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MindFULL Money

When was the last time you and your friends talked about money? I mean REALLY talked about it. Not just as a number, but deeper than that. What it means. More importantly, what YOU think it means.

I often say, if we all talked about money and sex, we’d have more of both (and I am pretty wealthy when it comes to generous friends – I am blessed with a few who are willing to share their thoughts on both subjects.) For my parents generation, the topic of money was taboo. So was wearing white after Labor Day.

For the next two weeks, I’ll be traveling to several cities, talking with people about the notion of retirement. It is a sensitive topic and an honor to hear their stories. It is also an opportunity to get a front row seat in the classroom of Life 101.

You see, I carry old family beliefs and behaviors about money that no longer serve me. It’s like wearing an old sweater that doesn’t really fit, but you can’t donate it. However, something deep inside is telling me “it’s time to hang it up”.

It’s crazy, for in spite of being married to a patient and numbers-oriented man, I still feel unsure of so many things. My husband uses Excel the way I use words and twice a year we sit down and talk about what we have and why we are doing what we are doing. Still, I lose steam.

In honor of this project, I vow to use what I hear to refill my tank. Yesterday I downloaded Mint to my iPhone and committed to tracking my spending. Do you know Mint? Check it out. www.mint.com . It enables you to set a budget and then monitor your success as you work toward your goals. While you are standing in line to pay for something, you can pop the amount into the app and it will automatically calibrate what you have left.

I am also going to make an investment next week. I always talk about doing it and never pull the trigger. For my own sense of empowerment, I am going to take a piece of my paycheck and buy a stock. Just one. I have my eye on foreign telecom. It’s a gut feeling. With Facebook in Bosnia, seems to me there needs to be tech support in smaller countries. Win or lose, I’ll know I tried. I’m so sick of hearing us all say, “If I had just bought Apple…”

And after breakfast, I am going to return the jeans I bought yesterday. I already have 7 pairs hanging in my closet. I’m no rock star. Who needs 8 pairs of jeans unless they are playing the bars on Sunday nights?

Who knows – if we open up this conversation, we might just find ourselves learning something new. Wouldn’t that be rich!

Do you have ways you are MindFULL about money? Let us know!

When Good-Bye Really Means Hello

Today we went to a going away party for our friend Akewak. A 14 year old ray of sunshine, he was brought to Denver, from Ethiopia, for lung and spine surgery and for six months lived as a “ward” of dear family friends.

If any of you have children, I’d like you to stop reading right now and look over at them, or at a picture of them, and imagine they need life saving surgery … and the only place they will get what they need is in a foreign country, hosted by people you have never met, in a hospital you have never seen the likes of. Can you begin to imagine what life must have been like for his family in Ethiopia and for the family that welcomed him into their home? Who knew he would end up in the safety and love of a Jewish community, millions of miles away. And who knew that he would touch the members of the community with his eyes and heart.

When we met Akewak last Spring, he trustingly climbed into our car and headed to the Ethiopian market in search of Injera – Ethiopian bread. You would have thought he had known us for years. He and my 12 year old daughter became fast friends, and while she wasn’t around this summer to play often, when they were together, they were bonded.

How lucky for them to have struck up a friendship that can span the world.

Last week, my daughter and Akewak enjoyed a trip to Pinkberry’s and the video store. He had gotten a gift certificate to the yogurt chain and saved it to share with her. She had the idea of buying him a Nintendo DS for his hospital stays and together they picked out two new games for him to take home.

There must have been 200 people there today (circling through the 2 hour party window). 200 people, who’s lives were touched by a young boy with a crooked spine and a missing thumb. Funny, we forgot to notice. All we ever saw was the spirit of faith and the trust of G-d.

As we left, he hugged us good-bye and handed us a thank you note. A thank you note! Handwritten in English on stationary. He not only has courage, he also has class.

We can only hope that his next note says, “Hello”. We will miss him in person, but hope to find new ways to stay in touch. We take for granted computer access and the US Mail. They have neither readily available. But I’ll bet we will find a way. After all, look at what we have all found already.

How do you MindFULLY say hello? Let us know!

Just Do What You Love

“Holy *&^!” I screamed as my husband brought in the New York Times Sunday Style section. There, beaming from the cover, was Desiree Rogers, my old boss from the Illinois Lottery, ex-White House Social Secretary and now, CEO of Johnson Publishing.

For those of you who didn’t follow the story, Desiree was appointed Obama’s White House Social Secretary, the first black woman to hold the title. Beautiful, savvy and endowed with a Harvard MBA, she was pushed out for reasons that covertly added up to being “too much”. Foes started the bus and when they had a chance, they backed it up and rolled her over.

But Desiree has never been one to be crushed.

Instead of changing who she is to quiet the noise, she turned up the volume and found a job that suited her. She turned what could have been seen as a failure into a new future.

Once again, Desiree shows us that you have to be true to who you are. And if you are willing, you can rise from public humiliation, dust off your shoes and start walking toward what you want. You never know what is waiting on the next block. When we emailed last Spring, she wasn’t sure what she was going to do next. And now, she is doing exactly what she is meant to do.

Are you?

Who are YOU and what do you mindFULLY want to do? Let us know!

Really?

Wow. I never cease to amaze myself with the number of people I know who are perfectly comfortable saying EXACTLY what they think. What puzzles me is why with some, I am deeply appreciative of their honesty and can laugh and with others I want to say, “ Reallllly? Was that necessary?” Seems to me, there is a fine line and an art to saying what you think in a way that doesn’t offend.

To remind myself of this, I keep the following saying in a frame by my land line (notice I didn’t say telephone? Does anyone even call it a telephone anymore? But, I digress…). I can only pray that on a good day, I remember.

The Sufis advise us to speak only after our words have managed to pass through three gates.

At the first gate, we must ask ourselves, “are these words true?” If so, we must let them pass on; if not, back they go.

At the second gate, we must ask ourselves, “are these words necessary?” If so, we let them pass on; if not, back they go.

At the last gate, we must ask, “Are they kind?”

How do you mindFULLY say what you really think? Let us know!

MindFULL Learning

How many of you know the brainteaser: There are two doors, one leading to pain and one leading to happiness, guarded by two men – one lies and one tells the truth – and you have to ask the same question of each to figure out which door to open?

Last night, Ken and I had fun trying to figure out the answer as we played around on a new website we found, Khan Academy. http://www.khanacademy.org

Sal Khan, a young and VERY smart guy (MBA from Harvard Business School, a Masters in electrical engineering and computer science, a BS in electrical engineering and computer science, and a BS in mathematics ALL from MIT) uses nothing more than his Yahoo Doodle Pad and a videocamera to upload his explanations to Youtube, where he helps us understand everything from Algebra to Mortgage Backed Securities to History to Brainteasers.

Khan, an ex VC’er turned world educator, shows us the easiest ways to understand some of the toughest concepts. Smart isn’t only what you glean from a book, its also about how you explain what you know in a way that someone else can understand. This makes Khan a genius. And you can be one, too.

It started as a way to tutor his young cousin over the phone and grew into an open source project–allowing the Khan Academy to become the free classroom for the World, with the mission of providing a world-class education to anyone, anywhere. Its totally cool! There are over 1800+ videos on everything from Math (every level) to Science to Humanities to SAT Math and GMAT Test Prep.

Whether you have kids in school who could use a new way of hearing their math, science or history lesson or you are looking for a way to understand what the heck is going on in our world (i.e. why your 410k is down 40% and what your mortgage has to do with it), you have to at least check it out. There is no charge. His site runs on donations and one of his new benefactors is Bill Gates, who uses the site with his 11 year old son.

Simply click through and learn one new concept for today. You’ll be amazed at how you can fill your mind with something that leaves you the better for knowing it.

How do you mindFULLY encourage ease of learning in your home?

AND…what do you think the answer is to the brainteaser?

Let us know!

Splitting Hairs

There once was a woman who woke up one morning, looked in the mirror,
and noticed she had only three hairs on her head.

“Well,” she said, “I think I’ll braid my hair today.” So she did and she had a wonderful day.

The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and saw that she had only
two hairs on her head. “H-M-M, ” she said, “I think I’ll part my hair down the middle today.” So she did and she had a grand day.

The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and noticed that she had
only one hair on her head. “Well,” she said, “Today I’m going to wear my hair in a pony tail.” So she did and she had a fun, fun day.

The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror and noticed that there wasn’t a single hair on her head. “YEAH!” she exclaimed, “I don’t have to fix my hair today!”

Attitude is everything.

As the saying goes: “The kind of life you will have isn’t determined by what happens to you, its determined by your reaction to what happens to you.”

How do you mindFULLY re-frame your attitude? Let us know!

The Zen of Housecleaning

A few weeks ago, I moderated focus groups for a large financial institution that sought to understand how people plan for retirement. After two days of active listening, I began to take the pulse of my own financial health.

This is not new for me. Over the years, I’ve done many financial services projects and I’ve always come home with something to think about. Years ago, my first project with financial advisers led to a now bi-annual meeting with my husband at a local Deli to review “where we are” (I find that if we talk in public, I am less likely to cry). For several reasons tho’, last weeks project hit me hard. The night after I returned home, I thought about quite a lot and as I sat in my nook and pondered how I was spending money, I noticed how often I was sneezing. And then, it hit me.

I have never raised a rag to wipe a surface.

Since I was a teenager, I have accused my mother of switching babies at the hospital and depriving me of my royal birthright. Clearly I was not meant to do housecleaning. For 21 years of marriage, through good times and tight times, I have had someone clean for us every 2 weeks.

But let’s be real. We have a one-year lease on a 2,000sq ft condo and it doesn’t warrant a cleaning lady that charges more per hour than my daughter’s teacher is making.

And so, realizing that if I simply picked up a rag and stayed on top of it, I would save close to $3,000 a year, I embarked on a cleaning frenzy this weekend and proclaimed, “I am going to clean the condo and save toward things I want.”

See, it’s not about depriving myself. Rather it’s about reframing money and having a sense of control and choice. I could easily spend the money on a cleaning lady, but it seems to me that I would rather take a trip to China, make a substantial community donation and know that I have a few extra dollars in case of an emergency. Not forever, but for NOW. As my friend Tamara says, ” it’s about doing more with less” vs thinking I have less for more.

On top of it all, picking up that rag also became a chance to teach my 12 year old daughter that we are fully capable of making smart financial choices that are empowering. Yesterday we went shopping for clothes. We talked while we shopped. When we came home, she redid her closet and folded everything in her laundry basket that really didn’t need to be washed. I cleaned her bathroom and together we cleared off her bookshelves and made her bed. By helping keep her room clean, she was learning the value of the clothes we bought and how to make a bed when she lives on her own.

We’ll see how long this lasts. But really, who cares. Its about the insight to be conscious and to own the choices we make; to move towards the financial security that we all crave and to let go of thinking that if only we had the life we were meant to have, it would all be OK. It is already better than OK. It’s great. We are all so lucky to have any choice at all. Why not use it to create the life we want?

Do you have any tips on MindFULL cleaning that you can share? Let us know!

Ellys

OK friends…as promised, the much awaited One Dish Wonder! “Ellys”, as my daughter calls them, are in the oven. They can be in yours too, in less than 30 minutes. Simply follow the recipe and steps below. Measurements are not exact, but you can feel your way through them. Promise. Enjoy!

You’ll need:

2 packages of LARGE and flaky crescent roll dough (It takes two triangles per person, to make one Elly).

Enough ground beef or turkey or Boca meatless crumbles to feed your family ( I use 1/2 lb of meat for for two of us or one bag of crumbles for all three)

Whatever veggies are in the fridge – chopped fine ( I usually have broccoli)

1 envelope of onion soup mix

Dijon mustard

In a skillet, cook meat, veggies and 1 envelope of onion soup mix.

Lay two triangles of dough side by side and shmoo them (aka “pinch the slits together) together to make a rectangle.

Shmear mustard on one end.

Place a few big scoops of meat mix on mustard.

Bring end of crescent dough up and over meat mix and pinch the sides to seal it all in (like a big full puffy square).

Bake at 375* until golden brown (about 15 minutes)

What MindFULLY delicious recipe makes your life easier? Let us know!

What’s For Dinner?

It’s 5 o’clock and the question that causes me to shallow breathe and pour a small vodka on the rocks, echoes from the family room…”what’s for dinner?” I know how fortunate I am to be able to answer that question with “what are you in the mood for?”, but that doesn’t keep me from standing in front of the refrigerator with the doors wide open and staring at the shelves, tasting dread.

You see, I have made many mistakes as a parent. And the one that is in my face (literally) every day is around food. My 12 year old is a vegetarian (and has been for 4 years), my husband is as skinny as a refugee and I am still battling the chubby 10 year old I see when I look in the mirror.

So wondering what I can make that will be meatless, fill up my husband and keep me from carbo-loading, is a constant challenge.

Elly to the rescue! Elly is my old sidekick from high school who makes all things look effortless. I appreciate knowing that the woman behind the curtain actually has to think about being human. Even she wonders, “What’s for dinner?” As such, she follows the blog of her friend, Amanda Haas. Elly claims that Amanda has “the best cooking blog and marriage saver I’ve ever tried!” When asked what makes it so great, she says, “No more wondering what’s for dinner and we go to the store once a week. Reading Amanda’s blog saves me time, energy and money.”

So friends, check it out. www.onefamilyonemeal.com

What if we tried it together, for a month, starting the week of September 6^th? Its Labor Day weekend – and we could take the “Labor” out of the day. We could use TMC to post ideas we find, tips and success. Yum!

In the meantime, it would be delicious if you could share your favorite time-saving dinner recipe with our MindFULL Creative readers. I will post mine next week. It’s actually an old recipe that I have changed over the years that Elly used make in high school! And guess what, I have managed to make it into a vegetarian, low-fat and filling one dish meal. Thanks, girls!

What’s your favorite MINDFULL and easy family dinner recipe? Let us know!

What Next?

While today is MindFULL Monday and the last real day of summer (school and work start tomorrow), for many of my friends it’s the start of a new life story. Many are closing their old books and sending their kids off to college for the first time. It’s huge. I can’t imagine, as my child is still navigating middle school. However, for many dear ones, there are lots of emotions and thoughts flying around. I am struck by how many are pondering the question, “What Next?” As old chapters end and new chapters begin, getting clear on a new life direction can be challenging. Picking up the pen and writing “Next” can be daunting.

Unless you are lucky enough to have someone like Tama Kieves whispering words of wisdom in your ear.

Tama wrote the book, This Time I Dance. Creating the Work You Love/How One Harvard Lawyer Left It All To Have It All. Lucky for me, Tama lives in Denver and while reading her book can inspire you to step into your life, looking into her eyes and seeing them sparkle can gently get you to lift your foot.

I’ve talked with Tama about different ideas, desires and dreams over the years. How sometimes I hold myself back. How certain projects bring out fear and others bring out creative genius. Learning to excavate our “why’s” can take time. Taking action, while taking time, is where someone like Tama can come in. She’s been there. Did all the things she was “supposed” to do. And almost croaked along the way. But she triumphs. Her story inspires introspection, her courage inspires permission.

Lucky for you, you don’t have to live in Denver to hear her speak, read her words or dance with her under a foreign sky. Check out her website. http://www.AwakeningArtistry.com Sign up for her inspirational newsletter. Read her book. Pack your bag and spend a weekend with her on a retreat. Do a phone session. The least you’ll do is gently pick up the pen – and who knows what you’ll begin to write next!

As you MindFULLY think about new chapters this Fall, what’s “Next” for you? Let us know!