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Today is International Women’s Day, and for all women, including you….yes, YOU, this is a great day to sit back, reflect, and find out what you really want out of your life.
We have so much more freedom than before, so many more opportunities and so much more access to pretty much everything.
So what are you going to do about it?
GIRLS, GO OUT THERE AND GET THE LIFE YOU WANT!!!!!!
sit back, relax, and plan your dream life
Today is a day to dream large. Always wanted to open a spa, climb Everest, set up a date night with your husband every two weeks? Whatever it is that will help you achieve your dream life go out there and get it! Don’t make excuses, and stop thinking about all the reasons why you can’t do it, or it won’t work out.
Everyone has a chance at a dream life. Do you have the courage to live yours?
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In just under two weeks we’re getting married in Mexico. Eeeeks! Two Weeks!
We’ve got some solid plans laid out, but it’s true, destination weddings are not really for control freaks.
We had to book the wedding package we were interested in at the resort, and select a few other things like the menu and time of our reception…but otherwise it’s a total game time decision!
- We won’t know which restaurant or hotel area we’ll have our reception in until we get to tour the resort.
- We won’t know what the food is going to taste like, or even if we made good choices until we have our party…or if we are extremely lucky we will be allowed to sample some food a few days earlier.
- We aren’t sure if the dj can play our songs or accomodate our requests until we meet him on our wedding night.
But the funny thing out of all of this is that my fiance and I really like to have control of pretty much everything. Or at least he does. I tend to go from one extreme or the other…make me the captain or the servant, but god forbid I have to discuss every detail with many different people to get their approval and spend forever going back and forth. That makes me bananas! Either tell me what to do, and exactly how to do it…or let me do it my way.
So, some funny things have happened because of this. I have spent most of my wedding planning time labouring over things like colour combinations, or how I would like the print work to look like, while my fiance has spent his time emailing friends and family and reconnecting with all the guests, and continously colour coding the rsvp list.
I guess we’ve just transferred our desire to know exactly what is going on and how we want everything to work into other things…and so far it’s been okay! I guess if our guests have cold soup and terrible music we can feel some sort of satisfaction knowing that the colour pallette is pretty and we are up to date on eveyone’s business!
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If you are design inspired but need to start laying out your furniture and ideas before you pull out your wallet this may be the pefect thing for you…an HGTV Room Planner that lets you create a space, move around the furniture and try out a bunch of ideas before spending a dime!
This is also a great tool to use if you are thinking about buying a house or moving and you don’t know how the current plan fits your lifestyle. After spending a little bit of time you’ll easily be able to gage if the space works for you as is, if you’ll have to do renovations, how extensive they may be, or if there’s so much work to be done that maybe the space doesn’t work for you at all.
The kitchen room planner, complete with dinner guests and a puppy!
The room planner is really easy to use too. I tested out this kitchen concept that I’ve had in mind for a while. I’ve always wanted a kitchen with the stove in the island – that way you can cook and talk to people in the kitchen instead of having your back to them. Also, since the kitchen is such a social part of the house I put some big comfy chairs for people to sit and have a glass of wine while I’m cooking. It’s so fun to design the fantasy life, and after this experience I’m ready to go house shopping again and find my new home!
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I’m a pretty relaxed girl, and I’m not worried about having a super planned wedding. But…today is the day that our wedding is one month away!
Oh my god! I’m totally unprepared! The only wedding planning we’ve done is selecting the resort, and sending out invitations…and also thinking about all the tricks and pranks we’re going to play on our friends – if that even counts as wedding planning.
We can’t find our sheet that lists all the things we have to do, but I know that we haven’t done any of them!
Eeeks! How do you plan a wedding in one month???
Photo Credit: Sex and The City The Movie 2
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I love real estate. I watch shows on it, I check listings online all the time, I come up with different dream houses, investment opportunities and everything in between almost every day.
And yesterday I saw a house online that has taken the new spot on my dream house list.
From the outside it doesn’t look like much. Just a simple one level house
But the house is actually built on the side of a hill, so what looks like a one level house is really three stunning levels with sweeping views from every room.
the dining room
the living room
the kitchen
the outdoor dining room
the bedroom - can you imagine waking up to this view
even the bathroom has a gorgeous view!
The only challenge is that this house really only works in a year round hot weather environment.
I guess we’ll just have to move somewhere tropical!
…What I can dream, can’t I?
Photo Credit: Propgoluxury.com
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Like many engaged women I will shortly be leaving my apartment to move in with my fiancé. The whole thing is very exciting, but even better because the recent sale of my condo turned out to be a big win.
I bought my condo in 2007, and it was a major achievement for me. It was a dream that I’d had in my back pocket for so long, but it just seemed so hard to scrape together a down payment, and then the monthly payments that seemed to last forever were also extremely intimidating.
But, despite it all, my dream came true. In August 2007 I bought my first place.
the messy kitchen that I bought
the messy sleeping area pre-renovation
When I bought it I looked at it like an investment, a necessary step to get me to the next place in my investment goals. I planned on living in my place for 2.5 or 3 years, and then I would sell it – and hopefully make a big, fat profit – or I would rent it out while it continued to increase in value.
making improvements to the apt
Two and a half years later I decided I would list it, and prey for the best.
So, in the beginning of December I put my place on the market. While the real estate market may be suffering in most of North America, things are not so bad in Toronto. Actually they are pretty good. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t miss out this opportunity to make money off the sale of my apartment. What if things fell sharply in the Spring? What if the new buildings in my neighbourhood – set for construction to be completed in Spring 2010 – were more appealing than my 3 year old condo? What if the economy slipped into more of a recession and nobody was buying?
I didn’t feel comfortable with waiting it out until the Spring market, so I listed it.
Thank my lucky stars it sold in one week!!!
At the end of January I will be closing the sale of my condo and moving into my fiancé’s place.
And, I have to say, buying my condo was THE BEST INVESTMENT I’ve ever made.
I made 275% return on my initial investment!
I think I might just try this again…
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send thank you flowers often
In business and pleasure, amongst family and friends, all of us give and receive favours that we should show our appreciation for. But how many of us express our thanks? Is a simple “thanks, dude” enough? When do you send a thank you note? What about flowers?
As a general rule if someone does something kind, thoughtful, or a job well done you should let them know. It’s always appropriate to let them know how much you appreciate that they’ve taken some time out of their day and paused all the things that they could have been doing otherwise, just to help you out.
So go ahead, write an old fashioned thank you note and post it in the mail, pick up the phone and take two minutes just to say “thanks, that really made a difference” or send some flowers to show how much you appreciate someone’s effort.
You will feel great, the other person will feel great…and as a lovely hidden benefit the recipient of your gratitude will likely pay it forward and do something kind to another person.
An Attitude of Gratitude is Contagious – help spread it!
Photo Credit: Flowers Flowers
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Today’s post is a guest post from my friend Heena. Heena is a Toronto lawyer who was “restructured” earlier in 2009.
Enjoy! Ingrid
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When Donald Trump utters the words “Your Fired”, it makes for must-see t.v., but when your boss says, “We no longer require your services”, it’s a whole different ball game. This is exactly the situation I found myself in five months ago. I have to admit, I didn’t see it coming and the whole scenario seemed a bit surreal as I sat there, with a VP, HR and outplacement services. Once I peeled myself off the floor, consulted my lawyer and negotiated a severance package I was left with the daunting task of reconciling my feelings of hurt and anger over the loss of my job.
To put things in perspective, you probably need to know a bit about me. At age 34, I’m a successful professional woman with a condo in a swish area of Toronto, with a mortgage, student loans and other financial responsibilities of the typical 30 something set. I live a pretty good life, I like to vacation, eat out, shop and go for cocktails. Not quite the ‘Sex in the City’ life but certainly a watered down version. So being the sole income earner in a family of one, was going to throw this ‘girl about town’s’ life on its ear.
The first step was to deal with the anger. I needed to vent and vent I did. Confiding in my close knit circle of friends, I cursed, yelled and cried, until I was emotionally spent. Then I stepped back and looked at this situation for what it really was, an opportunity. As my friends reminded me, I had not been happy at my job for quite a while but had remained there out of complacency. I had been half-heartedly looking for other jobs, but I had become trapped in the comfort of familiarity and a steady paycheck. Not to mention the recent global economic melt-down had me nervous about making any risky moves.
So here I was, not of my own free-will but forced to face my career dissatisfaction head on. I let go of any feelings of inadequacy and blame and prepared a plan for moving forward. With the help of a career counselor I took stock of all of the things I didn’t like about my previous jobs, identified my key strengths and weaknesses and made a list of my interests. From there, I narrowed down my career options to four different paths and assessed their suitability by comparing pros and cons.
Once I decided on the top two options, I started doing some research and tapped into my network to see if anyone I knew was doing those jobs currently and met with them to do a bit of informational interviewing. I also met with everyone I knew to let them know that I was looking and told them exactly what I was interested in. Through networking and conventional means of job searching, I have had 7 interviews and am confident that I will land something very soon.
Being out of work is a very stressful time and it can often be difficult to remain motivated and positive. My experience has been not to fake it. If you’re having a bad day, give in to the bad day. Here are a few tips to make it through the rough patches:
- Treat yourself – “food is love”- sometimes it’s ok to indulge in that burger or piece of chocolate.
- Don’t feel guilty for not spending 24/7 in front of the computer searching for jobs – go for a walk or window shop to get some fresh air
- Stay connected with friends and family – you may have to be more frugal about spending money but that doesn’t mean you can’t go out for coffee or invite people over for a glass of wine.
- Get into an exercise routine and make sure you eat well most of the time – this will energize you and keep you in a positive head space.
- Pick up old hobbies or start a new one
- Organize your day so that you are doing a variety of activities – get started on small projects you’ve been meaning to get to but just haven’t had the time
- Ask for help – if you don’t have anyone to talk to and the stress is getting the better of you, speak with your doctor or get a counselor. We all need help sometimes and it is not a weakness to ask for it. Losing a job is right up there on the stress scale with divorce and death.
Remember, losing your job is not the end of the world. If you take this time to figure out what you really want out of life, chances are, you will end up in a much better place than where you began.
Heena
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Most girls love change. We change our clothes a few times every morning, our accessories every day, our hair a few times a week, and sometimes our male companions monthly and jobs and homes semi annually.
But how much change is too much?
When the major components of life – living, loving and labouring – are always changing, it may be too much.
There’s something nice about constants in life. Like work you’ve maintained for years, friends you’ve had since grade school, or homes that have been in your family for generations. It says you’re rooted, comfortable, and reliable. Maybe your vacations change, or your Tuesday dinners, but you’re not always in flux. People know what to expect from you…and you’ve passed the test of time in many situations. You don’t have disposable friends, temporary housing, or castaway career ambitions.
Like most girls I love change. I thrive on it…it fuels me up and gives me energy. I find nothing more exciting than travelling to foreign soil and being thrown in a land of surprises, where everything is changing and dramatically different than what I’m used to.
I’ve lived all across Canada, moved to France without speaking more than 20 words of French, and migrated to Asia without a clue of what I was getting into.
But when I got engaged so much change was on the table. Was I going to change my name? Was I going to sell my apartment, move into my fiancés apartment, rent another one, or buy a house? What about a family…were we going to try right away? Were we going to have a big wedding, a small wedding, a destination wedding, a themed wedding? Were we going to have another one in Argentina (where my fiancé is from)?
And that was just too much change. So for now, I’m going to get married and move into my fiancé’s apartment after we get married. And when, and only when, those changes have settled in I’ll be ready for more change.
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I have this funny habit.
Every time I go to a new place I like I suggest to my fiance that we should move there, or a buy a country house, or rent a chalet, or build a cottage or…
He’s so patient. He nods and supports my crazy ideas and let’s me rattle off all the plans I’ve concocted. I’ll research for a few weeks and send him many real estate listings…..and then the idea will fade into the background and be replaced with another equally absurd suggestion.
I asked him one time when we were going to buy a cottage and he smiled and replied “When you find a place you want to buy, and it sticks in your mind for more than one month, I’ll know you’re serious”.
I laughed.
Guilty as charged!
