Inspired Forward

Cut Through the Confusion and Chaos to Live a Well-Organized Life

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How Budgeting Can Banish Your Nightmares About Money

The golden standard for being financially sound is having a budget.

For some reason this is something many people don’t do–and it’s why they live paycheck-to-paycheck.

As for me, I didn’t know how to handle my money until I had a “real job.” I worried about how I’d be able to afford things like a house, a car, possible future children (which are no longer an option), and pets.

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While in college I used a tool called Mint. It let me connect my bank accounts to categorize transactions, but I found it clunky and unable to reliably tell me where my money was going or if I had enough money to cover my expenses for the next month.

After too long using Mint I switched to YNAB and have been using their digital envelope system for over a year now [since September 2016].

For many people, finances are scary and difficult to talk about.

[Read more…]

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The Journey to Magnificence: Week Thirty-Five

Welcome to The Journey to Magnificence! This is week thirty-five: October 7 – 13, 2018.

To be totally honest, having a cold kinda messed me up. I’m not totally blaming my feelings of burnout and feeling behind-ness on it, but it certainly didn’t help.

What really messed me up was stopping using my time tracker.

I tried to make my own for fifteen-minute increments, thinking it would give me a better idea of where I spend my time, but it just made things a lot harder to track – so I didn’t.

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What I Said I’d Do

  • Since this cold is changing things up, pretty much I just want to make it through the week without missing any deadlines or putting things off “just because I feel sick.”

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3 Weird Ways a Cubicle Made Me Feel Valuable

All companies are different.

That seems like a no-brainer.

But it’s important for those who are dissatisfied in their jobs and looking to jump ship. A big part of it is culture, but what about your office space?

I’ve written before about that first “big girl” job that I lost at the beginning of 2017. I loved my coworkers, I liked (for the most part) the work did and the skills I learned from my mentors, but the office layout sucked.

cubicle board game

My manager’s office was down a hallway that required security clearance to enter without an escort, so I couldn’t just pop my head in to ask a question. The majority of the office spaces were actual offices with doors – very few people had cubicles, which at first seemed awesome!

Like, what kind of low-level fresh graduate with only 2 guaranteed years gets an office, even if you’ve got to share it with another person?

[Read more…]

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The Journey to Magnificence: Week Thirty-Four

Welcome to The Journey to Magnificence! This is week thirty-four: September 30 – October 6, 2018.

This week’s review is short and sweet since I’m pretty sure I caught a cold at the conference. I usually write this up on the weekend, but instead spent all day Sunday feeling sick and watching Louder with Crowder videos. But hey! Sometimes you just need that kind of day.

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What I Said I’d Do

  • Smartsheet Conference
  • Start my October Challenge – Hand-Copy a chapter of Scripture a day (the Book of Acts).

What I Actually Worked On

  • Smartsheet Conference
  • Started my October Challenge to Hand-Copy the book of Acts

[Read more…]

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Hand-Copy the Book of Acts: October’s Challenge

So this is my third month of 30-day challenges. I started doing these after reading about Sarah Ruszkowski’s personal challenge to complete a year’s worth of these things! My original intention only had six on my list but after reading about Sarah’s goal I upped my game.

In August, I endeavored to write 1000 words a day and knocked that one out of the park. Read more about August’s challenge here.

 

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Last month I set myself the task to read 10 or more books in 30 days. 

By the end of the day on Sunday, September 30th, I was halfway through book 13. So I’ll count that as a successful challenge! 

To recap the books I read, check out the post I wrote about September’s challenge here.

Lessons Learned from September’s Challenge

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The Journey to Magnificence: Week Thirty-Three

Welcome to The Journey to Magnificence! This is week thirty-three: September 23 – 29, 2018.

As the weeks go by and I get busier, I feel like I have less to talk about for these daily and weekly updates. I’ve also noticed a pattern: the week starts strong on Sunday, slumps on Thursday, and lasts through about half of Saturday before I feel up to it again.

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What I Said I’d Do

  • Finish Module 1 of #GoalSlaying in 6 Steps
  • Survive my company’s conference (that I’ve been co-organizing for the last four months)

What I Actually Worked On

Sunday, Day 225 – #GoalSlayer Masterclass on Wednesday, 10/3!

Oh man. Today felt quite productive!

The husband and I did a few Mewtwo raids for Pokemon Go and spent an hour at his parents’ house picking grapes and conversing.

But when we got home, I really dug into the things I’ve been putting off…like getting all the promotional material scheduled for the upcoming #GoalSlayer Masterclass, hosted by Nadalie Bardo of It’s All You Boo.

[Read more…]

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6 Ways to Stop Worrying About Your Diet

The biggest obstacle to eating a good diet, for some people, is the time it takes to research and purchase the foods for a new recipe. For others, it’s the time it takes to make any food at all, not just untested recipes.

And yet for others, it’s what they should even eat.

I found that I spent a lot of time worrying about what I was going to eat for dinner at the end of a long day, and then spending perhaps an hour making and consuming it.

At the end of it, my kitchen looked and felt too cluttered with dirty dishes–yet another thing to take care of.

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But one shouldn’t have to worry about her diet.

It should be easy to go to the store, pick up what she needs, and make her food.

But it’s not that simple for a lot of people.

Here are some tips and methods I use to stop worrying about my diet during any given week.

[Read more…]

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The Journey to Magnificence: Week Thirty-Two

Welcome to The Journey to Magnificence! This is week thirty-two: September 16 – 22, 2018.

I have so many things I want to do, and it feels like not enough time to do them. Soon I’ll need to take a weekend (or two) to fully map out what’s going on in my life and how they need to be prioritized.

Definitely sounds easier than it’s going to be!

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What I Said I’d Do

  • Complete Module 7 of the 30 Days or Less to VA Success Course
  • Complete Module 1 of the #GoalSlaying in 6 Steps Course

What I Actually Worked On

  • Completed Module 7 of the 30 Days or Less to VA Success Course
  • Got through half of Module 1 of the #GoalSlaying in 6 Steps Course

[Read more…]

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The Journey to Magnificence: Week Thirty-One

Welcome to The Journey to Magnificence! This is week thirty-one: September 9 – 15, 2018.

This week started out with a bang and ended with a BAM. I got my champagne moment done pretty much immediately and left the rest of the week for reading towards my 30-day challenge and reading fanfiction.

I’m struggling with a few things, mostly mindset around building a virtual assistant side business, and competing priorities amongst all my responsibilities.

The top lesson of the week: I do NOT want to be an event planner. 

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What I Said I’d Do

  • Decide 3 things to focus on next week and pre-schedule each day’s 3 most important things in advance. And stick to it. These are the top 3:
    • Create opt-in for a new homepage
    • Create & implement Welcome.ly homepage using the new opt-in
    • Spend 2 hours on the Goal Slaying Course

What I Actually Worked On

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What You Need to Know About Bullet Journaling

If you’re on Pinterest, I’m sure you’ve come across something called “bullet journaling”. It seems like literally everyone is sharing their “spreads” and their “cover pages” for each month.

In fact, on Reddit, there’s an entire sub dedicated to Bullet Journaling.

What is Bullet Journaling?

Bullet Journaling is a method of rapid-logging tasks, notes, events, and appointments, developed by Ryder Carroll. He, like many of us, disliked the vast assortment of journals available with built-in layouts that don’t work for everyone.

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The only planner I ever used up completely was the one I got from my community college in the fall of 2009. I don’t know why that one, in particular, inspired me to use it every day, but I found that I really liked the layout. I also inadvertently built a habit around using it for everything, and then they changed it the next year.

For me, the layout change broke my habit, and from 2009 to 2017 I couldn’t find a journal I could stick with.

While browsing Pinterest, like one does when one is bored, I kept seeing those pins about Bullet Journals. Eventually, I saw so many of them that I had to figure out what everyone was talking about.

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