Best of the Tips

Because of my participation in the LiteMind writing project, I found a few really great new blogs. Here are the entries that I have deemed most worthy of your attention:

Articles:
7 Powerful Tips to Overcome Failure
7 Tricks to You Need to Fight Procrastination (Boy do I need this one!)
26 ways to Change the world (Easy ideas that make you happy in the process.)
10 Ways to Improve Personality (Apparently it can be done. Not that any of us need to...)

Resources:
100 Resources to Improve your Career, Relationships, and Money (This is a long list of articles that look excellent.)

No Cost Business Tools: 37 Free Applications that Make Your Life Easier (Tons of free resources for getting stuff done online.)

And that's that. Stay tuned for a longer post from me soon. I plan on writing some idea and tips for the holiday season.

Link love - Frugality and Personal Finance

Hi. If you're new here, welcome! Please consider subscribing to my blog's feed, found in the upper right hand corner. And feel free to browse around, leave comments, and make yourself at home.

Today I'm sharing some end of the week link love. I've recently done a lot of thinking about personal finances. Probably because my husband just started a PhD program at the same time that I went from a full-time job to beginning a freelance writing career. So we've had to do a lot of changing where finances are concerned. There have been several great posts from other bloggers this week (and a few weeks ago) on the topic, so I thought I'd share.

If you have trouble saving money, Force yourself to save! is a great article that shows you how you can.

I'm looking to spend less money at the grocery store, and for that reason, I found this article How to Feed yourself for $15 a Week very useful. (Though I know I'll NEVER be able to limit my food intake to $15 a week...)

Are you thinking about switching careers or quitting your day job to branch out and do something new? Quitting the Day Job: Finding the Guts to Pursue your Dreams is a very insightful post about doing just that. For me, it didn't take as many guts to quit the day job (I had to quit because we moved across the country), but having the guts to stay with this freelance writing thing is quite a leap for me!

Want a quick rundown of the main points of personal finance? Check out Everything you Need to Know about Personal Finance. It comes with cool illustrations!

This post, How to Budget with ING Direct, is a look at how an online savings account can help you budget for and save for a variety of different things. I'm experimenting with the idea myself. I like ING Direct so far. (If you want to sign up, let me know and I can get you the $25 sign-on bonus.)

Lists writing project

I submitted one of my blog entries to a writing project contest at LiteMind. I don't think you can vote if you aren't one of the project participants, but you should check it out anyway, because there are a lot of interesting blog entries. You may discover a great new blog!

Being grateful for the daily small miracles

In my last post I talked about switching from a negative outlook to a positive one. Megan commented on one of her techniques for doing that - a gratitude list. I find that listing out the things I'm grateful for really does help me feel more positive, happy, and yes - grateful.

I wrote about increasing gratitude before if you'd like some tips on making room for gratitude in your life. I also want to share something I've tried to do lately that has increased my gratitude and helped me focus on the positive things in my life.

Every evening I like to reflect back on the day. I try to remember the positive things that have happened, and think about the things I am grateful for that day. I also look for the little 'miracles' that occur daily.

For example, yesterday I was backing out of a friend's driveway. Her driveway is narrow and has ditches on each side. See where this is going? Yes, I backed up right into a ditch and got stuck. :( But it was a miracle to me that we got the car out quickly and safely. I'm grateful that (so far!) I didn't seem to cause any damage to the car. (We haven't noticed anything, anyway.) But even if there is damage, I'll still be grateful that it was a small accident and that no one was hurt.

There's always something to be thankful for; there will always be tiny miracles happening in our lives every day. If we aren't paying attention, we may not even notice them. Take some time to reflect today on the miracles in your life. Even better, write them down so you can get a positive boost every time you read it.

What you think is what you see: 4 Ways to stop negativity

When my husband and I moved this summer from Arizona to Georgia, I noticed an interesting phenomenon. I already knew that the things you think about are the things you see, but the principle became real to me at that time.

During the time that we were shopping for deals on moving trucks, we saw moving trucks on the road all the time. Then when we decided to go with Penske, we suddenly saw Penske trucks everywhere on the road. Was there an influx of moving trucks on the road because summer is the time of year when people move? Maybe. But more likely we noticed the trucks because we had moving trucks on our minds. After we moved, I no longer noticed or cared about moving trucks on the road.

This illustrated to me perfectly just how powerful the mind is. My thoughts dictated what I saw and payed attention to. The world is what it is, but how we see it depends upon what we're looking for. I guess you could say that it's like the law of attraction (though I'm not talking about it the way some people do. I don't believe that if I sit around thinking about money that a money bag will suddenly appear on my doorstep.)

What I mean is that you will notice and pay attention to the things you are thinking about, and that will become reality for you. If you think about the kindness and goodness the world has to offer, you will find it. If your mindset is one of abundance and gratitude, you'll find the world to be a plentiful place.

I'm going to admit to you right now that I struggle with this principle. There are times when my attitude is negative and I can only picture negative outcomes in certain areas of my life. Not surprisingly, a negative outcome is exactly what I get. And the negative outcome makes it easier for me to picture negative outcomes, so the negativity becomes circular and powerful and difficult to escape.

But it is possible to short-circuit negativity and to focus on the positive instead. There are several things we can do in order to break the negativity cycle:

Focus on the positive things in your life. There are so many good things to be thankful for but it's easy to take them for granted. It's often easier to notice the negatives, so work at it and notice the positives!

Change your behavior. We often behave in certain ways that reinforce and help cause the negative outcome. Change the behavior that leads to negative. Choose to act differently. One example from my life is my tendency to nag. Nagging is a negative behavior that does not inspire positive change in others. In order to increase the positive outcomes in my life, I can choose to not nag.

Find faith and hope. Do you have faith in yourself, faith in others, faith in a higher power? It is important to be able to trust that good things will happen to you and that even difficult or painful situations can benefit you and lead to a positive outcome. How do you develop that faith? It's difficult. Meditation or prayer can help. It also helps to look back to past events. Haven't you learned important things, even from your most difficult trials? I know I have, and this helps me to have faith that the right things will happen in the present moment.

Seek and you will find. How do you want your life to be? If you desire goodness, abundance and happiness, you have to be those things; you have to send those things out into the world and seek for them in others. I think it's a life-long process. Sometimes I'm better at positivity than at other times, but I believe it's important to keep at it. There are good and wonderful things in this world, and it's up to us whether we see them or not.

Seven Ways to Stop Wasting Time

I've had a hard time lately with time management. I have a lot to do, but it's hard to make myself do what needs to get done. Instead I manage to waste time. I'll sit down to check my email in the morning, and next thing I know, an hour has gone by. I still get the essential things done, but it takes much more time to get them accomplished.

You may know the feeling. For my benefit, I've assembled a few tips for avoiding the 'time-waster' trap. Perhaps they may help you as well.

Have a planning session with yourself. What are your big goals? If you have a purpose, it's a lot easier to stay focused on what's important to you. Think about your long-term goals and what you need to do to get there.

Start each day with focus. What is it you want to accomplish today? Make sure your tasks and activities fall in line with your main goals. If you want to clean your kitchen, then sending email all day does not fit with your goal. Know what you want to do and stick with those things.

Have a clear-cut plan. Instead of going through your day aimlessly, list out your most important tasks and set out to achieve them first. That way, even if you waste time later, you'll still have accomplished the important things. I like to schedule each hour of the day, assigning myself certain tasks for each hour. That way, I always know what I should be doing.

Cut out (or at least cut down on) your time-wasting culprits. You know what they are - TV, Internet, email, magazines, blogs, chatting with co-workers or friends, ... etc. If you can't cut them out completely (and who can?), start by cutting down. Cut one hour of TV every day, and you've got a lot of time on your hands!

Set a timer. Set a timer for 15 minutes and accomplish as much as you can within that time frame. I learned this trick from FlyLady, and I was shocked to find out just how much can get done in that amount of time.

Reward yourself. Decide that you want to work at something for x amount of minutes. At the end of that time, you can reward yourself with your time-waster of choice -- but set a limit on it!

Throw in a 'lazy' day every now and again. I don't know about you, but every once in a while, I like to lounge in my pajamas all day and watch cheesy movies. It's a somewhat rare occurrence, but it allows me to rest my brain from my goals, plans, and to-do list, which in turn assures that my goals stay fresh.

Time-wasters will always be lurking around. But with a little planning and some practice, we can say goodbye to wasted time. What techniques do you use for managing your time?

Good, Better, Best

I recently decided to take a serious look at the way I use my time every day. Some of the patterns I discovered are disturbing - I waste time, I check my email almost incessantly, and I spend a lot of my free time in front of a computer or a TV.

I'm not really happy with my usage of time lately. Especially since hearing a talk given by a respected leader in my church entitled Good, Better, Best. The talk is fairly religous in nature, but I think it has a larger application.

The point of the talk is that there are practically limitless good things we could be spending our time on. Researching a topic on the Internet could be considered good. Educational TV programming falls under the good category as well, and there are countless other good pursuits out there.

And not to say that pursuing good things is bad; it's not. But his point is that there are better and even 'best' ways to use our time. I agree. With the infinite possible ways to use my time, I'd like to make sure I'm using my time on the best things possible.

Some 'best' things for me: Spending quality time with my husband. Keeping in touch with family and friends. Getting involved in charity work and doing good deeds (big and small) for others. Doing good things for my body (like exercise). Learning new skills and gaining knowledge.

I haven't done such a good job of focusing my time on the best things, but I'm looking to change that. What are your 'best' things? Are you spending sufficient time on them?

The start of a new (Celtic) year

Did you know that the end of the Celtic calendar year is (or was...) celebrated around October 31? Neither did I. But now that I do know, it's a perfect opportunity to set a couple of goals to see me through to our new year.

Are you with me? Let's all set a goal that we will achieve by January 1, 2008. My goal is health related. I've been really bad in that area. I am going to exercise three times a week and lose five pounds by the new year. And if I have a bad week, I don't get to scrap the whole plan - I keep going with my goal!

What goal will you set? I'd love to hear yours, so leave me a comment!

Free Disposable Phone Numbers - Numbr and PrivatePhone

Have you ever had a need for a disposable phone number? Let's say you sold something on Craigslist or filled out a form that required a phone number, and you didn't want to put your actual phone number. Or maybe you just met a potential love interest (but you don't know yet if that person is a psycho stalker.) That's when a disposable phone number comes in handy.

You can get a free disposable phone number at either of the following sites:

Numbr
PrivatePhone

Since I've used both of them, I’ll review them both, sharing the pros and cons of each. Keep in mind that these services are free. PrivatePhone has extra features if you want to pay for them, but I don't! So I'm reviewing the free stuff. Also, I am not being paid to write this review, nor do I benefit in any way if you sign up for either service. I just like the flexibility of having a disposable phone number.

Numbr
Pros:
• It can be set so that calls to the disposable phone number are forwarded to an actual phone.
• You can also set up a 'do not disturb between 9pm - 8am', which means all calls received during that time will automatically go to voicemail.
• The customer service is excellent, which is very important to me. I sent a 'technical difficulties' email to them, and within hours they had responded, and they worked with me until the problem was solved.

Cons:
• The disposable number is ten digits plus a three digit extension, which is sometimes awkward.
• The number expires automatically after one month if you do not access your account and extend it. (But if it expires, you can always reactivate it.)
• You can't record a personalized voicemail greeting.

PrivatePhone
Pros:
• The disposable number is ten digits only.
• You can record a personal voicemail greeting.
• You can listen to the voicemail online OR by calling your account from a regular phone.

Cons:
• When someone calls the disposable number, they can only leave a voicemail - calls cannot be received on an actual phone.
• If you do not access your account regularly, the number will be deactivated.
• If the number is deactivated, you only have seven days to reactivate it or your number is lost to you forever.

As you can see, there are benefits to each provider. I personally use both, but my bias is toward Numbr because of the amazing, personalized customer service I received from them. Plus I prefer to receive calls on a regular phone rather than have them sent directly to voicemail. However, it's really a personal preference.

Whichever you choose (maybe both, like me), it really does come in handy to have a disposable phone number. It's nice to have another way to thwart the telemarketers.

New personal development blog

Hey, all. I just got back from a trip across the country where I had zero access to the Internet. I know, how did I survive?!! In fact, while on the trip, I decided that I may have an Internet addiction. I definitely felt some withdrawal symptoms from being away from email so long. :) Perhaps it's time for some serious cutting down on computer time. Perhaps I'll bring you along for the ride!

Anyway, I'd like to be back up and posting regularly by tomorrow. Meanwhile, check out a blog I recently found - Think Simple. Be Decisive. It focuses on simplicity and happiness and definitely has some great ideas.