areas where you believe you can improve. Reflect on any challenges you faced throughout the year and the steps you took to overcome them. Be honest with yourself and identify areas where you could have performed better or would like to develop further. By acknowledging your areas for improvement, you are demonstrating self-awareness and a commitment to growth.

When documenting your achievements and areas for improvement, be specific, provide concrete examples, and quantify your results whenever possible. This will help you communicate your contributions effectively during your appraisal discussion. Use metrics, such as sales figures, cost savings, or customer satisfaction scores, to objectively showcase your performance.

Consider using a structured format, such as a performance journal or an electronic document, to organize your achievements and areas for improvement. Group them into categories that align with the performance criteria outlined in your organization's appraisal process. This will help you easily reference your accomplishments and focus on the key points during your discussion.

By taking the time to document your achievements and areas for improvement, you are not only providing yourself with a clear picture of your performance but also setting the stage for a constructive conversation with your manager during the appraisal discussion. It demonstrates your dedication to your work and allows you to proactively address any concerns or areas where you can grow. So, let's now delve into the next section and discover the best strategies to prepare for this important discussion.,

Preparing for the Appraisal Discussion

Consider using a structured format, such as a performance journal or an electronic document, to organize your achievements and areas for improvement. Group them into categories that align with the performance criteria outlined in your organization's appraisal process. This will help you easily reference your accomplishments and focus on the key points during your discussion.

By taking the time to document your achievements and areas for improvement, you are not only providing yourself with a clear picture of your performance but also setting the stage for a constructive conversation with your manager during the appraisal discussion. It demonstrates your dedication to your work and allows you to proactively address any concerns or areas where you can grow.

Preparing for the appraisal discussion is a crucial step in ensuring a stress-free experience. It allows you to enter the conversation with confidence, armed with evidence of your accomplishments and a plan for improvement. By proactively addressing any concerns or areas for growth, you are demonstrating your commitment to personal and professional development.

Now that you have organized your achievements and areas for improvement, it's time to move on to the next section. In the following section, we will explore strategies for navigating difficult conversations and receiving feedback. These tips and techniques will help you approach the appraisal discussion with openness and a willingness to learn and grow.,

Navigating Difficult Conversations and Receiving Feedback

In the world of annual performance appraisals, one aspect that often makes employees anxious is the prospect of difficult conversations and receiving feedback. It's natural to feel uneasy when your accomplishments and areas for improvement are being discussed, but approaching these conversations with the right mindset can make all the difference.

When faced with feedback, it's important to remember that it is not a personal attack. Instead, view it as an opportunity for growth and development. Take the time to actively listen to what is being said, and resist the urge to become defensive. Remind yourself that constructive feedback is meant to help you improve and reach your full potential.

If the feedback feels overwhelming or unclear, don't hesitate to ask for clarification. Seek examples or specific instances where improvement is needed, as this will provide you with a clearer understanding of the expectations. Remember, your aim is to fully grasp the feedback so that you can identify actionable steps for improvement.

Another aspect to keep in mind is the importance of maintaining a professional demeanor during difficult conversations. It's natural to have emotions arise when receiving criticism, but try to remain composed and objective. Take deep breaths and focus on the conversation at hand, keeping in mind that the goal is to find a way to address the concerns and move forward.

In addition to receiving feedback, it's also important to be proactive in expressing any concerns or challenges you may have faced during the appraisal period. By communicating openly and honestly with your supervisor, you demonstrate initiative and a commitment to growth. Use this opportunity to seek guidance or ask for resources that can help you address any obstacles that may be hindering your progress.

By approaching difficult conversations and feedback with an open mind and a willingness to learn and grow, you are setting yourself up for success. In the next section, we will delve into the process of setting actionable development goals, which will further enhance your performance and professional development.,

Setting Actionable Development Goals

By approaching difficult conversations and feedback with an open mind and a willingness to learn and grow, you are setting yourself up for success. But let's not stop there. To truly enhance your performance and professional development, it's crucial to set actionable development goals. These goals provide a roadmap for your growth and enable you to measure your progress along the way.

When setting actionable development goals, it's essential to be specific and concrete. Rather than stating vague objectives like "improve communication skills," break it down into actionable steps. For example, you could set a goal to attend a communication workshop, practice active listening in meetings, and seek feedback from colleagues on your communication style.

Additionally, it's important to set realistic and achievable goals. While it's great to challenge yourself, setting goals that are too ambitious can lead to frustration and demotivation. Consider your current skill level and the resources available to you. Set goals that stretch you but are within reach.

Furthermore, make sure your development goals align with your overall career aspirations. Think about where you want to be in the future and what skills or knowledge you need to get there. By setting goals that align with your long-term vision, you ensure that your development is purposeful and meaningful.

To make your development goals even more effective, create a timeline for achieving them. Break down the larger goal into smaller milestones with specific deadlines. This will keep you accountable and motivated throughout the process.

Lastly, don't forget to communicate your development goals with your supervisor. Share your aspirations and discuss how your goals align with the organization's objectives. Your supervisor can offer guidance, provide additional resources, or even assign you specific projects that align with your development goals.

Setting actionable development goals is a powerful tool in your journey toward professional growth. It allows you to take ownership of your development, demonstrate your commitment to learning, and ultimately achieve the success you desire. In the next section, we will explore the importance of regular check-ins and feedback sessions to ensure continuous improvement.,

In conclusion, implementing the strategies outlined in this comprehensive guide can transform your annual performance appraisal into a stress-free and empowering experience. By understanding the purpose of performance appraisals, setting clear goals and expectations, documenting achievements and areas for improvement, preparing for the appraisal discussion, navigating difficult conversations and feedback, and setting actionable development goals, you can take control of your professional growth.

This is your opportunity to showcase your achievements, address any areas for improvement, and set actionable goals that propel your career forward. With these tips in mind, you'll be well-prepared to approach your next appraisal with confidence and excel in your chosen field. Remember, the path to success is paved with self-reflection and continuous improvement.

As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Now, take a deep breath, harness your potential, and let your annual performance appraisal become a stepping stone to your future success. Embrace the opportunity and unleash your full potential!

Your Guide to Prospering with a Wealthy Mindset

Your Guide to Prospering with a Wealthy Mindset

Do you often wonder how “other” people create a lifestyle full of abundance and prosperity? Have you ever found yourself asking what their secret is, or worse, chalking it all up to luck? If so, you are not alone. As humans, we all tend to compare ourselves to others in a survival of the fittest way. When we fall short, rather than see what action steps we can take to create change, we say other people have it better or are just lazy. 

Did you know there are ways to attain prosperity that have little to do with luck and have a lot to do with creating a wealthy mindset first? Abundance is not only for the "chosen few"; It’s even” one’s birthright. How often have you heard stories of people pulling themselves up from nothing to create mass success and fortune? It can happen to you, too. 

You’re probably. You may wonder how even shaking your head while thinking is for “others “People and not for me. That’s a great ”place to start – with your thoughts. Change your thoughts, change your mindset, and change your life. 

You don’t simply wake up one morning and declare that you will be more mindful of your prosperity. It takes practice and intentionality. You need to want this so much in your life that you focus on it daily and willingly move forward, taking the steps to make it a reality.

Any goal worth achieving requires action on your part. You have to move forward and take the steps to reach your goal. As a human being, you want things now. You do not intentionally take small steps and allow them to add up as you go. So, what do you do? You avoid taking any steps. You remain inactive. You don’t even bother to try. 

Sometimes, you set goals so high that there is no place to go but down. You fall short, become overzealous too quickly, and don’t follow any guidance. There is a way around all of this.

Here is your guide to prospering with a wealthy mindset.

Keys to Prospering with a Wealthy Mindset

A good idea is only as good as its action plan. If you are wondrous, you need to have a prosperity-mindset action plan. For some, setting goals means using pen and paper, creating lists, and making graphs. All those things are well and good. However, you need to start with what’s in your mind first.

Since your thoughts drive your actions and your actions take you to your destination, it's essential to ensure that your thoughts steer you down the right road—the road to prosperity. Get your thoughts down on paper before creating any plan or action plan. It all begins with your mind. Learn how to train your mind with these 10 key steps.

1. Focus on your "what" and your "why" first – focus on what you are creating and why you are creating it. Have this show up before you move on to the "how" part. Those who are for the end goal tend to leave out the big picture: what you are creating and why you are creating it. An example would be "create a coaching business that inspires women to break through their abundance-blocks." While it may sound like part of an elevator speech, it is more of a declaration to yourself and others. Don’t lose sight of your "what" and your "why. You can tackle the "how" to-do list later.

2. Attach emotion to it—if you have c. If you plan your business and focus daily on your "what" and "why," attach emotion to everything you are, including excitement about creating that to-do list, feel exhilarated about the scary unknown, and get inspired so you can inspire others.

3. Change your perception – don’t look at it. Don’t view it as a tedious, mundane chore. View it as a piece of your part. Look upon it as you Consider it to create a life that you love, love and dreams come true.

4. Take on keywords – the same way y. I would use keywords for SEO purposes on your blog or website and apply keywords to yourself, too. Choo, see a, too. Choose and create yourself words. Be energized, vibrant, vibrate, inspire, build it, build, and pay attention to your thoughts – if you want a prosperity mindset, a reward system for every time you use a positive word. Deduce points for using terms such as “I can’t, I don’t know, I’m not…” Once you consciously try these self-sabotaging words out of your thoughts, you will begin to shift. There will be a shift in your vocabulary too. You will catch yourself saying things such as, “I wish, I want, and If only.” You will begin to use phrases such as “When I become, I am going to.” You will be amazed at how this most critical shift in your mindset will change your thoughts, words, and life.

5. Play the game of opposites – you get to choose your thoughts daily. If you have a negative thought, turn it into an opposite. If you are mad, turn that into a positive by acknowledging that feeling as a call to action. It’s time to make a change because the thing you are angry about didn’t work.

6. Pay attention to your thoughts. Chances are you have some old dialogue running in the background telling you something is impossible. When you hear that old dialogue, recreate it to I’m Possible. Check in with your thoughts. Do you feel other people have it better than you do? Do you have a woe-is-me attitude? 

7. Pay attention to your words. The words you speak could dictate your life. If you spend too much time talking and discussing subjects, you will likely energetically attract more of that into your life.

8. Pay attention to your feelings. Your feelings are a guidepost. If you feel sad, see what you must do and turn it into joy. What’s to turn in your life that will give you more prosperity? Don’t just sweep those feelings away. Chances are you had the thought first and the feelings afterward. Change your thoughts. Change your feelings.

9. Don’t go it alone. The most successful people have other people holding them accountable for their thoughts. They are not afraid to be authentic and surround themselves with positive people. Look at your people and decide whom you need to distance from and whom you need to keep closer to you. Have you ever seen someone so enthusiastic that you can’t help but laugh despite your negative thought pattern?

Thoughts for Sustaining a Prosperity Mindset

Now that you have spotlighted those negative thoughts to identify them and replaced them with positive action steps such as “I am” statements let’s look at replacing those negative thoughts to create a mindset that is ripe and ready for prosperity. 

1. I have unique gifts and talents.

2. I am the best version of me I can be.

3. Success flows effortlessly and lays itself out before me.

4. I can do anything I put my mind to doing.

5. I am a creator of prosperity.

6. Abundance is my birthright.

7. Each courageous step I take leads me closer to prosperity.

8. I deserve prosperity. 

9. The more I have, the more I can share.

10. When I follow my passion, prosperity waits for me.

When you recognize your negative thoughts or mindset of lack, take the appropriate action steps, and replace the negative thoughts with positive "I-can-do-it" thoughts, you are retraining your brain to drive you straight towards prosperity and wealth. In short, you are rerouting your path in life, as well as changing your ultimate destination.

Ways of Being to Create the Mindset of Prosperity

Keep identifying those old negative thought patterns as they come to you. The more quickly you catch yourself, the more aware you become. The more aware you become, the more you can smile and think, “I’ve got this.” 

Keep pushing out negative thoughts by replacing them with positive corrective action steps. It’s that simple. The more you practice this, the more it will become a habit and event and dually become a wild nature. You will have put your wealthy mindset on a cruise and automatically do it with little or no effort. Replace those negative mindsets with successful mantras and shine a light on "who" you are in the moment. 

If you are focusing on lack and being stingy with money, the chances are high that there won’t be room for anything more. Look at how you are behaving and replace that negative behavior as well. 

1. Act fulfilled. When you are grateful for what you do have, you don’t have to worry so much about what you don’t have. Knowing that you are already fulfilled and prosperity is yours every day is an excellent way to stay in the moment of gratitude. 

2. Create momentum. Contrary to popular belief, momentum is a way of starting small and growing bigger and better. Most people believe that momentum means starting with a bang and skyrocketing. Momentum is a continual movement and motion.

3. Be bold and courageous – take time to step out of your comfort zone in the slightest and most minor. Do you want prosperity? Well, your ego wants you stuck in comfort to protect it in all ways. 

4. Act excited—Be excited about that fabulous and prosperous event coming your way. You will be astonished by how it will make your life prosperous.

5. Be exhilarated – Remember how you felt before you took a daring leap of faith or even before getting on that roller coaster? Be that way every day to create a mindset of prosperity.

6. Take on being more alive in every moment. Each prosperous moment brings you closer to living a long life of prosperity.

7. Be engaging. Get excited about life and living, and you’ll also see your relationships will prosper. A life of prosperity comes from a lack of mindset. No, it would come from a cheerful perspective. Change your mindset. Change your life.

8. Get enthusiastic – bring others on board your prosperity train. When you are passionate, you become contagious.

9. Feel vibrant. Notice colors, sounds, and sights, and be lively. Your vibrancy will attract more of the same. 

How to Reset Your Mindset

Now, it’s time to kick your ego to the curb. While ego was necessary to assist us in our fight-and-flight mode, there aren’t too many dinosaurs around anymore. It’s time to give your mind a reset button.

It’s time to think outside of the box. Now, you will explore and create your thoughts and view them differently. Who would have thought you could take your thoughts out of your head and examine them in a new light?

1. Stick with one idea rather than getting bogged down and overwhelmed by a million different ideas. Try it. If it doesn’t work, choose another idea. Making mistakes is a natural part of learning. Please don't beat yourself up about them. Remember that mistakes are opportunities to learn and stepping stones to greater prosperity.  

2. Don’t associate failure with quitting or giving up; associate it with learning how to do things better and better every time. If you want a set of, there is no room for feeling like a failure, only a mindset of mentality that didn’t work. Let’s check out what it is.”

3. Think about not having to be perfect but just being in action. Someone with a growth mindset can bounce from thoughts of imperfection to recreating those thoughts rather quickly. Now that you are human, you know that you are not perfect. As long as you are in action, you will prosper. However, staying stuck and feeling bad will halt your prospect and instantly rous tracks.

4. High abilities, gifts, and talents – To change you. Mindset: you need to move away from a shift from one on what you cannot do to one on what you can and will do. 

5. Minimize your weaknesses and strengths, but work on them – it’s okay not to expect to exaggerate your shortcomings, but it’s not prosperous to leave them stagnant either. Do you procrastinate and is, and is procrastination stopping you from prosperity? What can you do differently? Get an accountability partner. When you feel you need to procrastinate, reach out and ask someone to guide you back to the task at hand. Maybe you could give yourself a 15-minute break to daydream, which will reset your brain. Recreate your weaknesses, but don’t magnify them.

6. Breakthrough by looking at exciting and exhilarating challenges – You can choose your perception at any time while standing in your way. Rather than go into woe-is-me mode, try taking it on as a challenge that is exciting, fun, and – okay – a little scary too. 

7. Reward your passion. When you get excited about something, reward yourself. Highlight when you are passionate about your prosperity goals. The more attention you pay to this mindset, the more prosperous you will become. When you are excited and passionate about something w, write it down; make a note of, andd recreate itrepeatedlyy You and only you know what makes for a prosperous life. This is your passion.

8. Downplay the negative results; don’t get caught. Don’t your head; keep moving forward. Get out of your head and into your goals. If you want to feel bad, don't take that too long. I need to brush it off, push it aside, and keep putting one foot in front of the other. Prosperity doesn’t come to those who feel sorry for themselves or those who quit.

9. Begin to mMovet-to-do list” higher than your “need-to-do list.” How many times have you filled your phone apps and your paper to-do list with household and family chores? What about your “want-to-do” items? Where are they? If you want a prosperous life, you must include the things you love that bring you joy. Prosperity comes from adding things into your life that bring you joy in the first place. If you have a mindset of joy, lack will not follow, but prosperity will surely follow.

10. Visualize your prosperous life, the big house, and the fancy car. Keep reminding yourself that it is possible. Remember that procrastination project? Give yourself time to daydream—and do it by utilizing what makes your heart sing and your mouth smile. 

Ask Pertinent Questions of Yourself

Tell the truth. You love your family and children so much you want them to prosper, right? You spend a day asking your kids questions and moving them higher and closer to their goals. You don’t ask them questions that make them feel bad. You probably make them think toofaraisinghem to their higher selves. 

What about yourself? Do you ask yourself pertinent questions? If not, here’s a chance to move closer to prosperity with these top questions.

1. Is this my highest potential? When you ask yourself if this is my question, pace to think anew. What if you expanded yourself a little more each day? How would that show up in your life? Imagine going a little furbitach day and waking up to realize you are inflow influences achieving priority.

2. Where can I stretch myself? Look at which areas in your life are perfectly balanced and which are out of balance. Where can you stretch? Can you do it at work, at home, or in your personal goals? Tell one about yourself and go the extra mile.

3. Where can I challenge myself and have it show up as exciting? If you understand your perception, take on new challenges, and view them positively, you will find abundant prosperity in your mind.

4. Does this make a difference to others? Ask yourself where the value is for other people in what you do. Are you a life coach? Are you a writer? Do you sell products or services that would make a difference in someone’s life? Once you see the value in making a difference to others, prosperity will come knocking at your door. 

5. If I had a deadline, would I be able to pick up my game? WRegardingpersoLet's be honest: nal goals that lead to prosperity, le dohem seriously. What if you were to attach the attacheds? Think of it as something you get done on your to-do list; otherwise, a negative impact will occur. You will be holding prosperity at bay once again. 

6. Does this spark interest in others, and does it catch fire? Are you excited about what you are taking on in life? If so, why not keep the spark until the unit becomes a full-fledged flame? 

7. Am I being enthusiastic enough? If you are ho-hum about your goals, your goals will be ho-hum for you. Prosperity doesn’t follow a ho-hum attitude; it follows enthusiasm like a match to wood. 

8. Are others being inspired by my path? Are you inspired by what you do? Do your natural gifts and talents inspire you? What about others – If you inspire them, you blaze a trail of inspiration, and prosperity will become part of who you are and what you give.

9. Are others feeling enthusiastic, like they are motivated, and so adopt enthusiasm a people enthusiasm? Anytime enthusiasm is involved, success, abundance, and prosperity follow shortly after.

10. Am I willing to undergo the necessary transfer to create a wealthy mindset? This is a good question to ask yourself daily. Are you willing to take the steps and do the work to achieve prosperity?

11. Am I willing to give up my old stories of lack and deprivation? How badly do you want prosperity versus wanting to hold on to your old stories and patterns?

12. Am I willing to embrace the work necessary to get me to the other side? Embrace the work, but view it as the means to an end or the road to reach your desired destination.

13. Am I willing to take responsibility for my life to be more prosperous? Are you ready to stop blaming circumstances for blocking your prosperity and willing to take responsibility?

14. Do I know how to say no? Learn how to say no. When you first begin, it will feel terrible, but it does get easier. 

15. Do I know how to delegate to create a wealthy mindset? If you are doing it all, then not everything is getting done. Not everything makes room for abundance, learning, and taking on more meaningful goals. Are your goals impactful enough? Look and see if you can amp them up. 

16. Will I remember that feeling when I do reach hard to reach goals for next time?

17. Am I willing to work to transform my brain? Are you willing to examine your old examples and beliefs about prosperity and admit that some do not work for you?

18. Do I fully understand the power I have to rewire my brain for prosperity? Do you have a good grasp on how powerful your mind is in creating a life of prosperity?

19. Can I fuentirelyocus my energy and create emotional engagement with prosperity as a way of life now? Can you have a relationship with prosperity without feeling guilty?

20. Am I willing to feed my mind healthy foods that give me the responsibility to eat healthy, energy-giving foods and energy-giving foods that are at my optimum levels?

21. Can I need to be filled with positive books, thoughts, and people? What are you feeding your mind?

22. How can I recreate my role inside my head from procrastinating or not going old enough to be independent and prosperous? People who procrastinate often do so because of feelings of not being good enough. Are you willing to throw that notion away?

23. What are the fruits of my labor; small st?ps lead up to giant achievements. Are you recording your achievement, no matter how big or small?

24. Am I ready to take on the mindset of abundance and prosperity? Am I prepared to walk the walk and talk the talk? How exciting!

When you use this guide, learn the keys, change your thoughts, create new ways of being, and ask yourself tough questions, you rewire your brain from ultimate prosperity and wealth. 

Change your mind. Change your life.

Anxiety In The Workplace

Let's chat about something that's as common in the workplace as spilled coffee and jammed printers - anxiety. It's that sneaky feeling that creeps up on you when the inbox is overflowing, the deadlines are screaming, and you've got a meeting in five that you're not ready for.

Sound familiar? You're not alone.

Workplace anxiety is like an invisible octopus; it's got its tentacles in just about everything. But here's the good news: you can navigate these choppy waters and sail into calmer seas with a few smart strategies.

(GET THE FREE REPORT, Anti-Anxiety Affirmations, HERE!!)

Recognizing the Ripples: Understanding Workplace Anxiety

Anxiety in the workplace can be subtle, a shadow that lurks behind even the simplest of tasks. It's not just the butterflies in your stomach before you step into the spotlight for a big presentation; it's this persistent sense of being dragged down by invisible weights, turning what should be a manageable paddle into an exhausting swim against the current.

Imagine sitting at your desk, but instead of focusing on the task at hand, your mind is a whirlpool of 'what-ifs' and 'not-good-enoughs.' This kind of anxiety doesn't just make waves—it stirs up a storm in the calmest of seas.

It's a feeling that resonates in the quiet hum of the office air conditioning and the steady clack of keyboards—a reminder that for many of us, the workday is as much about managing our worries as it is about managing our workload.

●      The Mask of Productivity: Ever notice that some of your busiest coworkers are just spinning their wheels? It might be anxiety in disguise, masquerading as productivity.

●      Email Overload Alert: When the ping of a new email sets off alarm bells, that's anxiety-talking. It turns each message into a potential mine in a minefield.

●      Meeting Mayhem: Feel like meetings are a merry-go-round of stress? Anxiety can turn the conference room into a coliseum where you're battling lions.

Charting the Course: Spotting Triggers

Pinpointing the triggers of workplace anxiety is like navigating through a dense fog—you need to know what you're looking for. For some, the mere glimpse of a packed calendar is enough to sound the alarm bells, while for others, it's the nuanced tone of a manager during a check-in that can feel like a silent siren's call toward panic. Or maybe it's the idea of standing up and speaking out in a room where every eye seems to be a judging jury. Identifying these triggers is a crucial step; it's about understanding that these feelings are your compass, pointing you toward the rough seas that need your attention.

By recognizing these signals, you can begin to chart a more navigable course through the day, one where you're at the helm, steering clear of unnecessary turbulence.

●      Deadline Dread: It's that countdown clock in your head, each tick is a reminder that the pressure's piling up.

●      Feedback Fears: Positive, negative, or in between, feedback can feel like a tightrope. One wrong step and you're second-guessing every move.

●      Social Navigation: The office isn't just about work; it's a social minefield too. From small talk by the coffee machine to post-work drinks, it's enough to make anyone's palms sweat.

Steering Through the Storm: Practical Anxiety-Busting Techniques

Time to take control and steer through this tempest. Picture your anxiety as a squall on the horizon; you can't stop it from coming, but you can prepare yourself to ride it out. Practical techniques are the sturdy oars in your hands, and the life jacket strapped snugly to your chest.

First, there's the power of pause—a mini-meditation can be as simple as a few deep breaths at your desk, allowing the maelstrom of meetings and memos to pass without sweeping you away.

Or perhaps the power of the list—turning towering tasks into manageable chunks, so each checkmark feels like a lighthouse guiding you back to shore. And let's not forget your space—transform it into a personal sanctuary with tokens of calm and corners of comfort. These techniques don't just fend off the waves; they help you navigate through them with a newfound grace and agility.

●      Mini-Meditations: Sneak in a 5-minute meditation at your desk. Close your eyes, focus on your breath, and let the chaos fade to background noise.

●      The To-Do List Tamer: Break down that monstrous to-do list into bite-sized tasks. Each little victory is a shot of confidence.

●      Workspace Oasis: Personalize your workspace with a plant, a photo, or a motivational quote. Make it a little island of peace in the sea of office buzz.

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Sailing in Sync: Building a Supportive Crew

Sailing the vast ocean of work life is not a solo expedition—you're part of a fleet, and every member plays a role in keeping the ship steady. Building a supportive crew around you is like tying your ships together in the face of a storm: it creates strength and stability. This means finding allies among your colleagues who understand the ebb and flow of your day-to-day challenges. It's about establishing connections that go beyond the superficial 'How was your weekend?'—it's about creating bonds that can weather the high-pressure systems and the doldrums alike.

Whether it's through shared coffee breaks where you can vent and laugh, or formal arrangements like peer support groups, having shipmates you can rely on is invaluable. When everyone is in sync, each person's anxiety becomes a shared challenge to overcome, rather than a solitary struggle.

●      Buddy System: Pair up with a colleague. When the waves hit, you'll have someone to remind you that you're not sailing solo.

●      Safe Harbor Sessions: Create a space where coworkers can share and address their anxieties without judgment. Think of it as a safe harbor in rough waters.

●      Professional Lifelines: Sometimes, you need the coast guard. Don't shy away from seeking professional help, like EAPs (Employee Assistance Programs) or therapists.

The Calm After the Storm: Fostering a Mindful Workplace Culture

Lastly, imagine a workplace that doesn't just endure the storm but learns to dance in the rain. Fostering a mindful workplace culture is about collective transformation. It's not just about personal coping mechanisms; it's about creating an environment where the storm of anxiety itself starts to dissipate.

This involves collective practices like company-wide mindfulness sessions or spaces where people can take mental health breaks without fear of judgment. It's about flexible working arrangements that recognize that sometimes the best way to calm choppy waters is to let people navigate them in their own style, at their own pace.

When a company commits to fostering such a culture, it sends a beacon of light across the workforce, signaling that it's safe to come ashore. It's a commitment to turning the workplace into a harbor—a place where everyone, regardless of their role, can find peace and a sense of belonging.

●      Mindfulness Training: Encourage or initiate mindfulness training in your office. It's like teaching everyone to swim.

●      Flexibility Floats: Advocate for flexible work arrangements. Sometimes, the best way to calm the waters is by not being in the water at all (hello, remote work!).

●      Open-Door Policy: An actual open door, not just a saying. It makes approaching management as easy as a sea breeze, encouraging open communication and reducing anxiety.

Conclusion

Anxiety in the workplace can be a relentless wave, but remember, every ship has an anchor, and every sailor has a port to call home. By understanding and addressing workplace anxiety, by knowing our triggers and learning to steer through them, we're not just becoming better professionals; we're becoming better crewmates on the ship we all sail together—our workplace.

So, let's take these tools and use them. Let's create spaces where the storms of anxiety are met with the right equipment, where every desk feels a little less like a dinghy in a hurricane and more like a cabin on a steady cruiser.

Anxiety may be part of the job, but it doesn't have to rule over it. Instead, let's make our workplace a harbor of harmony where everyone can dock their worries and sail into their professional journey with confidence.

Why You Need a Personal Vision Statement - And How to Create It

What Is A Personal Vision Statement?

Vision statements are tools used by businesses and other organizations to convey their mission, values, and goals succinctly to employees, shareholders, and other parties. 

The goal of a vision statement is to help the people involved in decision-making to make decisions that align with it and the overall purpose of the group. They have proven to be valuable tools that help a company reach its goals without forgetting its values or purpose.

A personal vision statement is nearly identical to one used for a business but is directed toward a single individual and his or her life. It encompasses one’s values, goals, and purpose in life. Sometimes it also includes a statement of the lifetime impact you wish to have on the world.

The overwhelming majority of research on organizational business statements shows that they are effective in helping keep an organization on track and aligned with its values. Less research has been done on personal vision statements, but so far it looks like they have the same effect on individuals when created and used properly.

Personal vision statements can encompass both personal and professional goals. They also tend to include a list of some deeply held personal values. They tend to be short, only a few sentences long, and can be either kept private or made public.

Some of the most successful and famous people in the world have or had personal vision statements. Sir Richard Branson, Maya Angelou, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Amanda Steinberg, Oprah Winfrey, and Mahatma Gandhi are just a few examples. Each of these people used or use their personal vision statements to guide their lives.

You don’t have to be famous, a hero, or a CEO to create and use your own personal vision statement. Many people do it. Millions of people around the world in every walk of life from students to farmers to artists have a vision statement they use in their daily lives.

It takes some work to create your own personal vision statement, but it’s not hard to do and you don’t need any special help or expertise. All you need is commitment and a willingness to do the work to craft it. After it’s finished, all you need is a determination to use it to guide your life.

The remainder of this special series is going to be devoted to exploring the benefits of personal vision statements and teaching you how to construct yours.

The Benefits of Creating a Personal Vision Statement 

You might be wondering why you should go to the effort of creating a personal vision statement, especially if you’re already driven and goal-oriented. What’s in it for you? Will the benefits outweigh the time and effort? 

Personal vision statements bring a lot of benefits to the people who have them. There’s not enough space to cover all the benefits you’ll get from creating your own vision statement, so here are the top three.

It gives you a sense of direction

A personal vision statement will provide you with a feeling of direction, of knowing where you are right now and where you are trying to go. This motivates you and makes your work feel meaningful. This is something most humans crave, especially in a world as chaotic as the modern one.

If you start to feel lost or rudderless, all you have to do is look at your vision statement to help you realize the truth. This is an important psychological benefit -don’t underestimate it!

It helps motivate you

Motivation isn’t something you feel all the time. It comes and it goes. Sometimes you’ll be more motivated than others. Sometimes you won’t want to work on your goals at all, either because you’re too busy or you’re frustrated at a lack of progress. 

Lack of motivation is where discipline becomes important but getting your motivation back is also a prime goal.

Personal vision statements have been shown to provide additional motivation when it’s lagging. It can provide you with that extra “oomph” you need to keep pushing and get yourself over the finish line when times are tough.

It provides a framework for decision making

Making decisions is part of being an adult and sometimes it becomes hard to make decisions that keep us moving forward towards where we want to be in life and that are aligned with our values. 

A personal vision statement helps with decision-making by providing a framework you can use to evaluate options, especially for complex decisions. Which options move you towards accomplishing your next goal? Which will move you further away from it? Which ones would let you uphold your values? Would any require you to break your values?

You can use this yes/no framework to decide which options to evaluate further and which to eliminate. This takes the stress out of decision-making and lets you make decisions that will help you succeed

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Examples of Personal Vision Statements 

Personal vision statements are just that -personal. No two are the same and many might not even be recognizable as examples of the same thing. Some will focus more on personal issues and others more on career or spiritual issues. 

The one thing they all have in common is a deep focus on creating a life of purpose for the people who hold them. Most people don’t share their personal vision statements with anyone, or only with a few trusted people such as a spouse or advisor. Others make them public.

With that said, here are some examples of personal vision statements that people have been willing to share, both those of famous people and those of ordinary people.

“To be a teacher. And to be known for inspiring my students to be more than they thought they could be.” -Oprah Winfrey

“To have fun in my journey through life and learn from my mistakes.” -Richard Branson

“My purpose in life is to dedicate myself solely to God and the performance of good works in His image. I want to heal the broken, feed the hungry, and bring justice out of injustice. May my every decision reflect these goals.” -Catholic Priest (anonymous)

“To serve as a leader, live a balanced life, and apply ethical principles to make a significant difference.” -Denise Morrison

“My vision is to create a company that will balance my three core principles of people, planet, and profit and leave behind a lasting legacy.” -Startup founder (anonymous)

“I shall not fear anyone on Earth. I shall fear only God. I shall not bear ill will toward anyone. I shall not submit to injustice from anyone. I shall conquer untruth by truth. And in resisting untruth, I shall put up with all suffering.” -Mahatma Gandhi

“My vision is to have as much fun as I can in life and make as many people smile as possible.” -Stand-up Comedian (anonymous)

“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.” -Maya Angelou

Keep these examples close at hand as you go through the next several steps of creating your own vision statement. Refer to them when you need inspiration. Your personal vision statement might be shorter or longer than these and more or less detailed. It’s up to you. It’s your personal vision statement, after all!

Step 1: What Are Your Goals?

The first step in creating your personal vision step is going to be writing down your goals for your life. What do you want? Do you want to start a multi-million-dollar company? Do you want to become an astronaut? An artist? A stay-at-home parent?

You need to create this list before you go any further. Start by brainstorming. Get a sheet of paper and a pen (not a computer) and write down every single thing you’d like to do in your life. Don’t hold back and don’t censor yourself. Write down everything that comes to mind.

If you have a hard time doing this at once, that’s okay. Take some time with it. Carry the list around with you for a few days and add to it whenever something crosses your mind. Keep going until you feel like it is completed.

Again, don’t worry about what anyone else’s list would look like. Everyone is different and unique. Every person has different goals. Your list of lifetime goals will be different from every person you know, even if you have an identical twin. That’s normal and to be expected.

Next, go down this list and think through every item you wrote down. Is this something that you want in your heart of hearts? Or is it something you think you want? Or that you think you should want? Mark these latter items off at once.

What’s left is a list of things you do want to achieve in your life. Which ones do you most want to accomplish? Some of them are going to exert a stronger pull on you than others. Put a star beside these.

After you’ve done that, go back through the list and consider the compatibility of all of your goals. You’re probably going to find that some of them are contradictory or at least can’t be accomplished together. You’re not going to become a famous actor and an astronaut at the same time, for example.

This is the hard part. It’s time to choose. You’re going to have to make some painful choices here -which goals do you want most? Which are you willing to sacrifice in order to get to the others? Mark off the ones that don’t make the cut. It will hurt, but you have to do it.

When you’re done, copy the surviving goals down onto a clean sheet of paper. This is the beginning of your vision statement.

Step 2: What Are Your Strengths, Skills, and Weaknesses? 

The second step in creating your personal vision statement is to make a list of your strengths and skills and decide how they relate to what you want to do with your life. It’s time to get out the handy pen and paper again.

What are your strengths as a person? Write down everything you can think of. This is another brainstorming session. Don’t judge yourself and don’t hold back because of uncertainty or insecurity.

Are you strong (physically or psychologically)? Stubborn? Independent? Are you a freethinker? Are you good at helping people get along? Are you highly intelligent? Empathic? Incredibly organized? You have a list of strengths just like everyone else. Don’t stop with this list until you feel like you’ve covered them all.

Next, you’re going to do the same thing for your skills. List every skill you can think of that you have, in particular those that are related to the goals you identified in step one. What skills do you currently have that will help you get to those goals? How many of those are good to go and which need work?

Now, look at the list of goals once again. What are the strengths a person who reaches each of those goals must possess? Go down the list and evaluate them one by one. Take your time with this; don’t rush this process. When you’re done, do it again and write down the list of skills needed to accomplish these goals.

You may have already guessed what the next step is going to be. You’re going to compare the two lists you’ve created -the one of strengths and skills you already have versus those that you need to accomplish all of these goals you want to achieve.

The differences between the two are your weaknesses. These are things you need to work on if you’re going to make all of your goals a reality. Circle all of these weaknesses. 

If you like, you can add working on or developing some or all of these weaknesses to your personal vision statement. You don’t have to do so, but if you don’t, you still need to keep the list handy because you will have to work on these things if you want to reach your goals.

When you’ve finished with this step, set the lists you made aside -but keep them handy for later -and go on to the next step. 

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Step 3: What Are Your Values?

You’re almost ready to write your personal vision statement. You’ve written down your goals and come up with a list of strengths and skills you need to work on. The next part of the process is to decide what your most important values are.

As with steps 1 and 2, this step is going to yield different answers for everyone. There are no wrong answers so don’t get anxious or worked up. All you’re going to do is decide what’s most important to YOU, not what is important to anyone else or that you think should be important.

Once more, you’ll need your pen and paper. Write “My Values” across the top. What’s the most important thing in the world to you? Your top priority, the thing you work so hard for, the one rule you always follow, the one guideline you use to define everything else in your life.

It’s a hard task, isn’t it? It may require some thought. Or maybe you know right away what it is. If so, you’re one of the lucky ones. The rest of us have to think about it for a while!

The answer, when you come up with it, might be simple or it might be complex. It might be the Golden Rule. It could be taking care of your family. Making money is a top value for some people while making a difference is most important to others. Some write a single word, such as “love” or “caring.”

Again, there are no wrong answers. This is about you and no one else. Your answers are private and should reflect your innermost self, or your vision statement won’t be genuine. Being honest with yourself is the most important part of this process.

Once you have an answer, you’re going to write down your second and third most important values. These might take you a while as well. You might even discover you have two or three on the same level. That’s okay too. 

Now write down any other values you hold in high importance. Don’t write down too many; you don’t want to dilute the issue. You’re going to want to include your top value in your vision statement. Depending on your personality, you might want to do your second and third most important and maybe a few others as well.

When you finish this exercise, you’ll be ready to write down your vision statement.

Step 4: Put it All Together

You’re almost finished. You’ve reached the final and most difficult step -combining everything into a coherent statement. If you’ve done the first three steps thoughtfully and honestly, you should be able to come up with a moving and motivational personal vision statement for yourself.

Get out a new sheet of paper. Write down all the things you’ve already come up with that need to be included in your vision statement. That is, write down your most important goals, any strengths or skills you want to include, and your personal values. These together form the nexus of your vision statement.

You’ll create drafts of your vision statement by playing around with words. Start a sentence with any of the following phrases and write until you have incorporated everything you want to include. Your vision statement may be anywhere from one sentence to a short paragraph long.

Vision Statement Opening Words

“I am…”

“I want…”

“My purpose/mission/vision is…”

“My life will show…”

“To…”

“I will…”

“I won’t…”

Don’t just try one set of these opening words. Try several. Play around with them. Come up with four or five draft vision statements. Use active, first-person verbs in all of them. That means you should write as “I [verb]” as much as you can.

Take some time with this, at least as much as you spent combined on the first three steps. Make multiple drafts of vision statements that all start with the same opening words. Add things in and take out other things. Use synonyms and antonyms. 

Try different lengths, sentence structures, pacing, and tones. Make drafts that sound as different as possible while still expressing the same core set of beliefs.

How will you know when you’re finished? If you’re extraordinarily lucky or a talented wordsmith, you might be able to come up with the perfect vision statement just from these drafts. If not, keep working on drafts until you get tired of it or frustrated.

Set the task aside for a day or two, then come back and read your drafts again. Circle things that you really like. Mark out things you don’t. The bits and pieces that you like are going to form the core of your final draft.

Start making another set of drafts and this time use only the phrases you’ve circled from your first drafts. Then repeat the process until you’ve formed a personal vision statement that suits you. You’ll know when you’re finished. 

Menopause and the Workplace

I’ve really learned over the past five years that menopause is not just going to impact your physical well-being…but it can really impact how you show up at work, deal with stress and your co-workers, and your ability to be present and productive as well. As much as I don’t want to blame my most recent work issues on menopause, I do see how it can have a negative impact and so I have done a great deal of research on ways that you, the Menopausal Professional Woman, can help education both yourself and your younger co-workers on how to navigate this period of your life.

How to Explain the Changes to Your Younger Co-Workers

Explaining the various changes in behavior during menopause to your colleagues can help them understand and provide support during this transitional phase. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to approach the conversation:

Choose an appropriate setting

Find a quiet and comfortable space where you can have a one-on-one conversation without interruptions or distractions. This will help create a conducive environment for open communication.

Educate yourself

Before discussing the topic with your colleagues, gather information about menopause and its potential effects on behavior. Understanding the physical and emotional changes associated with menopause will enable you to provide accurate and comprehensive explanations.

Express your intention

Begin the conversation by expressing your desire to share some personal information that might help your colleagues better understand your recent changes in behavior. Emphasize that you value their support and want to foster a positive working environment.

Explain menopause

Start by providing a brief overview of menopause, clarifying that it is a natural and normal biological process that all women go through as they age. Explain that menopause involves hormonal shifts that can lead to physical and emotional changes.

Describe common symptoms

Outline some of the most common symptoms experienced during menopause, such as hot flashes, sleep disturbances, mood swings, and memory lapses. Explain that these symptoms can be unpredictable and vary in intensity from person to person.

Highlight personal experiences

Share some of your personal experiences related to menopause. Discuss specific changes in behavior that you have noticed and how they may be attributed to hormonal fluctuations. Be honest and open about any challenges you have faced as a result of these changes.

Discuss coping strategies

Mention the strategies you have adopted to manage the symptoms and adapt to the changes. This may include lifestyle adjustments, seeking medical advice, practicing self-care techniques, or joining support groups. Encourage your colleagues to offer suggestions or accommodations if they have any.

Request support and understanding

Clearly express your need for support from your colleagues during this time. Explain that their understanding and patience can make a significant difference in your well-being and work performance.

Answer questions and address concerns

Allow your colleagues to ask questions or express any concerns they may have. Be patient, understanding, and willing to provide additional information or clarification if needed. Remember that some people may have limited knowledge about menopause, so be prepared for varying levels of understanding.

Express gratitude

Conclude the conversation by expressing your gratitude for their time, willingness to listen, and potential support. Let them know that you value their understanding and collaboration.

Remember, each conversation may differ depending on your relationship with your colleagues and the workplace culture. Approach the topic with sensitivity and openness, and tailor your explanation to suit the specific context.

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Why Are Folks Reluctant to Discuss Menopause at Work, Anyway?

There are several reasons why people may be reluctant to talk openly about menopause in the workplace. These reasons can vary depending on cultural, social, and individual factors. Here are a few common factors that contribute to this reluctance:

Stigma and societal taboos

Menopause has historically been surrounded by stigma and considered a taboo subject in many cultures. This stigma can make people uncomfortable discussing it openly, particularly in professional settings.

Lack of awareness and education

Menopause is often misunderstood or not well-understood by many people, including both men and women. This lack of awareness can lead to discomfort or embarrassment when discussing the topic, as people may not have accurate information or may hold misconceptions about menopause.

Fear of judgment and discrimination

Women experiencing menopause may fear being judged or facing discrimination in the workplace. They may worry that disclosing their symptoms or asking for accommodations could lead to negative perceptions of their competence, reliability, or productivity.

Workplace culture and norms

Some workplaces may not have a supportive culture that encourages open conversations about personal health issues, including menopause. If discussions about health are generally discouraged or perceived as unprofessional, employees may be less likely to talk openly about menopause.

Personal privacy and comfort

Menopause is a deeply personal experience, and some individuals may simply prefer to keep it private. They might feel more comfortable discussing it with close friends or family members but not in a professional setting.

Lack of policies and support

In some workplaces, there may be a lack of policies or support systems in place to address the needs and challenges associated with menopause. Without clear guidelines or resources, employees may be hesitant to bring up the topic.

It's important to note that attitudes toward menopause are changing, and many organizations are recognizing the need to create supportive and inclusive environments. By fostering open dialogue, providing education and resources, and implementing policies that support employees going through menopause, workplaces can help reduce the reluctance to discuss this natural phase of life.

The Impact of Menopause on Women's Productivity and Performance in the Workplace

Menopause is a natural phase in a woman's life that marks the end of her reproductive years. It is a complex biological process accompanied by physical, psychological, and hormonal changes. Menopause can significantly impact various aspects of a woman's life, including her productivity and performance in the workplace. In this essay, we will explore the challenges women face during menopause and discuss how these changes can affect their professional lives.

Physical Symptoms

Menopause brings about a range of physical symptoms such as hot flashes, night sweats, fatigue, and sleep disturbances. These symptoms can disrupt a woman's sleep patterns, leading to decreased energy levels, concentration difficulties, and reduced overall stamina. The resulting fatigue and lack of sleep can affect women's performance, making them less alert, focused, and efficient at work. Moreover, physical discomfort caused by symptoms like hot flashes can be distracting and impact concentration during important tasks, leading to decreased productivity.

Cognitive Changes

Hormonal fluctuations during menopause can contribute to cognitive changes, including memory lapses, difficulty concentrating, and mental fog. These cognitive symptoms can affect women's ability to recall information, stay organized, and multitask effectively. Reduced concentration and memory can lead to errors, missed deadlines, and decreased productivity. Moreover, menopause-related cognitive changes can erode self-confidence, which can further impact a woman's performance at work.

Emotional Well-being

Menopause is often accompanied by emotional changes such as mood swings, irritability, and increased anxiety or depression. These emotional symptoms can affect a woman's emotional well-being, making her more prone to stress and affecting her interpersonal relationships at work. Persistent feelings of sadness or anxiety can impact motivation and engagement, leading to decreased productivity. Moreover, women may find it challenging to manage their emotions effectively, affecting their ability to handle workplace stressors and navigate professional challenges.

Work-Life Balance

Menopause can coincide with other significant life events, such as caring for aging parents or supporting children through important transitions. Managing these responsibilities alongside menopause symptoms can create additional stress and strain on women's ability to achieve work-life balance. Juggling multiple roles and coping with physical and emotional changes can lead to increased absenteeism, reduced engagement, and difficulty meeting work demands. Achieving a healthy work-life balance becomes crucial for women during menopause to maintain productivity and performance in the workplace.

Supportive Workplace Environment

Creating a supportive and inclusive workplace environment is vital to mitigate the impact of menopause on women's productivity. Employers can offer flexible work arrangements, such as modified schedules or remote work options, to accommodate menopause symptoms. Providing education and awareness programs about menopause can help foster empathy and understanding among colleagues and supervisors. Encouraging open communication and offering confidential channels for seeking support can enable women to address their concerns and access appropriate resources. By normalizing discussions around menopause and creating supportive policies, employers can help women navigate this transition and maintain their productivity and performance at work.

Menopause brings significant changes to a woman's life, including potential impacts on her productivity and performance in the workplace. Physical symptoms, cognitive changes, emotional well-being, and work-life balance challenges can all affect a woman's ability to perform at her best. Recognizing the unique needs of menopausal women and creating a supportive workplace environment that offers flexibility, understanding, and resources can help mitigate these challenges.

Prevent "Quiet Quitting" Amongst Your Co-Workers

"Quiet quitting" refers to employees disengaging from their work and slowly losing motivation without explicitly expressing their intentions to leave the company. It can have a negative impact on productivity and overall morale. Here are three ways to prevent quiet quitting among your employees:

Foster a Positive Work Environment:

Create a positive and inclusive work environment that encourages open communication, collaboration, and recognition. Encourage employees to voice their concerns, ideas, and opinions without fear of judgment or repercussions. Regularly solicit feedback through surveys, team meetings, or one-on-one discussions to identify potential issues and address them promptly. Promote a culture of appreciation by recognizing and rewarding employees' achievements and contributions.

Provide Growth Opportunities:

Employees often seek opportunities for growth and development. Ensure that your organization offers professional development programs, training sessions, and skill-building workshops. Help employees set clear goals and provide them with the necessary resources and support to achieve those goals. Encourage internal mobility and provide avenues for advancement within the company. When employees see a clear path for growth, they are more likely to stay engaged and committed.

Implement Effective Communication Channels:

Establish regular and transparent communication channels to keep employees informed about company updates, changes, and future plans. This can be done through team meetings, newsletters, intranet platforms, or dedicated communication tools. Encourage two-way communication by actively listening to employee concerns and addressing them promptly. Ensure that managers and supervisors maintain an open-door policy, making themselves approachable for discussions and problem-solving.

Remember that each workplace is unique, so it's essential to tailor these strategies to your organization's specific needs. Regularly assess the pulse of your workforce, solicit feedback, and remain adaptable to evolving employee needs and preferences.

A Late Starter's Guide to Effective Retirement Planning

Retirement is a significant milestone in life that requires careful planning and financial preparation. However, if you find yourself starting late in the game, there's no need to panic. While time may be limited, taking action now can still yield positive results. In this blog post, we will explore key strategies and steps to help late starters effectively plan for retirement. By implementing these practices, you can still work towards a comfortable and secure retirement, regardless of when you begin.

Assess Your Current Financial Situation

The first step towards effective retirement planning is to assess your current financial situation. Take an honest look at your income, expenses, and assets. Calculate your net worth and determine how much you can contribute towards retirement savings each month. Consider consulting with a financial advisor who can help you understand your financial standing and provide guidance tailored to your unique circumstances.

Set Clear Retirement Goals

Next, set clear retirement goals based on your individual aspirations and financial capabilities. Determine the lifestyle you envision during retirement and estimate the expenses associated with it. Be realistic about your expectations, factoring in potential healthcare costs, inflation, and any outstanding debts. Having specific retirement goals will help you create a more focused and actionable plan.

Maximize Contributions to Retirement Accounts

One of the most effective ways to catch up on retirement savings is to maximize contributions to retirement accounts such as 401(k)s, Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs), or their equivalents in your country. Take advantage of any employer-matching contributions offered by your workplace retirement plan. If possible, consider contributing the maximum allowed by the government each year. Additionally, if you're over 50, you may be eligible for catch-up contributions, which allow you to contribute extra funds to your retirement accounts.

Diversify Your Investments

When starting late, it's essential to make the most of your investment opportunities. Diversifying your portfolio can help manage risk and potentially increase returns. Consider a mix of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and other investment vehicles based on your risk tolerance and retirement goals. However, remember to regularly review and adjust your investments as needed to maintain an appropriate balance and align with your changing circumstances.

Reduce Expenses and Increase Savings

To make up for lost time, it's crucial to examine your current expenses and find ways to cut back. Review your budget and identify areas where you can reduce unnecessary spending. Consider downsizing your home, finding more affordable insurance options, or reducing discretionary expenses. Allocate the money saved towards your retirement savings to accelerate your progress. Every dollar counts when you start late, so prioritize saving as much as possible.

Consider Alternative Income Sources

If you find that traditional retirement savings alone may not be sufficient to achieve your goals, consider exploring alternative income sources. This could include part-time work, freelancing, or turning a hobby into a small business. Supplementing your retirement savings with additional income can help you bridge the gap and build a more robust financial cushion.

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Stay Informed and Seek Professional Advice

Lastly, staying informed about retirement planning strategies and seeking professional advice can make a significant difference. Attend seminars, read books, and stay updated on financial news. Consult with a financial planner who can provide tailored advice based on your specific circumstances. They can help you navigate complex retirement planning concepts, optimize your investments, and make informed decisions.

While starting late on retirement planning may seem daunting, it's never too late to take control of your financial future. By assessing your current financial situation, setting clear goals, maximizing contributions, diversifying investments, reducing expenses, exploring alternative income sources, and seeking professional advice, you can effectively plan for retirement. Remember, even small steps taken today can have a significant impact on your financial well-being in the future. Don't let the late start discourage you—start planning now and build the retirement you deserve.

The Power of Positive Thinking

“Optimism is the most important human trait, because it allows us to evolve our ideas, to improve our situation, and to hope for a better tomorrow.” ~ Seth Godin 

Believing in the power of positive thinking is one of the most effective ways to change your attitude. But this can be difficult for many people.

From the time we are young, we are told not to do certain things. We hear the words “no” and “can’t” more often than not. We go through difficult times; everything from divorce to the loss of jobs or loved ones. We could become bitter and negative about everything in life. 

Being optimistic is directly related to how we think. Positive thinking has the power to change a lot of things in our lives. Research reveals that positive thinking is more than just being happy or having a happy attitude. Positive thoughts can actually help you create life skills that last much longer than a mere smile. 

Negative thoughts, on the other hand, can narrow your mind and focus your thoughts. They keep you from seeing opportunities and moving forward – there is always that “what if” scenario going through your mind.

Positive thinking impacts your work, your health, and your life in every way. It’s been shown to affect how you develop your skills. It affects your health in how you see things. For instance, when you are happy, contented, and feel loved, you see more possibilities for your life. 

In this report, we’ll discover what “positive thinking” actually is and how it affects us. We’ll see why it works and how you can incorporate it into your daily life.

What is positive thinking?

René Descartes had it right when he said, “I think; therefore I am.”

What and who you are begins with a thought. The mind is a powerful tool that can make or break your life and your business success. You can use your mind to fuel business success, change your life for the better and improve your relationships with others. But what exactly is positive thinking? Is it simply putting on a happy face or does it involve more than that?

You’ve probably heard the saying “Is your glass half-empty or half-full?” How you answer that question provides some insight to your outlook on life and whether you are generally a pessimist or an optimist.

Positive thinking is basically your mental attitude. It’s an attitude in which you always expect good results. In other words, it’s the process of creating thoughts that can transform energy into reality. A positive attitude looks for happiness, health and happy endings in every situation.

Positive thinking is gaining popularity among many people.

More and more people will tell you they got where they are because of their positive thinking lifestyle. In fact, a person who faces their life with a positive mentality will almost always be more successful in both their careers and their personal relationships than the negative thinker.

Understanding positive thinking and positive self-talk.

Positive thinking isn’t the act of hiding from life’s tough or unpleasant situations. In fact, positive thinking means you approach those situations in a more productive and positive way, instead of with a negative attitude. You believe the best is going to happen. 

Negative people are worriers. They believe the worst will happen no matter what.

Positive thinking begins with self-talk – the thoughts that run through your head. 

Negative self-talk leads to a pessimistic outlook on life, while a positive outlook leaves you an optimist.

Positive thinking isn’t the idea that you see the world through rose-colored glasses by ignoring the negative things in life, though. Positive thinking means having a positive outlook, but you don’t ignore the bad things. It involves making the best out of a bad situation, or trying to see the best in others. 

Researcher and positive psychologist Martin Seligman put it this way: positive thinking is how you explain why something happened. People with an optimistic explanatory style will give themselves credit when good thing happen, but see negative events as temporary.

Those with a pessimistic style, on the other hand, blame themselves for all outcomes. They believe bad events will last and are to be expected.

There are health benefits that come from positive thinking as well.

Some of them include:

• Increased life span

• Lower rates of depression

• Lower levels of distress

• Greater resistance to the common cold

• Better psychological well-being

• Reduced risk of death from cardiovascular disease

• Better coping skills during hardships and times of stress

• Increased physical well-being

Positive thinking is more than just smiling and avoiding bad situations. Positive thinking is how you see every situation in a positive way. It reduces the stress on your body that comes from negative thinking. An optimistic and positive attitude leads to healthier lifestyles, both physically and mentally.

Why positive thinking works. 

You know what positive thinking is and how it can affect your health. But does it really work?

Can positive thinking improve your life or is it just a scam? 

Positive thinking is very effective at changing your life if you understand what it is and how it works.

Before you put on your rose-colored glasses, you need to realize positive thinking is more than just being overly optimistic about life. Psychologists suggest that you center on things like your belief in your abilities, to come at challenges with a positive approach, and try to make the best of bad situations.

Positive thinkers look at situations realistically while they look for ways to improve the situation and learn from their experience.

A lot of research has found that positive thinkers cope differently in their lives than other people do. They are problem solvers who try to improve their individual situations. If a bad situation can’t be improved then they are more likely than pessimists are to move on. 

Optimists are more likely to engage in healthy habits that will protect them against disease. They are less likely to smoke, drink heavily or eat poorly. They exercise, sleep well and stick to rehab programs. 

Optimism is associated with better psychological health. Optimists are less depressed, have less anxiety and face difficult life situations with less distress. 

Positive thinking has a positive effect on their bodies, leading to better decision-making and control over situations that optimists may find themselves in.

Positive thinking works by helping the body effectively change how you perceive bad situations in life.

How to incorporate positive thinking into your life.

Having negative thoughts can play havoc on your life. They can bring you pain and worry. They drain your energy and keep you at the moment instead of being able to move past it. 

Positive thoughts, though, can help you see solutions to a problem, help you move forward, and leave you feeling relaxed and full of energy. 

“See the positive side, the potential, and make an effort.” ~Dalai Lama

Now that you know what positive thinking is and how it can affect almost every situation in your life, you probably want to know how you can begin incorporating it into your life. 

Here are 11 things you can do to help overcome your negative thoughts:

1. Do yoga or meditate. 

Clearing your mind to allow you to focus your thoughts can bring your attention to what you need to be focusing on.

2. Look for the positive.

Be loving toward yourself and to others. Focus on your strengths and assets. Maybe you felt nervous when going to a particular event, but then you received lots of positive comments from others who were happy to see you. 

3. Smile.

Force yourself to smile. It really does help to change your mood. And it relieves stress too.

4. Surround yourself with positive people.

Get away from the negative people in your life. Talk to people who are positive.

5. Halt negative thoughts immediately.

When you catch yourself with negative thoughts, give yourself permission to stop it. Instead of thinking, “I can’t do that. I’m not talented enough,” say “I can do that. I am just as talented as anyone else.”

6. Don’t play the victim.

You are responsible for creating your life. If you don’t like the situation, change it.

7. List five things you are grateful for at this moment.

Being grateful is a form of positive thinking. 

8. Be nice to yourself. 

Treat yourself with respect. Treat yourself the same way you would treat someone else. Would you call someone else names like ugly, fat, or loser? Probably not. Then don’t do it to yourself.

9. No one is perfect. Move on.

Don’t dwell on your mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes. Learn a lesson from each of them and then move on.

10. Learn to accept compliments. Build your self-esteem, self-image, and confidence.

Take the compliment as it is meant to be given; as a gift. Compliments can help you build your self-image and self-confidence. 

11. Focus on what's possible.

Get rid of the negative words like “can’t.” Remind yourself that you don’t need others’ approval for your accomplishments. Focus on your own capabilities and what is possible. 

Incorporating positive thoughts into your life can change your future. You can become happier, healthier, and more successful if you believe you can.

How to encourage positivity around you.

What happens when you’ve changed your thinking into positive thoughts, but those around you are still negative? How do you change (or at least encourage) positivity around you? There are a few ways you can encourage positivity in others with your own actions. These work in not only workplace situations, but in the home and other places as well.

A few ideas to encourage positivity:

• Show gratitude towards others. Recognize others’ work and their contributions to your own success. Expressing gratitude can set a positive tone of respect from others.

• Focus on your strengths, as well as the strengths of others. Using our talents is a big confidence builder. Helping others use their talents to excel can boost their confidence too.

• Encourage others, especially children, to try or to keep trying. This can build their confidence and make them more positive.

• Balance out the negatives. We have a tendency to dwell on negative thoughts. Refocus your thoughts on the positive successes you have.

• Use positive words when speaking. Replace negative words with positive ones. Speak to others with positive words. 

• Use words that suggest strength and success. 

• Praise others when they do good things or achieve an accomplishment.

• Use visualization techniques with children. The visualization uses their imagination to help them see the positive. 

• Encourage them in private. Don’t bring up their mistakes in front of others.

• Explain others’ value.

• Stop finding fault with what is wrong and applaud what is right.

You can encourage positive thinking and attitudes in your surroundings by being positive in how you speak and act toward others. Praise others, offer encouragement when they do something good and stop finding fault in others.

Where to Go From Here

Positive thinking is more than seeing life through rose-colored glasses and avoiding bad things. It’s about a way of thinking that encourages positive outcomes. Positive thinkers seek solutions to problems. They see their value in different situations and can visualize their successes. 

You can build happiness and positive thoughts in your life through meditation, writing in a journal, playing games or whatever else that encourages positive thoughts. 

Positive people share characteristics that promote good health and overall happiness: 

• They think about and emphasize good things in life.

• They are grateful and thankful.

• They don’t complain.

• They feel they can do anything to achieve success and reach their goals.

• They believe in abundance.

• They are confident.

• They eat a healthy diet, exercise regularly and get enough sleep.

Having a positive attitude is something that can be changed. You don’t have to live with negative thoughts. When you catch yourself being negative, change the thought.

The Impact of Personality on Success

Okay, where are my personality inventory people????

Nothing to Hold You Back: Your Personality Means Your Success

When it comes to succeeding in life, introspection is a powerful catalyst to ensuring your success. Thankfully, today you have access from the comfort of your home to powerful and proven personality test technology that until now was only used in large corporations, psychological circles, and education settings.

If you want to know more about yourself, you can spend as little as 15 minutes taking a test that will give you tremendous insight into your own psyche. You’ll learn about both positive and negative factors of your personality that affects all aspects of your life. 

Once you learn these parts of your personality, you can work toward actually changing the negatives. You can also find ways to work around the negatives so that you can accentuate the positive aspects of your personality to reach more success than you ever thought possible.

About The Myers & Briggs Test

The Myers Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®), heavily influenced by Carl Jung’s work on “Psychological Types” published in 1923, was created by a mother and daughter pair: Isabel Briggs Myers and her mother Katherine Briggs conducted a study of personality types, due to Katherine’s curiosity of personality types influenced by her daughter’s fiancé’s different personality. Publishing the first finished questionnaire in 1943, it’s been updated and changed over the years to more match not only the times but also new insights into personality that has developed along with the advancement of computer technology.

The test was designed to determine, based on Carl Jung’s four dichotomies:

What Type of Energy You Have

The type of energy you have is categorized as either an extrovert, more commonly spelled extrovert, or an introvert. While you may be a combination of the two, typically you will lean to one side or the other. Extraversion can be described by the way you do things. Extraverts are gregarious, active, and enthusiastic. They are expressive with their feelings and like to initiate activities. Whereas introverts are more likely to stand back and be more contained. They are more likely to wait for someone to impart information on them than engage in small talk and can be very reflective and quiet preferring more intimate settings.

How You Gather Data

Another thing the four dichotomies look at is how you gather data about the world. You may be sensing, or you may be intuitive. What this means is that if you’re a sensing individual you think in more concrete, realistic and practical ways about the world. You are more likely to rely on traditional ways of doing things as well as your experience of how the world works. Whereas, if you are a more intuitive person you tend to go with your gut when making choices and gathering data. You are also more able to use your imagination to decide how things work because you are good at envisioning things in an abstract way. This enables you to come up with original ideas that others might not consider.

How You Make Decisions

With decision making, Jung believed that people were thinking or feeling or a combination of the two but usually leaned to one side on how they make decisions. Thinking people are logical and reasonable. However, if you’re one of these types you can be critical and hard. You tend to ask a lot of questions. Whereas if you’re a feeling decision maker you will use your innate ability of empathy, compassion and acceptance to make choices that align with your accommodating and tender personality.

How You Live Your Life

As you’re living your life you may be the type of person who is either judging or perceiving. If you’re a judging person you are very systematic, scheduled and methodical. You like to get started early and will typically choose a method that allows for more planning than your perceiving counterparts who are more open, casual and spontaneous. Perceiving people tend to be more likely to need a little push or outside pressure such as a deadline to get things done than the judging personality.

Once you understand these four dichotomies it makes it easier to understand how the test works to determine your personality. But, you may still wonder why you should take the test. Let’s go over a few aspects of that.

• Who Uses The Test? 

Usually, the test is used in education, career counseling, team building, professional development and life coaching. Individuals can use the test as well to help gain insight into their lives as they choose their life path.

• Why Do They Use the Test?

It’s used in any area that addresses the need for either an individual or a team to function better in life by using introspection and self-study to help you make better choices, enhance positive traits and learn import tools to deal with negative personality traits.

• How Does the Test Help Achieve Success?

The test helps give you new insight and awareness about your personality that you might not have otherwise. Organizations and groups can learn to work better together by sharing each other’s results openly.

• How Can the Test Help an Individual?

You will have many “aha” moments as you read your results. You’ll learn which career path is best for you, and even how to enhance the good aspects of your personality while turning potential negative factors into positives. 

Learning as much as you can about yourself is something everyone should seek to do. You may feel that this is silly since, after all you are –you—and you think you know yourself well enough. But, the truth is, taking this personality test and getting the results can change your life and set you up for untold success if you let it.

Let’s go over the 16 different personality types that will help guide your career choices and help you make better life choices if you read and study your results.

Hello, World!

Overview of the 16 Different Personalities According to Myers Brigg

The Analytical Personality Types

INTJ – “The Architect”

As an INTJ, your ideal career due to your planning capability and big-picture thinking should involve business leadership and project management roles. Your ability to break down projects into step-by-step plans that others can follow is ideal for managing teams and even entire businesses. Whether you’re an entrepreneur running your own business, a project manager, or a business manager you will excel due to your ability to make decisive decisions and strategically develop solutions to problems with big-picture thinking.

If you’re one of the 2 percent to have this personality type you have a firm belief that everything boils down to attitude and planning. With a penchant for making detailed plans and backup plans, at work you might want to be clear about which plans your team should follow so that there isn’t any confusion by setting up a system for the team to follow for everything from brainstorming to putting ideas into action.

You also need to be aware that with your habit of making contingency plans, you are still somewhat idealistic because you are confident that you can devise plans for any issue and solve any problem without help from others. It’s important to keep this in perspective and realize that if you’re working as a team, you will need help from them. You’ll need to avoid focusing so much on your own vision that you avoid listening to your team as team collaboration can add a lot to any idea and ultimately improve the results.

Tips: Accept your personality and toss out any notion of working in a structured environment. Try to let go of your tendency to be overly analytical which can come off as arrogant and judgmental. Since you are truly a person who can do anything due to your skills in all areas, choose something that lets your quick imagination and strategic mind to shine. Look into becoming an Online Marketing Manager to put all your positive traits to work.

INTP – “The Logician”

As an INTP you have a strong entrepreneurial spirit and prefer to work alone as a freelancer in such fields as technical writing, data analysis, software development, and research alone or in small groups. You are an innovative, idea machine. You love coming up with theoretical methods and concepts about any project or problem you face. You’re drawn to scientific, analytical ideals in the abstract. However, where you excel in coming up with amazing ideas, you aren’t so good at implementation and desperately need someone to help you with this aspect of your work.

You’re still a self-driven perfectionist with high standards, even though you need that extra push from outside your own mind to ensure that you get to the implementation point of any project instead of continuing to generate more ideas. In other words, you need to watch out for shiny object syndrome and stick to your plan of action and career choice to reach success. You’ll need to watch out for appearing condescending to your group due to your tendency to use others as sounding boards without taking into account their needs.

In some ways, you’re like the stereotypical “absent-minded professor” You have so many ideas that come to you at all hours of the day and night that you need to keep organized and act on. Finding a partner to offer accountability will help you put your genius to work so that you can see each project through to success.

Tips: Even if you’ve never written a word, consider how being a writer might work for your personality. You can use your ability to think outside the box, analyze data, and imaginative ability to write copy or even books. This type of career will enable you to stay private and avoid issues with having to follow too many rules and guidelines.

ENTJ – “The Commander”

As an ENTJ you have a keen sense of intelligence, determination, and self-confidence. You’re a fabulous communicator who excels at keeping other people on track, helping them get things done. Due to these skills, you will thrive best as a business owner, manager, leader, executive, entrepreneur, strategist, lawyer, and judge or executive.

You’re strong-willed and would not thrive in slow-paced positions focused on everyday administrative tasks. For example, you’d be very unhappy as a secretary or subordinate required to do routine daily tasks. You much prefer to be the overseer or manager focusing on the big picture. If you had to work in an office where you aren’t the executive, being an office manager would be more of your style.

While you have above-par communication skills and you’re excellent at sharing your vision with others, sometimes you can come off as dominant and overbearing due to your inability to sugarcoat things. Incidentally, you don’t really want people to blow smoke toward you either. Instead, you appreciate honest and constructive criticism. 

You also have no patience with others when you believe they are sloppy, lazy and worse, incompetent. You can be quite nasty to these people instead of considering whether or not they’re in the right position to do a good job.

Tips: Don’t let the need for more education put you off from reaching your ideal career goals. Learn to be more patient while harnessing your energy, efficiency, and ability to think clearly. This will allow you to be a charismatic leader.

ENTP – “The Debater”

As an ENTP, you are full of intellectual curiosity which in turn gives you unlimited ideas for solutions to problems both technical and intellectual. Your ability to see all sides of an argument and love for playing devil’s advocate would make you an excellent lawyer, psychologist, analyst, or research scientist. 

Due to your disdain for dealing with practical matters, you are most suited to be one part of a two-person partnership – as long as the partner carries the ability to follow through with your ideas and is on board with helping you stay focused.  Other careers that you can choose from are engineering, acting, and photography.

If you can control your urge to debate everything because believe or not some people don’t enjoy it as much as you do, you can be a natural leader who is quick on their feet and who inspires others to develop sound and logical systems. You might love working as a life coach.

Tip: You don’t have to be a lawyer to be successful even though your personality is perfect for becoming a litigator. Instead, you could harness your knowledge and charisma to become a life or business coach. 

The Diplomatic Personality Types

INFJ – “The Advocate”

As an INFJ you’re an extremely rare find as less than 1 percent of the population. You like to be productive and creative and will find joy in meaningful work in healthcare or counseling. You might also enjoy being a life coach, author, or blogger. The important thing to you, more than money, is the ability to feel as if you’re helping people and making the world a better place. 

In fact, you’re most likely to find satisfaction in starting your own business so that you can live your morals and values and not someone else’s. However, due to your soft-spoken nature, you tend to see subordinates as equals and that can make leading difficult people hard or even impossible. But, since you’re not really the analytic type and you dislike daily routine work you will have to go outside of your comfort zone to find a way to lead.

While you can be a strong-willed scrapper for a cause you care about you tend to put taking care of others ahead of taking care of yourself which can lead to burnout. Since being an entrepreneur is the career choice most likely to bring you happiness, your ability to let love and compassion rule your choices will pay off in the long run as long as you learn to speak up for yourself as much as you do for others without overreacting.

Entrepreneurship though, will only work if you can find a business that aligns with your morals and values, as well as allowing you to make the world a better place. But, you may need to hire a life coach yourself to help you narrow down exactly what you want to do. You have such a hard time figuring it out due to wanting to do so much. But, with your decisive nature, if you get help figuring it out you’ll end up on the right path to find success and happiness.

Tips: Even if you’re in a 9 to 5 career right now, you can break out if you want to. Your creativity and insightful nature will help you become an effective and successful blogger if that’s something you want to try. What’s great is you can do it while you work. Just be sure to ignore your perfectionistic tendencies to help you avoid getting stuck before you realize success.

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INFP – “The Mediator”

As an INFP your idealist and passionate nature can be hidden behind your reserved, private and self-conscious attitude causing misunderstanding about you as a person. To be truly happy you need to find work that allows your creative side to flourish while helping others; money doesn’t matter to you as much as the feeling of happiness. Work that can be done mostly alone, as an individual is most attractive to you such as being a writer or actor.

As a leader, you have a serious problem with any type of confrontation due to your disdain for conflict. This hate of conflict can actually cause you a lot of problems contributing to the fact that people have a hard time getting to know and trust you. Understanding this fact can help you work with the best parts of yourself in such a way that people finally start “getting” you.

You’re fabulous when working on projects. You’re open-minded and flexible, and you’re good at helping people get things done. Even if you have to do a bunch of boring tasks and drudge work, if you can convince yourself that there is an ultimate good in the work, you’re happy to do it. In addition to your above-average communication skills, this might make you an excellent Virtual or Personal Assistant.

A downside to your personality is that you dislike conflict so much that you might do things you don’t like doing longer than you should. You’ll need to be careful not to allow people to take advantage of your deep desire to help others. You’re a good communicator so use those skills to stand up for yourself. Say no to work that makes you feel worthless so that you don’t get depressed and isolate yourself to avoid conflict.

Tips: If you’re going to be a writer, you’ve got to let go of your adverse feelings about criticism and realize it’s not all meant personally. Even if someone disagrees with something you said, it’s not always about you. Use your open-mindedness to get along with others.

ENFJ – “The Protagonist”

As an ENFJ, you love helping and motivating people. Thankfully your resourcefulness and likable personality make it easy for people to trust you enough to let you help them. Some professions you will find happiness and success in include politics, coaching, teaching, team management, event coordinator, sales rep, and consultant. 

Anything that lets you help people over the long term using your eloquent communication skills and natural leadership ability, without having to think too fast on your feet is an ideal career choice to you. For example, while you like helping people you would not be great at being a first responder due to your inability to think fast on your feet.

If you were in a leadership position you would have a lot of trouble giving criticism to subordinates because you hate conflict so much. Instead, you’re more likely to try to help them turn their ways around because you’re so interested in their well-being. Though, with hard cases, you may get over-involved. You have to guard yourself against becoming obsessed with fixing things for others.

Sometimes in your desperation to help people, yet avoid confrontation, you can become passive-aggressive to ensure you meet your goal of helping the person. In addition, your need for appreciation and gratitude can stifle your ability to help people even though you mean well and really do care about others. Your motto can be said to be: people over data. 

Tips: You have the perfect personality to be a life coach. However, you cannot allow the failure of your clients to cause a dent in your self-image. After all, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink.

ENFP – “The Campaigner”

As an ENFP, you’re a free spirit, the life of the party, and a gregarious communicator that people love. You’ll love a career that helps you make social connections and keeps your energy up. Careers like journalism, acting, reporting, science, service, counseling, teaching, politics as well as researching interesting topics will fit well with your personality as long as the topics are interesting to you and each day is a little different.

You love learning so much that you find it hard to settle on one career in which to seek success. A common problem with this is that you stop doing something just as it’s getting ready to take off and become successful. You need to stick it out; instead of stopping each time, you get bored so you can feel your own success.

You’re not a big fan of doing daily tasks like paperwork, data entry, and bookkeeping or even cleaning out the dishwasher, you want every task you do to have deep meaning. Plus you really dislike rules and will often, in spite of your people-pleasing nature, buck the system when rules are in place. 

As someone who is a terrific listener who can offer insightful advice to others after talking to them for a while, you hate being micromanaged because you think it means the manager doesn’t trust you. You also will not micromanage people but tend to want to encourage people by making them like you and want to please you.

Tips: Your popularity quotient will make you awesome at becoming a Vlogger. You can do that using YouTube.com, or another video format on a blog. Just don’t over-schedule yourself or bite off more than you can chew.

The Sentinel Personality Types

ISTJ – “The Logistician”

As an ISTJ you have a lot of company since this is thought to be the most common personality type. You have a lot of integrity and are very dedicated to those you care about. You enjoy positions that are traditional, have rules, and standards, and allow you to take responsibility. You’re great at meeting deadlines, as long as someone else sets them. You’re highly uncomfortable with entrepreneurship, but it doesn’t mean you can’t learn. You might consider starting with a work-at-home job or a Virtual Assistant position.

You’re great at coming up with plans of action to get you from point A to point Z in any project. You can be super intolerant of other personality types who you work with. Keep this in mind as you work with others. People may look at a situation differently than you and that’s perfectly OK.

You love working alone and on your own terms. This makes you a great entrepreneur and business owner or manager. You can be honest to the core; even overly ethical if that is possible, taking the blame for things that perhaps could be shared with others. This could cause problems for you, and even make you lose jobs if you’re not careful.

Due to your high ethical standards, it’s hard for anyone to meet them. In this case, you often find yourself totally alone and isolated from others. It’s imperative that you learn to take care of yourself to avoid additional stress in your life. 

Tips: Whatever career choice you choose you’ll need to try to let go of your stubborn nature in order to avoid self-destructing. Whether you choose to work for someone else or work for yourself, it’s important that you try to be more sensitive to others.

ISFJ – “The Defender”

As an ISFJ you’re very well-suited to help others. You’ll enjoy working with customers directly as well as helping executives in support positions. Careers in medicine, academics or charity work are especially good for you. While you’re not likely to seek out a leadership position that you deserve, you should consider it. Chances are you are more than capable of doing the job due to your vast skillset.

Altruistic and generous to a fault, you’re a true “do-gooder” who is humble and kind.  Even though you are technically introverted you are well trained socially to network and meet people. You do like meeting people, and even being around people, but to stay on top of your game you need to take a break occasionally to be alone and recharge. 

Since you rarely take credit for work other personality types will take advantage of you. Using your skills to get ahead, leaves you behind. You need to learn when and how to say no. Let people know that you have too much on your plate. Just because you can do everything doesn’t mean you should.

You have the ability to understand others and be open-minded with people, making teaching a great career choice for you. Teaching doesn’t have to be in a traditional format, today with the advent of online schools you can find a position teaching online or even create your own courses and sell them via a course delivery system. 

Tips: Because you are a people pleaser who likes serving others and you don’t take credit for your hard work you may not be able to fully experience success. However, you will enjoy everything you do. Let go of your fear of change and start your own business. Everyone knows you’re more than capable.

ESTJ – “The Executive”

As an ESTJ, you’re very involved with tradition and order. Right, and wrong seems black and white to you. You are very honest and dedicated and love leading others by example. You might find your best career by becoming a community organizer, as that would fit your needs to help others.

As someone dedicated to dignity and leadership, you don’t like to switch jobs much and will stay as long as you can with one employer. If you start a business, you’ll be 100 percent dedicated to it and not distracted by shiny objects or promises of riches from gurus. You’ll stick to it, and work hard to become a success.

When working with others, the biggest problem you have is that co-workers see you as inflexible and unwilling to listen. You get so hyper-focused on one goal, one vision, and one way to do something you’re not willing to change. But, since you’re highly intelligent and work best with facts, with practice, you should be able to adjust this part of your personality and actively work on your listening skills. 

You’re great at sorting out details and making complicated tasks easier for yourself and others but you fail to understand why no one will listen to you. It’s important for you to realize that some people are different and that it’s okay to be that way.  If you want to be a true leader, you need to accept people as they are. Consider their needs and personalities and find a way to work together to meet your common goals. 

Tips:  You have many terrific qualities, but your judgmental behavior and inability to relax can hold you back; not because of lack of skill, but due to your perception of others. Learn to connect better with people and the sky is the limit of where you can go.

ESFJ – “The Consul”

As an ESFJ you’re very popular, well-organized, and altruistic. You love rules and authority whether you’re in charge or not. You’re well-suited for administrative work and accounting due to the order and rules required, but you also like people so you need to do these things as a self-employed individual. 

A lover of routine you like setting up or following strict systems to get things done in an orderly way. For example, you likely use a project management system to keep you on track with any work that you’re doing. You have a lot of common sense so you don’t find technology scary to use at all. 

Even though you’re not that accepting of other people’s differences, you do not like conflict and tend to try to be supportive and unite people. You love networking and consider it a joy rather than work. Even though you have a bad temper due to your tendency to stuff down feelings to avoid conflict, you are well-liked.

For the most part, you can enjoy almost any type of career choice, as long as you get to interact on some level with people. To do that, you need to be more accepting of differences and non-traditional ideas.

Tips: You have a great mixture of both outgoingness and the ability to analyze data. This puts you in a unique position where you can do all the analytic jobs yet, also deal with people – both things you love. This makes entrepreneurship perfect for you. 

The Exploring Personality Types

ISTP -- “The Virtuoso”

As an ISTP you love taking things apart and putting them back together. You love people and excel at working with others and networking. You have a high regard for freedom, and hold your principles dear. You’re a great problem solver, a skill found in mechanics, engineers, bloggers and graphic designers. Thankfully, most of these careers can be done as a freelancer. 

You prefer hands-on experience over book knowledge. You like being different for the sake of being different and will try anything once. Even though you like learning, it’s hard for you to stick to schoolwork due to your inability to focus.

Sometimes your behavior can be overblown and come off as insensitive. It can be difficult for you to find a company or organization to work with due to your unpredictability. If you can get a handle on your tendency to go too far in a crowd and harness your creative powers for good, you can be a great business owner. 

The ability to call your time your own is imperative for you to be happy and successful. However, you need to learn how to plan for the long term if you want to continue to be productive and run a successful business.

Tips: Because of the fact that you’re able to prioritize well, and you’re good at seeing the big picture, you will make a great freelancer. You’re self-motivated, optimistic, and very capable of doing any position on your own from your home office. 

ISFP – “The Adventurer”

As an ISFP you are naturally born artistic. You crave the ability to make your world more attractive and easier to live in. You will excel, given the time, as a teacher, counselor, artist, musician or photographer. But, not working 9 to 5 with someone else. Instead, you must freelance or consult to be truly happy. 

You love learning new things but find it difficult to choose a career due to not wanting to spend the time on long-term education. You need creative freedom more than things and money so you’re not overly motivated to work hard to achieve something you feel you can learn on your own.

Non-traditional, spontaneous, and unpredictable describe you. However, you’re still an introvert who needs to go into your cocoon for a while before returning as a beautiful, colorful social butterfly. Your passion is clear, and you are an expert networker who can work the system to get your way. Sometimes you come off as self-centered, selfish, and manipulative; however, it’s usually directed toward doing good and not being hurtful.

Not only are you terrible at taking criticism, but due to your dislike of conflict you’re not likely to lead by direct confrontation but rather by charming them into submission. As a freelancer, you’ll need to find someone who can make you accountable so that your poor self-image doesn’t get in the way of your success. 

Tips: You’re way too independent to be held down to a 9 to 5 job. You will be miserable being tied down. Take the jump and work toward having your own business and you’ll be most happy. Take the time to choose something that you are willing to stick to for a long time though. You can’t “job hop” when you have a business.

ESTP – “The Entrepreneur”

As an ESTP, you love being the center of attention and know how to get your way. This is why you make such a great entrepreneur. In spite of your networking prowess, you’re better at doing than talking about doing. What’s more, everyone wants to be on your team. They know a winner when they see it.

You love taking chances and gambling but you rarely lose. You have a deep dislike for too much organization, which can be a deterrent to your success. You’ll do best with hands-on learning which you can find it you look, so don’t give up.

You have super abilities such as being able to notice social cues easier than others. If you’re talking to someone and they are acting “funny” you know it and you have the ability to talk about something else, drawing the person into your web and winning them over.

Don’t get caught up and distracted by what’s happening right now, forgetting about the future entirely. Place your focus on one thing at a time so that you can experience success.

Tips:  Of course, with this personality profile you’re built to become an entrepreneur, but you must be patient and structured even if you need to bring on a partner to do it. Success can be yours if you’re willing to let go of your defiant nature and work with others.

ESFP – “The Entertainer”

As an ESFP, you’re a born party planner, actor, tour guide, travel agent, life coach, or any career that involves being highly connected to people. You need the immediate feedback of humans to feel accomplished and would be miserable stuck in an office all day in a cubicle dealing with numbers.

You love living in the moment and that’s where you are happiest. Too much planning for the future can make you jumpy and depressed. You have a magnetic personality. You love the spotlight so much that you can sometimes get carried away but you’re so charismatic and sensitive to others that most people love you in spite of it.

Sometimes you can be too focused on immediate gratification and not focused enough on the future. It’s challenging to do repetitive tasks and stick to any one thing for long even when it’s very important to do it for your future. You need someone to provide accountability so that you can harness all your energy to become more focused and do awesome things in the world. 

Tips: One thing you need to realize is that every job has something boring about it. Every job has paperwork. Every job needs long-term planning. Every job needs your full focus. These are skills you need to work on in order to be successful, regardless of which career you choose. 

Your Next Step

If you haven’t already, go take the test to find your personality type. The results may just surprise you. Be completely honest while taking the test. Do not answer the questions based on how you “wish” you were but instead on how you really are. Being successful starts with being aware of whom you truly are so do yourself a favor and answer the questions honestly. 

Look at your strengths and weaknesses. Write them down. Look for ways to overcome your weaknesses. Learn how to make better use of your strengths. Remember that a personality test is only as good for you as what you do with it. If you just read it and don’t put into action the suggestions you will continue to struggle to find success, but if you truly work it, nothing can hold you back.  

Self-introspection is an important part of your success because you only have control over one thing in your life, and that is you. You are responsible for your future, and only you can make the choice to put the information you’ve learned into action.

Mastering the Art of Discussing Finances with Your Spouse: 5 Strategies for Financial Harmony

Money is a fundamental aspect of our lives that impacts everything from our daily routines to our long-term goals. Yet, it remains a common source of stress and conflict within marriages. Open and effective communication about finances is crucial to ensure financial harmony within a partnership. In this blog post, we will explore five strategies to help you navigate and initiate conversations about money with your spouse, fostering a healthy and collaborative approach to managing your shared finances.

Establish a Safe and Judgment-Free Space

When discussing money matters, it is essential to create an atmosphere of trust and openness. Both partners should feel comfortable sharing their thoughts, concerns, and aspirations without fear of judgment or criticism. Designate a specific time and place for these discussions, ensuring minimal distractions and uninterrupted focus. This safe space encourages honest and productive conversations about financial goals, challenges, and dreams.

Practice Active Listening

Active listening is a skill that can significantly enhance your communication about money matters. Give your partner your undivided attention, maintain eye contact, and demonstrate empathy. Encourage your spouse to share their perspectives and truly understand their financial beliefs, fears, and desires. Repeat back what they have said to clarify and validate their feelings. Active listening fosters mutual understanding and enables you to find common ground when making financial decisions.

Align on Shared Goals

Aligning your financial goals is a crucial step towards a harmonious financial partnership. Take the time to discuss your aspirations and create a shared vision for your future. Set both short-term and long-term goals, such as saving for a down payment, funding retirement, or going on a dream vacation. Regularly revisit these goals to ensure they remain relevant and adjust them as necessary. By working towards shared objectives, you foster a sense of unity and purpose, making financial decisions more meaningful.

Be Transparent and Accountable

Transparency is the cornerstone of a healthy financial relationship. Share financial information openly, including income, expenses, debts, and investments. Regularly review your budget together and be honest about any challenges or concerns that may arise. Being accountable for your financial decisions fosters trust and allows both partners to actively participate in managing their finances. Consider creating a joint bank account for shared expenses and individual accounts for personal spending to strike a balance between individual autonomy and collective responsibility.

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Seek Professional Guidance if Needed

Sometimes, complex financial matters require the expertise of a professional. If you find yourselves struggling to make financial decisions or facing significant challenges, consider seeking guidance from a financial advisor or a marriage counselor with expertise in financial matters. These professionals can provide objective insights, help you develop effective strategies, and mediate any disagreements. Seeking outside help demonstrates a commitment to the financial well-being of your marriage.

Talking about money may initially feel uncomfortable, but it is an essential skill for a successful and harmonious marriage. By establishing a safe space, practicing active listening, aligning on shared goals, promoting transparency, and seeking professional guidance if needed, you can lay the foundation for open and effective communication about finances with your spouse. Remember, healthy conversations about money can strengthen your partnership, deepen your understanding of each other's values, and pave the way for a prosperous financial future together.

Starting an Online Business as an Introvert

Many introverts often wonder how to start an online business. After all, many entrepreneurs are extroverts who thrive on networking and social interaction. However, that doesn't mean that introverts can't succeed in the online world. In fact, there are several advantages to being an introvert when starting an online business.

Here are six steps to follow to start your own online business as an introvert:

Step One: Clearly Define Your Niche

Defining your niche and target market is essential when you first begin an online business. This information allows you to determine the products or services you'll offer and who your ideal customers are. As an introvert, it’s tempting to try to appeal to everyone, but it’s a mistake for all businesses, which means yours too. Instead, it’s vital to focus on solving the problems of a specific group of people – your ideal audience – so that it doesn’t cause you to become overwhelmed or unhappy.

Step Two: Create a Strong Brand

As an introvert, you may be more introspective and thoughtful than other entrepreneurs. But, the truth is, being introspective and thoughtful is an advantage when it comes to creating a strong brand for your business. Knowing makes your business unique, and what message you want to communicate to your target market is half the problem. Once you consider these questions, you can use that information to create a memorable brand identity.

Step Three: Build an Engaging Website

Your website is the first thing customers use to really get to know you. Think of it like a first impression. As such, ensuring that your website is engaging and user-friendly is essential. Start by ensuring that your site is well-designed and easy to navigate. Then, populate it with high-quality content that will appeal to your target market.

Step Four: Use Social Media Strategically

While social media helps you connect with potential customers, introverts may not be comfortable using it for business purposes. If this is how you feel, don't force yourself to use social media if you're uncomfortable with it. Instead, focus on other marketing channels that align with your personality, like SEO, blogging, or making videos. 

Step Five: Focus on Quality over Quantity

As an introvert, you may be more likely to focus on quality over quantity when it comes to your work. This is a significant advantage when starting an online business. In the online world, getting lost in the sea of mediocre content is easy. However, focusing on creating high-quality content will make you more likely to stand out from the crowd.

Step Six: Belief in Yourself

Last but not least, it's important to believe in yourself when starting an online business. There will be challenges. No one gets through a lifetime of business without a few bumps along the way, but if you stay positive and focused on your goals, you can achieve anything you want. So don't let your introverted personality hold you back; believe in yourself and your business, and you'll be successful.

Any introvert can succeed in the world of online business. So don't be afraid to take the plunge and start your own business. Your introverted personality just might be your biggest asset in the world of online entrepreneurship.

How to Use Social Media to Grow Your Business as an Introvert

Social media is just another tool for businesses to use in marketing. It can help you reach new customers, connect with other businesses, and even create meaningful relationships with your target audience. However, being an introvert, the thought of using social media to grow your business can be daunting. After all, it's often seen as a platform for extroverts, making it seem like it's not for you. The truth is that social media is a great way for introverts to grow their businesses.

Be Genuine

Show your audience who you really are. Being who you are will often make it easier for introverts put themselves "out there." When you're genuine on social media, people will kindly respond to you, which can help build trust and relationships with your target audience.

Be Strategic 

Growing your business on social media doesn't have to be a full-time job. In fact, being too active on social media can actually be detrimental to your business. As an introvert, it's essential to be strategic about how you use social media. That means posting regularly, but not too often, and when your target audience is likely to be on the platform.

Don't Use Strategies That Don't Work for You

Many social media "experts" out there provide strategies that they claim are “musts,” -- but not all of those strategies will work for you. If something doesn't feel natural or authentic, don't do it. There's no one tried and true approach to social media, so find what works best for you and your business that you can live with and that doesn’t feel traumatizing.

Ask Lots of Questions

One of the best ways to get to know your audience and build relationships is to ask questions. Questions show that you're interested in what other people have to say - and that can be extremely attractive to potential customers. On social media, you can use questions to start conversations, get feedback, and even create polls.

Focus on Quality Over Quantity

When it comes to social media, it's important to focus on quality over quantity. That means it's better to have fewer high-quality posts than lower-quality ones.

Take Advantage of Tools and Resources

Many social media tools and resources are available to help you grow your business on social media, and you’re sure to find one that fits your needs. For example, plenty of scheduling tools can help you automate your social media posts, so you don't have to do it yourself. There are also a number of apps and plugins that can help you track your progress, find new customers, and even measure your ROI.

By following these tips, you can use social media to effectively grow your business - even if you're an introvert. Remember to be genuine and strategic and focus on quality over quantity. With the right approach, social media can be a powerful tool for any business - including yours.

Tips For Running a Business as an Introvert

The Benefits of Being an Introverted Entrepreneur

As an introverted entrepreneur, you may feel like you have to put on a persona that isn't really you in order to be successful. As the common myth goes, entrepreneurs should be outgoing and sociable. But the truth is that introverts can be just as successful in business as extroverts. In fact, there are many advantages to being an introverted entrepreneur. 

Here are seven of them…Which of these are your favorites?

You're Highly Focused 

A precious quality of an entrepreneur is the ability to focus. And as an introvert, you are likely exceptionally good at focusing on tasks and getting things done. This ability to focus can be a great asset in business as it helps you stay on track and reach goals. 

You're Good at Listening

As an introverted entrepreneur, you probably know the value of listening more than talking. However, listening is a valuable skill in business, as it allows you to really understand your customers and what they want.

You're Creative

Introverts tend to be highly creative. Likely due to all the time spent alone thinking and recharging. This creativity can be a great asset in business, as it can help you come up with new and innovative ideas. Without creativity, businesses can quickly become stagnant.

You're Thoughtful

Introverts are often very thoughtful and considerate in their actions. This quality can be valuable in business as it allows you to make well-thought-out decisions that are in the best interest of your business.

You're Not Afraid of Taking Risks

Many introverts are actually quite daring and not afraid of taking risks. This helps you to take the necessary risks to be successful. Most businesses start from risk and require it daily to grow. If risks are avoided, businesses will fail.

You're Good at Networking

Even though you may not enjoy large social gatherings, you will still be good at networking. This is because introverts are usually good at one-on-one interactions, which work great in building networks and growing strong relationships. This ability is valuable in business as it helps to grow your business. 

You're Self-Motivated

As an introvert, you are likely very self-motivated. This is important as it can help keep going even when things get tough. No one tells you exactly what to do or directs you every step in business, so it's essential to be self-motivated.

These are just benefits of being an introverted entrepreneur. If you're an introvert, don't let that stop you from pursuing your dreams of starting your own business. Instead, embrace your introversion because you can use it to your advantage. Doing so can help you to be a successful entrepreneur. 

Make the Most of Your Introversion in Business 

Introversion is often seen as a hindrance in business, but it doesn't have to be. There are many ways that introverts can use their natural tendencies to their advantage in business. 

Use Your Introspection to Your Advantage

A really fabulous part about being an introvert is that you tend to be very introspective. You're always thinking about what you're doing and how you can improve. This quality can be a great asset in business as you continually seek to improve. So use it to your advantage by constantly evaluating your work and looking for ways to improve.

Leverage Your Listening Skills

Introverts are great listeners. Introverts are almost always paying attention to what's happening around them and are quick to pick up on nonverbal cues. This makes you very good at active listening, which is a valuable skill in any business setting. To get ahead in business, make sure to always listen first. 

Think Before You Speak

Introverts are known for their thoughtful, considerate responses. They take their time to process information before they speak, which can be seen as a strength in business. In fast-paced business environments, it's crucial to be able to think on your feet and make quick decisions. But it's also essential to take a step back and think things through before you make a decision. To be successful in business, learn how to strike a balance between these two tendencies. Don’t be afraid to take extra time when you need it. 

Know Your Limits

As an introvert, it's important to know your limits. It’s really easy to get overwhelmed, so it's important to know when to take a step back and recharge. Then, once you’re rested, come back to the task at hand with fresh energy and a clear mind.

Find Your Niche

Many different business niches are perfect for introverts. If you're an introvert, finding a business niche that suits your personality is important. For example, if you're an introverted writer, you might want to start a blog or write a book. Or, if you're an introverted salesperson, you might want to focus on online sales or B2B sales. There are endless possibilities for introverts in business. It's just a matter of finding the right niche for you.

Play to Your Strengths

As an introvert, you can use many of your internal strengths to your advantage. For example, you're probably very good at concentration and paying attention to detail. In addition, you're good at problem-solving and thinking creatively. Use your strengths to your advantage in business, and you'll be sure to succeed.

If you're an introvert, there's no need to feel like you're at a disadvantage in business. Rather than being disadvantaged, introverts can use their natural tendencies to their advantage. So instead, make the most of your introversion by learning how to accommodate for it. 

12 Ways Introverts Make Excellent Business Owners

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The Keys to Success as an Introverted Entrepreneur 

If you want a successful business, you may feel like you have to work twice as hard as extroverts. But know this, you’re not alone -- many entrepreneurs are introverts. While it may seem like extroverts have all the advantages when it comes to networking and building relationships, there are plenty of keys to success that introverted entrepreneurs can follow.

Here are seven keys to success as an introverted entrepreneur: 

Find Your Passion

The first step to success as an introverted entrepreneur is finding your passion. What are you genuinely passionate about? What excites you? What makes you want to wake up and work every day? When you find your passion, it will be easier to build a business around it in which you are truly invested.

Know Your Strengths

As an introvert, you likely have a unique perspective and set of strengths that you can bring to your business. Use these to your advantage. Play to your strengths and outsource or delegate the rest. This will help you focus on what you do best and grow your business more effectively.

Build a Strong Support System

No entrepreneur is successful alone. That’s why it’s imperative that you build a strong support system of family, friends, and mentors who believe in your vision and can help you when you need it. With a supportive network, you can weather any storm and come out stronger on the other side.

Create a Strict Schedule 

Good advice for entrepreneurs of all types is to create a schedule and stick to it. This is especially important for introverts, who can easily become overwhelmed by too much stimulation. By creating a daily or weekly schedule, you can ensure that you have time for both work and rest- and that you're not overloading yourself with too much at once.

Take Time for Yourself

To be successful, you need to take time for yourself to recharge – “you can’t pour from an empty cup.” But, remember, the cup is refillable! So, refill yours often by taking time for yourself. This may include things like reading, spending time in nature, or taking a break from social media. Whatever helps you relax and rejuvenate, be sure to make time for it.

Network Effectively

Networking is essential to any business but can be difficult for introverts. However, there are ways to network effectively as an introvert. Try attending networking events that are smaller or more intimate or meeting potential clients one-on-one. Connect with other entrepreneurs online through social media or professional networking sites.

Believe in Yourself for Real

Believing in yourself is the last and most important key to success as an introverted entrepreneur. It may be easy to doubt yourself, but you need to remember that you are capable of great things. When you have faith in your vision and your ability to execute it, you will be able to overcome any obstacle.

Don't think you can't be successful if you are an introvert. You can create a thriving business aligned with your passions and strengths -- introvert or not! Just remember to believe in yourself -- you have what it takes to succeed.

The Pros and Cons of Being an Introverted Entrepreneur

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There are many personality types in the business world. Some people are natural-born leaders, outgoing and extroverted. Others are more introspective and thoughtful, preferring to work behind the scenes. Some fall somewhere in between.

Unsurprisingly, many successful entrepreneurs and business owners tend to be introverts. After all, it takes a certain amount of self-motivation and drives to start and grow a business. But being an introvert has its own set of challenges, both in terms of running a business and in terms of interacting with customers, suppliers, and employees.

Here are some of the pros and cons of being an introverted entrepreneur:

Pro: You're Comfortable Working Independently

One crucial advantage of being an introvert is that you're comfortable working independently. This can be a significant asset when you're running your own business. You don't need constant interaction and stimulation to be productive, which means you can get much work done without interruption. In addition, you can focus on complex tasks and come up with creative solutions when you're alone.

Con: It Can Be Difficult to Delegate Tasks and Build a Team of Employees

Since you're used to working independently, it can be difficult to delegate tasks and build a team of employees. It can be a big disadvantage if you're trying to grow your business. If you're not good at delegating, you'll do a lot of the work yourself, which can lead to burnout. And if you're not good at building a team, you'll have difficulty scaling your business.

Pro: You're Able to Focus Deeply on Your Work

Because you're comfortable working alone and don't need a lot of stimulation to be productive, you can focus intensely on your work. With this skill, you can get a lot of work done without getting distracted, which means you can make a lot of progress in a short amount of time. This can be a major asset when trying to scale your business quickly.

Con: You May Have Trouble Networking and Building Relationships with Potential Customers and Partners

This can be a big disadvantage when you're trying to grow your business. You'll need to make a concerted effort to network and build relationships if you want your business to succeed. 

Pro: You're Good at Problem-Solving and Thinking Outside the Box

Since you're comfortable working independently and can focus deeply on your work, you're good at problem-solving and thinking outside the box. This can be a major advantage as you can develop creative solutions and discover new ways to market your business.

Con: You May Prefer Working Alone

This can limit the growth potential of your business. If you're not good at networking or building relationships, you'll have a hard time finding customers and partners. And if you prefer working alone, you'll have a hard time delegating tasks and building a team. This will also mean you are doing all the work alone, leading to burnout.

Pro: You're Good at Planning and Organizing

Planning and organizing are essential skills for any entrepreneur or business owner, and introverts tend to be good at them. This is because they're used to working independently and can focus deeply on their work -- a major advantage when you're trying to grow your business, as you'll be able to create efficient systems and processes.

Con: You May Be Overly Cautious and Risk-Averse

You'll need to strike a balance between being cautious and taking risks if you want your business to grow. If you're too careful, you may miss out on opportunities. And if you're too risky, you may make costly mistakes.

Being an introverted entrepreneur has pros and cons, but it can be a successful business venture if you strike the right balance. For example, if you're decent at networking and building relationships, you'll be able to find customers and partners. And if you're good at planning and organizing, you'll be able to create efficient systems and processes. But you'll need to be careful not to be too cautious or risk-averse. Strike the right balance, and you can be a successful introverted entrepreneur.

Ten Tips for Networking as an Introverted Entrepreneur

Networking is a big challenge if you consider yourself an introvert. You may not enjoy the process of meeting new people and making small talk, but it is essential for growing your business. There are plenty of ways to network successfully as an introvert. With a bit of planning and effort, you can make connections that will help you reach your goals.

Here are ten tips for networking as an introvert:

Make a Plan

Before you go to a networking event, take some time to think about your goals. Who do you want to meet? What information are you looking for? What questions will you ask or want them to ask you? A plan will help you focus your energy and make the most of your time.

Do Your Research

Who is attending the event? Who would you like to connect with? Conduct research to find out if you share any common interests or connections you can use as an icebreaker.

Dress for Success

First impressions matter! Ensure that you look your best. Wear what makes you feel confident and presentable and represents your brand and goals as a business owner. 

Be Prepared

Consider a few conversation starters and be ready to talk about your business. Practice your elevator pitch so that you can deliver it with ease.

Set Limits

Don't try to do too much. Networking is exhausting for introverts, so take breaks when you need them. Stepping away for a few minutes to recharge is acceptable, and no one will likely notice. This also means scheduling fewer events throughout the week. 

Listen More Than You Talk

You’re likely more comfortable listening than talking as an introvert. Use this to your advantage by asking questions and really getting to know people. People will be grateful for your interest and be more likely to remember you.

Follow Up

After meeting someone, send a follow-up email or connect with them on social media. This will help keep the connection alive and allow you to further the relationship.

Join Groups

There are plenty of networking groups that cater to introverts. These can be a great way to meet new people in a comfortable setting.

Attend Events Solo

It is scary to go to a networking event yourself, but it's also an opportunity to stand out. People will approach you if they see you're open to meeting new people, so pay attention to your body language, so people know you’re ready to meet new folks.

Be Yourself

Don't try to be someone you're not. For better or worse, you are who you are. It’s too exhausting to try to be someone you’re not. So just be you. People will appreciate your authenticity. Plus, you'll be more likely to make lasting connections.

Introverted or not, networking is an essential part of the business. You can make the most of your personality and build relationships to help you reach your goals. Just give it some consideration and act accordingly. 

How to Promote Your Business as an Introvert

You may feel like you're at a disadvantage when it comes to promoting your business as an introvert. After all, extroverts seem to have all the fun and make networking look easy. But don't despair - there are plenty of practical ways for introverts to promote their businesses. You just have to know how to work with your strengths.

Here are six tips for promoting your business as an introvert:

Learn to Get Comfortable with Self-Promotion

This may not come naturally to you but getting comfortable with self-promotion is essential if you want to be successful in business. That doesn't mean you have to be brash or pushy, but you do need to be able to talk about your accomplishments and what makes your business unique.

One way to make self-promotion easier is to focus on helping others. When you're promoting your business, think about how you can provide value to your potential customers or clients. What problem are you solving for them? Why would they want to collaborate with you? Focusing on how you can help others will make it easier to promote your business in a way that feels natural and authentic.

Use Social Media Strategically

Social media is actually a wonderful and effective tool for introverts who want to promote their businesses. You can connect to potential customers and clients without interacting with them face-to-face. When using social media, it's essential to be strategic. Identify which platforms your target market is most likely to use and focus your efforts there. 

Don't try to be everywhere - it's better to have a strong presence on one platform than zero action on many other platforms. Also, ensure you're creating quality content that will engage your target market. No one wants to follow a business that just posts marketing messages all the time - that's boring and annoying. So instead, focus on creating engaging and valuable content that will resonate with your audience.

Build Relationships One-on-One

Even though you're an introvert, you can still build strong relationships with potential customers and clients. In fact, one-on-one interactions can be much more effective than networking events or other large gatherings. So, when meeting new people, take the time to really get to know them. Discover their business, their goals, and their challenges. 

Ask questions and listen attentively. The more you get to know a person, the easier it will be to build a strong relationship with them. And don't forget to follow up. Once you've met someone, make sure to stay in touch. Send an email message, connect with them on social media, or send them some snail mail if you have the info. A little effort helps you build strong relationships as an introvert.

Leverage Your Writing Skills

If you're an introvert, there's a good chance you're a fairly good writer. Writing is a highly valuable skill when it comes to promoting your business. Use your writing skills to create helpful blog posts, articles, and even social media content. By providing valuable information, you'll be able to attract potential customers and clients to your business - without having to interact with them directly. If you're able to write well, you can also use that skill to create marketing materials like brochures or website copy. Again, the focus should be on providing value and helping potential customers rather than just selling them something.

Get Creative with Your Marketing

There are a plethora of effective ways to promote your business - you just have to get creative. For example, you can partner with another business in your industry. This can help you reach a new audience and build relationships with other businesses in your field. Another option is to hold an event, either online or offline. 

This can be a great way to connect with potential customers and clients while showcasing what your business has to offer. Don't forget about Guerilla Marketing. This type of marketing involves using nontraditional methods to promote your business. It can be something as simple as leaving flyers in local cafes or putting up posters in busy areas. Get creative and think outside the box.

With effort, you can be just as successful as any extrovert. Remember to focus on building relationships, creating quality content, and leveraging your unique skills and strengths. And don’t fear being creative with your marketing. With the right customer-centered approach, you can successfully promote your business - even as an introvert.

Six Tips for Building Relationships as an Introverted Entrepreneur 

Building relationships are vital if you want to be a successful entrepreneur. However, this may seem difficult or impossible if you are an introvert. You may feel like you don't have the skills to build relationships or are not outgoing enough. However, many introverted entrepreneurs have successfully built relationships with the right tools and information. 

Here are six tips for building relationships as an introverted entrepreneur:

Don't Try to Be Someone You're Not

Don't try to be someone you're not just to build relationships. It’s vital for you to be who you are without judging yourself. Be genuine and honest with the people you meet. Trying to be someone you are not only leads to burnout. Plus, it is also evident to those around you and makes it more difficult to build genuine relationships. 

Create Opportunities to Connect

Introverts may not be the best at networking events, but that doesn't mean you can't create opportunities to connect with others. You can reach out to people you want to connect with and invite them to coffee or lunch. 

You can also join groups and organizations that are related to your industry. The best thing about creating these opportunities is that you can set them up in how you communicate best. For example, you can have a one-on-one conversation instead of being in a large group or start a Zoom meeting instead of going in person.

Be an Active Listener

Introverts are often good at listening, which is a strength you can use when building relationships. Be present and engaged in the conversation when you are talking to someone. Show that you are interested in what they have to say by making eye contact and asking relevant questions. This will make the other person feel valued and appreciated.

Make an Effort to Connect

It's important to make an effort to connect with the people you meet. If you're introverted, this may mean pushing yourself outside your comfort zone. Converse with people, exchange business cards, and follow up after meeting them.

Attend Networking Events

Networking events allow you to meet new folks and build relationships with them. They can be intimidating but try to see them as an opportunity to practice your social skills. Attend as many networking events as you are comfortable with and talk to as many people as possible.

Join Professional Organizations

Professional organizations are another great way to meet new people and build relationships. Many of these organizations have networking events that you can attend. They also offer other benefits such as educational resources, discounts, and access to a community of professionals.

Building relationships is vital for all entrepreneurs, but it can be especially important for introverts. These six tips will help you build relationships and succeed as an introverted entrepreneur.

Succeeding in a World That Loves Extroverts

The world loves extroverts. That's a fact. Just look around, and you'll see that the vast majority of people are extroverts. It is not a bad thing, but it can make life difficult for introverts. But, if you're an introvert, don't worry. There are plenty of successful introverts out there. In fact, introverts often have certain advantages over extroverts. 

Here are six tips on how to succeed as an introvert in a world that loves extroverts:

Embrace It and Be Yourself

The first step requires that you embrace your introversion. Just because the world loves extroverts doesn't mean there's anything wrong with being an introvert. In fact, there are a lot of great things about being an introvert. Embracing your introversion will help you be more comfortable in your own skin and make it easier to deal with the challenges that come with being an introvert.

Find Your Tribe

It's essential to find other introverts to connect with. However, just because the world loves extroverts doesn't mean you only have to be close friends with them. In fact, it's often easier and more enjoyable to connect with other introverts. There are plenty of online and offline groups for introverts, so there's no excuse not to find them.

Recognize and Use Your Strengths

As an introvert, you have a lot of strengths that extroverts don't. For example, introverts are typically good listeners, great at problem-solving, and very thoughtful. Use your strengths to your advantage, and you'll be surprised at how far you can go.

Know When to Step Outside Your Comfort Zone

Just because you're an introvert doesn't mean you have to live a life of complete solitude. There will be times you must step outside your comfort zone and interact with people. The important thing is to stay calm and focus on the task at hand. It's also an excellent tip to have an escape plan in case you start to feel overwhelmed.

Create Your Own Success

The best way to succeed as an introvert is to create your own success. Don't wait for someone else to give you an opportunity. Make your own opportunities. This might mean starting your own business, authoring a book, or creating a blog or website. Whatever it is, ensure it's something you're passionate about.

Be Confident

Just because you're an introvert doesn't mean you have to be shy or insecure. Be confident in yourself, your abilities, and your ideas, and the world will notice. Presenting those skills slightly differently than an extrovert doesn’t make you wrong or more likely to fail. 

You can use these ideas to succeed as an introvert in a world that loves extroverts. If you remember these tips and put them into practice, you'll be well on your way to success. So embrace your introversion, find your tribe, and be confident. The world is waiting for you.

5 Ways To Positively Focus on Personal Finance

Why You Need To Keep A Household Budget 

We work hard to earn a living. We should make sure we spend the money we bring home wisely. That’s where a household budget comes in. It’s a good tool to see at a glance what we have coming in, what’s going out (and what that money is paying for) and if there’s anything left at the end of the month to put into savings. 

Before we dive into exactly what a budget can do for us, let’s consider for a minute what will happen if we’re not tracking income and expenses. We may end up spending more than we’re making in a given month (or two, or three). Over time that can put us into some pretty hot water financially. We may also spend a lot more than we’d like to believe on things like eating out, going to the movies or new clothes. 

Having a budget gives us more control over where we want to really spend our hard earned cash. Maybe that’s dinner and a movie, but maybe it isn’t. Wouldn’t it be nice to have an actual choice? 

It Tracks Where Your Money Is Going 

A budget simply tracks your money. You record where the money comes from each month (your income) and then write out everything you spend it on, starting with your regular monthly bills like mortgage or rent, car payments, utility bills etc. What’s left after all the bills are paid is your discretional income. 

Helps You Identify Things You Waste Money On 

Having it all in front of you in black and white helps you identify things you’re wasting your money on. 

It makes you reconsider if you really want to spend well over $200 a month on Cable TV or $150 on your large cell phone plan. Or how about that yearly magazine subscription to something you no longer read? Go through your expenses and reevaluate if this is REALLY how you want to spend your paycheck. 

Allows You To Be Proactive About Savings 

Saving money without a budget is hard. We go in with the best of intentions at the beginning of the month, but somehow there isn’t anything left at the end of the month. 

A budget gives you a chance to be a bit more proactive. Set aside some money for savings at the beginning of the month, even if it’s just $20. Put it in the budget as a regular expense, just like you do with your other urgent bills. If you need to, open a separate savings account so you’re not tempted to spend it. 

Ensures You’re Not Spending More Than You’re Making 

Most importantly, your budget will keep you on track and help you make sure you’re not spending more than you’re making. And I don’t have to tell you that that’s pretty important for your financial well-being. 

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Put Your Savings On Autopilot 

Putting a little money away for a rainy day isn’t always easy. You may have some good intentions, but at the end of the day, there just isn’t any money left. Somehow whatever you make is spend before you make it to the next paycheck. 

Start by making a personal budget. Take a look at what you bring in each month. Next, write down your fixed expenses. These are things like rent, car payments, utilities etc. Figure out how much you need each month for groceries and other essentials. This is your bare bones budget. It’s good to know what you need to get by each month. 

Next it’s time for a little bit of math. Start with what you bring in each month and subtract all your core expenses. What you’re left with is your discretional income. This will pay for entertainment, clothes, getting your nails done etc. And from here on out, part of that discretional income will go into a savings account. 

Pick a number you’re comfortable with. Maybe that’s just $20 per month, maybe it’s $500. Put it in your budget and treat it like any other bill. It won’t take you long to get into the habit of setting aside that money for savings. 

To make it even more hands-off, talk to your bank about setting up a separate savings account. Then set up an auto-deposit to have the savings transferred to the new account as soon as your pay check comes in each month. If you don’t see it, you’ll never miss it and your savings will run on autopilot. 

Don’t forget to audit your savings from time to time. Take another look at your budget. Can you increase your savings a little more? Another great way to boost that savings account is to take any extra money – thinks like birthday cash, tax return, bonuses etc. – and put them straight into the savings account. Again, you won’t even miss the money, but it will help you build up your savings quickly. 

Make sure your savings are sitting in an interest bearing account. Since you won’t be touching this money unless it’s a dire emergency, you should be able to earn at least a little interest. Talk to your banker about your best options and start putting your savings on autopilot. 

One last tip: Talk to your employer about matching 401K funds. You may be able to get a contribution from the company you work for towards your retirement savings account. 

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How To Plan For Unexpected Expenses 

It’s just a matter of time before it happens. The transmission blows on your car right around the time your daughter needs braces and your washing machine decides to call it quits. All of these are unexpected expenses and something we need to deal with throughout life. 

Being prepared as much as you can is your best bet when live throws you a financial curve ball. Do your best to anticipate upcoming expenses. If you’re driving an older car, or your dishwasher has seen its better days, start saving up to replace the item. You may also want to start keeping an eye out for good deals on the replacement. 

An even better strategy is to have an emergency savings fund. Set up a savings account and add to it monthly. Use it only for completely unexpected expenses. Make sure you know what’s in the account. And once you have to take money out of it replace it as quickly as possible. 

This brings us to a good point. Here’s how to recover quickly after that purchase. Go over your budget (you have one of those, right?) and look if you can temporarily cut back on some things. Stop ordering Pizza every Friday night and make your own at home. Skip a night out on the town and watch a couple of movies on Netflix instead of going to the theatre. 

Use the money you’re not spending for the next few months to refill your emergency fund. For an extra boost, work a few hours of overtime, do a few freelance projects or temporarily pick up a part time job to get back on track fast. 

But what do you do when the expense comes up before you had a chance to set up the emergency fund? Take a deep breath and assess the situation. Can you make do without the item for a little while? Just long enough to scrape together the funds to repair or replace it. If it’s the dishwasher, that’s easy. You can wash dishes by hand for a little while. If it’s the fridge or the car you rely on to get you to work each day, that’s a different story. 

If you need the item that broke, evaluate if it would be less expensive to repair than replace. Even if it isn’t the perfect solution, it may get you to work until you can safe up for a different car. Shuffle your money around and if there is no other option charge it to the credit card and get to work. Your one and only goal right now is to pay off that expense. If you stick every penny of discretional income in, it won’t take you long. 

One your bills and credit cards are paid off, do what you can to get that emergency fund set up. Because you know something else will break down the road. Do You Have A Financial Safety Net? (And How To Build One) 

Do you have a financial safety net? It’s something worth thinking about and setting up. What will happen to you and your loved ones if you lose your job for a few months? What if you get into an accident that may prevent you from earning a living? Or what if some unexpected expenses come up. Do you have anything in place to make sure the bills continue to get paid and your family is taken care of? 

If not, now is the time to get started. But where do you actually start? Having three to six months’ worth of living expenses tucked away in an interests-bearing account is a good beginning. Figure out what your family needs to comfortably live on if all income stops. Then start saving as much money as you can until you have built up this safety net. 

Put the money you usually spend on going out to eat, going to the movies, buying the newest TV and Tech gadget and the likes into your savings account until you’ve saved enough to have a comfortable cushion. Take make this step go even faster, add any bonuses, tax refunds etc. as well. 

Don’t just stop there. Make it a goal to add to your safety cushion as you can and come back and revise your numbers from time to time. Your living expenses may go up or down over time and you can adjust how much you need to set aside in quickly accessible money accordingly. 

Life and disability insurance are another important part of your financial safety net, as is your retirement money. Do you have a plan in place to continue to cover your living expenses (or those of your family) when you can no longer work? Call up your insurance agent and go over your current coverage. Make sure the insurance you’re paying for will pay out what you need and if not, make adjustments. 

Once you have those two parts of your safety net firmly in place, consider investing any additional savings into higher interest-bearing accounts. While you may not be able to access any money invested here right away, it will come in handy when you’re dealing with a long-term financial emergency or are ready to retire. The plus side is that there are plenty of investment vehicles out there that will get you a much better return than your plain savings account at the bank. Talk to your financial adviser and come up with a plan that’s right for you, your family, and whatever the future may hold. 

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Keep Your Grocery Spending Under Control 

Aside from your mortgage, your biggest monthly expense is likely groceries. And unlike your mortgage, your car payment and most of the rest of your bills you actually have some control over how much you spend at the grocery store. 

Make A Grocery Budget 

Start by tracking how much you’re spending on groceries for a few weeks. From there, come up with a weekly or monthly budget. Allot that money for groceries and whatever you do don’t go over. 

Next, try cutting back your budget by $20 per month. Keep going and see how low you can go. The remaining tips will help you do that without feeling like you’re depriving yourself. 

Keep A Price Book 

Who doesn’t love a bargain or a good deal? They are all over the store, but do you know if what they advertise as a good deal is actually saving you money? 

Keep a little notebook in your purse or keep a text document on your phone with the regular prices of the items you buy most often. Not only can you see if that “deal” really is a deal, you can also determine what kitchen staple is cheapest where and adjust your shopping accordingly. Your price book will also come in handy when you browse through weekly grocery flyers. You can decide if a loss leader deal is worth driving to the store long before you ever set a foot out the door. 

Come Up With A Few Frugal Dishes 

You don’t have to make drastic changes and eat nothing but rice and beans all week. Instead think of a few inexpensive dishes your family enjoys. They may be rice and beans. Or how about a big pot of soup or chili. Often meatless dishes will be your best frugal bet, or use meat in small portions on frugal dish days. 

Enjoying frugal meals even just a handful of days during the month combined with using up any and all leftovers will make a big difference in your grocery budget. 

Cut Out The Extras 

Make a list before you head to the store and stick to it. All those little extras like the fancy bread from the bakery or the candy you grabbed at checkout start to add up. Get in the habit of skipping those extras unless there’s a good reason to buy them. Stick to your list and you’ll cut your grocery bill by quite a bit each week. It’s amazing how all those little extras add up.  

Give these tips a try and see if you don’t start to see big savings on a weekly basis. What you do with all the extra money each month is up to you. Save up for a fun summer vacation, pay off those credit cards or start building your financial safety net. 

10 Ways to Boost Your Confidence When Life is Trying to Keep You Down

No matter who you are, where you live, or what you’ve chosen as a career, life is stressful. Even the most successful people in the world have endured tough situations and they made the conscious decision to take control of their lives, take advantage of every opportunity given to them, and change their stories into ones of success. Building up that confidence to tackle challenges and grab opportunities is a trait we should all strive to improve.

If you’re feeling like life is getting the best of you, incorporate some of these tips into your daily life so you can feel a boost of confidence. These confidence boosters will magically lighten your emotional load so you can focus on the positives in life instead of the negatives. Confidence brings a brighter outlook on life which naturally leads to less stress and the ability to recognize beneficial opportunities.

Just remember…low confidence is not genetic. You’re not destined to always suffer from low self-confidence but you may have to work harder to overcome that weakness. Here are some easy tips for boosting that self-confidence:

1. Take care of yourself every single day. Starting from a shower in the morning to washing your face at night, daily hygiene is a symbolic way to wash away the negative mojo from yesterday and start fresh today. Some women also notice a marked difference in their confidence when they add just a little makeup or lip color.

2. Dress your best. While it may sound cozy to work at home in your PJs, many experts agree that productivity and self-confidence improve when you dress for the day. One friend told me she did her best work when she wore fancy high heel shoes! You don’t need a full-on business suit to be productive but choose something more business-casual as opposed to gym clothes or pjs after your shower.

3. Be aware of your self-talk. How is your inner ego treating your outer self? If you overeat at lunchtime or devour an entire box of your favorite cookies, does your inner demon berate you? Take notice of how you treat yourself when you “fall off the wagon” and turn that negative self-talk into positive self-talk. Instead of berating yourself for unbecoming behavior, turn that into an opportunity to exercise or to meditate instead. Or take a moment and actually TALK to yourself out loud with reassuring words. 

4. Take action every day. Nothing occurs in life without action. Students can’t get an A on a paper or test without studying hard. You can’t balance a checkbook without analyzing your expenses. You can’t earn a promotion without a strong work ethic. You can’t find new clients without marketing your business. Go one step further and think positively, which will then carry over into your actions. Instead of believing you can’t do something, change that into a can-do attitude. Soon you’ll discover how to find the silver lining in every situation.

5. Set a small goal and celebrate the win. Whether you need to shop for groceries, email your subscribers, or take time to exercise, set that goal as a priority for the day and celebrate when it’s complete. Enjoy the accomplishment and that lightened feeling it brings! Go one step further and schedule that goal task for early morning so your accomplished feeling lasts throughout your day.

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6. Incorporate small habits into your daily life. What could you do with an extra 10 minutes in your day? Tiny habits are all about taking small, minute chunks of time and using it wisely. So if you woke up 10 minutes earlier tomorrow, would you meditate, practice yoga, journal, or simply start your daily routine without feeling rushed? Small habits could be absolutely anything but that sense of accomplishment will motivate you to do more throughout the day. So this tip really goes hand-in-hand with number 5 above. You don’t need to solve the world’s problems but pick something small and dedicate a small amount of time to it. Soon you’ll link multiple tiny habits together and have a full-fledged productive routine!

7. Focus on solutions instead of problems. Focusing on problems alone leads to complaining and I’m certain you’ve seen your fair share of complaining on social media! Don’t become one of them! When something goes wrong, focus on how to fix it. Find alternatives instead of finding someone to blame. Sure, disappointment or anger over a problem is natural reaction but the key is not to dwell on this negative reaction. Do what you can to fix the problem and you’ll feel an immediate confidence boost when the problem is resolved (whether you get any credit for being the problem solver or not).

8. Be grateful. Gratitude is so easy to forget about in the course of a busy day. While gratitude journaling is popular these days, practicing gratitude can be as simple as saying, “Thank you for another beautiful day” when you awaken. Or “Thank you for preventing my getting into an accident” if you have to slam on your brakes. You can also profess gratitude with a simple phone call or email to special friends, simply thanking them for all the good they bring into your life. Recalling all that is good in your life can fill your heart with warmth and will also boost your confidence when you realize all your good choices have led you to this place.

9. Conquer self-limiting beliefs. As the old quote from Henry Ford reads, “Whether you say you can or can’t, you’re right.” As we grow older, we start to lose confidence in our abilities and those self-limiting beliefs take root in our brains. To rebuild confidence, tackle each of those beliefs by stepping out of your comfort zone. More often than not you’ll come away from the experience thinking it wasn’t as bad as you thought it would be. Then you’ll be ready to move on to the next belief!

10. Gain inspiration from the backstories of people you admire. We can all use a dose of inspiration nowadays but if you have a celebrity, business person, or author you admire, learn about their lives and how they overcame adversity. This is not to draw comparisons or to make you feel like you should be further ahead in reaching your goals; to the contrary, this is to inspire you that ANYONE can overcome challenges and still come out with confidence and success. Looking at their challenges, maybe you’ll realize that YOUR challenges aren’t nearly as bad as you once thought.

Take comfort in knowing that your confidence can be regained! Give yourself a confidence booster every day as needed until you see your mood lifting and your outlook on life turns more positive.

Your Plan to Passive Income Streams

WHOA - y’all - can you believe it’s been a YEAR since I posted a blog? So much has been going on and happening in my world - day job, side hustle, swim team, marriage, etc. - but I think I’m finally around the bend.

As of late, my big passion is working on multiple passive income streams - online printables, workbooks, ebooks, and other goodies. Because frankly - my day job has ramped up SO much that I need to rethink some priorities. But I really need some extra money right now - and this income idea makes the most sense to me.

Enjoy this marathon blog post with five sections on how you can create your own passive income stream - PLUS some fun exercises and resources! Here we go…

5 Reasons You Need a Passive Income Stream

Have you heard the phrase, “Make money while you sleep”? It’s a common phrase thrown around the internet marketing world that describes the power of passive income. Make a product one time but reap the rewards for years to come.

Passive income can benefit absolutely everyone, no matter what type of business you have or what type of coach you are. The key is to make product creation as simple and as inexpensive as possible. This doesn’t mean your product will be cheap; it means you should focus on your area of expertise and solve a common problem among your audience. 

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Let’s review why coaches need to create a stream of passive income:

1. Supplement your income when a client cancels their contract. No one wants to think about losing a client (or two!) but it happens. Instead of panicking at the idea of finding a new client to fill that space, you can approach the task calmly, knowing you have a passive income to fill that gap temporarily.

2. Expand your name recognition and attract new buyers from your target audience. The world is a big place and you always have the opportunity to reach new people in your target audience. Using your products as a giveaway or pricing it on the low end will entice these newcomers to learn more about you and your coaching practices.

3. Attract speaking or media engagements. Event organizers and reporters are constantly searching online for speakers or interview subjects. If you have products as part of your business and have a consistent marketing plan, the media will likely find you faster in their online searches. Adding these events to your media profile will immediately elevate your authority level, too.

4. Lead your prospects through a sales funnel, ultimately leading them to your more expensive coaching packages. A sales funnel is a must-have for coaches because people want to know about your practices prior to paying hundreds or thousands of dollars on a coaching package. Showcase your expertise with smaller, more inexpensive products first, then entice those buyers with your higher-priced packages.

5. Use products as part of your overall marketing plan. When you have products, you can run promotions that garner lots of attention on social media. Offer a freebie, a bonus if they buy a coaching package, or offer a chapter of your ebook as a teaser to entice them to buy. Unique promotions will attract attention from new prospects in your target market.

Check out this free webinar from my buddies Julie and Cody who have totally made bank on teaching people to create passive income in this way!

Creating Products Your Clients Will Actually Buy

I’m a big believer in creating passive income for your coaching business but many coaches don’t know what to offer or think that their one-on-one coaching services are enough to sustain their lifestyle.

Sure, your clients hire you for your specific skillset and specialty but wouldn’t you like to earn more in your business? Wouldn’t you like to cash in on the phrase, “Make money in your sleep”? Wouldn’t you like to reach more of your target audience who aren’t quite ready to purchase your big-ticket coaching packages?

This is why you need products to sell in addition to your coaching services. 

What Will They Buy?

A simple way to determine what your audience needs is to simply ask them. Create a survey with Survey Monkey and ask your followers on social media and on your email list to complete it. Maybe what they are looking for is a simple ebook or a workbook. Others may be looking for a class to resolve their particular problem. 

Also, ask your current coaching clients what they need. This is especially important to retain them as clients after their coaching sessions end. What’s the logical next step for them to continue learning with you?

Identify Your Target Market

You have likely done this exercise already however it’s important to reanalyze your market and identify any changes that may have occurred. Have you stayed true to your initial business plan of attracting your target market or are your clients at a lower income level? How do you attract new prospects?

By creating lower-priced products, you’ll attract people who aren’t quite ready to purchase a high-priced item. However, these are still good prospects to have in your sales funnel because they can start slowly with your lower-priced items, and as their income increases, you can offer higher-priced items, eventually leading to your highest-priced product. While they progress through your products, they will see you as a credible expert and will trust this expertise, especially when you offer your higher-priced coaching sessions.

Answering Your Questions About Sales Funnels and Why Coaches Need One

One question I am asked all the time by my readers is what is a sales funnel and why is it important to have one? I guess that’s really two questions but they go hand in hand so I’ll tackle answering them together.

A sales funnel is a pathway through which you guide prospects into the depths of your business. Unless your prospects have unlimited funds, you will rarely find someone ready to purchase your highest-priced coaching service. Likewise, if you’re planning a weekend retreat in a faraway land, very few will shell out $10,000+ unless they already know you and like what you have to say.

Hence the need for a sales funnel.

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Anatomy of a Sales Funnel

No doubt you have seen pictures of funnels, where the widest opening is at the top of the funnel with the smallest opening at the bottom. The idea behind this graphic is that you’re attracting as many people as possible at the opening of your funnel and bringing them down to the smallest opening, where your most expensive product is offered.

Every step along the way, from the wide opening and downward into the funnel, you need to make offers to this audience and usually, they are incremental in price. These offers make chronological sense to the consumer and after they purchase one product, they are more likely to purchase a second due to liking your content and your style of coaching.

What Can I Offer?

At the opening of your sales funnel, you want something with a mass appeal so you’re attracting a large number of people. It can be a freebie, a chapter from your book, a recording of an interview, or anything that will showcase your coaching.

Once people have responded to that freebie, I prefer to offer low-priced items throughout my funnel. These types of products give your audience a low-risk way of experiencing your coaching skills and beliefs. These low-priced items can include ebooks, workbooks, e-courses, or a membership site. 

How Can I Get Started Creating Low-Priced Items?

The key to creating low-priced products for your sales funnel is that they should be quick and easy to create. You don’t need ghostwriters or a huge team to create the products I’m talking about. The idea is to pull your expertise out of your head and get it onto paper or video. No extra research is necessary…it’s all about what you know (CLICK HERE for a free ebook to help you get started!)

How Consistent Product Branding Can Lead to Increased Sales

I have no doubt that before you opened your coaching doors you thought long and hard about the branding of your company, from the logo design to the colors of your website. The same kind of branding strategy should occur when you’re creating products for your audience.

While the product graphics don’t have to look exactly like your website, there should be repeating elements so your subscribers and clients will recognize the product as being yours. Whether that’s the same color palette or font, repetition develops trust and name recognition. And once people trust you, they are more likely to become repeat buyers.

Repetition is also important when you have a series of products, whether it’s a series of ebooks, webinars, or classes. For instance, do you know that section of Amazon that shows the “Customers who bought this also bought” section? If an author’s series of books show up, all looking similar in design, the reader would know right away that this author is a credible authority because, after all, look at all the books she’s published!

If the books in this section are all different in design – whether it’s because they are by different authors or because the series author didn’t think about consistent branding – the credit rating is not as dramatic. The readers might think they belong to all different authors or they cover topics different from the original book they published. Make it as easy as possible for customers to recognize and purchase your products through consistent visual branding. Making them confused or having to jump through hoops will lessen your sales and possibly hurt your credibility.

What Types of Products Should You Offer?

So many coaches focus on high-end products and forget that not all their clients will purchase their high-end products right away. In fact, that’s the rarity instead of the norm.

In most cases, people will hear your name and want to learn more about you. But they’ve worked hard for their money and will likely want to hear you speak or understand what your coaching practices and beliefs are prior to buying a package from you.

What better way to encourage potential new clients than to offer low-end products for them to test out before buying a high-end coaching product? 

Don’t Be a Copycat; Create Your Own Path

By now you probably have figured out that I’m a big believer in creating low-end products for your coaching business. There are plenty of coaching gurus who tell you to go after the high-end clients and you might think you can’t get those clients without offering high-end products.

But let’s think about it this way…does a high-end client start off as a high-end client? Or does that high-end client start off as a low-end client who increases her earnings year after year to eventually become a high-end client?

Food for thought.

Your own coaching success won’t be based on how other coaches structure their businesses. Your success is directly correlated to the amount of work you put in, the products you create, and the way you market yourself. Take control of your own destiny and make your business choices based on what YOU feel is the right move.

Just because Coach A is basing her clientele around that high-end demographic and doesn’t offer products doesn’t mean you have to do the same. Yes, be aware of your competition and what they’re doing in their business but do things your own way. 

Be original. Identify your target market and its pain points. Jot down their demographics and where that audience can be found online. Ask them what types of products they would like to see or that they desperately need. Plan your pricing based on what your market can handle as opposed to your own monetary goals. 

What Types of Products Can Coaches Offer?

You’re only limited by your own creativity but some of the easiest products to create are ebooks, workbooks, e-courses, and recurring revenue sites. They should be easy to create because you’re using your own expertise and experience to create these. No need for expensive ghostwriters or a team of researchers.

If the idea of creating products is daunting, or if you’re already coming up with excuses of why this idea won’t work for you, make sure you check out the free resources from Gold City Ventures: their ebook and workshop.

And remember, low-end products do NOT mean low quality! You should always over-deliver on your content and these products are no exception. Join us to learn how to work these products into your sales funnel and coaching business.

How to Truly Conquer Your Fears and Be More Confident

Acknowledge Your Fears and Conquer Your Low Self-Confidence

Fear can be one of the most crippling influences on your business success. If you take the time to sit down and list out all the fears you face as an entrepreneur in today’s world, the list can get quite long, quite fast. These are some of the most common fears business leaders experience:

• Fear of trying new things

• Fear of failure

• Fear of losses

• Fear of letting others down

They are all valid fears, especially if you own a business that employs others. That means other people rely on your success for their livelihoods and security. However, when these fears prevent you from moving forward, they become largely self-fulfilling. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to break free from these fears so you can accomplish the success you deserve once and for all. This is how you begin.

Know Your Own Value

If you don’t know it already, take a little time to discover that you are more than the sums of your parts. We all have strengths, weaknesses, knowledge, and talents. Some people are fortunate enough to have outright gifts they choose to share with others. It’s not a lack of experience or ability that is holding you back. It is, however, a lack of confidence. Until you understand the gifts you bring to the table, you’re going to struggle with self-confidence.

Find Ways to Improve Your Value

Some people choose to focus on eliminating the negatives but that isn’t always the best choice. It takes far more time to eliminate negative tendencies or overcome knowledge deficiencies than it would to improve your skills and talents and hire someone to tackle the tasks where you are less skilled. For instance, if you have a real gift for empathizing with people but aren’t as gifted at keeping your finances in order, hire a bookkeeper to work part-time handling those tasks while you develop your talents to grow your business.

Invest in Yourself

Take a class to help you develop the skills you need to grow as a person and as a business leader and innovator. If you lack self-confidence, taking classes in the areas where you feel deficient will help you grow your confidence. Knowledge, as they say, is power. Classes help you not only gain knowledge but also develop your talents and interests so you can accomplish impressive things with your business.

Get over Yourself

This isn’t meant to be negative or insulting. Sometimes, you are your biggest obstacle. This is often the result of the fear of failure rather than a lack of confidence. You have to risk failure in order to find amazing success.

Eliminate Negative Self-Talk

Finally, mute the voices inside your head that feed your doubts and fears. If you can’t turn them off, drown them out with positive affirmations, building yourself up, and reminding yourself of all you’ve accomplished until now – and that you’re not finished yet!

Conquering low self-confidence is all about changing the narrative in your mind. Once you’ve mastered that, you’ll open yourself up to greater success.

30 Day "Create Calm" Challenge!

If 2020 taught us anything, it was that we need some calm and comfort in our life.  There's just no room for "that kind" of stress any longer - life is too damn short.

This challenge consists of a daily email for 30 days.  By the end of the challenge you'll be able to:

• Embrace living a truly calmer life
• Get rid of clutter
• Utilize concrete methods for addressing chaos
• Understand what leads to chaos and squash it!

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How Taking Small Actions Can Build Your Confidence and Your Business

Building your business requires action; success is not something that can appear out of thin air or be granted by a magic genie. As the old saying goes, “Slow and steady wins the race,” but sometimes you’re simply overwhelmed by the list of things to do that wait for you. It’s not about moving mountains in the course of a day or taking over the Western world of business in a single year.  

Success in business comes by taking small actions daily. More importantly, these small actions compound over time and lead to small successes that build your confidence, creating momentum for larger successes down the road.

It Only Takes a Spark to Start a Fire

If you’ve ever watched a group of scouts trying to learn how to start fires, you understand what this means. Different troops use different tactics to create that spark:

• Flint and steel

• Magnifying glasses

• A bow and spindle

• Two rocks

Each of these methods requires small actions to create the spark that becomes a fire. In business, you don’t even need to take all the small actions in a single day, week, month, or year. The key is to take small actions consistently so you can make great things happen.

Use that Spark to Fuel Your Confidence

Those tiny sparks start more than fires for your business. The small actions used to create the sparks have cumulative effects on your business. They build, one on top of the other, while also building your confidence along the way.

When was the last time you noticed the look on someone’s face when he or she accomplished the task at hand? The sense of accomplishment? The enormous personal pride? Each time you accomplish one of these small tasks for your business, you will have that same sense of pride, accomplishment, and confidence. 

Break Down Larger Goals into Smaller Tasks

According to Inc.com, one of the reasons highly successful people are able to accomplish more in a day than the rest of us is because they understand the value of breaking large goals into a series of smaller tasks. This gives them the opportunity to accomplish something every day that gets them closer to their larger goals. 

Accomplishing Tasks Keeps You Looking (and Moving) Forward

Business owners always want to be moving forward. The more steps you take toward your goals, the faster your business can grow and evolve. The more you do to help your business get there, the greater your sense of accomplishment, confidence, and purpose.

One of the real secrets for success is not to sit back and relax once you’ve accomplished one of your larger goals. While you may want to take a moment to congratulate yourself on a job well done, now is the time to shift your focus to new tasks and goals.

It's amazing how important it becomes for business leaders to continuously strive to accomplish more. It’s part of what separates those who are content to settle in their businesses from those who might someday take top spots in their fields and industries. What small actions have you taken today? What’s on your list for tomorrow?

How to Boost Your Self-Confidence Before a Media Interview

Media interviews can be incredibly useful tools for helping to share your message with your community in addition to introducing yourself and your business to a wider, local audience. However, in order to truly shine during a media interview, you must first have a healthy dose of self-confidence to get you through the interview process.

Create “Talking Points”

When preparing for the interview, it is often best to have the main list of talking points you hope to stick with. Depending on the anticipated length of your interview you may want to have a few brief talking points, or you may be able to address some of your main points more in-depth. Your “talking points” list is helpful either way.

This helps keep you in familiar territory throughout the interview, allows you to tailor your message to the audience you’re addressing, and keeps the topic from devolving into the realm of the unfamiliar. It’s a huge confidence boost to you to have a list of talking points you can draw from because it keeps the interview in familiar territory.

Remind Yourself that Someone Wants to Hear Your Story

Whether you’re launching a book, introducing a new product to the world, announcing a workshop, or simply educating audiences about the risks and rewards of the services you provide, someone was interested enough in your message to conduct an interview. That has got to boost your own inner confidence a little.

Embrace Brevity

You don’t want to re-invent the wheel with your interview. Keep your answers brief and avoid going “over the heads” of your audience. Besides, keeping answers brief helps the audience stay engaged and increases the odds that your message will resonate. You know your stuff. Now put it into words the average person can understand.

Stay on Target

Resist interviewer attempts to take you off the topic at hand. Keep your questions and answers on target so you’re never in dangerous territory. Stick to the topic you know best and let your knowledge, expertise, and experience shine during the interview process.

Familiarize Yourself with the Show

Watch a few video clips of past interviews to allow you to get to know the interviewer, the interviewer’s style, and whether the interviewer tends to try to lead guests off-topic. This will help you prepare for whatever he or she throws in your direction while training you to identify these characteristics for the next media interview you must endure.

List Your Accomplishments

Write them down on paper. This isn’t for anyone but you. You just need to review the list before going into the interview so you can remember your value to others. The better you understand that value, the greater your confidence going into the interview.

Media interviews can be intimidating, especially if you haven’t done many up until this point in your career. They do not have to be intimidating, though. The steps above can help you develop the confidence you need to ace your interview while feeling calm, prepared, and relaxed the entire time.

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How to Build Trust with Your Clients When You Really Want to Hide

Building trust with your clients is essential for maintaining effective long-term relationships with them. However, some business leaders struggle with building these types of relationships. There are many reasons this can be a struggle:

• Lack of confidence in your abilities

• Low self-confidence

• Imposter syndrome (you may feel as though you’ve lucked into success and haven’t really earned it)

• You’re holding back because you’re afraid they won’t find you worthy

Any one of these fears can create a wall between you and your clients that prevents you both from the type of relationship and results you desire, especially if you’re trying to hide essential parts of who you are from your client. Fear can be devastating to your attempts to build trust but there are things you can do to stop hiding from your clients and build the type of trusting relationship you both deserve.

Be Responsive

Whether your clients call, send emails, send text messages, or fill out help tickets on your website, you need to respond promptly. This makes them feel like their concerns matter to you and that you are listening to them. That will help them trust you more and it’s something small you can do to build it. Of course, this doesn’t mean being on call 24/7. Set your business boundaries and explain to your clients when they can expect to hear from you.

Be Clear in Your Communication

The written word is beautiful. It has been used to create marvelous works of fiction, letters of love, and treaties of peace over millennia. It is also notoriously imprecise if you aren’t careful. Think about it: People argue over what songs mean, what poets intended, over what the framers of the constitution meant. 

This lack of clarity is the precise reason we need lawyers to look over contracts before signing them. People are deliberately imprecise at times. Don’t give your clients the appearance that this is your goal. Write clearly in plain language. Make your message heard. It shows trust in their interpretation of your words and confidence in your ability to convey your message.

Give Extra

Perhaps the biggest thing you can do to build trust with your clients is to always give them more than they expect. Whether it’s an extra bonus item, a condensed study guide, or even an easy-to-use flow chart of the information you’ve gone over with them. When you give more without asking for anything in return, it breeds trust and sets the expectation that you’re dealing honestly with your clients. 

Their faith in you boosts your own confidence creating situations in which you’re building deeper connections and trust unconsciously.

Building better trust with your clients when you’re feeling as though you’re not worthy of their business can be very difficult, but it’s not impossible to overcome. If you take a few moments every day to address their concerns, answer their questions, and, most importantly, solve their problems (address their pain points), you will cultivate incredibly loyal customers for life. You cannot really ask for better than that when working to grow your business.

Why Staying in Your Comfort Zone is Stunting Your Business

Comfort zones. We all have them. They are fuzzy. Warm. Comfortable. Many people, in life and business, can be perfectly content remaining in their comfort zones forever because it’s comfortable there. 

It’s like your favorite, threadbare, flannel pajamas. You might live in them when you’re not headed out for a day at the office or lunch with friends. But you’re not really going anywhere as long as you stay in those pajamas. 

The same holds true for business comfort zones. You gather a collection of clients you’re comfortable with. You develop a few key skills you’re familiar with. Then you hit a holding pattern. You’re not losing business but your business also isn’t growing. It isn’t evolving and it will never become all that it can be as long as you remain firmly planted inside your comfort zone.

How do You Break Out of Your Comfort Zone?

When you reach the point where you’re no longer expanding your business into new markets, bringing in new clients, or learning new skills to grow your business, you’re going to need to shake things up to get the growth you seek and that your business deserves. These are some things you can do to help shake things up and take a walk outside the lines your business has been boxed into.

• Design a new product. Not only does this exercise increase your personal creativity but it gives your business a new way to reintroduce yourself to your existing customers and to reach out to new audiences.

• Write a book. Writing a book introduces you to a much larger audience. The book doesn’t have to be about your business, but it will certainly help you grow your business, not to mention establish you as an expert in your field if it’s business-related.

• Consider public speaking. Groups are desperate to have speakers come in for a variety of topics. In fact, many of them struggle to find professionals and business owners willing to take the time to do so. However, speaking to these groups gives you much-needed exposure, helps you make new contacts for your business, and may even introduce you to potential joint-venture partners along the way. You can ask at your public library, your local chamber of commerce, or even local civic groups if they need public speakers.

• Teach a class. You know what you do best. You certainly know it well enough to build a career around it. Helping others to learn about the things you do every day or offering a sample of the skills you teach in your in-depth classes can bring you more customers than you ever thought possible. Most communities offer adult learning or adult education classes. Volunteer to teach a class on a topic that showcases your individual talents.

Your comfort zone may feel comfortable for a while. Before too long, though, you will begin to understand that it’s really stifling growth for your business, preventing you from taking risks that fuel giant growth and training you to settle for less in business and in life. Don’t settle for your comfort zone. Be bold. Be unpredictable. Be innovative and watch how quickly your business grows.

How to Establish a Better Bedtime Routine in Just One Week

When Should You Go To Bed?

The first step toward establishing a good bedtime routine is deciding when you should go to bed. There are a couple of things to consider here. Your weekly routine is part of it, as is how much sleep you need per night. Let’s look at these things and discuss how you can use them to guide you toward a good bedtime for yourself.

Look at your weekly schedule. Is there a certain time you have to get up? Most of us have to go to work or get the kids to school. Start with when you know you have to leave the house. From there, think about how long it takes you to get ready. Are there any morning routines that will take additional time? Do you have to get other people ready, fix breakfast for everyone, or start a load of laundry before you leave the house? Add all that time up and come up with an estimate of when you need to wake up to get it all done.

I’m calling this an estimate because if you don’t currently have a good routine and are winging it, your first guess might be off by a little. That’s okay. As long as you’re in the ballpark, it won’t be hard to make a few adjustments.

The next question is what do you do if your schedule changes from day to day, or what do you do about the weekends when you don’t have to be anywhere at a given time. It’s a good question and the answer is simple. You want to get into the habit of waking up at the same time each day. That means you want that time to be the earliest you have to get up during the week. If that means getting out of bed at six every morning, then that’s the time you want to pick. It may not sound like a lot of fun, especially if you’re struggling to get up that early right now, but there’s a reason for it. It will become routine and after a few weeks of getting up at six every day without fail, it will be easy. Trust the process and give it a try.

Next, decide how many hours of sleep you need per night. Most people need between seven and nine hours. If you're not sure the optimal number of hours of sleep you personally need try starting with 8 hours and go from there. Let’s stick with the six am wakeup example. To get eight hours of sleep, you need to fall asleep by ten pm at night. Since none of us can put our head on the pillow and fall asleep, a good bedtime would be nine-thirty.

Now it’s your turn. What’s the earliest you need to get up? Subtract eight and a half hours from that time and make it your regular bedtime for a week or two. How does that feel? If you consistently wake up well before your alarm, you may only need seven hours of sleep. If you still feel tired after establishing your bedtime routine, you may want to try giving yourself an extra half an hour of sleep and see if you do better with that. Above all, stick to going to bed and getting up at the same time each day - even on the weekend and when you’re on vacation. Your body and mind will thank you.

Simple Ways To Introduce Calm Into Your Evenings

Many of us struggle to fall asleep at night. We toss and turn, or pop supplements and pills before we can drift off. If you are having trouble falling asleep, or simply want to work on a better bedtime routine, here are some simple ways to introduce calm into your evenings. If your mind and body aren’t overstimulated, it’s easier and quicker to fall asleep at night.

Stop the Caffeine Early

Caffeine has surprisingly long halftime, which means it stays in our system longer than we think. You may have built up a tolerance and tell yourself that you can drink coffee or caffeinated tea late in the day, but it will not help you fall asleep. Most experts recommend you stop drinking caffeinated beverages between noon and two pm. Stick to that for a while and see if it helps you stay calm in the evenings and get sleepy around bedtime.

Turn Off The Screens

I’m sure it comes as no surprise to you that screens like computers, televisions, and especially tablets and phones make it harder for you to fall asleep. The reason why is because the light they emanate mimics the sun and tricks our bodies into thinking it’s earlier in the day than it is. That in turn throws off our circadian rhythms. Phones and tablets are particularly bad because we hold them so close to our faces. I encourage you to turn off all screens for at least two hours before you go to bed. It will make a bigger difference than you think.

What about blue light blockers or filters? They will help and are better than nothing, but they will not help you establish a good bedtime routine. It’s okay to not check your email until the morning. Now is also a good time to be honest with you. Are you doing productive things on your phone, or are you scrolling social media, playing games, and letting yourself be entertained? Give putting your phone to the side at night a try and see if you don’t start to sleep better.  

Lower The Sounds And Lights

At the same time, it’s a good idea to start lowering the lights and anything you may be listening to. It even helps to lower your voice and invite your loved ones to do the same. Use softer light bulbs, and turn off any overhead lights. They mimic the sun and can trick your body into thinking it’s still early in the day.

Now that we talked about everything you shouldn’t do during the hours before bedtime, let’s discuss a few things you can do that promote calm. Reading a book is a good idea, as is sitting together in quiet conversation. Listen to some music or play a relaxing board game with your family. Or take this time for yourself and indulge in some self-care.

Taking a warm bath or shower has been shown to promote sleep. Light a candle, turn on some soothing music and meditate or write in a journal. Spend some time unwinding and letting go of your busy day. After that, driving off to sleep will be easy and natural.

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 Why You Should Ban Screens From Your Bedroom

You know it’s better to avoid using your phone or tablet in the hours before you go to bed. I hope you’re making strides towards putting your phone away at night, but I would like to suggest taking it a step further and banning all screens from your bedroom. Instead, make it a sanctuary designed for sleep and maybe another bedroom activity.

There are some very good reasons why you should keep screens out of your bedroom. First, let’s talk about what type of screens. The obvious one is a TV or computer. Unless there is no other way, keep them out of your bedroom. If you need to have a computer in there because the bedroom is also your home office, power everything off and unplug it before bedtime. There will be no blinking lights or fans coming on that could disrupt your much-deserved rest. You also won’t be tempted to sneak one last check of email or to turn on the TV to catch up on your favorite TV show when you should be sleeping.

Of course, keeping your smartphone on your bedside table can cause much of the same problem. Even if you silence your phone, there’s a good chance it will blink or the screen will light up in the night. And if nothing else, you’ll be tempted to check what time it is or if you’ve gotten any messages if and when you wake up in the middle of the night. Having your phone within arm’s reach makes it too tempting to turn it on. This in turn will not only flood your eyes with an intense light that mimics sunlight. It also gets your brain going when you see a few email subject lines or alerts on the screen. Both will make it much harder to fall back asleep.

What if you need your phone because you use it as an alarm clock? Simple. Buy an old-fashioned alarm clock and leave your phone in the kitchen or living room. It can charge there without you, trust me. One of the best things you can do for a better night's sleep is to stop looking at your phone an hour or two before bed. And don’t even think about replacing it with a tablet or e-reader.

One of the big problems with any type of screen is something I alluded to earlier. Screens put off a type of blue light that when it hits the back of your eyes, tricks the brain into thinking it’s daytime instead of night time. Filters and blue-light blocking glasses can help some, but it’s best to avoid using them late at night and definitely if you wake up in the middle of the night. Try it and see for yourself how much of a difference it makes.

Getting Comfy - Temperature, Touch, Sound & Scent

It’s time for bed and you’re ready to get comfy and drift off to sleep. The more conducive you can make your bed and your bedroom to sleep, the easier it will be to rest and actually fall asleep. Let’s talk about a few simple things you can do to create a better sleep environment.

One of the easiest things to change and improve for most of us is the temperature. It’s easier to sleep at cooler temperatures. Turn your central heat or air down a degree or two when you head to bed. Make sure you’ve dressed appropriately. Light pajamas when it’s warm and a blanket that will keep you warm enough, but not sweating in the middle of the night. If it’s cool outside, consider opening the windows for a bit before you go to bed to let some fresh air into the room, or consider sleeping with the window cracked open. There’s something about it that makes for a restful night. Of course, you should ignore this advice if you have allergies and fresh air causes you to sneeze or gives you a stuffy nose.

Next, let’s think about touch. What makes you comfortable? Is it the sleek cool feel of satin sheets? The comfort of flannel and a heavy quilt on top of you? How about soft cotton that you can wrap up in? Find your perfect sheets and bedding. Don’t forget about what you are wearing to bed. The clothes should be comfortable, because when you are, it's easier to fall asleep and you’ll sleep deeper.

If you’re having trouble falling asleep because the slightest noise from outside alerts you or you can’t shut off your mind, give white or brown noise a try. Turn on a fan, play some soft sounds, or try a bedtime meditation. There are plenty of options out there. The sound can be soothing and it will cover up anything going on outside that keeps you from drifting off to sleep.

Last but not least, there are calming scents that will help slow down your body and mind when it’s time to go to sleep. Light a scented candle for a little while or diffuse some oils. Lavender has long been a favorite at bedtime. You can even create a fun linen spray by combining distilled water with a few drops of lavender oil. Spritz it on your sheets and your pillow before bed. The aroma will carry you off to dreamland in no time.

Don’t be afraid to play around with any of these suggestions. Come up with what works for you and create your very own bedtime routine.

Dealing With Stray Thoughts & Worries At Nighttime

Do you ever have one of those nights when you can’t turn your mind off and end up tossing and turning? We all have days and nights when our busy minds and worries keep us up. Thankfully there are some simple strategies you can employ to deal with them, leaving you to enjoy the remainder of your night in restful slumber. Let’s look at a few you can try whenever you need them.

Distract Yourself

If you had a rough day or are going through stressful times, it can help to distract yourself before bed. Read a good book. Watch a movie. Catch up on your favorite show, or play a video game in the hours before bed. For the last hour or two before you lay down, it’s best to avoid screens. Reading or listening to a podcast or some engaging music are great ways to distract yourself. Or how about a good conversation with a loved one, or some private time with your spouse? Get your mind off what’s worrying you and do what you can to leave it until the next morning.

Journal Before Bed

If you can’t quite distract yourself, it’s not a bad idea to face and acknowledge what’s worrying you. Take out a notebook and journal for a page or two. It will help you process whatever is going on in your life. And by writing it down and getting it all out before bed, it can help clear your mind.

Journaling isn’t a quick pill fix. It can take some time to see the long-term benefits. Give it a few weeks and see if it’s something that works for you. Or maybe you’ll get lucky and one night of journaling is enough to calm that busy, anxious mind. After all you only have a page, some ink and a few minutes of your time to lose on this simple exercise.

Nighttime Meditation

If journaling isn’t your thing, or it isn’t quite enough to help on its own, try meditating. Meditation any time of the day is a great way to bring calm to your day and reduce stress. It’s particularly helpful right before bed.

It makes sense, doesn't it? If you’re anxious and worried when it’s time to go to sleep, meditating can help you shift into a calmer, more centered, and present state. Short, guided meditations are especially helpful for beginners. Find one online, plug in your earbuds and give it a try.

Keep A Notepad On Your  Night Table

Last but not least, here’s something anyone can do. Go find a little notebook, a notepad, or a piece of scrap paper. Put it along with a pen or pencil on your nightstand. When your mind gets busy about all the things you need to do the next day, or something pops up that you don’t want to forget, write it down. It gives great peace of mind and maybe just what you need to fall asleep.

Relax Your Body With A Warm Bath Or Gentle Stretches

The key to a good night's sleep is being able to relax in the hour or two before you climb into bed. It makes sense, doesn’t it? If your body is relaxed, your mind will follow. There’s a lot you can do to relax at night. Read a good book, meditate. But two that are particularly helpful both physically and mentally are a warm bath and stretching. Let’s look at those and how you can include them in your bedtime routine.

How Stretching Helps You Sleep At Night

Doing some gentle stretches or a little relaxing yoga can be a great addition to your nighttime routine. The key here is gentle. This isn’t a workout. It’s part of relaxing and getting your body ready for sleep. Roll those shoulders, work out the kinks in your neck, and stretch those limbs.

You can find plenty of stretching and yoga videos online. While it’s usually a bad idea to use screens at night, you can use them for a few evenings until you get the routine down. Or, if you are familiar with the concepts and can do so safely, feel free to come up with something individual that works for you. After all, we don’t always carry tension in the same parts of our bodies each day.

Pay attention to how you feel when you get into bed after spending a few minutes stretching first. Does your body feel warmer? More relaxed? That’s what will make falling asleep much easier and you end up with better rest.

The Benefits Of A Warm Nighttime Bath (or Shower)

Another great habit to get into is taking a warm bath or shower at night. Not only does it feel good to be clean when you slip between the sheets, it also helps relax your muscles, your body, and even your mind. You can even combine it with gentle stretches.

There’s an additional benefit that has to do with some of the processes inside our body as we transition from being awake to asleep. When you sleep, your body temperature lowers. This is closely connected with feeling sleepy. In your brain falling asleep and a drop in body temperature go together. Taking a warm bath taps into that connection and hacks it to your benefits. Take a warm bath or shower an hour before you’re going to bed. Make sure it’s long enough to warm you up. A minimum of ten minutes is good. Then, as you lay in bed, that temperature slowly starts to drop, making you feel a little drowsy and ready to fall asleep. Give it a try. You’ll be sold.

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Establish Your Nightly Routine & Stick To It

Human beings thrive on routine. If you are a parent, you know how true this is. And while most of us will do a good job setting and sticking to a routine for our kids, we don’t do as well for ourselves. It’s time to change that. Let’s talk about what you can do to establish a nightly routine and how you can stick to it until it becomes a habit.

It all starts with the decision to get a better night’s sleep. And you do it with a daily routine that includes getting into bed at the same time each day - including weekends. It also helps to get up roughly at the same time each morning. Sleeping in a little when you get the chance is fine, but don’t make it more than an hour or two so you can still fall asleep at the appropriate time. That might sound hard at first, but the more you stick to your routine, the easier it will become. After a few weeks, it will become a habit. You’ll know you’re close when you start to wake up a few minutes before your alarm.

Going to bed and waking up at the same time are the cornerstones of your routine, but you don’t want to stop there. What you do in an hour or so before bed can make a big difference in how easy it is to fall asleep and how soundly you’ll sleep through the night. There is a lot you can do to set yourself up for a good night’s rest. A warm bath, reading a book, leaving your phone in the living room …

Take a moment to sketch out your ideal nighttime routine. Keep it simple and start small. What are two or three things you can do consistently before you go to bed at night? This could be brushing your teeth and washing your face. It could also be lighting a candle and reading or journaling for a few minutes right before bed. Or how about sipping a cup of herbal tea?

Write down our first take at a bedtime routine and try it out. How did it feel? What works for you, what does not? It’s okay to make changes over time and tweak it as needed. The only rules are to stick to your bedtime and to eventually land on a routine you can stick with until it becomes an automatic habit.

Once you’ve found your routine you should stick to it for a few months. After that you can make the occasional exception. You’ll be surprised how much easier it will be to fall asleep with a good bedtime routine in place.

Self Care: What It Is, Why It Matters, and How to Make Time for It

Why Self-Care Matters & Super Simple Ways To Treat Yourself 

You’ve probably heard the term “self-care” used a lot lately. It’s become a popular buzzword in the media and in personal development circles. However, you still may be unclear on what it means. While the concept does involve taking care of yourself, it actually goes much deeper. Read on to learn what self-care is, why it matters and how to get started doing it. 

About Self-Care

Self-care covers a lot of areas with regard to caring for yourself. It involves nurturing your body, mind and spirit. It focuses on building yourself up so that your internal resources don’t become depleted. Essentially, self-care is being as good to yourself as you would be to someone you care about. It requires you to show yourself some compassion and encourages you to be vulnerable with others, asking for help you when you need it. What doesn’t fall under the umbrella of self-care are self-destructive coping mechanisms such as using drugs, drinking, gambling or retail therapy. These things only make you feel good in the short-term. 

The Benefits of Self-Care

There are lots of benefits to practicing self-care. Embracing this concept can be difficult for those who’ve always placed emphasis on the welfare of others. However, giving all your energy to those around you without filling your own back up leaves you depleted and empty. That’s no way to live. Instead, spending time and effort on yourself rejuvenates and energizes you. Taking time to indulge in your own interests demonstrates your worth, leading to improved self-esteem and a more positive outlook on the world. It teaches you a lot about yourself and provides you with insight into what you need to be the best version of yourself. Self-care helps you better cope with stress and to prioritize what’s important to you. You’ll be better able to take care of others when you also take time to meet your own needs. 

Examples of Self-Care

There are countless ways to add self-care into your routine. The key is to choose activities that are most enjoyable to you and provide you with the most benefits. Going for a walk in nature is great for those who enjoy the outdoors. Other forms of exercise like yoga, running or going to the gym work well, too. Spending time with friends can be rejuvenating, but so can saying no. Allowing yourself to decline invitations or favors when you’re feeling run-down is a big part of caring for yourself. Treating yourself to a favorite, affordable indulgence like a movie, manicure or ice cream cone are all good examples. As is taking a bath or meditating. These are just a few of the ways you can easily incorporate self-care into your life. 

Now you know what self-care is and what it’s important. You’ve also got some ideas of how to get started, so you’re well on your way to adding this useful practice to your life. 

Start & End Your Day With A Little Self Care 

Like any new habit, adding self-care into your life can seem kind of tricky. You probably wonder how you’ll manage to find time to do anything extra for yourself, let alone how you’ll actually remember to do these things. One of the best ways to get started is to build your activities into predictable parts of your day. In order to make something a habit, it has to happen regularly. Keep reading, and I’ll show you some tricks to making self-care a routine part of your life. 

Make It Personal

The first thing that will help you in creating your self-care rituals is to choose activities that are meaningful to you and that you enjoy. This is your practice, so you want to be sure it’s customized in order to get the most out of it. Consider making a list of things that help you to feel relaxed, peaceful, excited or happy. These activities should be able to be done in a short amount of time and easily fit into your life without special equipment or tools. At least as you begin your practice, the things you choose to do should be as simple as possible. 

Fit It In

You should add your self-care rituals to the most convenient parts of your day. Choose times that are already somewhat flexible so that incorporating something new into that space will be less stressful. Many people go with morning or evening routines, right when they wake up and before going to sleep each night. Getting up fifteen minutes earlier than usual and setting aside a window during the usual night-time schedule are usually things most folks can do. However, maybe designating your daily lunch break as your self-care time might work better for you. Consider activities like writing a gratitude journal entry before bed, listening to music while having your morning coffee or going for a short walk over your lunch hour. Trial and error may be required, but find a moment to call your own every day. 

Be Flexible

It’s best to come up with a routine that works for you and stick to it. Committing to a particular schedule will help you to create a habit and ensure that you get the self-care you need. However, try to cut yourself some slack. Some days are more hectic than others. You may not be able to fit in your anticipated self-care activity, and that’s okay. Tomorrow is a new day, and you can try again. Soon, you’ll find yourself wanting to take part in these rituals, and getting back on track will be easy. 

Getting into the practice of regular self-care doesn’t have to be difficult. Making a few adjustments to your existing schedule can free up some space in your day. Choose things that will refresh you and that are simple in nature will make getting started a breeze. 

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• Get rid of clutter
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• Understand what leads to chaos and squash it!

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Try Something New Today To Care For Yourself 

Creating habits and adding activities to your calendar help increase your chances of sticking with your new routine. Another way to keep things interesting is to treat yourself to things you’ve always wanted to do. Adding new and novel experiences to your self-care routine is like giving yourself a little gift every day. It’s a great way to stay motivated to do things to care for yourself. 

Pamper Yourself

Taking physical care of yourself in a pampering way makes us feel good. Pampering is a go-to for many people when it comes to their self-care routine. Think of something you’ve never done before. It doesn’t have to be expensive. A small act of indulgence can have the same effect as an extravagant one. Maybe consider scheduling a manicure if you’ve never had one. A bubble bath with candles can be soothing if this is something you don’t do very often. If your budget will allow, a spa day with a friend could rejuvenate your body and spirit. 

Celebrate Today

Most of us don’t buy ourselves presents very often or even give ourselves little treats. You can change that starting now. Think of something within your budget you’ve been wanting for a while now. Then give yourself permission to buy it. Maybe it’s that snazzy pair of shoes you’ve had your eye on or the cell phone upgrade that would make your life easier. Giving yourself one gift, no matter how small, can be a boost to your self-worth. 

Enjoy the Little Things

Self-care really doesn’t have to be on a grand scale. The tiniest gestures can be the most meaningful. Indulging in small free or low-cost treats allows you to spoil yourself more often. What are some little things you’ve never done for yourself that you can start adding to your life today? Have you ever bought yourself flowers? Give it a try. You’ll get a boost every time you see that beautiful bouquet on your table or desk. Think of your favorite food item, the one you have on special occasions. Why not make one day a week a little more special by trying a new version of it? For example, commit yourself to taste a new truffle each week at your favorite cholate shop. Get creative with it.

Adding new experiences to your self-care routine keeps things interesting and can also help make them more meaningful. The novelty will also expand your world and enrich your life. Plus, it’s just fun!

Make A List Of 5 Simple Self-Care Routines You Can Fall Back On When Needed

Beneficial habits like self-care often go by the wayside during stressful times. It can be difficult to focus on anything but the bare minimum when life gets hard. The fact is, though, that these are the days when you most need to take care of yourself. One way to have a self-care toolkit to help you out during these instances. Having a list of self-care routines can make it easier for you to implement them when needed. There are some other tricks you can employ to get you through the tough times, too. Keep reading, and I’ll share them with you. 

Make a List

Let’s start with your self-care backup plan. This is a list of at least five activities you can easily fit into your life during the most stressful periods. Having such a reminder on hand will let you gain the benefits of caring for yourself without having to think about it too much. This list can include simple reminders like going to bed early so you get enough sleep, eating nourishing food to keep your energy up, or asking for help you need it because these are all things you might forget when you’ve got a ton on your plate. During times of trouble, the very basic foundations of self-care can be the most important. 

Make a Care Package

Another way to boost your chances of keeping self-care at the focus during hard times is to prepare a care package ahead of time. This can include some of your favorite little indulgences like a good book, herbal teas, facial mask, fuzzy slippers, and classical CD. Include anything that brings you joy. Being able to reach for this package when you’re stressed can mean the world and make a huge difference to your outlook. 

Involve Your Crew

When things look bleak, you may require a bit of help to get back on track. That’s why it’s a good idea to reach out to trusted friends and family now to enlist their help for the future. Talk to your closest confidantes and let them know you would like them to always encourage your self-care routine. Share with them the benefits it’s provided you and tell them you’d appreciate their assistance if they see you aren’t caring for yourself as well as you should be. Sometimes those who know us best can see things we don’t. When your crew knows to look out for you in this regard, they can reinforce your self-care needs during times of stress. 

Taking steps to plan now can make maintaining your self-care routine easier in the future. Always remember it’s during the hardest times that you need to nurture yourself the most. 

Self-Care Doesn’t Have To Cost Anything 

Lots of people get the wrong idea about self-care. They think they have to be deserving of it. They feel like it’s splurging to do something good for themselves. It can seem extravagant. I’d like to change that mindset today. Self-care is something you deserve. Everyone does. It benefits us all, along with those around us, when we put our own well-being at the forefront. You can’t take care of others when your own well-being is suffering. Let’s take a look at some free and low-cost ways you can care for yourself. 

Take a Time Out

Sometimes just a little bit of alone time is all you need to feel rejuvenated. So why not give yourself a time out? Lock yourself in your room with a nice cup of tea. Listen to some quiet music. Just sit still and think for a bit. It’s a luxury we all can afford.

Waste Some Time

We often feel pressured to be productive all the time. Being busy is a sign of worth and accomplishment. However, it really doesn’t have to be that way. Just kicking back and doing nothing is important to recharge our batteries. Let yourself have some downtime to do something frivolous like binge on your favorite Netflix show, take a nap or just sit and pet your cat. You deserve it. 

Do Some Writing

Even if you don’t consider yourself a writer, journaling can be a very therapeutic activity. Jotting down what you’re grateful for has been proven to be beneficial to well-being. It can also be energizing to simply do a brain dump in which you write down all the things that are floating around in your head. Jotting down dreams for the future might inspire and motivate you to take action. Give it a try. 

Reach Out to Someone

Socializing is a crucial part of self-care. Even introverts benefit from interpersonal connection. Humans aren’t meant to be isolated. Pick up the phone and call a friend you haven’t talked to in a while. Sit down and Skype with your favorite internet pal. Meeting up in person for a walk together or a cup of coffee is even better. Connecting to others might just provide the spark you’ve been missing. 

Change Your Perspective

A change of scenery can be a wonderful source of renewal, and it doesn’t have to cost a lot. Just heading out to walk in your neighborhood might help when you’re feeling stir-crazy in your home. If you’re able to afford it, a low-cost staycation to a nearby location for a day or two is a fun way to switch things up. You’ll be surprised what this change of perspective can do for you. 

While these are just a few of the countless ways you can indulge in self-care without spending much money, perhaps they’re just the jumpstart you need to begin exploring this concept. You truly do deserve to spend time, energy, and effort on your own well-being. 

Don’t Feel Guilty For Practicing Self-Care

There are a lot of complex reasons for this within our society. Despite what anyone else may say, you deserve to focus on your own needs. In fact, it’s good for those you love when you take care of yourself. You truly can’t fill another’s cup if your own is empty. So, I’d like to take this opportunity to emphasize why you shouldn’t feel guilty for practicing self-care and encourage you to do so in every area of your life. 

It’s Not Selfish

First and foremost, you must understand that taking time to care for yourself is not selfish in any way. It may be hard to get past the mindset that the needs of others are more important than your own, but overcoming this mindset is essential to allowing yourself to adequately meet your own needs. Care isn’t a zero-sum concept. When you care for yourself, it doesn’t have to mean you don’t care about others. 

It’s Necessary 

Self-care isn’t a luxury; it’s a necessity. It really is like the airplane air mask comparison. You have to ensure you can breathe before you can help those around you. If you’re tired, rundown and overwhelmed all the time, you absolutely cannot give your best self to others. You also can’t offer yourself the very best. Remember that self-care isn’t selfish. 

It Sets a Good Example

If you’re a parent, investing in self-care is not only good for you, it sets a good example for your kids. Even if you don’t have children, taking the time to care for yourself might be inspiring or motivational for those around you. In order for a stigma to end, it has to be normalized. When more of us let the world around us know why self-care matters, they may begin to change their minds about the concept, as well. 

It Demands Respect

It also sets a precedent for how you expect others to treat you. When you demonstrate that you value yourself and that you find it worth investing time in yourself, they will respond in kind. Learning to say no and set boundaries is good for your relationships. It teaches others how you expect to be treated and makes it clear that you see yourself as a priority. There’s no reason to feel guilty for that. 

It will take time to overcome a lifetime of message society has given you and you’ve internalized. With practice, you can come to see the benefits of self-care and that it doesn’t have to be something that causes guilt. 

30 Day "Create Calm" Challenge!

If 2020 taught us anything, it was that we need some calm and comfort in our life.  There's just no room for "that kind" of stress any longer - life is too damn short.

This challenge consists of a daily email for 30 days.  By the end of the challenge you'll be able to:

• Embrace living a truly calmer life
• Get rid of clutter
• Utilize concrete methods for addressing chaos
• Understand what leads to chaos and squash it!

I'm happy and honored to have you come on this journey with me!  Get started below!

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Tips To Continue To Take Care Of Yourself Going Forward

Self-care is a process. It requires practice and dedication if you want to make it stick. Don’t get discouraged if it takes time to make this new concept a part of your life. It’ll get easier, and you’ll probably find yourself craving your self-care activities so much you’ll wonder how you ever lived without them. However, there will inevitably be times that are busier or more stressful when self-care may go by the wayside. If you find that happening, be sure to follow these tips to continue to take care of yourself going forward. 

Follow Your Gut

Sometimes we get so busy that we find ourselves living on auto-pilot. That’s only natural during hectic times, but it’s critical that you make an attempt to listen to your instincts during these times to know whether you’re in need of a boost. When you start to feel especially frazzled or fatigued, that’s not a cue to double down and work harder. It’s your body and mind telling you that you need a break. Listen to them. Along these lines, look for other unusual signs that things are off-balance with you such as irritability, eating poorly, losing sleep or indulging in bad habits. These things are telling you to take care of yourself. 

Schedule It In

A trick that helps some people to fit self-care into their schedules when life gets busy is to actually write it in their datebook or calendar. Treat your self-care commitments like any other appointment or event. Write down the time you’ll start and finish. Try to be specific about the activity you’ll engage in. Doing these things will increase the odds that you’ll actually follow through. It’s easy to put yourself on the back burner when life gets crazy, but don’t forget that these are the times you need self-care the most. 

Create a Plan

Developing a self-care plan is crucial to maintaining your well-being. I shared some ideas in a previous blog post about how to do this. Let’s review a bit, as it’s so important to have a self-care toolkit at your disposal during life’s busiest and most stressful periods. Keep your emergency self-care list and your care package together so they’re easily accessed when you need them. You also make sure there’s a list of trusted contacts to call when you might need some self-care encouragement and accountability. Your tribe can provide the motivation and support you need to take care of yourself. 

One final word. Take time to assess your self-care needs regularly. This will also help to keep you on track. Ask yourself once a week or so if you’re giving yourself enough time and attention. Listen to your instincts. Make adjustments as necessary. Self-care is an ongoing and evolving process. It requires your constant attention.