Perhaps my most favorite picture of my sister and me.
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Halloween 2010
A few Hallowe’en pics. More coming later, I’m sure.
Just added:
Posted in Family, Fun
6 Comments
First Week Back at Home
It’s no accident, that I chose the week before Hallowe’en to be my “coming home”. For those in the know, you’re aware that I was home working on my business and with the kids for about 6 1/2 out of the last 8 years.
In September of 2009, I was called back to my government job with the requirement to work for 18 months. I was on the hook for some parental benefits I took in 2001 and I owed them that time. I always knew it was coming, even though I tried to pretend it wasn’t.
Anyway, I still had another 5-6 months to go and I couldn’t bear it any longer. I came home early and we’re going to deal with the consequences financially.
It will be SO worth it.
Yeah Hallowe’en!
So yep…I chose the week before one of my most favorite days of the year to come back home. We have a yearly Hallowe’en party and outside of the fact that I was hit with an atrocious cold/cough this week, it’s been prep time! That meant decluttering the house, cleaning the carpets (oh so embarrassing), decorating, getting costumes ready and more.
It’s amazing how things really built up over the past year. Working a nearly full-time job, running a business and having a hubby taking classes in the evening…sure can run you ragged. But you set your priorities and make it work.
Even though for much of the last decade, I’ve been accustomed to being on my own schedule, it has been kind of surreal being able to do my own thing. While I don’t think about it much in the daytime, I do have dreams that I keep forgetting to work and that my boss is calling me and yelling at me (while in real life, she never would do that!). It’s so weird to really just let go. I miss a few people from work (and miss them quite a bit), but for the first time in my life, I’ll say, “Thank goodness for Facebook.” LOL!
I am so thankful for the time that has been given back to me. I can really breathe again. I can truly be in charge of my business again. I can truly be dedicated to my family again. I can be creative again. I can be content again.
Posted in Family
5 Comments
Are You Neglecting What’s Right in Front of You?
A little shake up if you’re always on the lookout for the next best thing and possibly neglecting the sprouting seed right in front of you.
About a half hour ago, I posted this update on Twitter:
It’s been about 8 1/2 years since I began working online and I can still very vividly remember the desire to find the right thing, bouncing from idea to idea and hoping something would stick.
But I never really landed on that “next big thing”. What it took was using the resources I had, contacts I had and some good old fashioned work.
Over the years, it has always surprised me that people have opportunity right in front of them, but they seem not to want to take it. Why I don’t know, but if you’re pushing opportunity away…give yourself a little slap, okay?
I recently sent out a call for people to do some work for me. The work was paid, with the promise of more work and more pay with a job well done.
I had quite a few people respond. A handful have followed through. Some never produced anything and that’s okay…we have other things in our lives, priorities change, etc.
But what surprises me is that some of these people were offered this paid work kept looking for something else, instead of buckling down for the sure pay check.
Some did things like posting ads stating they were for hire…at rates lower than what I was paying. Others signed up to do work without pay with somewhere else instead.
Of course, we all have our reasons for doing things. Maybe the the nature of the work for me wasn’t their cup of tea. Maybe they don’t really want to work for a tyrant like me. 
Or maybe, in the last case, they figured the unpaid work experience was a better opportunity in the long run.
I don’t know what the motivations are in these cases, but I do know it’s a pattern I’ve seen countless times over the years. People always think that big thing will come along if they just keep looking.
Well, let me tell you, while I won’t be making anyone rich doing contract work for me, I can tell you that work can be steady and I recommend good work to others. In short, I can help those seeds grow into something your family can rely on.
So please…if you’ve been chasing, start working instead. I promise it works!
Learned Something about Competitiveness Today
Today, during a communication exercise in a workshop, I was accused of being too competitive.
It was interesting because the person who was most verbal about it and with whom I had previous interaction is the one I would have considered to be far more competitive than I.
In this exercise, we were told the purpose was effective communication and the objective was to “win as many points as you can”. That’s it…so we had to interpret that for ourselves.
While I learned something about effective communication during the exercise and most of us failed miserably at it…what really had me thinking was the competitiveness aspect. What I realized was is that some of us approach and even interpret competitiveness differently.
I looked at our exercise as a game…something to have fun with. I was going to play the game to win, but if I lost, that would have been just fine. In other words, I wanted to compete and see how it turned out.
Well, the other person in the room wanted to approach it from the perspective that everyone should win. She, with good reasoning, felt the instructor laid out the objective of the game to be for the greater good. In other words, she wanted to set it up so each team in the room got an equal amount of points.
My team – also with good reason – wanted to do things a little differently and go for the win on our own.
As soon as our approach was clear to other teams in the room, the backlash ensued. They couldn’t believe we weren’t going along with the group and one person got so upset, she declared that she didn’t want to play anymore and said in the real world, she wouldn’t do business with us.
At first, I interpreted this as a fear of not losing…which I think is the essence of competitiveness. But after further discussion as a group, it’s clearer that this person simply felt her way was the correct way. Even after she calmed down and our differing points of view were more clear to one another, she still kept defending her “win-win” approach was the correct one.
And I think feeling so strongly that it’s your way or the highway is also an aspect of being competitive. In other words, in order to succeed…it has to happen your way.
So let’s turn it back to how you approach your business? Do you take risks and play? Do you approach things with the fear of losing? Or are you insistent things should go the way you set out? Or is something else?
All of those approaches have advantages and drawbacks…no right or wrong answer, of course!
