Tag: goals

what's the goal?

Posted on by jplatt27

6:07 this morning.

I get out of bed to head to the gym.

I sit on the couch to put on my sneakers, thinking that maybe that’s not a good idea, I don’t want to get too comfortable.

As I fill up my water bottle I realize I’m moving kind of slow and am tempted to get back in bed.

But then I realize that my goal is to get to the gym three times a week.  That’s it.

It’s not get to the gym with pep in your step.

It’s not go to the gym and run 5 miles.

It’s not pop out of bed at 5:40 and run to the car to get to the gym.

It’s not go to the gym and do my strength training routine from my trainer complete with lunges and squat jumps.

No, it’s get to the gym.  It’s that simple.

So maybe I’m moving kind of slow and sitting on the couch lacing up my sneakers, maybe I’m not bouncing out the door revved for a killer work-out.  Maybe my legs can’t even fathom lunges this morning.

It’s ok.  Because as long as I get there, I’ve met my goal.

So I let myself take my time filling my water bottle.  And then I thought, maybe I’ll just bring my book and sit on the bike and pedal and read. I strolled to the car instead of walking with purpose.

I got the gym, parked myself on an upright bike next to two other readers, opened my book and started pedaling and reading.  It felt good to move my body and I could feel myself starting to warm up.

I lasted 7 minutes before my mind started to wander and I wanted to move more.

I switched to a spin bike, turned on my iPod, and started grooving and spinning.

If I would’ve stopped before I walked out the door, stopped because I thought I couldn’t do it, I would’ve missed out on the benefit that my goal is set to up to give me: energy.

And because I allowed myself to relax and refocus on the goal instead of the perfect completion of the goal, I not only met the goal but exceeded it.

 

 

 

what i'm up to…

Posted on by jplatt27

In my post on having a baby last week, I mentioned that I’m pretty much not ready to have a baby because I’m really enjoying focusing on myself right now.  Here’s what I’m up to…

Things After the Rings

Obviously.  I love writing and often find my mind wandering to potential blog posts.  I’m having fun with my blog and have so many things I’d like to do to continue to improve it.

Prepping for life coach training

I start a life coach training program at the end of July (can. not. wait!) and I’ve been busy doing some pre-work for it including a 27-page questionnaire about my life and a book report.

Business course

I’m enrolled in Ramit‘s Earn 1K course about making money on the side through freelance work.

Starting a business

The reason I’m enrolled in Earn 1K is because I’m in the process of starting a life coaching business. In addition to learning more about business and reading a lot about life coaching and personal development, I’m also spending significant amounts of time brainstorming ideas for services and packages, ways to find leads and clients, and working on branding.

My day job

I’ve actually become much more engaged in my day job over the last few months and find my mind brainstorming ideas on my own time.

And then there’s life…

In addition to all of these great things, I’m having fun being married, spending time with friends, exploring DC, and just relaxing and enjoying weekends.

 

Creating lives we love

Posted on by jplatt27

Yesterday I hosted my first vision board party.

While planning this party and waiting for RSVPs to come in, I hoped I would get a good turnout and maybe worried I wouldn’t. But then I reminded myself that the women that everyone that was meant to be here would show up.  And I truly believe that’s what happened.

I had a wonderful group of 7 amazing, beautiful, creative women: two friends from work, my Girls on the Run partner, a friend from high school, a friend that’s dating one of my friends from high school, my little from my sorority, and another friend from college.

We spent the afternoon flipping through magazines and gathering images, words, and phrases that inspired us. Then we each organized our clippings onto poster boards to create a vision for our lives.

This is the first step in creating lives we love.

Each board was different: some were vertical, some horizontal; some all words, some all photos. But each board was beautiful and inspiring, and hopeful in its own way.

As we went around sharing key pieces of our boards, I was so touched by what each woman had to share. I’ve known most of the girls for at least a few years at this point and I was still surprised and inspired by what they included on their boards. It was awesome–as in I was literally in awe of the the women, my friends, that came out. The best version of each woman and what the lives the aspire to have.

My heart was. so. happy. Even recalling this now, my heart is swelling with joy.

Thank you again to the girls that came out to support me. You each have a special place in my heart.

I can’t wait to host my next party. Probably late August or early September!

But who knows…it could be sooner!

I’d love to know:

Have you ever made a vision board?

Extra money: make it then make it work for you

Posted on by jplatt27

I had some pretty exciting financial accomplishments in the month of March. I paid off my credit card, paid off my smallest student loan to accelerate my debt snowball, and signed up for a business workshop that’s coming to DC next month (and paid in full!). While I paid off the student loan and half of the business workshop with my salary and regular budget, I paid off my credit card solely with money I earned outside my 9-5.

Here are some ways I’ve made extra money this year:

  • tutoring–I’ve been tutoring for the last three years.  I currently have two students that I see on a weekly basis for an hour.  I stack the appointments so they’re one right after the other so it only takes up one week night.
  • house/pet-sitting–Mike and I are house-sitting for the week for one of the families I tutor for.  Not only is this a mini-vacation in a beautiful house, it’s also great opportunity for us to make some extra $$. I also cat-sat for a week in February, visiting the cat during my lunch hour.
  • baby-sitting
  • sold an old text book on Amazon

Here are some other ways to make some extra money:

  •  sell clothes on e-Bay
  • start an etsy shop
  • monetize a skill.  For example, my friend Amanda has great organizing skills (remember when she organized us after the bed bugs?).  I keep telling her that she should start organizing on the side while she finishes up law school.

But simply making extra money isn’t all you have to do to truly make the most of it. I’ve been tutoring for the last three years.  I’m sure I’ve made a couple thousand dollars or more in that time but it wasn’t until recently that I started capitalizing on this side income.

To make your side income really work for you, you have to do two things: capture  and earmark.

Until last fall I would put the cash in my wallet and deposit the checks in my checking account but not really use it for anything in particular.  I’m pretty sure I spent most of that money on food–lunches, coffee, random snacks, breakfast, etc.  What a waste!

But in the fall I set a goal to pay off my credit card. I decided to use my tutoring money to do this.  I earmarked the weekly income from tutoring for my credit card–allocating it before it even came in to one specific goal.

I’d capture this income by knowing the exact total of what I earned and making sure it didn’t get used.  Every Tuesday, I’d walk to the bank and deposit the cash and the check into my checking account. Then I’d get back to my desk and make a payment on my credit card. To capture money for a goal that you have to buy outright (like the registration for the workshop, or a new bag), I still deposit in my checking account and just make sure that I subtract that money mentally when figuring out my balance.

I was amazed at how quickly this income added up when I began to capture  and earmark.

I try not to think about how much progress I could’ve made in the past 3 years if I would’ve done this the whole time.  What’s done is done.  Can only look forward.

I encourage you to try the capture  and earmark method for a few months and see how many goals you reach. Maybe you have some debt you want to pay down or maybe you want to build up a small amount in savings. With spring here and summer on the way, maybe you have weddings coming up, plans to travel to see friends, or have your eye on a cute spring dress. Working this method will make you feel empowered and relieve some of the stress that goes along with big money goals. Go for it! Work it girl!

Let’s chat:

What are some ways you’ve made extra money?

What money goals do you have right now? What would you earmark money for?

I love a good brainstorm–share your ideas for earning and capturing extra money in the comments.

My new favorite "toy"

Posted on by jplatt27

Since we’re not saving for a house and focusing on paying down my student loans using Dave Ramsey’s debt snowball method, I’ve been playing around with CNNmoney’s student loan calculator. This thing is seriously like magic!  Before our money conversation, I was doing my own number crunching at Modern Times Coffeehouse at Politics and Prose, my favorite Saturday morning spot. I was so shocked and excited when I clicked calculate that I just had to interrupt the woman sitting across from me and share my findings with her.  Since then, I’ve gone a little farther in my calculations and I wanted to share my new calculations with you!

First, let me explain the debt snowball.  The debt snowball is a pretty easy concept.  Make a list of all of your debts (minus the mortgage) from lowest amount to highest amount.  While still making minimum payments on all accounts, attack the lowest amount by paying as much above the minimum as you can.  Once the smallest loan is paid off, put all the money you were putting to the lowest one, to the next lowest.  Continue until the highest loan is paid off.

My lowest loan amount at the beginning of the year was $1,710.  The minimum payment is $50/month and the interest rate is 6.8%. Put that info into the loan calculator:

At this rate, it will take 3 years and 3 months to pay off this loan.

In our budget conversation we decided to allocate $130 to the loan in addition to the $50 minimum. Then, I realized that we actually had money in our student loan budget line that wasn’t actually being spent each month.  (My interest rates are variable and my monthly payments have gone down over the last few years but I haven’t changed the budget line). So we decided to put that money toward this loan too.  So now, each month we can put $299 towards the loan.  Put that in the calculator:

and we can have this loan paid off by the 4th of July! We’ll also save 83% in interest. Pretty great, huh?

Think that’s cool? Watch this.

Here are the terms for my next smallest loan:

If I continue to pay the minimum each month, I’ll make my final payment summer 2019.

If I use the debt snowball and roll the $299 from loan 1 onto this loan plus its minimum:

we can pay off this second loan by Easter next year!

And it will just get more powerful as the snowball continues to grow through five more loans. I haven’t crunched those numbers yet as I’m sure we’ll have some big expenses/adjustments to our budget in the next few years but this is all very exciting to me.  When I graduated college my goal was to pay off my student loans before my kids go to college. Now, I see it’s possible to pay off them well before that.

So go ahead, I dare you, play around with my new favorite toy. It should work with credit cards and car payments too.

Our pace: what we're not saving for

Posted on by jplatt27

If you missed the post I wrote last week about going at your own pace, I highly recommend reading it here. It’s a good reminder for all of us.

Along the same lines, here’s an example of how Mike and I are going at our own pace.

As a young married couple, the next big step is to buy a house or at least save for one. But, during our money conversation, Mike and I decided to not save money for a house right now.

Prior to this conversation, we had been saving for a house.  That was our big goal. But at the rate we were saving, we wouldn’t be able to buy a house for quite some time, 8 years according to Mint.com.

And besides, we essentially already have a mortgage: my massive student loan debt.

Right around this time I found personal finance guru Dave Ramsey (thanks, Words of Williams!) and started listening to his daily radio show and did a little bit of reading on his website. And I got motivated to pay down my student loans. I couldn’t wait to get my debt snowball rolling.

So as we walked to meet friends for dinner, I suggested this to Mike.  That instead of saving for a down payment, we start putting extra money toward my student loans each month. And Mike agreed. He said he’d been thinking something similar.

As we walked through the city we discussed that we could probably stay in an apartment for another few years and that we probably won’t need or want a yard until our kids are 5 or 6 (which, since they’re not born yet is still quite a bit away).

Our money will add up so much more quickly against my student loans (bye-bye compound interest) than it would in a savings account.  So not only will we feel like we’re succeeding at this goal as we pay off some of the smaller loans but we’ll also be saving ourselves money in the long run.

When we’re ready to buy a house, we’ll have more money to put aside for a down payment because the monthly payments on the loans will be less (and hopefully we’ll make more money each year) and we’ll be more motivated to do it when we feel like it’s in our reach.

So–here we are–a newlywed couple that’s not saving for a house. Probably a little odd.  But we couldn’t be happier with this status.  It feels great that we’re going at our own pace.

Another bonus of this decision is that if we’re not saving for a house, we don’t have to decide where said house will be–something that we felt a lot of pressure to figure out.

I’d love to know:

How are you going at your own pace?

Household organization

Posted on by jplatt27

My focus for January is household organization because I’ve been feeling unorganized and not on top of things for the past few months (thanks bed bugs!). We had our last bed-bug treatment on January 3, so this focus is fitting and timely. And what a great way to start a new year.

Organized Space

My best friend Amanda came down the weekend after the treatment and helped us put all of our belongings back in their homes. Without her, it would’ve taken Mike and I days to put everything back and it would’ve remained unorganized even after things were in their places. It can be so paralyzing to make decisions about your own things and I can get totally lost in the weeds over-analyzing where things should go.  But as I combed through all of our belongings making decisions on what should stay and what should go, Amanda found homes for them in our closets, on our desk, and in our bookshelf. I honestly couldn’t believe how organized things were when she was done.  She just has an eye for this sort of thing. (I told her she should start a side business to make some extra money while she’s in law school.)

Our space is organized (minus our bedroom, we decided to let the treatment sit for an additional week), and I’d like to keep it that way so I’ve paid special attention to putting things back where they belong.  I’d also like to keep our apartment clean.

Clean Space

To be honest, I’ve never been great about keeping our place clean.  Aside from dishes and laundry, cleaning has never been super high on our priority list. We’d both clean the apartment but not on a regular basis. It was just something we never thought about, until things got so gross that one of us got fed up and decided to do something about it.

To get us organized I made a Cleaning Checklist and taped it to the wall in our kitchen.  This way we’ll both remember what needs to be done and if we have some time we can tackle one of the items on the list.  Honestly, each of the tasks on the list takes 20 minutes tops and I’d rather spend 20 minutes here and there than an entire afternoon on a weekend cleaning. I proposed we adapt the Williams’ 10-minute rule but it hasn’t caught on just yet.  Next week is the first week this month that our schedules aren’t crazy so maybe we’ll pick it up then. But even 10 minutes a few times a week is better than what we were doing before.

Money in order

The other aspect of our household that we wanted to get organized was our finances.  We had a nice conversation about our money and then on January 1 we sat down and worked out a new budget. Then I posted a tracker on the wall in our kitchen to track variable expenses throughout the month.  And so far, we’ve stuck to our budget! I think just having the awareness helped.  I’m not sure we’re necessarily spending differently than we did in the past but we’re more on the same page about where we are with our budget, what’s been spent, etc.

Still to do

In the last week and a half of the month, we’ll get our bedroom cleaned and organized, I’ll look through our apartment for things to purge, add them to the pile above, (inspired by Jess’ challenge, I’m hoping to get rid of 100 items), and then get them out of our home either by freecycling, donating, giving to friends, or trashing.

I’d love to know:

How’s your January? 

Do you ever feel not-on-top-of-it when it comes to household/personal tasks?

Resolutions: set yourself up for success

Posted on by jplatt27

On Friday, I shared my 2012 resolutions and my 2012 resolutions spreadsheet. When deciding on my resolutions, I thought about my intentions for this year and what I wanted to achieve and then thought about what steps I could do to make them be my reality this time next year.

Have you made any New Year’s resolutions or goals yet? It’s not too late, you know. But I’m sure you don’t want them to be like this:

If you haven’t made your 2012 resolutions yet (or if even if you have), here’s some tips to help you set them (or revise them) to set yourself up for success.

When writing resolutions or setting any type of goal you want it to be SMART:

Specific–make the goal something very specific

Measurable–make the action item something you can quantify

Attainable–you want a goal that is actually within your reach

Realistic–set goals that you know you can meet or are just a bit of a stretch

Time-bound–set a time frame for your goal

For example: If your intention for 2012 is to lose weight, you’ll want to set SMART resolutions that support that intention coming true. So instead of saying “go to the gym” a SMART goal would be go to the gym 3 times per week for 45 minutes. This is

Specific–saying what you will do for how long and how often

Measurable–you can say whether or not you achieved this

Attainable–if you have a gym membership or means to get one this would be attainable

Realistic–3 times a week is do-able whereas every day may not be

Time-bound–there’s a time period in which to measure this.

And that’s that. Then you go on working toward it.

I’d love to know:

What are your SMART resolutions or goals for 2012, this month, or this week?

If you want help setting smart goals, leave a comment below or shoot me an email at thingsafterrings@gmail.com. I’m happy to help.

Resolutions 2012

Posted on by jplatt27

I’m sure my friends will find it hard to believe that I’ve never made a New Year’s resolution before.  I’m a pretty goal oriented person and I’m all about making myself better so you’d think New Year’s resolutions would be right up my alley. But it’s true, I don’t think I’ve ever made a New Year’s resolution before.

For some reason I’m really excited for 2012.  I think it’s going to be a really good year and I’m excited to see what opportunities it brings, and what I can accomplish this year.  But I want to play a part in what the year holds and what my life will look like on January 1, 2013.  Last weekend I used my Saturday morning to draft a letter to myself in which I described exactly what I want my life to be this time next year. I used the intentions I described in my letter to form my 2012 resolutions.

My 2012 Resolutions

  • Contact each member of my family once per week
  • Entertain once per month
  • Two HH/lunch with girlfriends per month
  • Contact two out of town friends per week
  • Go shopping twice per month
  • One item off blog to-do list per month
  • Do something toward my future business once per month
  • Stick to weekly/monthly cleaning schedule (more on that later)
  • Put extra money to my lowest student loan each month
  • One date night per month
  • One item of love-to/mean-to list (a list of things that I’d love to do or have been meaning to do and just haven’t done yet)

There they are!  I’m excited for these.

None of my resolutions are earth shattering, at least I don’t think so.  But in meeting each of these resolutions I will be a little bit happier. And isn’t that what resolutions are all about?

I’d love to know:

Do you make New Year’s resolutions?  What are your resolutions for 2012?

 

PS–I’ve created a spreadsheet to track my resolutions throughout the year:

Resolutions Spreadsheet

Thanks to my friend Jen for that idea. I modeled my resolutions spreadsheet after hers.

Stronger

Posted on by jplatt27

This video has been playing at my gym recently and I really enjoy it.  It reminds me why I go to the gym and makes me feel empowered.

I hope you’ll be inspired by it…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjuHgD-Ft1c&feature=related]

So fill in the blank and tell me:

I’m stronger than ________. 

My answer: I’m stronger than SAD–Seasonal Affective Disorder.