When A System Stops Working I would love it if I could find a solution to the problems I cause myself - and the problem would stay solved. That’s not how it typically works for me. I find myself struggling with problems I solved some time ago, but I can’t make it work any more. My Bullet Journal I have been an advocate of the Bullet Journal for years for my non-work stuff. I revise it every few months when I find things that aren’t working optimally. And it’s a good system - until I stopped...
19 days ago • 2 min read
LauraEarnest.com Deliberate Living Made Simpler. VIEW IN BROWSER Changing Jobs With Little Change At the beginning of July I made the transfer from being a consultant to being an employee of the company that I had been working at for 8 years. I've been a consultant for most of my career, and this is the first client that has ever hired me away from my company. It's a good change for me, and one that comes with little change. I have the same desk, same management, same team, same work tasks....
30 days ago • 4 min read
Lazy Proof Your Day There are days when I feel like I’ve got it all together. And there are days when it is a struggle to do anything. What I’ve noticed is on those days when I feel lazy there are activities that I fall back on - and they are not optimal. And once I start down that path, it’s very easy to keep going. I was talking to a friend recently about how I have been “phoning it in” with a specific area of my life. She, being the sympathetic and kind person she is, pointed out that...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Boundaries: What and How I’ve been seeing a lot of articles about “infinite workdays” after a study from Microsoft was released about the state of the workday. And inevitably, people will follow this with “you just need to set boundaries.” All well and good, unless you only have a vague notion of boundaries and how they work. Most people have the idea of a boundary is a hard and fast rule they place, usually on someone else’s behavior (”You can’t do that”). And most of the time these types of...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
LauraEarnest.com Deliberate Living Made Simpler. VIEW IN BROWSER A New Chapter? One of the things I have been working on is cleaning out my library. It started with the physical books in my to-be-read pile, where I went through books and got really honest about whether or not I was going to read them. From there I moved onto my Kindle. I look on my Kindle books much as I would paper books. If I am not going to read it again, I am going to get rid of it. The only down side is that no one gets...
2 months ago • 3 min read
Cleaning Up The (Dreaded) To Be Read Pile My daughter worked at a national bookstore chain for the last year. She used her staff discount liberally - and frequently. I was in her room the other night and she proudly showed me a small basket. “This is my ‘to be read’ pile.” I looked her dead in the eyes and said “Amateur.” And while I was joking around with her, my mind went to the other side of the house and the feet of physical books that are in my pile…and the books that are languishing on...
2 months ago • 2 min read
What’s In My Carry Bag This article was inspired by a recent article from Chris Bailey. I read the article, and decided to pare my carry bag way down, and then share the results. I was headed down a frightening path. I’ve always carried stuff with me. Lots of stuff. Kind people tell me I’m just prepared for things (Be Prepared is the Girl Scout Motto). Unkind people, well, it’s unkind. But I could see that I was heading to being one of those old women who has a purse the size of a steamer...
3 months ago • 2 min read
LauraEarnest.com Deliberate Living Made Simpler. VIEW IN BROWSER One Charger To Rule Them All It really seems like chargers are finally starting to standardize. It’s reminded me of the video tape format wars in the 80s where VHS was up against betamax. Chargers have taken a lot longer to standardize, though. I used to carry a pack of chargers with me when I traveled: usb-a for my Kindle, Apple for my phone/iPad and usb-c for the Android users I live with. Even with a multi-ended charger, it...
3 months ago • 3 min read
LauraEarnest.com Deliberate Living Made Simpler. VIEW IN BROWSER Featured Article: Checking In With Yourself Most of the time when people ask how I am, I say, “fine.” Even if it isn’t technically true. But I learned that when the person in question is a medical person, I need to really check in and give an honest answer. My oncologist asked at my last appointment if I was having any pain. My answer, after a quick body scan was, “My arm hurts where you just jabbed me with a needle.” I’m...
4 months ago • 4 min read