I can’t find a church I like…..

If I had a nickel for every time I heard this….  Here is a quick and easy way to start down the road of finding a church you like!

1. Make a list of 5 churches you would be interested in.  Ask your friends where they go, pick it based on location, pick it based on denomination.  It really does not matter how you pick them just that you pick them!
2. Attend each church on your list 2-3 times and then move on to the next church.
3. When you reach the end of the list decide if any of those churches are a good fit for you.
4. Either start going to the church you liked or make another list till you find a church you are happy with.

Enjoy the journey and don’t give up till you find a place that nurtures YOU!

Keep Going

How do we as professionals keep going when we don’t want to?  I wish I knew the answer every time I had a slow start day, but I don’t.  I believe every time we struggle it may be a different issue!  Is it a project that you don’t want to work on, do you need a vacation, or did your day get off to a bad start and you just need to reset?  How do you re-set your day? 

My re-starts:
Great music
exercise
mediation
bath
walk around block
long lunch
small tasks that keep me moving till the motivation comes back – like filing and paying bills

What is balance?

Everyone talks about leading a balanced life, but what exactly does that mean?  To me balance is taking the time to recharge so that I can continue to achieve, prosper and focus on what is important in life.  You can be more effective in your job on a daily basis if you work 9 focused hours versus 12 half focused hours.  At some point during the day your brain turns off and you are no longer as productive or as accurate as you could be.  Often times you end up needing to review what you have done the next day.  Wouldn’t it be better to end your day earlier, get in some exercise or quality family time?  Then you are become recharged, and don’t feel as if you are neglecting anything.  This allows focusing on work when you are there to be easier and more rewarding.  Try it for one week and see how you feel.

Yoga

Yoga is a powerful exercise, mediation, stretching, and spiritual experience.  This morning I had the chance to do 25 minutes before Max woke up.  It always amazes me how beneficial just a few minutes can be and how much I am energized by yoga.  Within that 25 minutes, I had woken up, stretched the morning kinks out and even worked up a sweet.  It put me in an instantly happy mood.  It is one of the few things that I believe can be beneficial to everyone. 

Many are afraid of yoga or consider it a new wave experience.  Yoga is much more simply a fantastic exercise that allows you to stretch, strengthen, relax and push all at once.  How to get started?

1. Pick a local class to join.  I recommend starting yoga with a live teach at a yoga studio so that you can learn the poses correctly.
2. If you don’t like it a first try another style.  There are many styles of yoga from Hatha which is a slow stretching style to Bikram which is 26 poses done in a heated room
3.  Keep going it takes time to learn, but is worth the effort

Tools for learning more about yoga or doing yoga?
http://www.yogajournal.com/
http://www.yogatoday.com

Enjoy

Try Something New!

The weekend is upon us and I am really looking forward to it!  Marc is out of town this week till Saturday night, so I have decided Max and I are going to have a day of new things!  To start we will hit a new breakfast restaurant, and then I think we are going to go to a paint pottery place after that we will just go with the flow!  Why new things?  Because I know that it is very easy to get into a rut and when you take the time to do something new your mind opens up and you can have more fun than you ever thought!  So what are you doing different this weekend?

How to cut back on Expenses

Cutting back on expenses seems to be an issue we talk about frequently.  How the small expenses add up to a lot over the year.  I for one am amazed that every time you see this topic it covers the same things.  My problem with this is that I don’t want to give up my latte a day – I LOVE coffee.  Cutting back only works when you get to decide where you get to cut back – otherwise it is just painful!  So does that mean I am stuck with only a handful of other savings tips?  I for one hope not, so I challenge you to help us come up with as many ways to save money as possible to cut back on expenses.  Here are a few of mine!

1. watching my bank fees – I hate to pay bank fees, so I make it my business to ensure I do business with banks that give me free services!  This also includes reducing the interest paid out – why just give money to banks?
2. Coupons – but only for items I actually buy!  Coupons are a way to get you to try things that are not in your regular purchase habit, so only use when you actually use the item.  Don’t forget non grocery coupons such as ones for oil changes, restaurants, shoes – you name the coupon I try to use them.
3. Cook at home – this is hard for me as I am not a big cooking fan, but I know that when I need to cut back this is the easiest place to do it.
4. Shop your insurance – it is easy to ignore items that don’t require a lot of attention, but you may be amazed at the savings you can find.  Especially with term life insurance, the prices seem to just keep going down.
5. House energy use – invest in an automatic controller and adjust it when not home.  I even work from home and still turn the temp down during the day; I just add an extra sweater! (I also happen to like the cold) Don’t forget to shut out the lights when you leave the room.
6.  Turn the car off if you are waiting – save the gas
7. Consignment stores – especially for kids stuff.  I am always amazed at the quality and price I find when I hit the stores, some of them even carry toys in great shape at a wonderful savings!
8. When shopping in non consignment stores start in the back on the sales rack.  No need to pay full price!
9.  Don’t be afraid to ask stores what day they do mark downs, most stores have a very specific schedule on when things come in and are marked down.  Some stores (like baby gap) do it once a week!!!
10. When eating out try to go on Monday’s and Tuesdays – these are the slow days and many restaurants have specials to get you to come in.
11.  When eating out do lunch – it is cheaper than dinner!
12. When on vacation book lodging that has a kitchen – great place to save on breakfast, lunch, snacks and drinks.  I for one still always go out for dinner!

Okay, your turn how do you save money?

Is a House a good Investment

For the past week we were lucky enough to be on vacation!  Always needed, never long enough!  During all this time Marc and I have had the time to catch up on news and discuss the world’s issues – mainly the financial situation and politics. 
There are so many thoughts running in my head about the markets and money that I have really been struggling with what do I write and when and how much depth.  Lucky for me I found an article on Yahoo that they got from SmartMoney about the value of home ownership.  It is a concept that over the years of our home ownership I have slowly begun to believe – this article just adds more belief for me.  So today – a link to the article!  Enjoy!

http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/renting-makes-more-financial-sense-than-homeownership.html

Exercise When you don’t want to

My current practice is to drop Max off at day care and then hit the gym before work.  This particular routine is very hard for me because I am not a morning person.  I have a better workout in the afternoon.  So why am I doing this routine?  Because it is the only way that I can guarantee myself a workout for the day.  I find that when planning lunch or afternoon workouts I don’t always get there, because things come up with work, the house or I just decide I am not in the mood and would rather keep working.  With the morning workout nothing else is distracting me, and it happens to be on the schedule so it is hard for something to come up and get in the way. 

So how do I make it a good work out since my workouts are not great in the morning?

1. I let myself ease into the workout by taking a longer warm up.
2.  I start with what I like.  I really enjoy strength training, so after warm up I start there.  By the time I hit my cardio phase I am all ready into it.
3.  When doing cardio, if I am struggling I keep telling myself 5 more minutes (because I know I can do 5) and before I know it I am done. 
4.  Also when doing cardio I switch machines through the workout to keep it exciting, I really can’t handle much more than 30 minutes on any machine.
5. I have a ten minute rule – If I get 10 minutes into my workout  and I still am struggling I allow myself to call it a day.  (Studies have shown that 10 minutes is a break point for your body to get in the grove)

This morning was one of the hard mornings.  It is raining here and I really was not in the mood for the gym (I actually wanted to be walking outside).  To make matters worse it was a cardio only day so I did not have the strength training to get me in the mood.  So I started my workout with a mini pep talk (I am here might as well do this) and then moved on to focusing on the first 10 minutes.  Once at 10 minutes I was still struggling so I pushed for five minutes more.  Soon I was at 30 minutes and thought this is a perfect time to stop, instead I switched machines.  I made it to my 50 minutes of cardio and now have the energy and focus to get through my day!

Hello world!

This is my first official blog for Smart Step!  I am both excited and a bit stressed.  The thought of saying something meaningful on a regular basis can be very scary.  But I know that the best way to make progress is to just move forward!

My coaching practice is all about determining what you want your life to look like and then making it happen.  Mainly focusing on balance issues for professionals who mainly focus on work.  Both my husband and I fall into this category and it has taken me years to figure out how to manage what I want and my expectations of what can be accomplished.  For many years I focused so hard on achieving work goals that I would work very long days.  My health – mental and physical health waivered, my spiritual life came and went.  Since both my husband and I worked long hours it was easier to not let that become lost.  Then we had Max, my adorable patience testing 3 year old.  All of a sudden the lifestyle did not work for me, but I struggled to focus on what I really wanted and struggled to adjust my lifestyle.  Why?  Because I did not know what I really wanted out of life.  Not what my 15, 18 or 25 year old self wanted, not what my husband wanted, not what my parents wanted – but ME as I am today.   Through many trials I finally figured out how to determine what I wanted, what could be pushed onto the back burner and ultimately how to manage it all.  What made it all work for me?  I worked out my top five values, wrote my vision and mission statement and continually reviewed where I was out of line with those things.  Suddenly decisions were easy – I just had to re-read them and I knew what was needed.

So what is my first advice to any struggling professional – determine what the most important values are to YOU in your life.
Then start taking steps to focus on those values.

Need help with determining your values? Download your values assesment at:
http://www.smartstepomaha.com