Tag Archives: Goal

Mindful Monday: June Goals

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It is quite amazing what a person can do when they just do a little bit at a time. These small monthly goals have given me direction when I can think of so many ways to try to better my life. They will be incredibly important in this newest transition as Mike and I move back to San Diego.

I’ve been away for long enough that I can start over. Most long-time friends from San Diego hardly know the person I’ve become over the last seven years. I now have a chance to create the best possible image of myself in their eyes. It may sound calculated and a little cold but, in reality, it’s quite the opposite. I value these people and their opinion of me and I’d love to show them the true, kind, loving, health-conscious person I’ve become.

So, in that vain, most of this month’s goals will focus on my first-impression. The nine areas I focus on in setting my goals are: family/relationship, career, finance, spirit, body, intellect, friendship, environment.

Previous Goals That Have Stuck:

  • Family: Set up weekly phone dates (or REAL dates now that I live back in SD!) with every immediate family member. (Read about it here)
  • Spirit: When I’m sad, stop thinking of the future. Just smile and try to make that moment happier.
  • Spirit: Remember to be happy when I succeed. (This is a work in progress but I’m getting there!) 
  • Spirit: Keep a treasure box and a travel magnet collection. (It keeps out the crap while allowing for nostalgia)
  • Body: Eat at least one raw meal per day. (Usually my smoothie)
  • Body: Have at least one entirely vegan day per week. (This is actually becoming multiple days per week)
  • Career: Stop being late.
  • Finance: Purge the crap.
  • Intellect: Create a folder for design inspiration. (I rearranged my Pinterest page and now keep a physical, non-digital folder for magazine articles.)
  • Environment: Stop using paper towels.

June Goals:

  • Friendship: Stop spewing my life details.
    When I meet new people, I get this overwhelming urge to tell them every detail of my life. For some reason I think they will benefit from knowing all the ways I handle hardship. In my old age I am realizing that most people have been through MANY more hardships than me. Maybe I should just stop to listen. Mike does this very well and it has taught me the value of just shutting my mouth for a bit.
  • Friendship: Make friends actively but slowly.
    Another huge problem I have is rushing to make friends in a new place. Now that I’m back home, I have the luxury of already knowing many awesome people. But instead of rushing around like a headless chicken trying to hang out with people, I’m going to take it slowly. Contact people and re-form relationships one by one. Who knows what close ties will come out of the woodwork.
  • Finance: Keep down the cost of moving.
    Moving can be SO expensive. With the amount we move, Mike and I need to learn to keep down our costs. We are going to limit our spending to whatever we made in the Craigslist sale of our Peoria apartment furnishings. It’s going to be very tough, especially since we have no idea what we’ll need yet. We’ll see how this one goes.
  • Body: Continue to do my 20 minute workouts every morning.
    My commute will soon be starting at 7.15am. This means I will have to wake up around 6 to get in my workout. I can and will continue my workouts by setting up a new routine. Prep the night before and be efficient in the morning.

Anyway, I forgot about Monday mornings. They are pretty tough. Time to head to work! Plaster a big smile on my face and bounce around with energy. Hopefully by the time I arrive at the office, my smile and energy will be real. Haha. Happy Monday everyone!

Love and a big smile – Ash

 

Mindful Monday: Never Enough

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This morning’s repost is from a very smart man. His name is Seth Godin. He wrote an awesome book on entrepreneurship in today’s world (The Purple Cow). The type of world where ads on TV and small, incremental product improvements are not enough. Where business starters have to have not only a unique idea but myriad ways to get people to actually buy it. It’s a great book. A quick read full of awesome information, I recommend it.

 

He also writes a blog. Short posts dense with recommendations for leading a successful life. I thought his post today was perfect. Especially for a Monday morning. Just read it:

SethGodin

Never Enough

-Seth Godin

“There’s never enough time to be as patient as we need to be … investing now, when it’s difficult, is the single best moment.”

So don’t save for tomorrow what you know you need to do today. Even if it was extra hard to wake up this morning. Happy Monday everyone! Love and a toothy smile. – Ash

 

Remember Your Dreams?

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It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything from within the depth of my brain but I realized recently that I’ve made great strides in my life and I want to tell you all about it.

My dad always said that graduating from college came as a great shock to him. Financially, he was suddenly making money and had credit cards and basically went crazy with it. Emotionally, he went from being at the top of the food chain to the very very bottom of the barrel. Luckily, I’m not finding the transition quite as drastic but man is it a shock! I thank goodness architecture steeled me for servitude, the hard work thing isn’t a problem. And my finances have just switched from spending the bank’s money to all the money I make now being given right back to them. My belt will remain cinched for the next 15 years. There’s no sudden freedom in that department.

The area I have had trouble with is figuring out where and how to channel all that passion I graduated with. School was hard. I’m talking drive you to tears almost daily, lock you in the same room with the same people on lots of red bull for days at a time hard. School was hard. But it also made me an incredibly strong, capable, ambitious woman. It forced me to define a reason for every one of my actions. It forced me to cut out the bull crap and focus on my immediate and future goals. My goals, upon graduating, were both for my career and personal life.

Personal: I wanted to travel and find a place I love to finally settle down and, eventually, have a family. I wanted to remain close with some incredible people I met in college while hopefully branching out and meeting new people. I wanted to get back to my family. My lovely, supportive, completely outrageous, and weird family, who I love and miss so dearly. I wanted to get back to them. And I wanted to stay with this amazing man that I met in my final year. Mike, my other half. I wanted our relationship to continue to grow and get stronger.

Career: I wanted to get some experience under a construction contractor, enough to have some confidence in my ability to know and direct the process. Then I wanted to start designing and building anything and everything. I wanted to have my own business as soon as I felt confident enough.

Wow was I shocked at how quickly a person’s ambition and dreams can be crushed under the weight of real life. While I am continuously working towards those goals, and am actually reaching some of them right this moment, I’m finding that so many of them were lost in the shuffle. So, in order to keep my goals at the forefront of my mind, and to keep myself from going insane in my current position in life, I remind myself why I’m doing what I’m doing.

What am I accomplishing for my life but also (and this is new for me) what am I bringing to other people’s lives. I am finding that, in helping other people define and reach their dreams in my place of work, I’m discovering and reaching my own. My dreams shift and meld with me. With each new experience, I try to improve as a person. As I become a better person, my dreams become better too!

A dream, a goal, and ambition does not have to be static. In fact, it’s better if it’s not. Dreams should flex as I grow as a person. They will become more detailed or more blurry. They will, sometimes, completely change direction. But the important thing about reaching my dreams, I realized, is that I find fulfillment in all the steps along the way. I will never get to the end point and think, was that really worth it?

So what are your dreams and goals? When was the last time you defined them? Maybe it’s time to write them down.