8 Essential Ingredients to Master Your Time

Being rich is having money; being wealthy is having time. – Margaret Bonnano

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Sometimes it’s hard to believe we all have the same 24 hours/day and same 7 days/week. While some people seem pretty organized and on top of things, many of us find ourselves running out of time. At the end of the day, there are still so many items on our to-do list and we don’t feel like we’ve accomplished all that much. We thought technology would ease our time pressures, but with overflowing email accounts and lost hours surfing cyberspace, it’s done just the opposite. Then juggling our work and personal lives seems to make it impossible to ever get control of our time.

If you feel like you are a slave to the clock, you’re not alone. Time management books, classes, and even software are plentiful and among some of the most popular how-to subjects. They offer myriad solutions to an age-old problem. Maybe you’ve read some of the books or taken some classes only to find you slip back into your old habits.

In order to master your time, you’ll need to take a little time to plan your strategy so that you can end your stress-filled days. I know it doesn’t seem like you have time for one more thing, but this is a top priority and will bring you back to more control of your time. You’ll need to create a schedule not only to include what you intend to accomplish, but for unexpected interruptions, most of which cannot be avoided. When we don’t leave space for those surprises, we wind up angry, frustrated, and feeling even more out of control of our time.

Here are some key solutions that I have found to be very effective. Follow these 8 essential ingredients to master your time: (more…)

Develop a Support Network

istock_000005327714xsmall.jpgIt is virtually impossible to achieve any sort of work life balance without the assistance of a reliable support network. Today’s busy lives virtually demand you engage the help of others if you hope to reach your goals. Your support network may consist of trusted friends, family members, clergy, counselors, child care professionals, and even pet sitters. Long gone are the days when you were able to attend to every one of life’s details personally. In order to be fair to yourself and your family, you must be able to delegate some of your responsibilities to others.

Take the first steps in easing up pressure by hiring a gardener, a housekeeper, a pool maintenance professional, or anyone else who you can afford to take some of the load off of your shoulders. Ridding yourself of daily chores frees up your precious time so you can use it where it is most important – like playing in the park with your kids.

There are a number of other types of support you need in order to assure your ongoing physical and mental health. (more…)

Get Out of Debt to Find Greater Happiness

istock_000005541049xsmall.jpgOne of the biggest causes of marital strife is finances. So many couples who end up either in counseling or divorce court say financial issues caused excessive stress in the relationship, taking it to the breaking point.

Financial troubles can impact your personal happiness and health as well. Stress over money issues may lead you to work long hours of overtime to try to keep up, reducing your time with your family as well as your ability to get proper rest. Constant worry takes a toll on the body, too, and can lower the immune system’s resistance to disease.

If you find yourself spending sleepless nights worrying over money, or if you are fighting with your spouse over excessive debt or your long hours at the office, try these simple tricks to cut back on your spending and free you from debt’s evil clenches: (more…)

Turn Stress Into Success With These 10 Tips

From my guest article 10 Tips to Turn Stress to Success at Effortless Abundance:

istock_000005560630xsmall.jpg“If you know someone who doesn’t experience stress, they’re probably not human. We stress over our finances, relationships, health, and careers or businesses. We get stressed when things don’t go our way and we are not getting the results we want. We experience stress when we feel rushed and we run out of time to do all that we want to do. What causes you to feel stressed?

Of course, there’s good stress and bad stress. Good stress is when you’re stretching beyond your comfort zone and taking risks. You feel discomfort, while also feeling good about doing new things and taking new paths. Bad stress causes anguish, negative emotions, and oftentimes physical problems like pain, headaches, ulcers, and worse.

What I’ve noticed, however, is that some people can have the same experiences and not feel as stressed as others. So I wonder: Is stress an automatic reaction or can it be a conscious choice? Think about that as you consider some of these 10 tips to turn stress to success:”

Read the rest of 10 Tips to Turn Stress to Success.

Thanks to Tip Diva for including this article in the Carnival of Tips.

My Interview at Affirmawords: “What Inspires the People that Inspire Others?”

Many thanks to Michelle at the Affirmawords Blog for the opportunity to share my insights on the topic:  “What Inspires the People that Inspire Others?”

Check out my interview here.

eBook review: Your Life in Balance at EffTD

Mike Vardy at EffTD has posted a review of my eBook Your Life in Balance. Thanks Mike!

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Creating a Portfolio Career

What would you say if I told you that the idea of a linear, ladder-like career may have been a mere blip on the cultural radar instead of the taken-for-granted path that many of us have come to accept?

The fact is, the days of spending your life working for the same company and leaving with “30 years and a gold watch” are long gone. In today’s work world, more companies are viewing employees as contract labor, to be hired and fired as needed, and fewer workers are looking to stay in one place their entire lives. In fact, the newer generations are far more interested in work that seems like fun or that offers a unique experience than adhering to any outdated model of a linear, predictable professional career.

istock_000005793898xsmall.jpgAdd to that the reality that secure, long-term jobs that pay enough to support the average middle-class worker are becoming fewer and further apart thanks to cheap overseas outsourcing and technological automation, and you have the makings of a work-culture sea change of tsunami proportions. Enter the portfolio career.

A portfolio career is one, “in which instead of working a traditional full-time job, you work multiple part-time jobs (including part-time employment, temporary jobs, freelancing, and self-employment) with different employers that when combined are the equivalent of a full-time position.”

(http://www.quintcareers.com/portfolio_careers.html). A person with a portfolio career may work a few days a week at a local cabinetry shop, spend a few days a week teaching woodworking at a local continuing ed center and offer their services as an independent cabinet installation contractor to home builders when there’s work available. Or, it could be an IT geek with a part-time tech job, an on-call tech repair service and a website where they sell their own custom software.

Portfolio careers are shaping up to be the professional wave of the future. (more…)

College Freshmen Get Schooled in Work-Life Balance 101, Face Monumental Transitions

istock_000005937538xsmall.jpgWhen freshmen descend upon college and university campuses late this summer, chances are good that their orientation programs will be filled with maps of the institution, contact information for department heads, extracurricular activities schedules and parameters for maintaining passing grades.

The most important lesson missing from the agenda, however, may be a practical outline about how to adjust to a lifestyle that for many, includes learning how to live away from home for the first time. The scenario has been repeated all too often: kids get to college and they either party themselves to an early exit from school, or they spend so much time studying that they fail to grow socially. This leads to stress and often, mental and physical illness.

Read the rest of College Freshmen Get Schooled in Work-Life Balance 101, Face Monumental Transitions.

Thanks to Are We Balanced Yet for including this article in the Carnival of Work Life Balance.

Russert and McKay Lived Authentically and as a Result, Respect Followed Them

In less than one week, Americans heard how two giants in the television business loved their work and their families even more. NBC Washington Bureau Chief and moderator of “Meet the Press,” Tim Russert, collapsed and died June 13 and just six days prior, sports journalism and fans lost CBS legend and host of “Wide World of Sports,” Jim McKay.

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From Amazon.com

While they lived different lifestyles — McKay’s assignments required regular worldwide travel while Russert’s schedule was regularly spent at NBC studios in New York and Washington — they lived with passion for their jobs and families.

Read the rest of Russert and McKay Lived Authentically and as a Result, Respect Followed Them.

Success: Are We There Yet?

What’s your perception of success?

Do you see it as ever-elusive? Is it a work in progress? Or is success more of a final destination for you?

No matter what your thoughts on success, one thing is certain: if you don’t know where you’re headed, you’ll never know when you’ve arrived.

So where are you headed?

istock_000004839396xsmall.jpgSome people see success as the six-figure income, waterfront property, hot car, flashy clothing and all the accoutrements that go along with the high profile career and lifestyle. But they forget that success is a subjective term, and the above definition might sound good on paper but it’s not without its own set of sacrifices. What will you have to give up in order to maintain such a lifestyle? Peace and quiet? Time? Rest? Family time? A healthy, balanced life? An unassuming, everyman existence? (more…)