Life Updates of a Larger Magnitude

Today's morning challenge was inspired by my 2 current magazine subscriptions: Better Homes and Gardens and INC .  INC had a great article about defining success in your own terms, but also allowing that definition of success to grow as you grow.  BHG just always has beautiful, awesome stuff that makes me swoon. So here is what success looks like to me - time, and liquid funds.  And with that time and those liquid funds, I would... Throw gorgeous brunches and dinner parties, thus allowing me to cook (love), hang out with my favorite people (love), and decorate (love!). Decorate and redecorate things and blog about them.  And make little music videos. Build wooden things and then give them away (or maybe sell them for nominal fees). The thing with selling items is that you will never make money doing it.  Then it becomes a vicious cycle of wanting enough money to justify your time but your time was spent doing what you love so do you really need the money? ...

I'm pretty stoked about this year's adventure in gardening.  I have no idea if it will survive the summer, but at least we tried.  My goal was to use materials we had around the house, except for soil and seeds.  I wanted to build this because: I'm super absent-minded, and if a veggie garden has any chance of surviving, it needs to be in direct line of sight multiple times a day. Because of #1 above, I also wanted to add a water reservoir capability for when I do space out for a few days. We live in the country, and hopefully this will make it less likely that critters will get in and steal stuff. Ours is a 2'x5' bed, and I decided what to plant using this amazing site.  (Seriously.  Amazing.). So here's how we made it happen... We have a giant pile of scrap wood so first we had to wade through that.  Then we tidied up what was left.  Felt good for the soul! Using some 1x12 for the walls and 4 decking boards (yes, pressure treated)...

I've come to the conclusion I'm achingly, overwhelmingly, (annoyingly) empathetic, and that it is both a gift and a burden.  I basically can't make it through a day without crying about someone else's pain.  Especially when it comes to elderly people.  I've been fascinated (obsessed?) by the fact that we are all going to get old and die.  And by fascinated, I mean in the dictionary sense. Like, "drawn irresistibly to".  As part of this insane entrepreneurial journey, I've been devouring knowledge like a starving person.  There are 2 reasons for that: 1) I feel like a kindergartner when it comes to business and I'm looking to level up. 2) All the vocal successful e-types espouse the virtue of constant learning. I don't know if I believe that's a tenent of success, but I know that it's worked for them so who am I to argue? (I have a more-than-vague feeling they're right.) So while I've been gorging myself on business books an...

On Monday I bought a house from a sweet elderly couple.  At closing, they started telling me about how they moved in the 60s, when their kids were 1,3,5 and 7, and how they had lived their whole lives there, replete with all the memories.  Selling the house to us was very hard, because they were acknowledging the end of... their lives, almost.  The husband is sick and knows he doesn't have much longer, and he wants to make sure his wife gets settled in a place where she will be taken care of.  It was so sad, and not too uncommon a story for my line of work.  When I'm faced with these things, I inevitably hit my "What's the point of this life?" mental soundtrack, and it leaves me feeling hollow and terrified that I'm not doing it right.  And also that it's inevitable.  We get old, our kids grow up, our jobs go away, we see our loved ones die, and then we die.  This is the sadness inside of me.  This is also why some many people turn to religio...

Half of Lent has passed me by and I don't feel the silence in my soul like I normally do (when I'm being consciously reflective).  So for today's MM I decided to start reading a book they gave our on Ash Wednesday - Resisting Happiness by Fr. Matthew Kelly.  It comes with homework.  Here is today's: Key Point: Find out what makes you happy Action Step: Identify three activities that increase your happiness.  Write them down. Being active - exercising, dancing, training Spending time outdoors making memories with my family.  Specifically camping, swimming, exploring. Building things So I wanted to get super specific on these because it's easy to be vague ("Being healthy makes me happy.") but vague is not necessarily actionable.  That's why I chose being active.  When I get more sedentary I get unhappy.  It doesn't matter what my body looks like.  My mind projects an image of bleh over it when I'm sitting on my buttkins all day. ...

Hey peeps! It's my favorite time of year! We're actually about 8 days into the 40 days of Lent, and I apologize for the slowness of my annual post.  This year I don't feel like Lent is a strong top-of-mind thing but more a steady undercurrent.  I didn't pick one thing to do (my favorite in the past has been daily Mass attendance.  This year I've been really sticking with the Miracle Morning thing from 7a-8a, so I feel like I'm already punching that deliberate reflection ticket.)  I've been trying to add more conscious acts of kindness (take food or flowers to an elderly neighbor, give to charity), but I think the thing that has stuck with me so far this season is this article I read a few days ago summarizing the Pope's message to "give without worry". My favorite quote was,  "Then he posed a greater challenge. He said the way of giving is as important as the gift. You should not simply drop a bill into a cup and walk away...

This blog used to be called the steamvent, because it was where all the rage and angst went. (When you're normally upbeat and positive on the outside, those yucky feelings have to go *somewhere*) I just reread the titles of my last few posts and it seems like that still is mostly true. So let's take a stroll down a happier thought! It's January 23rd and 3 weeks ago I implemented a daily work schedule. From 7am to 9am I do the same 3 things, and then from 9 to 12 I focus on one major business area. And the funniest thing about it is that by being scheduled, I feel more free. Lots of people talk about this. Time-blocking is a Keller Williams staple (that far too few agents implement). The Get Stuff Done guy has a whole book about it. And there have been countless blogs and articles written. So yea, accept it. It's a thing. Yesterday I was at a baby shower and one of the women, a widow who has given herself to service in the Catholic Church (she helps at a ...