Breath of Hope

Breath of HOPE: Snow, Irritating Emails, and a New Use for Binder Clips

Hello readers!

I hope you had a great February and were able to feel some love in your world.  I have a bunch of tips, observations and even an irritation to share this month (plus a cute photo of a dog.)  Read on for what crossed my mind, path and desk recently.

Irritation: Receiving emails where the subject or preview line makes it sound like you have a conversation in progress with the person. (i.e. using Re: ________ in the subject line like it’s a response to a thread.)  It’s nothing less than lying, folks. Don’t do it.

Observation: Sometimes it’s still easier just to pick up the phone. I was tasked with making a hotel reservation for one of my executives. After first trying to handle it online (and not knowing for sure whether he had a username/password) I simply called reservations and gave them his member number. The reservation took only minutes to handle and he received the reduced rate.

Thought: I participated in a goal-setting training and share this interesting twist—when you set goals, do you consider the things you are currently doing that you no longer want to or should not be doing? It’s a different perspective to think about what you will stop rather than what you will start.

So Cool! Do you ever think, “I wish this app/program would do _____?” I keep a Google sheet of food/recreation discounts and when they expire. I was thinking “It would be nice if I could get a reminder a week before the coupon expires.”  Searched for a solution … and yep … there’s an add-on that works! (In the top menu go to “Add-Ons” and search “Reminders.”) I have it set that if it’s a week before the noted expiration date, send me an email.  I actually received one after setting it up!

Article: This article, How to Reduce Attention Residue in Your Life, is an intriguing piece about handling “life-admin” and the need to schedule some time to GYLIO – Get Your Life In Order.  Do you schedule time to catch up with home chores, personal pursuits, or simply to rest? I think it’s good that people are recognizing the need for this. 

Enjoyed: SNOW! The average annual snowfall in my area is about three inches per year. This month we’ve been blessed with a couple small but enjoyable snowfalls. I capture these in video/photos because they don’t happen much, and our woods are beautiful when it does. 

Finished book: I have a habit of finishing one book a month. This month’s book was With All Due Respect: Defending America with Grit and Grace by Nikki Haley. I the pleasure of meeting her briefly years ago and asked her what I could pray for her – she said “strength.”  After reading this book, I can see why. She shares about the tragedy in Charleston, various initiatives as the US Ambassador, observations (positive and negative) about people she’s worked with while in office, etc. No matter your political leanings, it is an interesting and insightful read about a profession many of us would know very little about. You can purchase it via my store here.

Time-Saving Tip: Some email programs allow you to “snooze” an email (an app like Boomerang can do this as well) so it will pop up again at a more relevant time. Make use of this to keep your inbox from overflowing.

Coworking Fun and another tip:  Caper (Endeavor’s office dog) turned 6 and we collected items for the Greenville Humane Society in her honor.  I loved this idea to use clips to hold up the signs for her birthday!

Momentum: I made some significant progress on my new book this month. The pieces are coming together for a self-guided workbook on the topic of friendship. Stay tuned!

Freebies:   This month, I recommend the March Hope Hints sheet and the “Give Notice to My Notifications” exercise. Check out all the freebies here.
Free Book: My book, 52 Ways to Be More Organized, will be free on Amazon March 15-20.  Click on the image to put a reminder on your Google Calendar.    

Trying: I’m trying out a subscription to Silk & Sonder planners. While I don’t use paper planners much (I lean toward digital), I am coming to realize that I’m a hybrid – I like pen-to-paper too and a mix of both linear and creative approaches to capturing thoughts. This type of journal seems to mix both. I like the March issue and look forward to diving into it. I’m calling it Planner Journaling and expect it will be more about capturing thoughts, prayers, positive concepts to keep in mind, etc more than planning time/calendar (which will remain online.)  I’ll give you an update next month.

Blessed: speaking of planners, I was gifted this planner by a friend who decided it’s format wouldn’t work for her. I like the feel of it and decided it would be another good “planner journal” specifically for noting thoughts about taking care of myself. I’m building on my framework and philosophy of “temple upkeep” / self-care and am trying out using this planner as a way to capture my thought process about it.

Organized: and yet again on a similar topic, one of this month’s organizing projects was finally putting my journals into attractive boxes for closet storage. It was interesting to see how many journals I have filled up over the years—they are all sorts of sizes and styles.

Video Greeting: for a video greeting loosely based on this post, see below or click to go to my YouTube Channel.

As always, thanks for reading and following. Hope you’ll join me on a social media platform too, where I share throughout the month.  For example, I usually have a running Instagram/Facebook story with tips, thoughts, fun stuff and more, including the types of things that end up in Breath of Hope.  Click here and then on the icon of the platform that interests you.

Beth

 

 

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