Stuck within our own comfort zone

Stuck within our own comfort zone:

Why are we so apt to avoid being uncomfortable? What part of being uncomfortable makes us so scared?

We are creatures of habit, we spend our days living within our comfortable bubble that keeps us content. But what happens when being content is no longer cutting it? Can we spend our whole lives living at the bare minimum of happiness?

We want to avoid conflict, change and anything else that can cause any disrupt in our daily numb lives. These things tend to throw a wrench in our comfort levels, but is that always a bad thing? I think some of our best moments come from struggles or changes in our lives.

Why? Because it tests us, challenges us, keeps us on our toes. Which in the end makes us stronger, wiser and more ourselves. We grow and change in some of the best ways possible. And that’s why I don’t believe in dodging the universe when it’s sending things my way.

I personally am more spiritual and believe the universe works around me to make sure I end up where I need too. But no matter what you believe, there is a greater power maneuvering us around like little game pieces.

I believe, as cliche as this is, that everything in life happens for a reason. It’s all a sign. From the broken-down cars, to the jobs we’re let go from. It all guides us to strive to be a different version of ourselves. I think it strengthens that inner goddess in us that we tend to water down and keep covered in fear of becoming too much or failing when we can’t live up to the ideals of how our goddess should look.

We all have this inner goddess, or god if any of my male readers are tuning in, that has so much potential and strength. The goddess in us is what we are meant to be. Whether that’s a doctor, a humanitarian or in my case, a traveler and a writer (my dream job of course).

So why don’t we take this leap to become our badass selves? We see people every day living out our dreams. Do you think everyone who is living our ideal life sat quietly and didn’t push themselves past their comfort zone?

Nope, they rose to the occasion and followed a different path. They become the inner goddesses they were meant to be. They didn’t ask “what if I fail” they asked, “what if I never reach that goal because I didn’t try”. I know I personally admire so many start up writers who started from literally nothing to now being idols. AKA, my favorite of all time Rachel Hollis – I am the fan girl of all fan girls. She is the epitome of someone who stopped ignoring all the signs the universe sent her and started following the exact path she needed to become the biggest badass she is today. She holds so much grace and power that she even writes about in her books. She preaches the idea of stopping the pity party and starting to follow exactly what you feel is meant for you.

The universe will not introduce a new job, a new city or a new relationship if it didn’t have a purpose. Keep in mind, I understand some of these can turn out to be negative BUT they are always lessons learned and have the possibility to help us grow. So why are always so reluctant to take on these new adventures?

Because it has the possibility for us to fail. And failure is the number 1 (don’t actually look that up, it’s possible it’s just my number 1 reason) for not wanting to continue with a new opportunity. No one wants to be as a failure. But I've come to learn, I have more desire to succeed then I have fear of failing. The good outweighs the bad, in so many ways. 

My biggest reasoning to starting this journey and a few others that are going to lead me to the same place (that’ll stay a little secret until the date gets closer when I can announce it, stay tuned) is finally being joyful in my life every single day.

Yes, I have amazing people in my life, and I am genuinely doing better than so many others, but I am not at my top peak of happiness. I am just content. Sometimes even sad I chose not to chase my dreams a long time ago. I always made the excuse of, maybe next year or when I get my debt under control (hello degree is rec management that will make me poor the rest of my life). But there comes a time when you wake up and say, nope, now is the time. If we put off our dreams or wants in life for too long, they become distant memories of what we wish we could have done instead of goals.

My time is now. I have been communicating my goals and speaking them into existence. I add a little work each night to make my future a reality. I take a step in the right direction every day, slowly but surely molding my life to be exactly what I need it to be to be the best version of myself.

So what are your dreams? I love to hear them and even help support them. Send them my way and remember we are meant for so much more. There will always be people telling us otherwise, but they are just jealous of our fire.

Why I Don't Believe in New Years Resolutions - Why Focused Habits are a Better Route

Hi Everyone!! 

It's January 23rd, do you know what that means? Roughly 80% of the “New Year New Me” people are about 3 weeks away from becoming part of the statistic that they will not meet their resolutions. Hate to start my first post off this negative but it’s true. 80% is a HUGE number of people not following through on making positive changes – which is not ideal. Why make resolutions and not even get the joy of achieving them??

News flash – statistically speaking, resolutions don’t work!!!

This is why I don’t believe in resolutions. Not that I don’t believe in making positive life changes, because I FULLY support anything that will make you the best version of yourself. BUT I believe we should address these positive changes in a different way.

So how should we make these strides to a better self?

HABITS

I start out my life changes by making my final goals so like the above idea, a resolution if you will, but then I break that resolution down into sub categories. My subcategories include all the following:

What does it take to achieve this goal: I take this list and make notes of the habits needed to be developed to reach the goal. These can range anywhere from making your bed every day to running a mile every day. Why is this important? Because as humans we love instant gratification. We as a whole want everything as quickly and painlessly as possible. Understandably, of course. But usually goals are large and have multiple parts that go into them to make them happen and stick for the rest of our year/life.

How much time will this goal take: I am a huge procrastinator in life, mainly because my full-time job takes up a solid chunk of my life/free time, so I always give myself a little extra time to achieve them. So why is time important? Because, as stated above, goals are not usually quick and achievable, so I think it’s extremely important to prepare yourself for how long this actual goal will take to happen, so you don’t feel like giving up with little to no headway a week into the new year.

Why do I want this change: this is my favorite part. When I am passionate about a change, such as financial freedom, I am 10x more likely to stick with it. I like to write these reasons down so I can go back to them whenever I am feeling as though I am not following the right course to my goal. This is pretty much your pep talk section, because guess what, only you can achieve the goals you set out. No one is following you around cheering you on every step of the way. So, I hope you’re ready to be your own personal cheerleader.

Okay, so now that I’ve done all of the above, what’s next?

I start by taking ONE habit from each goal. Usually starting with the most basic one and I make a mental note to strive to develop this habit after a week or so. Once this new habit is consistent and I feel it’s become a new part of my routine, I add in a new habit on top of the old one. I keep doing this little pyramid building of habits on top of habits until I am so far in that I’ve already reached my goal or close to it. By breaking it up into small daily changes, I notice I don’t feel defeated. I tend to be kinder to myself when I must start over on a habit because they are so simple and small. This keeps me from failing to reach my goal because I can see the build up to my success.

So, I want to give a little example so everyone can understand my process a little better.

One of my goals for this year is to develop a more “Neat Freak” side. Let’s just say if I can choose between an extra hour of sleep or folding the laundry after coming home from work, I choose the sleep. Unfortunately, I have spent years developing bad habits regarding this. I blame it purely on living alone. I have lived alone roughly 4 years now and have never had to really share my home with anyone other than the dog, who let me just add is the reason the house is a mess most of the time. (He really loves destuffing his toys and spreading it throughout the house as if to mimic snow.)

So, my overall goal is to become a neat freak. If I just went crazy and started ALL of the habits a neat freak partakes in during the first week, do you think it would stick? Maybe, but since I’ve already done that, I know it doesn’t work for me. I can deep clean the house and keep it tidy for a week. But then my focus starts to shift because goal achieved, my home is clean. For now. What happens the first weekend I am stuck picking up some extra shifts and I decide I’m too tired to clean up after dinner? Or I have friends over and they slightly destroy the place? Do you think my non-formed habits jump into play and I deep clean the house again to tip top shape? Nope, I go right back to my natural habitat and say I’ll worry about it tomorrow. Which let me just add, is my least favorite excuse I use. If I could erase this from my vocabulary, I would. It’s such a slippery slope once those words are formed.

Let’s start with step 1: List of habits needed to achieve the overall goal.

• ·       Make bed every morning
• ·       Empty and fill dishwasher every evening
• ·       Put clothes in hamper instead of on floor (seriously how have I made it this far in life)
• ·       Put shoes away
• ·       Fold laundry as it’s finished (I am queen bee at wearing wrinkled clothing)

There are so many more habits I could add but to keep this post from becoming a bore, I will keep it short and sweet.

Step 2: Timeline: so, like I stated above, I know my bad habits and how well I respond to change so I am giving myself a longer than normal timeline. Roughly, each habit should take a week, so for the purpose of the list above I should need roughly a month and a half to become a “neat freak”. Again, my current list, which I will attach to this post is much longer and in depth because honestly, I have so many awful habits I need to kick to the curb.

Step 3: My Why: little throwback to my younger days, I was always so impressed when I would go to my grandmothers as a kid (even still so as an adult) because she had a place for everything, and nothing was ever out of place. I always told myself I want people to see my home and admire me the way I admired her. So that should have been enough, right? In this case it wasn’t. Instead it created a small amount of shame in me that I am failing as an adult and sometimes I avoid having company over all together. So, my why is getting rid of the shame I have when inviting people over even when I know the place is tidy. I also want a place for everything, AKA Minimalistic Miki is coming next because honestly, I hate my awful desire to own stuff. But that is another post for another time.

As you can see, I shortened my real-life goal so I could explain it. But the general practice of holding each habit to a week and adding a new one is still how I hold myself accountable. As of right now, I am currently working on the folding laundry and the emptying dishwasher every evening habits and will move on from there.

I know this post may seem a little common sense, but I genuinely believe people jump the gun so quickly to achieve the large goals that they lose sight of how those goals are achieved long term. If I had developed this way years ago, I may be way better off. But I also would have something to blog about, so I guess life takes its path as needed.

I’d love to hear about everyone’s goals for the year and how they plan to achieve them! I am routing for you, via cyber space of course. And if anyone has any questions or even extra tips and tricks that worked for them, I am all ears!

Here’s to the New Year New Me Crew who won’t become part of the statistic!

Keep it up!

*Disclaimer- I have stated this before but your girl is not a Pinterest Perfect individual like most so please enjoy my chicken scratch example from my own journal 😄

Who Am I?

My name is Miki and I am nothing special but I enjoy writing and sharing life hacks as I come across them. I learned a lot of things the hard way, so I figured why not post some of my advice to the public to help and maybe save someone else the hassle. This isn't my first rodeo when it comes to blogging but the rest never became anything more than blank canvases as I was too terrified to post on. Why? I don't know, maybe fear of people not liking my work or my advice but also maybe because I've spent most of my life believing those who blog for a living were pretentious and pushy, which I would never want to be associated with.

I'm not here to push you to buy anything or to make you feel like you need to live my life. Another huge reason I never openly shared my love for blogging; I never wanted to seem fake or unattainable. I follow a ton of blogs and some are even friends pre-blog fame, and I always feel as though I could never live up to the blogging expectation that my life and content needed to be perfect. Because for those of you that do know me or plan to get to know me, will discover I am a hot mess most of the time and I am not a clean freak nor do I even brush my hair everyday. I like to live day by day and do my best to make it through without any major upsets. One thing you won't see here every single blog post is impeccable and prepped content photos. Not that I don't give so much credit to those who can manage life and still have the most perfect pictures, because honestly that is a gift, but because it's just not me. I will try to keep this blog as real as possible so all of us regular folks can obtain and follow any of the life tips given.

But here's a few fun details about me:
My dog is my best friend. His name is Bama and he is a mut I found in Alabama while on a getaway last summer. He enjoys long muddy walks and eating my bras.

I have a slight addiction to travelling. Usually to the same handful of places because my heart is left in those places so I need to go back often to feel whole. I studied tourism as part of my major as well but realized I am a better traveler than I am a hotel manager (AKA people who travel can be awful sometimes.)

I work at a recreation center running a department and teaching both swimming and certifying people to be lifeguards &
CPR/First Aid. This job was one of those scenarios where I was in the right place at the right time and it's made me grow as an individual and I've met some of the sweetest people. I also get to workout for free everyday so it's a win-win.

I am a college graduate, GO FLASHES and this page is just a way to share with whoever wants to listen (or read).

I have also attached a picture of my best friend so everyone can understand why I am obsessed with him.