Category Archives: Business

Day 3114 – 19 Days Into 2018 – 13 Books Read – 300 Books In A Year Status

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Alright, confession time….I may have set the bar a little too high. Last year, I read 300 books, but 200 of them were children’s picture books. Seriously, what was I thinking? But, I am not about to give up so soon. I noticed that I was reading out of obligation and it was really really really not enjoyable. Oh my friends, that cannot be. For me, reading is a balm to my soul. It encourages me to see the world through another’s eyes. It makes me think about things I normally wouldn’t think about. It challenges me to grow. So, I press on. Even if I don’t meet my goal of 300, I’m still going to read and not see this as a chore. At one point I felt like I was back in school, reading the things I didn’t want to read.

One thing I’ve increased this year is photography/art books. This helps increase my read count, but honestly, it has already pushed me out of my normal read zone. Last night I finished A Beautiful Ghetto by Devin Allen. His work is stunning, it gave me a deeper love for a city so close to home (being a born and bred Marylander), further opened my eyes to struggles right next door, and a reminder of things that aren’t normally talked about.

A new thing I started this year was joining Facebook groups for some of the challenges. Oh friends, I did not know what I was missing! Getting to chat with others who love reading as much as I do AND sharing recommendations? Ah, joy. It has also helped keep me motivated to carry on.

Without further ado, here are my last 10 reads! All of the reading challenges will be linked at the end of the list for ease of reading. Titles marked with an * are Amazon affiliate links. That means we’ll get a small percentage of your order if you order something. I only link to things that I personally stand behind and have read/seen/tried/etc. myself.

Book #4 – Dog Years: Faithful Friends, Then & Now by Amanda Jones – this fulfilled a book with an animal in the title for the Popsugar challenge.

Book #5 – The Princess Saves Herself in this One* by Amanda Lovelace – this fulfilled a book of poetry, a play, or an essay collection for the Modern Mrs. Darcy challenge. I really really really enjoyed this book. Poetry isn’t something I regularly read and when I do, there are only certain types that I really enjoy. This was one of them. I absolutely loved the progression, the style, and the content. Highly recommend.

Book #6 – The Two-Second Advantage: How We Succeed by Anticipating the Future–Just Enough by Vivek Ranadive and Kevin Maney – this fulfilled a book you’ve been meaning to read but haven’t got to. I’ve had this bad boy on my phone as an audiobook for a really really really long time. Happy to finally finish it!

Book #7 – Ready Player One* by Ernest Cline – this fulfilled a book that was made into a movie in the BWellread challenge. I know it’s not in the theaters yet but I DID ask BCPL online and they said it fits. Woo! I love this book and it was just as enjoyable the second time through.

Book #8 – Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander, J.K. Rowling, Albus Dumbledore – this fulfilled a book made into a movie you’ve already seen for the Popsugar challenge. Oh man, this was THE hardest book to read. Oy. Now, if I had Jim Dale read it to me, I might have had a different opinion.

Book #9 – Signs of Hope: Messages from Subway Therapy by Matthew “Levee” Chavez – this fulfilled a book you can read in a day in the Modern Mrs. Darcy challenge. As a deep lover of post-it notes, it was a joy to read this book.

Book #10 – Life’s Journeys According to Mister Rogers: Things to Remember Along the Way by Fred Rogers – this fulfilled none of my challenges. It could have fit into a book you can read in a day (this is on a few of my challenges), but I started it one day and finished it on another, so I didn’t feel right about putting it on one of those. Thankfully, my challenges only add up to 150 books, so that leaves me with 150 “freebies.”

Book #11 – Wild and Crazy: Photos from the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards by Paul Joynson-Hicks, Tom Sullam – this fulfilled a book that makes you laugh out loud in the Mommy Mannegren 52 books challenge. Oh man, this was a FUN book. Definitely made me (and Bret) laugh out loud.

Book #12 – A Beautiful Ghetto by Devin Allen – this fulfilled a book about a problem facing society today on the Popsugar challenge. See my thoughts above.

Book #13 – Mean Streets: NYC 1970-1985 by Ed Grazda – this fulfilled a book with the letter “Y” somewhere in the title in the Mommy Mannegren 52 books challenge.

The 2018 Modern Mrs. Darcy Reading Challenge
The 2018 #BWELLREAD Reading Challenge
The 2018 Popsugar Reading Challenge
The 2018 Read Harder Challenge
The Mommy Mannegren 52 Books in 52 Weeks Challenge

There you have it, I’m still powering through, with a renewed focus on just enjoying the journey. What are you reading right now?

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Did you like what you read? Here’s some ways you can support us and this blog!
Join our Facebook group, Planning an Epic Road Trip on Any Budget
Join the Journey With The G’s email list (bonus – you get my Epic Road Trip Budget spreadsheet)
Buy my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget.
Buy my book, Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner.
Shop on Amazon (no additional cost to you, this gives us a percentage of what you order).
Check out our resources page.
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Day 3108 – Make Your Dream Come True Day

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I love days like today because I’m a big believer in not just having big dreams, but actually achieving them. For years, I struggled with making my dreams come true. I was a great dreamer, but a poor executor. Thankfully, I’ve made some changes and have grown a lot in this area. Here are some things that have helped me achieve my big dreams.

– Have a plan and a goal. I talk about this a lot in my road trip book (link at the bottom of this post). You gotta know what your trip will cost and then break down how you will save for that. Until you can have a clear plan to get to your goal, you’ll (likely) never get there. I have a goal of reading 300 books this year. I have systems in place to hit this goal, and have ways to read every day to make progress towards that goal.

– Realize that any progress each day is progress – even if it’s super small. Some days, I’m only working on one page, or one paragraph on my alcoholism memoir. But it’s one step closer each day.

– Some dreams need a deadline and others just need daily consistency. My memoir is a great example of a daily consistency goal. I have no idea how long it will take me to finish writing. But since it’s a different type of book than I’ve ever written, I want to trust the process of showing up every day and eventually get to the published point.

– Make it a game. For my morning checklist (writing, working out, reading a book on book marketing, reading through Tribe of Mentors, and working on Pinterest), I printed out dated grids which I highlight every day I do them. This is a great visual reminder of what I’ve done and for how long. Seeing progress is a big motivator. We’ve talked about making a pie chart or something to show how we’re doing in each of our budgets and trying to stay under so we can put more towards other investments (whether real estate or savings or whatever).

– Realize it will be messy and hard. Going after any dream will have challenges. I think knowing you will experience them helps the process.

How are you making your dreams come true today?

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Did you like what you read? Here’s some ways you can support us and this blog!
Join our Facebook group, Planning an Epic Road Trip on Any Budget
Join the Journey With The G’s email list (bonus – you get my Epic Road Trip Budget spreadsheet)
Buy my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget.
Buy my book, Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner.
Shop on Amazon (no additional cost to you, this gives us a percentage of what you order).
Check out our resources page.
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Day 3101 – Life And Business Change – Letting Go And Being Ok With Slow Progress

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I’m a big dreamer. At any given time, I probably have 5-10 “that would be SO cool” ideas, jobs, or books floating around. Right now, I have at least 8. But, thankfully, a few things have changed my mindset about dreams recently.

I love learning, all the time. I have pages and pages and pages (and photos and typed documents) of notes from conferences, webinars, YouTube videos, books I’ve read, and more. I felt a tremendous pressure to get these notes typed up and/or organized into my Asana so I could quickly access them. I recently read/heard/watched (seriously, I intake so much information all the time, I can’t remember….lol, maybe if I had a system….) something about how just the act of taking notes or journaling and then never looking at it again is good. The act of writing something down helps your brain to remember. I also read something about ideas, that if it’s good, it will stick. Just mentally letting go of “catching up” with my notes has given me so much relief.

I have some great ideas for Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook. I know I have SO much content I can share. I’ve taken so many adventures, seen so many great places, and had many life changing experiences. I’ve learned lessons and have knowledge about a lot of things. It’s easy to get caught up in looking at other content creators and thinking “wow, they post every day” or “look at the editing and graphics in this video!” or “this image looks perfect!” and feel woefully behind. In a lot of ways, I had to let go of all of this and decide on what’s the most important, and that’s this blog and my Facebook group. Those are my “personal projects” definite to dos. I am still working through my old blog posts to add links, remove links, clean up text, and use posts for Pinterest, but I don’t have the pressure of getting it done by a certain time. That feeling has been freeing.

I am embracing my voice. This is something that I hear over and over – just be yourself – and I’m taking it to heart with the blog. I can see and feel a difference in my posts since we got back from California. I am unabashedly me, and that’s what I want to share. Going through my blog, I noticed I did a few quizzes about “what do you want to read?” and while it’s important to write things your audience wants to hear, I think it’s also important to be authentic and genuine and honest. Just like things change in a marriage over the years, so this blog will change over the years. What will I be writing about next year? Who knows, but I’m going to keep at it.

So while I would LOVE to get back into making our YouTube videos, and I would love to be marketing my books more, and I would love to have a super active social media presence, I am going to take my advice about being a minimalist and ruthlessly say no to the bad/good/great to make room for the oh “heck yea.”

Here’s one of my favorite “oh heck yea” places, Clearwater Beach, Florida.

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Did you like what you read? Here’s some ways you can support us and this blog!
Join our Facebook group, Planning an Epic Road Trip on Any Budget
Join the Journey With The G’s email list (bonus – you get my Epic Road Trip Budget spreadsheet)
Buy my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget.
Buy my book, Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner.
Shop on Amazon (no additional cost to you, this gives us a percentage of what you order).
Check out our resources page.
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Day 3100 – My Amazon Affiliate Experiences And Book Sales (How Many Books Have I Sold?)

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I don’t know if I’ll ever be an “educator about making money on a blog.” While I love making passive income, I’m not sure if I’ll ever be in a place to teach others about it. I’m much more passionate about road trips, organization, and personal growth. But, one thing that I think helps when you teach anything to others is brutal honesty about the journey. And I’m sure y’all are wondering how much I make from asking you to click on links to Amazon or how many books I’ve sold.

This month, I received a deposit from Amazon in the amount of pennies and I thought, you know what, I gotta blog about this. I also wanted to talk a little more about what the Amazon affiliate program is and my experiences.

When you click on a link I share, whether it’s for a book or a product, and you choose to purchase it or something else on Amazon within 24 hours, I receive a percentage. Think of it like a commission. It’s a small percentage, and that depends on a few things, but typically it’s very small. Ha ha, judging by my deposit this month, I hope that shares just how small.

I’ll never forget that first day I made a sale (even if it was a friend), and received like $.40. Waking up to my first deposit was great as well. For years, I wanted to make money when I slept, and it finally happened. All told, I’ve made over $200 passively through Amazon Affiliate program. I have loved using this program and getting a little something for sharing recommendations totally fits my personality type. I love sharing things that have changed my life with others in the hopes that it will change their life too.

Now my books. I get lots of questions in person like – “How are your books doing? How many have you sold?” I just added up my current totals through then end of 2017 and I have sold 34 books. Two of those were purchases I made, so I could have copies of my books. Even though there are times I think, wow, that’s not THAT many, I remind myself that it’s still 32 people who were interested in and curious about what I had to say. And I know at least one person was changed because of what I wrote (see the review of Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner (this is an affiliate link, lol). I was so moved and encouraged by that review, I have it printed out in multiple places. I did sell four of those 34 in December (which is always fun to see!) Hopefully this means there are folks hoping to take a road trip this year, if that’s you, kudos! Taking a road trip will change your life, even if it’s something you’ve done before. Every road trip has changed me in some way.

What about you? Have you sold books on Amazon? Have you had experience with the affiliate program? What do you think about clicking on links? Haha, I have heard of people purposefully not using the affiliate link but still purchasing the item. 😀 I’m so aware of affiliate marketing, that it’s hard to know what someone who isn’t thinks about it.

Oh, and fun fact – I submitted my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget (also an affiliate link) one day, ordered it that same day, paid an expedited shipping fee, and received it….the NEXT day. My how the publishing world has changed.

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Did you like what you read? Here’s some ways you can support us and this blog!
Join our Facebook group, Planning an Epic Road Trip on Any Budget
Join the Journey With The G’s email list (bonus – you get my Epic Road Trip Budget spreadsheet)
Buy my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget.
Buy my book, Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner.
Shop on Amazon (no additional cost to you, this gives us a percentage of what you order).
Check out our resources page.
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Day 3099 – My Word Of The Year – No

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I’ve known about the “word of the year” for a while now, but never selected one for myself. I thought about Good, based on Jocko Williams Good. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized my word needed to be No. Bret and I have some seriously big goals, and unless I can ruthlessly say no to the good, ok, and bad things, I won’t have room to say yes (or oh heck yea a la Jenna Marbles style) to things. Having this as my word forces me to question each decision I’m faced with and look at it honestly, a lot like how minimalism forces you to really think about why you own things.

I realized this morning that I also have to say no to myself. I’ve been sleeping in a little later than normal. I always think I’ll make the transition from pacific time to eastern time just fine, but those 3 hours seem to be a bigger deal than I think. Bret’s been getting up about 4/4:30 instead of the 5/5:30 we’ve been shooting for. This morning, his alarm went off at 4 but he mentioned sleeping until 5. At 4:30, our phones went off with a notification that schools were opening 2 hours late. Unfortunately, my brain starting running. I did fall back asleep and snoozed until about 6. During the snoozes, I thought, you know, I need to say no to myself when I want to sleep in. I’ve felt behind every day this week because of sleeping in. It’s crazy how just an hour or two can make a big difference in your day.

We’ll see if it sticks for the year, but it has definitely taught me a lot already.

Do you have a word for the year?

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Did you like what you read? Here’s some ways you can support us and this blog!
Join our Facebook group, Planning an Epic Road Trip on Any Budget
Join the Journey With The G’s email list (bonus – you get my Epic Road Trip Budget spreadsheet)
Buy my book, Planning an Epic Road Trip on any Budget
Buy my book, Trusting God With 2 Cents: 22 Days To Becoming A Successful Christian Business Owner.
Shop on Amazon (no additional cost to you, this gives us a percentage of what you order).
Check out our resources page.
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel