New Year’s Resolutions

It’s beyond the middle of the year and I realize that I’ve in no way followed through on my New Year’s resolutions, have you?

Getting my finances in better shape.  Working on my health.  Building our business at the office….  Ok, I do work on our business, all the time, but aside from that…I’ve failed dramatically.  Does anyone ever accomplish what they set out to do in a year?  In 2016 I was working on losing weight and was doing quite well until the Christmas holidays rolled in.  I promised myself that in January I would begin again but that never manifested itself.  I used to be pretty good with my finances but then ‘real life’ set in with it’s myriad of problems and issues and my finances have never been the same  

In 10 years I’ll reach retirement age with little to show for it and when I really think about that I’m not sure how much it matters anyway.  I’m in no worse position than many people my age and better than some.  I have a wonderful husband, my family (for better and worse), an awesome cat who showers me with love and a puppy who, as obnoxious as she is at times, I truly love and enjoy.  I have my faith which sustains me throughout this life I’ve been gifted with.  I have a roof over my head, cool air in the summer and warmth in the winter.  I have a reliable 14 year old car that gets me where I need to be.  I have plenty of food to eat and fresh, clean water to drink.  I have energy to continue working and that’s a good thing since I’m sure I’ll end up being a Wal-Mart greeter when I’m 85, lol!  We struggle, like everyone else, but we have love and that is the greatest blessing of them all.

I will continue to make those New Year’s resolutions as long as I’m able because they help me to focus and I think, in some ways, that has to help at least work towards the goals I’ve set for myself.  What about you, do you accomplish your goals set at the beginning of the year?  Do you even set resolutions?  Everyone’s different but we’re still all so similar too, isn’t it cool?

A New View — Vision Boards

Yesterday my SIL, Elane,  mentioned that she was working on her “vision board” for the year.  Elane is pretty wise and her ideas intrigue me.  I’d heard of vision boards before but never really imagined myself doing one.  I did a search online to see what was involved and what other people had to say about them and was impressed so I looked into free online versions.  There are a few and I did start one.  I was surprised to find that it wasn’t as “easy” as I’d imagined!  Of course I have goals, everyone does right?!  That didn’t stop me from coming up blank-like a deer facing headlights.  Maybe that’s part of the reason vision boards work?

I’d never really spent much time focusing on what my goals were before, why would they be so hard to articulate?!  It occurred to me that I spend a great deal of my time responding to life as it happens, like a rat on a wheel.  Putting out small fires around me all the while not realizing I’m dying of smoke inhalation.  All of the sudden a vision board makes sense. Why just put out fires?  Be like Smokey the Bear, prevent them from happening in the first place!

I spent the better part of the day yesterday working on my vision board.  It really took me that long because the process of creating one helps you to see what it is you really want to accomplish on multiple levels as well as the steps needed to make them happen.  Finances are important but, believe it or not, it wasn’t the first thing on my list.  One of the top things I truly crave is the time to focus on creativity.  I’m always “too busy” and then when I come home at night…too tired.  The program I went with ended up being one I paid for because it had more bells and whistles, one of them being a calendar that reminds me of the steps needed to achieve my goals in a timely fashion.  I’m very excited to see this in action, that I had the time to write this post is proof that I took advantage of making time for being creative this morning 🙂

Are you doing a vision board?  What’s your experience been with them?

Wishing you a wonderful day!

 

The above image was taken from an image search, it’s not my board, mine is online 😉

Deep Breathing

That’s what this week is all about  My husband’s youngest daughter, Jill, arrived this morning, they still aren’t back from the airport, and all I can think of is what hasn’t been done!  Yikes.  Usually procrastinating, for me anyway, means I’ll be sweating when she arrives but the house will be clean but this time I just can’t get myself up and running.  Breathe in, breathe out.  To use a cliche:  “what will be will be.”

We haven’t even gotten a tree yet because the weather was so bad last weekend.  It may be time to pull those fake garland out from the garage and put them around the house…or better yet, wait for Jill to arrive and we can all do it together.  That can be a form of celebration too, right?

It’s our busy time of the year at the work so when we come home we’re pretty wiped out.  We aren’t very “good” at Christmas anymore and that makes me a bit sad that these past few years we tend to celebrate afterwards.  We’ll go to Christmas Mass and have a nice meal but to really relax and reflect, we save that for after the holidays when it’s calmer at the office.  Maybe one of these days, when we retire, we’ll get back on the regular Christmas schedule  🙂  Here’s hoping!  Until then:  breathe in, breathe out and then repeat.

The above photo was taken at Tower Hill Botanic Garden in Massachusetts.  It’s a decoration designed with living plants!

Being Grateful

Last weekend I was exhausted.  I barely moved off the couch and when I did it was to go take a nap, lol.

I know this is a blog about Avon but that isn’t my only job and lately the full-time one has been requiring all my focus and attention.  My little Avon business It’s All About Avon is still a work in progress but today I’m going to share about the other work I do.

Our business recently went through a very trying time.  My husband is an optometrist and I run the office.  We had hired a professional billing company to do all of our billing since it’s become so complex the past few years.  (I’ve often wondered how many people would work without knowing whether or not they’d be paid for their efforts…it’s not uncommon in our business since we’re at the mercy of insurance companies and their wide, wide range of rules regarding payment.)  Several months ago I noticed that we weren’t getting many payments and they were coming in slower and slower.  I called our billing service and they told me that they were looking into it.  Weeks went by and checks were trickling in slowly so I thought it was just a matter of them catching up.  Another couple of months went by and we were getting into serious problems since the money just wasn’t coming in.  I called them again, they didn’t return my calls.  I emailed them…they didn’t return any of my emails.  I did this for a few weeks until I decided we wouldn’t be able to sustain our business much longer at the rate we were going.  We were floating our bills on credit cards, never a great idea.  To make a long story (a little) shorter I fired them.  They still didn’t respond!  I turned them in to the BBB and they also were unable to get a response  What a strange way to do business and yes, they’re still in business!  I had to learn how to bill in about 2 weeks time and then try to catch up on the claims that hadn’t been done by the billing company.  It’s been an ongoing battle and a steep learning curve for me but I’m finally beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I’m not saying that all of the sudden everything is as it should be.  No. We lost a LOT of money as a result of poor billing and have been told that it would cost us an arm and a leg to bring them to court.  Our attorney tells us to just start again…at square one.  I now have access to all the accounting reports I didn’t have before and I’m appalled to see what they were (and weren’t) doing.  I’m still working to clean up their mess so we can get our slate cleaned and there are some days I just want to pull my hair out but we’re getting there 🙂

I titled this post “Being Grateful” because, in spite of all the drama, I truly am.  We’re still in business.  I was able to learn billing.  My husband has been very supportive and understanding when I get frustrated.  We are truly blessed and I am so thankful to God for his amazing love even when we least deserve it.

Thank you for letting me share this with you!

When Worlds Collide

This week was just plain tough.  There’s no other way to describe it.  I worry sometimes about my little Avon business’s longevity.  I work full-time in my husband’s optometry office and recently we had to let go of our billing service because they were doing a terrible job.  I had to learn medical billing (and coding) in about 2 weeks so that I could take it over  That was in August.  I’m finally caught up but now I need to go back over and see what they didn’t do and see if I can recoup any of what they didn’t do properly…or at all.  I spend countless hours in front of a computer or on a telephone and by the end of the day I’m totally wiped out.  This new responsibility doesn’t change my old ones, it only adds to them.  I shouldn’t complain but I do get tired.  I do get frustrated.

I was supposed to get the rest of my Halloween bags out to potential customers before today, before Halloween.  After the first day of delivering them with my hubby the rest of them have taken up residence in the backseat of my car.  I haven’t had time the past few weeks to work on Avon at all and I know that it’s critical to be consistent.  Thus the frustration!  I have brochures from the past two campaigns that are still in my living room in the box.  Most of these things are going to wind up in the recycle bin.

This past week I hosted an online Halloween party.  It ran Tuesday through last night, every night for an hour and a half.  There was very little interest after the first night so a couple of the nights were cut short due to lack of attendance.  That was frustrating also because I’d spent hours preparing for them.

I know things aren’t always so crazy but it’s really been tough and I resent not having the time I need to work on my own little business.

That being said…I’m not giving up!  Thursday is my half-day at the office and I’m thinking that I may take the whole day off so I can at least spend one day working on Avon.  Even thinking about that makes me happy 😀  Do you have a side business?  How do YOU do it, how do you find the time??

I will do another online event but it’s going to be a one night event next time.  It will also be a sales event.  Christmas shoppers rejoice 😀

Thanks for listening and please feel free to share any tips you have for finding more time in the day, I’d love to hear them!