Filed under Healthy Living

Providing Healthy Food Choices for Your Children

fresh fruit vegetablesShopping for delicious food is extremely easy given the wide array of choices available to us. Today’s grocery stores are chocked full of tasty treats, snacks, and meals. However, selecting unhealthy options is far too easy, even when we think we are buying health foods. Our full schedules and rushed lives makes it difficult to eat healthy especially when so many pre-packaged, ready-to-be-eaten meals are offered in the stores. Providing healthy food choices for your children and family takes some extra work. Reading labels, selecting only the healthiest of foods to have in your home and avoiding dinning out are some steps you can take, read on to learn even more.

Fresh Fruits and Vegetable Choices

At about 6 months old, babies start enjoying solid foods like fruit or vegetable purées. Introducing their taste buds to the natural flavor of fruits and vegetables is a great start on the road to good health. In vegetable-eating countries like in Thailand, babies are offered fresh vegetables to chew on while they deal with the pain from teething– with close supervision of course. Starting them early means, you won’t have any problems getting them to eat these natural foods as they grow up. As long as you continue to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to your child rather than sugary or salty snacks, he or she will happily snack on the fresh selections without any problems. Choose organic options for your produce as often as you can, but especially when you are consuming the skin – they contain the most pesticides (Find more information on this by searching for The Dirty Dozen.).

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8 Comments Jessica Streit on May 16th 2013

 Filed under Guest Posts,On Behalf of

How to Win Over a New Client Overseas

Shanghai, China, 2010. Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/shanghai-1990-vs-2010-2010-6

Shanghai, China, 2010. Source: http://bit.ly/9nCiye

If you currently own your own business or you work for a fairly large company, you understand how important global business is today. With Thomas Friedman’s more recent book, “The World is Flat”, we are all gaining an understanding of how each small local business can no longer just be content with their small business any longer. If they want to expand, they have to reach out to the global market like everyone else. And, if they refuse to grow, then they will be overtaken by the companies that are reaching their local market from a global location. In order to survive as a corporation, we must learn to take our business across the globe.

For most of you, I’m sure you already know this, which is why you might even have a meeting on the other side of the world next week! Before you head off to that meeting, be sure that you are prepared for what you’re going to face. Here are some tips to come out on top in your next meeting.

1) Gain an Understanding – Before you can sell a product or an idea, you must first gain an understanding of the needs of your client. If they know that you’re just there to push a product on them without caring if it will meet their need, they won’t be interested.
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1 Comment Mich on May 13th 2013

 Filed under Guest Posts,On Behalf of

Tips to Find a Job You Truly Love

best-job-221x185With the recent recession and the uncertainty of today’s economy, many people will stick to a job they dislike or will apply for the first job that comes around, even if it is not the most interesting one. While being financially secure is important, being happy is certainly not less important. Here are a few tips to help find a job you truly love.

Know What You Want and Who You Are

While this may sound pretty obvious, it is still the starting point of your career seeking process. And be warned: It is not as easy as it seems! Knowing what you want and who you are is the quest of a lifetime. Let’s start on a smaller scale here, though: Ask yourself what your skills and interests are. A little trick: In order to spot your true skills and interests, just try and remember what you ended up doing in all your previous jobs, regardless of what they were. Did you naturally take on the lead? Did you naturally took care of all the accounting? Were you always in charge of organizing meetings and figure out logistics? If you look carefully at your life – even your life outside work – you’ll see a pattern. This should help you identify your true talents and your natural abilities.

And know that, often, people are not really honest about what they truly love to do, even with themselves. Try and go beyond the standards imposed by society and think outside the box. Read the rest of this entry »

 

3 Comments Guest on May 6th 2013

 Filed under Financial Freedom,Growing Your Wealth,Healthy Living,Motivation

You Can Avoid Living Paycheck to Paycheck

Money_TreeHoping with crossed fingers that the check you wrote doesn’t come through your account before you can make a deposit.

Driving your car until its comfortably on “E” and hoping you can get to work just one more time before you have the money to fill up.

Eating stale crackers and a 2 year old can of peas for dinner because you don’t have the money for groceries.

Do any of these situations sound like you? If you find yourself constantly waiting with bated breath for payday only to run out of money a few days later, you are bound to be feeling a great deal of stress and depression. There is hope though, you can avoid living paycheck to paycheck. Here are your best steps to avoid living paycheck to paycheck and to move forward if you are.

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23 Comments Jessica Streit on Apr 22nd 2013

 Filed under Financial Freedom,Growing Your Wealth

Why Freelancing on the Side Will Set You Free

spa cupcakes

Spa themed cupcakes!

Are you sick of your current job? Do you want to move on to something new?

Well I’m not here to tell you to quit your job. Sorry. I’m a bit more realistic than that. I’m going to suggest a different idea. I want you to start freelancing on the side. I want you to use your spare time to increase your income and to change your life forever. I spent far too much time chasing passive income and other random strategies.

I never really took the time to actually get down to the work. I would just follow advice on starting a million dollar business through passive income. This never worked out for me. Let’s start off with an important question… Why will freelancing on the side set you free? By testing out business ideas in your spare time you’ll be able to figure out if you have a chance of branching out on your own.

I find it to be absolutely careless advice to suggest to someone that they just quit their job and “follow their passions.” Screw that. You have bills to pay and you don’t want to end up poor. You don’t want to curse some blogger dude because they told you to quit and now you’re homeless (okay, maybe that’s a bit extreme). I have far too many friends that are convinced that you have to go all in to be successful. This is false because you just have too much to lose and you can lose out on valuable time making money and working in your field.

When you freelance on the side you’ll not only get to test out your ideas with comfort, but you’ll also be able to build up your savings/pay down your debt. This is critical because if you have debt (student loans, mortgage, or consumer debt), you still have to cover your payments. You can set yourself free by working your day job and freelancing on the side until you’re debt free and in a position to quit your job. Read the rest of this entry »

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24 Comments Martin on Apr 1st 2013

 Filed under Guest Posts,On Behalf of,Paying Down Debt

How to Boost Your Income to Deal with Debt

Money_TreeThis is a guest post by Shay Quincy.

If you’re in debt and are drowning in bills and demands, there are two important things you need to do. The first is to find ways to reduce your outgoings – which may involve asking yourself if you are packing the right credit card – in order to save money to put towards clearing your debts.

The second thing is to boost your income, so it exceeds your outgoings and gives you some spare cash with which to pay your creditors. You might think that unless your boss gives you a pay rise, there isn’t really any way to boost your income. This isn’t necessarily the case, as there are lots of things you can do to make the most of your income and get your hands on some extra cash. Follow these tips to get started:
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2 Comments Guest on Mar 26th 2013

 Filed under Financial Freedom,Growing Your Wealth,Miscellaneous

What Does ‘Early Retirement’ Mean to You?

Hammock. Source: http://www.comingunmoored.com/2009/07/early-retirement-extreme/Jacob from Early Retirement Extreme and Mr. Money Mustache from Mr. Money Mustache have recently been talking about the “Internet retirement police”, self-appointed folk who call out bloggers for calling themselves retired, when, according to these people, their lifestyle doesn’t fit into the pre-approved notions of what they consider to be “early retirement”, or just plain ol’ “retirement” in general.

That got me thinking, because we often use the same word to mean different concepts, and “early retirement” means different things to different people. Jacob breaks down “retirement” into the following categories:

“Retired”, as in “put out to pasture”

This is when we’re just too old and tired to do anything productive, so we spend the rest of our days watching TV, playing golf, or whatever else we can muster. This is probably what the reality of “retirement” was for most people in ages past, but it seems like an old-school definition to me and not one that I personally look forward to.

Will this type of retirement still be a reality for people going forward? There are incredible advancements being made in technology and medicine right now, and I firmly believe that, barring a major world war or something of that scale, most younger people today will live to see aging “cured”, and death by senescence will become obsolete. There will still be fatal accidents, crime, and stuff of that sort, but those are different problems, and I believe that we’ll find solutions to those problems as well. There should be no reason that a young person today would find him or herself forced out into the pasture due to plain old age, and by young, I also include people in their 30s, 40s, and heck, maybe even in their 50s. Technology moves fast these days.
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24 Comments Kevin on Mar 11th 2013

 Filed under Financial Freedom,Growing Your Wealth,Healthy Living

Handling the Uncertainty of Self-Employment

Lemonade standIn my last post about our aim for financial freedom by age 50, I quickly mentioned my transition to self-employment.  It was a bit sudden in the big scheme of things.

Our Jump to Self-Employment

I started my last day job right out of college in June 2005 and expected to work for 30 years or more.  We planned to retire on what we could squirrel away in my 401k, two Roth IRA’s, stock investments, and my husband’s pension as a teacher.  But my online business took off in 2011 and all our plans changed in less than 4 months.

I was self-employed by the end of July 2011 and my husband joined me at home in January 2012.  I would never have dreamed until then that we would put all of our eggs in a self-employment basket, but there it was staring me in the face.  Not only did we need to worry about the normal things like making enough to pay our bills, but we did truly have to change our mindsets in order to function well while working from home.
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18 Comments Budgeting in the Fun Stuff on Mar 4th 2013

 Filed under Healthy Living,Motivation,Relationships

How Finances can Stress a Relationship and What You Can Do About It

money relationship couplesThe role money plays in a relationship is so important that often times couples overlook having the discussion about money. I mean, how do you know when the right time to discuss money is? Do you tell him on the first date that you declared bankruptcy last year, or do you wait until there is a commitment to discuss money? And even then how much should you talk about? Should you tell him how much money you make the day after you decide to be monogamous?

It can be difficult to choose the right time, especially since money is such a hard topic to discuss. Its how some people define themselves, so it can be quite uncomfortable for someone who doesn’t think they make enough to share that part of their life with someone.

Whenever you decide to have the money talk with your significant other is up to you, but it is vital that the discussion happens. In my opinion you should know what your partner’s beacon score is before you marry that person. I am not saying not to marry them if they have a 520 beacon score, but you sure shouldn’t be surprised that they have a low beacon after marriage. It’s better to ask yourself if you could be with someone who cannot manage their money well, prior to marriage. Maybe he or she has too much debt for you to handle. Whatever your significant others financial situation is, you should be aware and know if it’s something you can deal with before making such a lifelong commitment.

The money talk is extremely important because things can change very quickly when financial struggles begin. The pressure of a job loss or debts piling up can have a powerful impact on a relationship.
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21 Comments Call Me What You Want, Even Cheap on Feb 26th 2013

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