Ah, January. A long month with 5 whole weekends in it. The month right after the holiday season. Some may think of it as a let-down month. Others may subscribe to the Blue Monday way of thinking (did anyone else not hear about Blue Monday until this year?). And even others yet may be so focused on their New Year’s Resolutions that they don’t have time to be down. For sure, January is one of the harder months for me, especially living up in cold, dark Vermont at this time of year. And although I’ve never gotten into setting resolutions, I do set yearly goals, and I just happen to do them in January or late December because that’s when I find I have the most time to reflect. With a busy holiday season, this year I got to setting my goals a bit late, and I was surprised by what I discovered.
Continue reading “This Year I’m Prioritizing Friends and Family”Category: My Goals
Money Goals With A Spouse
Well, in case you missed it folks, 2023 has arrived! Although I’m not a fan of New Years’ Resolutions, I am a big proponent of goal setting, and I happen to set my goals around the start of the New Year. Thanks to a busy holiday season, I’m just now starting the process of reflecting on 2022 and beginning to think about my goals for 2023. While there will be more to come on those details, today I’m starting with another goal-related post. I’m reflecting on how my goals have changed now that there’s another human being in my life: my spouse. I sometimes forget that it was just me and me alone for so long. I did some good work on myself before Mr. Dink came along, and it’s sometimes surreal to think about how different my goals would be if I was still single. Does anyone else feel this way?
Continue reading “Money Goals With A Spouse”Is It Time To Get Rid Of Expectations?
I’ve been thinking a lot this week about expectations. How we all have them. How unhelpful they are. How Buddhist thought says they are a major cause of human suffering. How they relate to my financial independence journey. We are all littered with expectations every day. But how does that go for us? If expectations are met, we are left feeling happy and fulfilled. But if our expectations aren’t met, which so often is the case (because, let’s be honest, usually we have no control over this), we are left feeling at best empty and sad and at worst resentful or even depressed. So, what’s the point? Is it time to get rid of expectations for good?
Continue reading “Is It Time To Get Rid Of Expectations?”The Power Of Living Intentionally
I’ve written in the past about spending intentionally, but today I want to go a bit broader. Today I want to talk about living intentionally. Do you live intentionally? Or maybe you’re wondering, what does it mean to live intentionally?
Continue reading “The Power Of Living Intentionally”What Sparks You In Work And Life?
The 4th of July weekend is about to be upon us, and so what better topic for the blog today then to discuss what sparks you in work and in life!
If you’ve read my story, you know that not so long ago, I was on the hamster wheel of work and life, with no clear way off but also no real intention of getting off the wheel. Then, a lot of things collided for me all at once. I took a pay cut for a job that ended up providing me with more time outside of work than I’d ever had in my life, I discovered Slow financial independence (FI), and I discovered my Sparketype, to name a few.
What is a Sparketype, you might be asking? Well, I’m here today to tell you all about it!
Continue reading “What Sparks You In Work And Life?”The Magic Of An Organized Email Inbox
For the past few weeks on the blog, I’ve been writing a lot about goals. First, I shared my yearly goal-setting process. Last week, I wrote about how goal setting helps me make decisions.
This week, I want to tell you a little tale about how, when I recently decided to clean out and organize my email, I unknowingly aligned my inbox with my values and goals.
Continue reading “The Magic Of An Organized Email Inbox”How Goal Setting Helps Me Make Decisions
Last week, I wrote about my process of setting my yearly goals. In that post, I mentioned how setting goals has helped tremendously with my decision-making process. This week, I want to dive deeper into this topic.
I recently heard a story about a friend of a friend. I was told that this person uses her values to make all her decisions. When a decision is put in front of her, she advocates that it is easy for her to say yes or no because all she has to do is ask herself if what she is being asked to do aligns with her values.
I admired this strategy, but I immediately knew I wasn’t there yet. My first, gut reaction was that’s great and all, but does she feel any guilt about her decisions? Apparently the answer is no, but the guilt that comes with decision making is where I struggle most.
Continue reading “How Goal Setting Helps Me Make Decisions”How I Set My Goals
It’s June! Things are getting warmer and greener here in Vermont. In addition to a changing season, it’s also about the time I like to do my mid-year goal review with myself. Because I’m doing my own goal check-in, I thought what better time than now to share with my readers how I actually set my yearly goals?
Continue reading “How I Set My Goals”How Part-Time Work Became My Goal
I may be on a journey to financial independence, but for the longest time, when I was still on the hamster wheel, it was just a feeling of “I’ll get there when I get there”. I liked working, and I didn’t have any plans to stop. How the times have changed!
Continue reading “How Part-Time Work Became My Goal”My Current Financial Independence Goal
If you’ve been reading the blog so far, you know that when I first discovered the FIRE (financial independence, retire early) movement around 7 years ago, the whole “retire early” part didn’t really resonate with me. At the time, I was just starting a postdoctoral fellowship and had dreams of being a big-time professor. I was still on the hamster wheel, and I had no intention of slowing down anytime soon.
Continue reading “My Current Financial Independence Goal”