“When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” Harriet Beecher Stowe Some days are light and filled with inspiration. Some days are simply routine. And on some days you may think to yourself: “I give up”. You may feel like just giving up on… Your new habit of working out or eating healthier. Your own small business or blog because you haven’t had the results you expected or wanted. Truly feeling better about yourself . Dating because you can’t seem to find the right person or maybe even have a good date at all. Winding up in such situations is a normal part of making positive changes in life. But what you do when you feel like giving up will determine a lot about where your life will go. In today’s article I’d like to share 10 things that have helped me to hold on or to change direction on those difficult days. 1. Tap into realistic expectations. This one has been very important to me. Tap into realistic expectations not by listening to advertising that promises you quick results. Not by listening to the perfectionism – from the people around you or yourself – that allows no mistakes or failures. Tap into it by listening to the people who have already gone where you want to go. Listen to the people who know what works and how you will stumble and fail along the way and can tell you how long your journey may take. You'll probably not get an exact blueprint. But the things people can tell you in person or via books and blogs can be a great guidance. 2. Remind yourself why you are doing this. It’s easy to lose the big picture in the busy everyday life. But if you feel like giving up then try reconnecting with why you are doing what you are doing. Maybe it is to: Support and keep your family safe. Live healthier and longer so you get to watch your kids grow up. See the world and explore new things. Write your answers down. Then, whenever you feel like giving up pull out that piece of paper with your most powerful why(s). It often helps. 3. Remember: It’s darkest before the dawn. This thought has helped me to hold on when things have felt very difficult and I felt like giving up and going home. Because I have found it to be true. When things seemed to be at the lowest point with my blog and business, with my dating life or with my motivation in life in general something always happened. Probably quite often because being at that low point forced me to change something in how I did things. But maybe also because life seems to have some kind of balance if I just keep going. If I just keep taking action instead of giving up and doing nothing then something good always happens. Seeing this repeat itself strengthened my belief in taking action and to keep going even on rough days or weeks. And it brings some comfort even when things look pretty dark. 4. Reconnect with the basics. When I have run into a plateau or a longer rough patch then one thing that has often helped is to simplify and reconnect with the basics. It is easy to become overwhelmed by all the information out there about any change you can make in life. That can lead to confusion and to trying to do too many things at once. In those situations it has been helpful for me to simplify. To just focus on a few or one of the things I have learned that are the basic fundamentals in this area of life. To improve my social skills those things were, for example, to keep a positive attitude and to assume rapport . 5. Learn more and course-correct. Reconnecting with the basics often works well. But sometimes during a rough patch or when I feel stuck it has been helpful to change my course slightly instead. To examine how I do things, what results they bring in and to compare it to how people who have gone before me have done things. To be honest with myself and admit that maybe one or two things or small parts of that I am doing are not working so well. And to replace those things for a while – based on what others have done in the past – and see if that works better. Even if it means that I have to get out of my comfort zone. 6. Tell yourself: Just for today! Here’s a little phrase I got from Brian Tracy that I often use when I’m having a bad day with a new habit. I say to myself: Just for today I will XX! Replace XX with what you will do just for today such as getting exercise, getting going with the most important task first thing in the day or eating a healthy lunch. By telling myself that I only have to do it today I get two big benefits: I release the mental burden of the past times I did it and future times when I will do it. And so the task becomes much lighter and the inner resistance melts away. It also reminds me that the period that I am investing in changing a habit is not the rest of my life. After 30 days or so the habit will mostly be automatic so it is not something I have to do on willpower for the next few years or decades. And guess what, when tomorrow comes I’ll probably have a good day again with less resistance and I will most likely feel like doing the task again. 7. Connect with the people around you to let it out (and to reload your motivation). I've found that when the hurdles seem insurmountable or I don't have the energy to tackle another obstacle then one thing that can help a ton is to just open up about it. To talk to my wife, a friend or my parents about it. To vent, to figure things out for myself as the other person listens. And to get some level-headed and experience-based advice when I need it. This replenishes my energy and motivation . If you have trouble with finding someone to open up to at this time – or the people in your life have difficulty with understanding or helping you with a current challenge – then you can for instance seek out supportive Facebook groups or other groups online. 8. Look back and celebrate how far you've come. When you feel like giving up and you're overwhelmed and tired then it's easy to lose perspective on what you've actually accomplished so far. The things you've learned, the steps you've gotten to done and the obstacles you've overcome. Reflect on those things when you feel like giving up. Appreciate and celebrate what you've done so far to move yourself towards your goal. Appreciate yourself for the effort you've put in. This will help you to change your perspective to a more optimistic one once again and to find a new step you can take to keep moving forward. 9. Just cut yourself some slack and take a break. Yes, it might feel like you just want to give up. But in my experience that may sometimes simply signal that you need a well-deserved break after you've put in too much work or tried to stick with a too optimistic time-plan. So when that happens listen to your body and mind. Take a few hours or days off. Rest, recuperate and forget all about the task, project or whatever you want to give up on during that time. This can change how you feel in a remarkable way and recharge your batteries. 10. See if it's time to quit and to try something else. Sometimes it's not time to give up. But it may be time to quit what you are doing and to try something else. If you feel like giving up or you are bored a lot, if you feel no real passion or excitement or curiosity about a change or your current path then ask yourself these two questions: Am doing this because I truly want it? Or am I doing it because someone told me to or because so many people around me seem to have done it or are working on it? What you want isn't easy to know before you get started though. You may need to try different paths before you find one that fits you. And just because everyone around you seem to love running doesn't mean that you have to love it or that you have to give up on the habit of regular exercise. Try walking, biking, playing badminton or table tennis instead. Try a new way of doing what you want and see if it's a better fit and more enjoyable for you.

Short on time? Give this 4-minute Pilates booty workout a try! In this workout, I’ll lead you through a series of exercises that help strengthen and tone the muscles in your lower body. CLICK HERE to view the workout on YouTube! Feel free to sneak this workout in when you don’t have much time, or add it on to another workout for an added booty-strengthening bonus! xo, Ready to BUILD STRENGTH & FEEL GOOD in just 15 minutes a day? Join the FREE 5-day Pilates Strong challenge! JOIN THE FREE CHALLENGE!

Today I'd like to share the best and most powerful quotes about change. Because change is inevitable. Sometimes it surprises and tackles us on a regular Tuesday afternoon. At other times we may simply realize that a change is needed to live a happier, less stressful or more successful life. So in this post you'll find 101 of the most helpful and thought-provoking quotes about dealing with change and about making a change happen in your own life. And if you want more motivation then have a look at this post with quotes about courage and also this one that will help you to stop procrastinating . Inspirational Quotes about Change in Life “Be the change that you wish to see in the world.” Mahatma Gandhi “You never change your life until you step out of your comfort zone; change begins at the end of your comfort zone.” Roy T. Bennett “If you don’t like something change it; if you can’t change it, change the way you think about it.” Mary Engelbreit “Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me.” Carol Burnett “Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” Lao Tzu “If you can't change it, change your attitude.” Maya Angelou “Words are powerful; if you change your words, you can change your life.” Joyce Meyer “I didn’t get there by wishing for it or hoping for it, but by working for it.” Estée Lauder “When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.” Tuli Kupferberg “Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change.” Brene Brown “A ship in a harbor is safe, but that’s not why ships are built” John A. Shedd “When the winds of change blow, some people build walls and others build windmills.” Chinese proverb “Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it's always your choice.” Wayne Dyer “The changes we dread most may contain our salvation.” Barbara Kingsolver “Even if you cannot change all the people around you, you can change the people you choose to be around. Life is too short to waste your time on people who don’t respect, appreciate, and value you. Spend your life with people who make you smile, laugh, and feel loved.” Roy T. Bennett “Adversity is like a strong wind. It tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that we see ourselves as we really are.” Arthur Golden “You must welcome change as the rule, but not as your ruler.” Denis Waitley “True life is lived when tiny changes occur.” Leo Tolstoy “When in doubt, choose change.” Lily Leung “Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control of what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don't.” Steve Maraboli “You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.” Margaret Thatcher “Don't wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what. Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.” Mark Victor Hansen “By changing nothing, nothing changes.” Tony Robbins “Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.” Wayne W. Dyer “A wise man changes his mind, a fool never will.” Spanish Proverb “In times of great stress or adversity, it’s always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.” Lee Iacocca “Consider how hard it is to change yourself and you’ll understand what little chance you have in trying to change others.” Jacob M. Braude “To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.” Henri Bergson “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” George Bernard Shaw “The greatest discovery of all time is that a person can change his future by merely changing his attitude.” Oprah Winfrey “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” Steve Jobs “ All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me … You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.” Walt Disney “Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.” Michael Jordan “Any change, even a change for the better, is always accompanied by discomforts.” Arnold Bennett “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” James Baldwin “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” Rumi “If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write.” Martin Luther “Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” George Bernard Shaw “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” Reinhold Niebuhr “When we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change; at such a moment, there is no point in pretending that nothing has happened or in saying that we are not yet ready. The challenge will not wait. Life does not look back. A week is more than enough time for us to decide whether or not to accept our destiny.” Paulo Coelho ”Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.” Leo Tolstoy “One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world.” Malala Yousafzai “Though I might travel afar, I will meet only what I carry with me, for every man is a mirror. We see only ourselves reflected in those around us. Their attitudes and actions are only a reflection of our own. The whole world and its condition has its counter parts within us all. Turn the gaze inward. Correct yourself and your world will change.” Kristen Zambucka “It’s never too late to be who you might have been.” George Eliot Quotes about Change and Growth “In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or step back into safety.” Abraham Maslow “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” Victor Frankl “Some people believe holding on and hanging in there are signs of great strength. However, there are times when it takes much more strength to know when to let go and then do it.” Ann Landers “Growth and comfort do not coexist.” Ginni Rometty “Anyone who isn’t embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn’t learning enough.” Alain de Botton “Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.” Isaac Asimov “The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself.” Mark Caine “If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we aren’t really living.” Gail Sheehy “Change, like healing, takes time.” Veronica Roth “People do not change, they are merely revealed.” Anne Enright “If I am an advocate for anything, it is to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river.” Anthony Bourdain “When people are ready to, they change. They never do it before then, and sometimes they die before they get around to it. You can't make them change if they don't want to, just like when they do want to, you can't stop them.” Andy Warhol “I wanted to change the world. But I have found that the only thing one can be sure of changing is oneself.” Aldous Huxley “Change the changeable, accept the unchangeable, and remove yourself from the unacceptable.” Denis Waitley “You will find that it is necessary to let things go; simply for the reason that they are heavy.” C. JoyBell C. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” Nelson Mandela “I have accepted fear as part of life — specifically the fear of change… I have gone ahead despite the pounding in the heart that says: turn back.” Erica Jong “We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers – but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault, because if you wanted to change you're the one who has got to change.” Katharine Hepburn “Change is inevitable. Growth is optional.” John Maxwell “Follow effective actions with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.” Peter Drucker “When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” Haruki Murakami “Anger, resentment and jealousy doesn't change the heart of others– it only changes yours.” Shannon Alder “When the Japanese mend broken objects, they aggrandize the damage by filling the cracks with gold. They believe that when something's suffered damage and has a history it becomes more beautiful.” Barbara Bloom “Some changes look negative on the surface but you will soon realize that space is being created in your life for something new to emerge.” Eckhart Tolle “Procrastination is the fear of success. People procrastinate because they are afraid of the success that they know will result if they move ahead now. Because success is heavy, carries a responsibility with it, it is much easier to procrastinate and live on the ‘someday I’ll’ philosophy.” Denis Waitley “No matter who you are, no matter what you did, no matter where you've come from, you can always change, become a better version of yourself.” Madonna “Life will only change when you become more committed to your dreams than you are to your comfort zone.” Billy Cox “Whenever you’re in conflict with someone, there is one factor that can make the difference between damaging your relationship and deepening it. That factor is attitude.” William James “The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” Alan Watts “Change is painful, but nothing is as painful as staying stuck somewhere you don’t belong.” Mandy Hale “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.” Mark Twain “Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go.” Hermann Hesse “The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny.” Albert Ellis “When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill, When the funds are low and the debts are high, And you want to smile but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit Rest if you must, but don’t you quit. Success is failure turned inside out, The silver tint on the clouds of doubt, And you can never tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems afar. So, stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit It’s when things go wrong that you mustn’t quit.” Edgar A. Guest “Good things take time.” John Wooden “The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.” Ralph Waldo Emerson “If you don’t change your beliefs, your life will be like this forever. Is that good news?” W. Sommerset Maugham “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” Karen Lamb Motivating Quotes about Change in Business “The successful man is the one who finds out what is the matter with his business before his competitors do.” Roy L. Smith “The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.” William Arthur Ward “If you know what you want to achieve in life, then you are more inspired to change for the better.” Philip Vang “Resistance is never the agent of change. You have to embrace the actions that are going to get you closer to your goal.” Ali Vincent “Things work out best for those who make the best of how things work out.” John Wooden “They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.” Andy Warhol “Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.” Confucius “Failure is a bend in the road, not the end of the road. Learn from failure and keep moving forward.” Roy T. Bennett “Open your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.” Dalai Lama “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.” John F. Kennedy “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” Margaret Mead “Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force but through persistence.” Ovid “All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.” Sophocles “If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door.” Milton Berle “You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight.” Jim Rohn “Maturity is when you stop complaining and making excuses, and start making changes.” Roy T. Bennett “Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.” John Wooden “It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” Charles Darwin

“Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.” Jose Ortega y Gasset “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” Aristotle It is early morning. You've had your breakfast and done your morning routine. So you head out into your day. And in a short while you'll sit down in school or at your job and get started with your daily work. But how can you get that work done in a way that is less stressful, less energy consuming and simply a bit smarter? Today I’d like to share 10 tips that have helped me with that. I hope you will find something here that will help you too to simplify and relaxify your own daily work. 1. Do just one thing at a time. It will help you to get your task all the way to done, to feel less stressed and confused and you’ll do a better job compared to if you multi-task things. And if you feel stressed and overwhelmed during your day then you can tell yourself this simple thing to regain focus and inner clarity again. 2. Keep a minimalistic workspace. It makes it easier to keep your focus and attention in the right place and to keep your thinking clear. I keep a workspace with just a wooden desk, a chair, my computer, a larger screen and a glass of water or mug of tea on that desk. 3. Go slow. One good way to do more focused work is to go a bit slower than you may usually do. I have also found that by just doing something at a slower pace it feels less like a mental burden and so I am less likely to procrastinate. 4. Eliminate. From time to time ask yourself: What one task during my day or week can I simply eliminate and not do with few or no consequences? It's easy to just keep doing everything simply because “you should” or because you’ve always done so. So question how you go about things to free up energy and time. There is often room to at least simplify a bit through elimination. 5. Cycle 100% focused work with 100% full rest. This is a big one for me. By doing things this way you'll help yourself to keep your mental sharpness and energy up for the whole day and workweek. I do this by setting the timer-app on my phone for 20 minutes (or sometimes just 5-10 minutes). During those minutes I only focus on the one task at hand and it becomes easier to do so because I know that I only have to do it for this limited time period. When the timer beeps I leave my work for 5-15 minutes. During those minutes I focus only on resting by having a snack, taking a short walk or by relaxing with my eyes closed on the couch. 6. Don’t beat yourself up when things don’t go as planned. Instead, be kind to yourself and smart with your energy and ask yourself: What is one thing I can learn from this? Use what you can learn to do things better and to avoid making the same mistake in the future. It’s a better use of your time than spending it on regretting a past that you cannot change anyway. 7. Let emails and other online checking wait until the end of the workday. Or at least for a few hours. Don’t start your day with going through your email – if possible – because it can add a lot of stress and suck away your limited energy and attention early in the day. It can also make it hard to even find enough time for your most important tasks if you get too distracted by your inbox. 8. Limit your daily information input. Regularly unsubscribe to blogs, podcasts, forums and email newsletters that doesn't add much value to your life anyway. Keep only the most helpful, funny, inspiring and best ones. This very simple thing can free up quite a bit of both time and attention during the course of a month. 9. Ask yourself questions every day that help you to find your focus. It's so easy to get off track during a day. To stay on it or to get back there if you get lost use one – or both – of my own favorite questions: What is the most important thing I can do right now? What would I work on if I only had 2 hours for work today? If you like, write these questions down on a note and put that note where you cannot avoid seeing it during your day. 10. Focus mostly on the how to and not so much on the what-ifs. Don’t get stuck in analysis paralysis, overthinking and in the worry and lack of self-esteem that usually comes from those destructive thoughts. Instead, focus on what you actually can do, on what action you can take to move forward. Empower yourself by asking yourself: What is one small step I can take right now to move forward towards my goal or out of this situation?

“Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.” Benjamin Franklin “If I don't train enough, of course I'm nervous.“ Haile Gebrselassie It starts with just a little tremble within. Then a pressure builds up. A hand or foot starts to fidget. Your palms become moist and you start to feel not quite like yourself anymore. The inner calmness you felt has flown out the window. Nervousness is back, like an old friend you didn’t want to see. Just in time for that date you had been looking forward to for the past week. Or the important meeting at work or your presentation in school. So what can you do at this point? Back down, come up with a poor excuse and cancel ( as your self-esteem plummets )? Plow through the meeting or date while being not quite your best self ? It is certainly possible. I have done both. But an even better approach has – in my experience – been to find strategies and develop habits that help me to handle this challenge. Here are 7 of my favorite habits for dealing with and overcoming nervousness. 1. Prepare if possible. A bit obvious. But doing your preparation in time and not at the last minute and doing the preparation well – without trying to do it perfectly – rather than somewhat sloppily make a big difference. You’ll feel more sure of yourself and relaxed about what you are about to do. If you have an important meeting, do your homework so you know what will or may come up in the meeting. If you have a date, perhaps try to think of 2-3 interesting topics/questions to bring up in case the conversational flow hits a stop. If you have a job interview, think about what they may ask you and figure out some good answers. 2. Ask yourself: what is the worst that could realistically happen? This question has helped me many times to calm down and to stop building a mountain out of a molehill. Because the worst that happened when I was dating was that I had a somewhat awkward date with someone I did not have a good chemistry with. It didn't lead a second date and sometimes I felt bad for day or two. And that was pretty much it. But the sky didn't fall because it is was a bad date. I got up the next morning again and had often learned something good from it. 3. Visualize in a positive way. It is so easy to get stuck in the usual and habitual negative visualizations in your mind of how a situation will go. And so you get nervous. Try taking a break from it the next time you are having an upcoming date, party or meeting. Just this once allow yourself to see things in a positive way. Here's how to do it: Lie down in your bed or sit down somewhere where it is comfortable. Close your eyes. In your mind see how great the situation will unfold – see and hear it – and also how great will you feel at this meeting. See yourself being positive, open and having a wonderful time with a smile on your face. And see the excellent outcome you want in your mind. Then release by visualizing that it has already happened , that the meeting is over with the desired result. This is surprisingly effective and will get you into a good, confident and relaxed headspace before even stepping into that conference room, class room or pub. Try it and see how this exercise works for you. Maybe it becomes something you want keep doing. 4. Slow down and breathe with your belly. A few minutes before you step into the situation that makes you nervous slow down. Walk slower to the meeting place. Move slower. Even stop for a minute if you like and stand still. Then breathe through your nose. Take a little deeper breaths than you usually do. Make sure you breathe with your belly. Not with your chest (a common problem when people get stressed or nervous). Focus on just your slow in- and out-breaths for a minute or two. Only on the air going in and out of your nose. This will calm you down, make it easier to think normally again and that singular focus can draw you back into this moment rather than past failures or future worries. 5. Assume rapport in social situations. After you have slowed down and focused on your breathing I have another good habit if you still feel a bit nervous and you are going into some kind of social situation. This one worked especially well for me when I was single and was dating. And it is also very useful just before any other kind of meeting. The habit is to assume rapport. This means that just before you met someone you pretend and think to yourself that you are meeting one of your best friends. Then you’ll naturally slip into a much more relaxed, comfortable, confident and enjoyable emotional state and frame of mind. In this state of mind the conversation tends to flow more naturally too, without much thinking. Just like with your friends. This is one of the very best and most helpful social habits I have adopted in the past 10 years or so. 6. Remember: people don’t think about you and what you do that much really. You may feel like everyone is watching, judging and thinking about you a whole lot. And so you get nervous, worried or hold yourself back in life. But a sobering realization I have had over the years is that people simply don't care that much about what you do. Just because you may think a lot about what you do and say doesn't mean that others do that too. They have their own plate full with doing the same thing as you: focusing on themselves, on their pets and kids and on their own challenges at this moment in time. This realization may make you feel a little less important. But it also sets you free a bit more to do what you want to do in life. 7. Tell yourself that you are excited. Harness the nervous energy into something that will help you. If you cannot minimize the nervousness in some situations by using the tips above then take a different approach. When the nervousness bubbles up, tell yourself that you are excited about the meeting, presentation etc. This helps you to change perspective on what is happening inside of you and I have found that it helps me to get a boost of enthusiasm and openness for a short while. So I can go into that meeting with that more helpful mindset and emotional state. And a few minutes into the meeting the excited energy has usually been used in a helpful way and I go back to feeling more relaxed and centered again.

In this special episode, Robin features stories from Sisterhood members as they share what brought them to the Sisterhood and the abundance of goodness it has brought to their lives. Silvia, Emily, Jamie, Julie, Dana, Bryony, and Lauren all have unique stories and perspectives on what the Sisterhood has done for them. All innately relatable, they discuss the dietary restraints, workout pushbacks, and mental strains they were experiencing before the Sisterhood, but how joining in the discipline of Pilates has empowered them not only on the mat, but off the mat too. Join Robin in this special episode to hear more about what the Sisterhood has offered so many inspiring women and what it can do for you too. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! The shift to a grace over guilt mentality has changed Silvia’s life and she discusses what that’s meant for her Emily talks about how the balanced life has centered her day-to-day life Jamie talks about her story of high-impact training and the pain it caused her and how Pilates has changed that for her Julie shares how Pilates has helped her be more present off the mat Dana discusses how her “all or nothing” mentality was holding her back and how the Sisterhood community helped her build strength physically and mentally Bryony shares how Pilates has transformed her life through creating body awareness and improving her relationship with herself Lauren dealt with years of chronic pain but learned how to heal that pain through consistency with Pilates Links in this episode: Sign up for Pilates Strong: A 5-day Pilates Challenge Follow The Balanced Life on Instagram Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

“Get out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new.” Brian Tracy I’m a big fan of doing the unusual thing. Sometimes in big ways. Often in small and daily ways to mix things up. Why? Because this habit is a simple and relatively easy way to: Get out of your comfort zone. And if you change your perspective on yourself from someone who sticks to the old and comfortable all the time to someone who likes to mix things up then it will feel more natural and easier to break out of your comfort zone when comes to bigger things too. Because this habit makes the inner resistance and the fear that may hold you back smaller . Add a spark to your day and come alive. It keeps you from getting stuck in the same old daily or weekly rut. And it adds more fun to your life. Refuel your curiousness about the world and life. When you do the unusual thing regularly you to discover a ton of new and exciting things. And that will refuel your curiousness about what else is out there that you haven't discovered just yet . So how do you do the unusual thing and break out of your comfort zone in small and sometimes bigger ways? 20 Ways to Get Out of Your Comfort Zone 1. Eat the unusual thing. Instead of choosing the meat-based dish at lunch try the vegetarian alternative. Or try the fish if you usually go for the beef. 2. Smile towards everyone. Instead of just going along with your day in your normal social way try smiling more . Smile more towards your co-workers, the lady at the checkout at the supermarket, the people closest to you and smile to yourself when you encounter a mirror. See what happens. 3. Cook something new. Each week we try cooking a new recipe. It is most often a tasty experiment and helps us to find, sometimes unexpected, new favorites. It has also certainly made me a better cook in the last few years. 4. Mix up your music. I mix things up by trying new music every month. I have a look at the best music on sites like Metacritic . Then I load a few of those albums on Spotify and listen. 5. Work in complete silence and stillness. Shut the door to your office, shut off your music, unplug the internet and just focus on doing the most important thing you can do today while enjoying the silence. 6. Read something that your friends wouldn't guess that you are reading. Doing this has helped me to expand my horizons and learn new skills and many, often unexpected things about the world around me. 7. Do all your shopping for the week. Instead of doing grocery shopping when you feel like it or need to, sit down and plan what you will eat and need for a whole week. Go and get all of that at the store. Now you don’t have to go back there for a week and you’ll probably have a bunch of extra free time (and less stress) to enjoy this week. 8. Have a day of kindness. Instead of having the usual bursts of irony, sarcasm etc. during your day try to go for a day where you are just being kind and friendly to everyone including yourself . 9. Enjoy it all. All fluctuations during your normal day is a part of life and as life it's a gift in some way or another. So on some days I just tell myself: “enjoy it all”. Then I try to enjoy my day no matter if the inbox is overfull, if I’m hungry and starting to get cranky. The things I usually don’t like so much I tell myself to enjoy as a part of life. And so my day actually becomes more enjoyable because much of how we see life is about how we choose to think about it. 10. Watch something odd. If you usually watch thrillers then try a romantic comedy. If you most often get stuck with documentaries try an animated movie from Japan (I recommend anything by Hayao Miyazaki). If you love Family Guy, try The Wire. Expand what you watch to get new ideas and impressions. 11. Listen to the sound of the world. Leave your portable music player/app at home or shut off and in your pocket. Just listen to sounds of the city, nature and people as you move about during your day. 12. Take a day to be offline. I tend to spend a day a week offline (usually Saturday or Sunday). It’s a wonderful change of pace and feels like I’m on a small, healthy and extra relaxing vacation. Plus, it makes it more fun to get back to work on Monday. 13. Take a news black out. Instead of reading the paper or watching the news as usual try to go without that for a day. See how it affects you and how much you miss the news. 14. Hide a note for a loved one. Hide a sweet note of affection for a partner, family member or a friend in his or her cookie jar, tea or coffee container, book on the nightstand, hat, shoes or somewhere else where they look each day. Make him or her happy in an unexpected and unusual way. 15. Take a different route. To work or to school. To your gym or home. See something new even when you are in transport mode. 16. Walk or take the bicycle to work. Instead of taking the car or riding the bus as usual. Get some exercise and fresh air before it is time to start working and on your way home. 17. Let it go just for today. If you often get into arguments or have trouble letting issues go and replay them over and over in your mind then just for today let it all go. Tomorrow you can take up your old habits just where you left them. But for today, instead of getting into an argument just let it go and walk away. If you replay something in your mind, let it go for today. If an old memory pops up today too, let it go instead of dwelling. 18. Go out. If you usually stay in during the weekdays, then call up a few friends and head down to the pub for a few hours even if it’s just a Wednesday. Or call up someone you haven’t met in ages and go for a cup of tea or coffee. Or pop down to the movie theater and catch a movie. If you usually do those things though, consider just staying in with PJs on and taking it easy. 19. Sit in a new place. If you have favorite chair or part of the sofa where you always sit then try another chair or place to sit today. It can give you a new perspective at work or at home. And I have found that it can even give me some new and fresh thoughts and perspectives on life. 20. Throw out the things you haven’t used in 1 year. Go through one part of your home – a closet, a drawer in your desk or bedroom cabinet – and see what's in there. Go through the items one by one and ask yourself: Have I used this item in the past year? If not, give the item(s) away to charity or a friend or simply throw it out.

“Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” Buddha “The best way to capture moments is to pay attention. This is how we cultivate mindfulness. Mindfulness means being awake. It means knowing what you are doing.” Jon Kabat-Zinn One of the most common habits that make life miserable is to not be where you are. What do I mean by that? That your body is right here, right now. But that your thoughts are elsewhere in time and space. They are in the past, reliving an old, painful memory. Or replaying an argument – that you still want to win – for the hundredth time. Or your thoughts are in a possible future. Worried and stressed about what may happen at work or in your relationship. Or trying to plan for every possible scenario and through that hoping to fully control the future. And the more time you spend in the future or past, the more you – in my experience – tend to also: Be ineffective. Making decisions becomes very hard if you second-guess yourself all the time or become paralyzed by all the possible outcomes. And overthinking zaps so much energy that you lose motivation to take action. Miss life as it happens. If you are not fully here in this moment then it is very easy to miss and to not fully enjoy a victory or simply a beautiful, fun or small moment in life. Maybe you cannot spend all of your time in the now. Because there are things you can learn from reexamining your past. And there are things you sometimes need to plan for in your future. But the kind of obsessive or addictive way to spend so much time in a regular week in the past or future can be replaced with something smarter, more helpful and happiness-friendly. Three habits that have helped me a lot to make that shift into being much more mindful are to: 1. Slow down. Start your day with doing whatever you do first in your morning slowly. This will make it easier and more natural to keep a slower pace and to focus fully on what you are doing for the rest of your morning. And starting your day in this way will often prevent you from going into your own most common thought loops that cause worry, anger or sadness. Plus, doing something in a calm and relaxed manner is often the quickest way to do something well. And you can of course slow down what you are doing at any time during your day to get your mind back to what your body is doing. 2. Tell yourself: Now I am… I often tell myself this silently in my mind: Now I am X. And X could be that I am brushing my teeth. Doing the dishes. Taking a walk and listening to the sounds around me. Just reminding myself of this helps my mind to stop wandering and it brings my focus back to just that one thing I am doing right now and nothing else. 3. Disrupt your thoughts + quickly reconnect with the here and now. If you are a regular reader then you know that I like to use a stop-word or phrase to silence the inner critic . This works well for getting back to the present moment too. When you catch yourself going somewhere else in the past or future with your thoughts then – in your mind – shout: STOP! Or: No, no, no, we are not going down that road again! Then, right away after you have disrupted those thoughts find your way back to the present moment by either focusing only on what is going on around you right now with all your senses – the sights, the sounds, the smells and so on – or by focusing 100% on your breaths going in and out of your body. Do either of those things for just 1-2 minutes.

When you get disappointed then it can hurt. Sometimes a bit. Sometimes a lot. It can drag you down into a negative funk for days or even weeks. But if you learn how to deal with that disappointment in a healthier and more helpful way then it can be less a lot less scary and painful and actually a springboard or learning experience for further personal growth. That’s at least been my experience in the past decade. And in this post I’d like to share 12 steps, tips and habits that I’ve learned over the years and that help me to both handle disappointment and to reduce the situations where I get disappointed in the first place. 1. First, accept how you feel. Disappointment hurts. And that’s OK. Don’t try to push it away. And don’t try to hide it under a big smile. I’ve found that it works better to not be swept away by such tempting impulses. But to instead accept how I feel. To let it all in and to hurt for a while. Because if I do then it will go quicker and in the long run be less painful to process what has happened. If I on the other hand reject how I honestly feel then those emotions can pop up later and at unexpected times. And make me moody, pessimistic or passive aggressive. 2. Remember, you are not a disappointment. Just because you may have been disappointed, had a setback or made a mistake and disappointed someone else doesn’t mean that you are a disappointment or failure . And this situation that you’re in right now won’t last forever. Even if it might feel that way today. The truth is: Just because you were disappointed today or you disappointed someone doesn’t mean that you’ll be or do that tomorrow or the next time. This does not label you as a disappointment (unless you choose to put that label on yourself). If you keep moving forward and you keep taking action then you’ll move on and you'll improve. 3. Learn from it. Instead of getting lost in the pain and negative emotions that can come from a disappointment choose to see it more as something you can learn valuable things from (and something that’ll help you to grow). You can do that by asking yourself better questions. Questions like: What is one thing I can learn from this? How can I adjust my course to avoid this disappointment in the future? What is one thing I can do differently the next time? Maybe you learn that you can likely communicate better the next time when you're in a similar situation or working together with someone else on a task or project. Or that you need to give yourself a better balance between rest and work to avoid mistakes or to think more clearly. You might even realize that you need to make a bigger change in your life and start spending less time – or no time at all – with someone who has disappointed you too many times (or always makes you feel like a disappointment no matter how hard you try). 4. Remind yourself: disappointment will happen if you go outside of your comfort zone. Who is never disappointed? Or never feeling low about a setback or a mistake? The people who never really go outside of their comfort zone. Everyone who is now successful and you may look up to have had his or her share of disappointments and failures. Setbacks and sometimes feeling disappointed is a natural part of living your life fully. A sign of you trying to grow and improve your situation. I’ve found that just keeping this fact in mind helps me to stay strong and to more easily handle my own stumbles and setbacks. 5. Refocus on what you still got in your life. To move on shift your focus to what you still got in your life. The people, the passions and the things you sometimes may take for granted like a roof over your head and clean water. Tapping into gratitude in this way helps me to put things into perspective and to not let a disappointment overwhelm me and derail my whole week. 6. Talk it over with someone close to you. Getting a healthier and wider perspective on what happened is, as already mentioned, a vital part of dealing with disappointment in a better way. And one of the most powerful ways to do that is in my experience to let it out into the light and to talk it over with someone close to you. By venting as your friend just listens you can release that inner pressure, sort things out for yourself and accept what has happened instead of trying to push it away or ignoring it. And if the two of you have a conversation about it then you can see the situation through someone else’s eyes and from another perspective. This person can help you to ground yourself and to not make a mountain out of a molehill. And the two of you can together come up with the start of an action-plan for how you will move forward. 7. If your expectations are of perfection, then adjust them. If you demand or expect perfection from yourself or from other people then you’ll often be disappointed. So adjust your expectations a bit. If you’re disappointed in what you did, what someone else did or how a situation turned out in your life ask yourself: Will this matter in 5 years? Or even 5 weeks? That’s one thing that has helped me greatly to not make mountains out of molehills and to adjust my own expectations. Another helpful thing is simply to remind yourself that if you buy into myths of perfection then you will hurt yourself and the people in your life. Because such myths that you may have picked up from movies, songs and simply what the world or Instagram highlight reels are telling you will clash with reality and tends to: Cause much stress and suffering within you and in the people around you. Get you stuck in procrastination because you become fearful of being disappointed or disappointing someone else once again. Harm or possibly lead you to end relationships, jobs, projects etc. because your expectations are out of this world. Keeping this reminder at the forefront of my mind – and sometimes written down on a piece of paper – has definitely helped me to adjust my expectations and reduce my own suffering and disappointments. 8. Take a break (and find other ways to reduce your stress levels as you move forward). Just focusing on your goals and working towards them all the time can cause unnecessary stress and make you lose your perspective. And sometimes you just need a break to get over a disappointment. So take some time to rest up, recharge and to have some fun. After you've taken that time off from your goals and dreams you’ll likely be in a better place to accept and learn from what happened and to then move forward once again. When you’re in this more level-headed place then also take a bit of time to see how you can plan for a better balance between work and restful downtime. I’ve found that when my balance between those two things is in order then it is usually quite a bit easier to handle setbacks and things not going as I’d like in a more constructive and mentally centered way. 9. Get outside of your own head. If you know you have a tendency to get stuck in mulling over a negative situation for too long and going down into a downward spiral then get out of your own head and thoughts bouncing around in there. Two ways to do that and to focus your attention outward is to: Help someone out. Help a friend plan for a party or a meeting at work. Or help him with moving boxes and other stuff into his new home. Or simply be fully there and listen to her as she vents about a disappointment in her life. Exercise. I find that lifting weights or going out for a long walk is a great way for me to focus outward once again, to renew my energy and to sharpen my focus. 10. Find energy and motivation again with the help of others. Lift your spirits, up the motivation and your positive thinking with the help of others. It could be with the help of conversations with friends, family or co-workers. But also help from other people further away in the world (and sometimes in time). Renew that focus and motivation to keep moving towards your dreams with the help of for example: Books (motivational ones or perhaps biographies of people you look up to) and podcasts. Movies, TV-shows and Youtube-channels. Online forums and social media channels. Spend anywhere from 10-60 minutes with one or a few such sources to find new energy and a shift in your thinking. 11. Find a small step to start moving forward again. After you have accepted the situation, perhaps learned a thing or two from it and upped your motivation again start to move forward. You don't have to take a big and bold leap though. When I’m in this place myself I usually try to come up with at least the start for a small action-plan for how to go forward. I do that together with someone – like for example my wife – or on my own. Then I break that plan down into small action-steps. And get to work with the first of those steps. If I start procrastinating on that step then I break it down into even smaller steps and take action on one of those. 12. Improve your self-esteem. Improving my self-esteem has helped me to avoid getting dragged down too far into self-criticism and negative emotions after a disappointment. It has also helped me to not get disappointed in myself as often as I used to but to handle a setback with a more level-headed mind and more emotional stability. This also makes it easier to not blame others to feel better about myself and to learn more from this situation and get better results the next time. So how do you improve your self-esteem? A couple of the most helpful tips and habits I’ve found are: Write down 3 things in the evening that you appreciate about yourself. Take a couple of minutes at the end of your day to ask yourself: What are 3 things I can appreciate about myself? Write down your answers in a notebook, on your laptop or a smart phone. This will help you to start focusing on the positive things about yourself and to stop being so self-critical. Stop falling into the destructive comparison trap. If you compare what you have, what you’ve done and who you are to other people and their lives then you’ll most often start to feel depressed and bad about yourself. Because there’s always people ahead of you. So choose another way of comparing instead. Start comparing yourself to yourself. See how far you’ve come. What you’ve overcome. And focus on how you’ve improved your results. Those are just two helpful habits for improving your self-esteem . You can also use much of what you find in this article such as being constructive in the face of adversity, being kinder and more helpful to others, not thinking that YOU are disappointment just because of one setback and replacing perfectionism with something healthier.

Have you been keeping up with your workouts or struggling to stay consistent? If you happen to find yourself in the place of skipping workouts and struggling to find time for yourself (now or in the future), here’s a quick tip to help you break the streak of inactivity: Roll out your mat, set a 10-minute timer or press play on a 10-minute workout, and require nothing more of yourself than being on your mat for 10 minutes. That’s it. No pressure to do the full workout. Just be on your mat. No pressure to feel high energy. Just be on your mat. No pressure to perform. Just be on your mat. Move, breathe, stretch. When we go a long time between workouts, it’s easy to allow the feelings of guilt to get in the way of starting back up again. It can feel like a massive thing to restart and get “back on track,” but it doesn’t have to be that way. Just break the streak. Start small and keep taking those small steps day after day, week after week. And remember you can use this trick to “break the streak” as often as you need to. (No one’s keeping score!) Tuck this tip away for the future when you’re struggling with motivation or put it to use today. You’re doing great, Robin. Just keep moving forward. All of us here at The Balanced Life are in your corner and cheering you on! xo, Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

“Don’t be fooled by the calendar. There are only as many days in the year as you make use of. One man gets only a week’s value out of a year while another man gets a full year’s value out of a week.” Charles Richards There are many important things in life. Your family and friends. A hobby perhaps. Working out and staying healthy. The most important relationship in your life . And reading, learning and growing as a person. But finding the time for what is most important in life is not always easy. It sometimes feels like there aren’t enough hours in the day. But even if it may not feel like it, there are often ways to improve how you use your attention and your time. This week I’d like to share 6 of the best questions I have found for doing just that and for shaking yourself out of a rut. 1. What are the top 3 most important priorities in my life right now? With a lack of focus on what is most important in your life it becomes easy to spend too much time and energy on aimless actions or work. On things that aren’t really that important but you do out of old habit or because of other unhelpful reasons. To keep your attention in the right place it is essential to remind yourself every day of what is truly most important to you. So ask yourself: what are the top 3 most important priorities in my life right now? Write those three things down on two notes and put one in your workspace and the other one on your bedside table. 2. What are the 1-3 most common distractions that keep me from doing my work in a focused way? Figure out how you can prevent those things from distracting you. It could be by: Shutting the door to your office. Putting your phone in silent mode. Having notifications for your email or an instant messaging program/app shut off. 3. What are the 1-3 most common distractions that keep me from having quality time with the people closest to me? The answer could for instance be your smart phone, TV-shows you just watch out of routine and not because you like them very much or bringing your work back home. Then figure out how you can reduce or eliminate those distractions. 4. What is one healthy limit I can start setting in my life this week? One of the smarter ways to simplify your life and to free up time is to set limits. Here are a few key areas that you can set powerful and healthy limits for: Your daily input. Reduce the number of blogs, newsletters, magazines, book clubs, podcasts, TV-shows etc. you follow. Just keep the ones you are really getting something out of. Email. Just check and process your email during one chunk of time once per day. Instead of checking it 10 times or more each day. Social activities. Write down a list of the social activities you are involved in after school or work. Maybe you are involved in a club or an activity that it is not as fun or rewarding as it used to be. Maybe you want to rearrange your priorities a bit to focus on something else this fall. 5. How can I minimize or eliminate one thing I may have missed? What else can you eliminate or minimize? Some meetings at work or in school? Redditing or some online forum you hang out on a lot? Really question and reconsider your own daily and weekly habits regularly instead of moving along in the same old tracks just because it is what you usually do. 6. What is one piece of unnoticed or misused piece of free time during my regular day? There is often quite a bit of open travel- or waiting-time during a year. What will you use such time for as we go into the fall this year? Perhaps you would like to read more while riding the train or while waiting for a meeting to start. I, for example, often listen to podcasts while I'm out and about or while waiting for a meeting. Even if you only have 10-20 minutes of commuting time each day you still have a many, many hours in a year that you may want to, at least partly, use in a new way.

Let’s talk about some disposable lunch box ideas (that are also eco-friendly) for back-to-school! It’s a back-to-school season unlike any other season, isn’t it? We’re all in different situations with our kids. Some home schooling, some facilitating distance learning, and others sending kids back to the classroom with new rules, precautions, and protocols. With a 7-year-old, 4-year-old, and 2-year-old toddlers – we have a mix of schooling situations happening in our family this year and the only child that will be returning to in-person learning is our preschooler. There are a variety of changes being put in place to keep our kids safe and healthy, one of those being school lunches. Many preschools are requiring kids to bring disposable lunches (aka: brown bag lunches) – and this is true for ours. Of course this bums me out because a) it’s not good for the environment and b) I love our Planet Box , but I understand that we’re all just doing the best we can. So let’s talk about eco-friendly disposable school lunch ideas! Bento box lunches are my go-to because they’re easy to pack, help with portions, and make it fun for kids to eat. So I started researching ways to pack a disposable lunch for my kid that is both functional (bento box style) and as eco-friendly as possible. As I was researching and making my plan, I figured I can’t be the only one who is looking for these things! So I thought I’d share a blog post with my best eco-friendly, disposable lunch ideas for kids to hopefully help you too… Disposable Lunch Box Ideas For School & Daycare: Re-use containers or takeout boxes when possible. It’s a regular thing for us to get takeout from a local Thai restaurant on the weekends. From here on out, I plan to save the takeout boxes so I can rinse and re-use. In my research, I also saw people getting creative by re-using containers from grocery items, such as strawberry clamshells or yogurt jars. And even saving paper bags from takeout orders (think Chik-Fil-A or Starbucks)! Replace plastic bags with recyclable or compostable options. Here are a few I plan to try: I love that these recyclable and sealable sandwich bags come with fun designs and fun stickers to make preschool lunch a little more fun. These Lunchskins recyclable sandwich bags are cute too! Cute designs + a place for a sweet note. I also found these compostable snack bags , if you prefer compostable over recyclable. Instead of plastic utensils, I’ll be stocking up on disposable wooden spoons & forks (biodegradable and compostable). I’m also considering these mini wooden spoons because they seem perfect for little hands 🙂 While I haven’t been able to find an affordable, disposable bento box for school lunch, I’ll be getting creative with little biodegradable cups to keep things fresh and fun for my little guy. Disposable Ice Pack Ideas for Preschool and Daycare Lunch While I plan to be as eco-concious as possible, I will also include grab-and-go items from time to time, some of which can serve double duty as disposable ice packs! I plan to store yogurts, muffins and applesauces in the freezer to keep the lunch bag cool, while still thawing by lunch – just in time to eat. So…this is my plan, but I’d LOVE to hear your tips and tricks too! I’ll also keep you posted on how this goes over on Instagram . Here’s to a new and “adventurous” school year! xo, PS – Unfortunately eco-friendly lunch box items tend to be more expensive than non-eco-friendly items. This is an area I choose to invest a little bit more money to do my part, but keep in mind that if you’re on a super tight budget re-using can be a great way to save money while also reducing waste! 🙂 Get 3 FREE Pilates workouts in your inbox now! YES PLEASE!

“When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” Marcus Aurelius “Every morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.” Buddha It’s still dark as your alarm bell goes off. You pull up the curtains and the world is waiting for you outside of the window. As you stumble out of bed and into the shower a new day begins. So how can you make it more likely that it will be a good or even great day? Well, in my experience, what you do early in the morning often sets the tone for the rest of the day. So let me share 7 simple tips that have helped me to create both better mornings and days. 1. Plan the night before. Put down just 1-3 of the most important things you want to get done on a to-do list. By keeping the list very limited it becomes easier to actually get the most important thing(s) done. And to not start procrastinating by doing a few of the less important and often easier tasks that I know I always used to add to a longer to-do list. 2. Prepare the night before. Reduce the stress during your morning by getting the simple details out of the way the night before. So: Pack your bag. Prepare and pack your lunch. Put your keys, wallet etc. in their “home” if they are not already there so you can quickly find and grab them before heading out the door. 3. Keep a simple reminder on your bedside table. What you see during your first minutes after you have woken up can in my experience have quite the effect on the morning and as an extension of that the whole day. So try putting a small note with a reminder on your bedside table. Three things you could put on that note are: One of your favorite quotes. A powerful and timeless quote is one of the easiest ways to charge the mind with positive emotions and to find a helpful perspective . So write down one of the own favorite quotes. Here’s a list of 101 of them about happiness if you want some help. Set a low bar for happiness. I love this simple reminder. I tell myself: “Today I will set a low bar for happiness”. And then I keep that thought in mind for the rest of the day as best I can. It helps me to feel grateful for the little and everyday things that I too often take for granted like having a roof over my head and all the tasty food I have available. It makes it easier to stay positive and to find a simple happiness throughout the day. Write down your most important whys. Here's a quick exercise that I use to recharge my motivation again. It involves finding your deepest and most personal reasons for why you want to make a positive change in your life. Keeping these most important reasons written down on your bed side table can give you a powerful start to your day and make it easier to stay on the right track from the moment you get out of bed. 4. Go slow. When I start my day slowly and keep doing things at a slow pace then it becomes easier to keep the stress away. It becomes easier to focus on what I am doing and keep my priorities in mind. When I go slow I stay in the present moment more of the time and so less negative feelings come my way. And I appreciate the everyday things in life more because my attention is focused outward and not aimlessly inward towards what happened in the past or may happen in the future. When I start my day slowly I sometimes get worried that this slow pace will mean that I get less done during my day. But at the end of the day I most often discover that I got more done. Because I did things well the first time and because when I go slow I tend to spend less energy on draining feelings and on having my attention bouncing around between many things. And so I have more energy during the last few hours of my workday to spend on things that matter to me. 5. Get some positive information into your mind over breakfast. Start your day with something that does not depress you or makes you feel powerless to change your life or the world in some small or bigger way. Add inspiration and optimism by for example: Reading one or a couple of new posts from positive, funny or uplifting blogs or websites. Listening to a podcast that boosts your motivation. Reading a chapter from a book that inspires you. Watching a motivating or uplifting video on Youtube. 6. Start your workday with the most important task. Find the most important task on the very limited to-do list you created. Do it first thing when your workday starts. This task is in my experience often quite hard so it is easy to fall for the temptation to procrastinate . If you feel that urge, then just be still and do nothing. The most powerful part of the impulse to procrastinate by checking email or Facebook passes pretty quickly. When the worst is over then go easy on yourself instead of trying to push yourself hard. Tell yourself that you will only work for 1-3 minutes on this important task. Then you can stop if you like. But you may not want to do that once you have gotten started. This seems to be the case for me most of the time. Because getting started is most often the hardest part. 7. Build a right thing string. Doing what you deep down think is the right thing will make you feel good. It will boost your self-esteem and put a spring in your step for an hour or more. One way that I like to do that is by creating what I like to call a right thing string. Here's what you do: Do something that you deep down think is the right thing. Do it right now. Give a genuine and encouraging compliment to someone at work or in your life. Help someone who seems lost with directions. Unclutter your workspace for 2 minutes. Go and work out. Then add another thing that you think is the right thing to do. Have an apple instead of an unhealthy snack. When you feel like judging someone in your life or on TV or in the newspaper try to find a kinder and more understanding perspective. Smile and ask how someone's day is going (and really listen to the reply). Then add another thing. And another. Build a small string of doing the right things during for example 10-30 minutes to boost your energy and the positive feelings you have about yourself and your life. Continue the string during your day as best you can. After you have added a right thing to your string – no matter how small it is – make sure to take a few seconds to pause and to appreciate the good thing you did. I usually think one of these things to myself: Awesome! Well done! That was a good thing to do. That was fun! (and then I smile to myself). This boosts the positive mood within and ups the motivation to add another thing to your string. If you break the string, no worries. Don't beat yourself up. Take a deep breath and then start a new string instead.

When it comes to working out, we all have preconceived notions that may not be entirely true. In today’s episode, Robin breaks down the most common misconceptions people have about Pilates and reveals the truth behind these notions. She discusses the difference between yoga and Pilates, why Pilates has no physical or gender restraints, and why your Pilates workout should never be “easy”. Whether Pilates is something you already actively practice, or you simply want to learn more, this episode is packed full of juicy information for everyone. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! Flexibility is not necessary to do Pilates Pilates requires a whole new level of work and control that should feel gentle, but not necessarily easy You do not need fancy equipment to do Pilates The difference between Pilates and Yoga Why Pilates is good for everyone Links in this episode: The Balanced Life Sisterhood The Balanced Life Reformer Program Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

Hi Beauties! Popping in with a quick encouragement for you today… If you’re like many of the women I’ve been speaking with lately, you may feel like it’s been hard to make forward progress on your goals. With so much uncertainty and disruption in our daily lives, it may not even feel like an option right now. So today, instead of feeling overwhelmed by big goals and big questions, let’s focus on small wins. Just start from where you are today and choose 1-3 things from the list below that you can do over the next few days to create small wins and celebrate forward progress: Complete a strength-building Pilates workout Unplug from your phone for a set amount of time (leave it in another room to resist temptation!) Take a walk in nature and soak in your surroundings Spend 10 minutes stretching, moving, & releasing stress Watch this free workshop to create healthy routines & a realistic at-home workout plan Be gentle with yourself today, Robin. Take a deep breath, start where you are, and remember to choose grace over guilt. I’m in your corner and cheering you on. xo, Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

“Simply put, you believe that things or people make you unhappy, but this is not accurate. You make yourself unhappy.” Wayne Dyer “Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.” Marcus Aurelius It is usually pretty easy to become a happier person. It is also quite easy to rob yourself of your own happiness. To make yourself more miserable and add a big bowl of suffering to your day. It is a common thing, people do it every day all over the world. So this week I’d like to combine these two things. I want to share 7 happiness stealing habits that I have had quite a bit of trouble with in my own daily life (and I know from the emails I get that many of you do too). But I’d also like to add what you can do instead if you find yourself being stuck in one of these destructive habits. 1. Going for a daily swim in a sea of negative voices. This one can be quite subtle. You just go around in your daily life like you usually do. Hang out with the same people. Listen to the same podcasts or radio shows, watch the same old TV-shows or Youtube videos and read the usual blogs, books and magazines. But what influence do these things have over your thinking and the limits you set for yourself and what you feel you deserve in life? What to do instead: Make a list of the 5 people you hang out with the most and the 5 media sources you spend most time on during your week. Then ask yourself this for each of these 10 things/people: is this one dragging me down or lifting me up in life? Consider spending less time with the ones that drag you down (or move fully forward and cut them out completely) and to spend more of your time with the people and sources that lift you up and make you feel good, motivated etc. If you have trouble getting started with this one, then go smaller. Take a few minutes to think about what one person or source that has the biggest negative impact on you. And how you can start to spend less time with it/him/her this week. 2. Waiting for just the right time. When you have a dream then it is so easy to get lost in planning how you will accomplish it. To drift away in daydreams about how it will be. But also to get stuck in fears about failing with it. So you make a common choice and wait – and wait and wait for maybe years – for just the right time to take action and get started with making that dream into something real. What to do instead: Sure, not every dream is something you can get started with right now. But there are many that you can get going with. Dreams that only fear is holding you back from. So make things easy on yourself. You don’t have to do it in a big and extremely courageous jump. If that was the case then only the bravest people in the world would do and achieve what they want. Instead, take a small step forward. Take one small action. That is it. Then tomorrow you can take another small step forward. The important thing is that you get started and get going instead spending so much time on just waiting and feeling more and more frustrated and unhappy about the state of your dreams. 3. Letting criticism get under your skin time and time again. When someone criticizes or verbally attacks you then it may just roll off you like water of the back of a duck. But if it on the other hand gets under your skin pretty much every time and drags you down into hours or days of self-doubt or self-beatings then you have a problem. What to do instead: Let it out. Talk it over with someone close to you to let the inner tensions out. And to find a healthier perspective on what happened together. Remember: it is not always about you. If your self-esteem is low them it is easy to start thinking that all the negative things people tell you are your fault in some way. That is however often not the case. People will attack or harshly criticize to let their own steam out. Because they have had an awful day, week or simply do not like their lives that much. So don’t think it is all about you. There are two of you in this situation. 4. Focusing on the wrong people and getting lost in envy and powerlessness. When you spend much time in your day thinking about what other people have and do and you compare your life to theirs then you have a good recipe for unhappiness. Because you spend the attention and energy in the wrong place. What to do instead: Focus on you. Compare yourself to yourself. See how far you have come. The obstacles you have overcome. How you have improved in small or sometimes bigger ways . Appreciate that and yourself. Focus not on what others have but on what YOU deep down want in your life. And ask yourself: what is one small step I can take today to get the ball rolling with this goal/dream? Keep your focus on yourself and what you can actually do to raise your self-confidence, to start walking on your own path and to spend your limited daily time and energy on something that will actually pay off. RELATED: 160 Deep Quotes That Make You Think 5. Not allowing yourself times of peace and rest during your day. When you are busy, busy, busy all the time and give yourself no time to recharge then you soon become fatigued. And so each step and each thing you do starts to feel heavier and you do not get much enjoyment at all out of pushing and pulling yourself through it. What to do instead: Take a break every hour. Try setting the timer on your cell phone for 45 minutes. During that time-period just focus on doing your most important task at the moment. Then, as the bell rings, set the timer for 15 minutes and step away from your workspace. Have a snack, talk a walk or stretch a bit. By cycling rest and fully focused work like this you’ll get more things done, do a better job and it will be easier to keep the optimism and motivation up. Be 10 minutes early. Transform those traveling times during your day into relaxing breaks instead of passages of time and space that only increase your stress levels and other negative feelings. 6. Never trying anything new. This one can be sneaky. It can make you think that things are pretty OK. You have your safe and comfortable routine. I know, I have been there for long stretches of time. But during those times there was also denial of feeling dissatisfied. A vague feeling of standing still that sometimes bloomed up into a big burst of undefined, negative feelings directed towards the world or myself. What to do instead: Remind yourself of the past times when you tried something new. And how you most often did not regret it one bit but had an exciting, interesting or fun time. Go small. You don’t have to try skydiving. Just take one small step and try some new and different music, a movie or book you would normally not go for or the vegetarian dish if you usually have the beef or sausage for lunch. Say yes just once this week when your mind says no. If a friend invites you to go out running, doing yoga or to go fishing or to a party and your mind goes “let’s say no, that is not what I usually do” then stop yourself for a second. And reconsider. You don’t have to say yes to every suggestion you get this week to try something new, but give it a shot and say yes to just one of those things. 7. Taking things too seriously. When you take life too seriously then it is easy to become so afraid of making a mistake and of stumbling a bit that you get stuck. When you take yourself too seriously then, in my experience, it becomes difficult to fully enjoy the moment and what is happening, to let go of the past and to laugh about yourself and life when you need it the most. What to instead: Put up a reminder. When I wanted to develop a lighter mindset quite a few years ago one thing that helped me was a simple note on fridge that said: Lighten Up! This reminder helped me to snap out of overly serious thoughts several times a day until this way of finding a lighter perspective became more and more of an automatic thought habit. Surround yourself with lighter mindsets. As mentioned in the section about habit #1, what and who you surround yourself with will have a big effect on how you think. No matter if it is a positive or negative aspect they add. So one powerful thing to do is to add lighter mindsets via people, books, the internet etc. to your daily life. Raise your self-esteem . I have found that as my self-esteem has gone up I can laugh about myself more because I am less defensive. I have more trust in myself and so I fear a temporary failure less. And I like myself more and so I am less concerned about getting everyone else to like me all the time.

“When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.” Ralph Waldo Emerson Fear. It's so easy to get stuck in it. To let it hold you back. I have been there many times in my life. The fear has, for example, held me back from: Trying new things. It has held me back from trying something new for lunch or a new hobby because I feared I would have a bad experience or fail. And so I stuck to my usual routine and choices. Asking someone out for a date. Because I didn’t want to risk being rejected or looking like a fool in eyes of other people. Living my life like I deep down wanted to . The fear has held me in its grip and calmly explained to me that it would be best and most comfortable for me to stay where I am and to do nothing new. And many times I have sadly believed the fear and gotten myself stuck in a place where I honestly deep down didn't want to be. The fears we have are based in how we think about things. Destructive thought habits can create a lot of fear that is really unnecessary and damaging. But there are also ways to handle these habits when they pop up and to – over time – replace them with healthier habits. So today I'd like to share 6 destructive and fear-inducing thought habits and what to do instead of letting them roam free in your head. 1. You keep the fear foggy and undefined. As long as your fear of doing something is foggy and undefined and just floating around in your head it will hold you back and often grow stronger with time. What to do instead: Ask yourself this question: what is the worst that could realistically happen? And don’t just take a second or two to answer it. Sit down with a pen and piece of paper. Take time to really think about it and to write out the realistic worst-case scenario. This will: Bring a lot of clarity to what you truly fear. Defuse quite a bit of fuzzy fears or disaster scenarios that may have been bouncing around in your mind. Help you to realize that you can often bounce back pretty quickly even if the worst-case scenario somehow becomes reality. 2. You keep the fear to yourself. When you keep the fear to yourself then in my experience it can easily take charge of your imagination and build a horrific and paralyzing nightmare in your mind. Just being alone with the fear makes it is easy to lose touch with reality. What to do instead: Writing it out as mentioned above can certainly help. Another step you can take is to share your fear with someone else. By sharing and getting some level-headed input from a friend or family member that nightmare can often be quickly deflated and seen for what it really is. And just talking about it to someone who truly listens will release a lot of your inner tensions. 3. You focus on aspects that will keep you stuck. If you just focus on the negative things that could happen if you face your fear then it will be very hard to start moving forward. What to do instead: A change in perspective is needed. You can get it by talking to your friend or family member and by exchanging ideas and experiences about what opportunities lie ahead if you move forward. You do it by focusing on the positive and on why you want to move towards what you fear. A few questions that have helped me to find the more constructive and positive perspective when I have faced a fear are: What are the potential upsides that I want and can have by taking these actions? What are the potential upsides in one year if I start moving on this path? And in five years? And how will my life be in five years if I continue on the fearful path that I am on today? Talk these questions over with someone. Or take out a piece of paper and write down the answers. Or do both. 4. You misinterpret the often little information you have. It is easy to take very few experiences – maybe just one – and start seeing them as evidence of something permanent and frightening in your life. What to do instead: Question your fears and what they are based upon. Again, sit down with that pen and a piece of paper. Think back to what evidence you have in your memories for a fear and a belief of yours. Try to see the situation(s) that created your fear with fresh eyes today. Instead of the way you may usually see them. Doing this helped me to for example reduce my fear of social rejection . I looked back at a few situations from my past that formed and fueled that fear. And I realized that: Honestly, I may have just misinterpreted being rejected in some of those situations. I often wasn’t rejected because it was something wrong with what I did but simply because we weren’t realistically a good match for each other. Or because the other person had a bad day or because he or she simply wanted to push me down to feel better about himself or herself in that moment. This was an eye-opening experience and also helped me to understand that everything is not about me and what I do. And that our memories can often be pretty inaccurate and unhelpful if not reexamined later on. And that our minds love to create patterns and conclusions based on very little evidence or few experiences. 5. You try to push the fear away. When you try to deny a fear in your life, when you try to push it away or not think about it then it can often grow stronger. What to do instead: I have found in recent years that pushing the fear away can certainly work and help you to not be paralyzed from taking action. But I have also discovered that it can sometimes be more helpful to accept the fear. To accept that it is there instead of for example trying to tell yourself to focus on the positive like a laser-beam. That may sound a bit vague so here's how I do it. Breathe. Take a few breaths and focus only on the air going in and out to calm and center yourself a bit. Tell yourself something like: “Yes, the fear is here. It simply is at this point in time.” Take that feeling of fear in and just let it be there in your body and mind. It will be uncomfortable. But just for short while. Because if you do let it in then after a while – often just after a few minutes of discomfort in my experience – the fear starts to lose steam. It becomes a lot smaller or just seems to float away. And it becomes a lot easier to think clear and constructive thoughts again. 6. You make it harder than it needs to be to take action. If you think that you have to take action in a big, heroic and risky leap to overcome your fear then that may often lead to more fear and to not taking any action at all. What to do instead: A more helpful way to go about things is to not go all in at once. But to instead just dip your toes in. To take a small step forward but to do it today or as soon as you can. And to take that first step slowly if you like. The most important thing is that you start moving. That you start building momentum forward so that you can take more small and perhaps slow steps forward. Doing things this way will not only build momentum but also self-confidence and expand your comfort zone. And all of this will make it a lot easier to take a bit bigger steps later on too if you’d like to.

Notoriously Poor Relationship Between Chase Bank and Quicken Continues to Bring Pain and Frustration to Users Quicken and Chase Bank have a longstanding feud, while their users, who need them to work together, suffer in silence. The two organizations, who are not in any way competitive with each other, cannot seem to work together in a cohesive manner. Quicken is an old-school personal financial management (PFM) software application that allows users to manage their banking from their own computer, rather from in the cloud. Older (and sometimes wiser) computer users prefer a local software solution because for something as important as personal banking, they want the local control if things go bad. Quicken is a 30+ year personal financial software application that was originally created and owned by Intuit Software> the product was sold in 2016 to H.I.G. Capital, a Miami-based private equity firm, who have been struggling to make the software stable. Chase Bank is a major high street retail bank where over 65 million people have their bank accounts. Quicken Acquisition By H.I.G. Capital in 2016 Fails To Resolve Ongoing Software Problems A recent software upgrade from Quicken demonstrates that the new owners, H.I.G. Capital, have a lot of problems making the software work properly. They often rely on users to be their beta testers. The documented problems with the upgrade from V R39.19 to R39.23 incident, where all Quicken users were locked out of Chase Bank is not an isolated one. The incident is indicative of a culture of poor quality and failure to support customers and it is at the very heart of H.I.G. Capital’s problems. Quicken users often talk about all the problems that they face getting the software to work with the Chase Bank system. When things seem to be working OK, Quicken forces an upgrade for some new feature or “fix” and it breaks the whole system. Users are pissed, Chase is pissed and Quicken always tries to finger point to either of those two parties, never themselves. What seems to be a big problem is that the Quicken developers do not sufficiently test their software and they allow their own users to become the de facto beta testers. This is evidently not an effective strategy. Chase Bank Appears to Often Work Very Poorly With Quicken Software The ongoing relationship between Quicken and Chase is often like a divorcing couple who live in the same house. They might have a cordial talk over breakfast, but when one of them sleeps with the neighbor, one of the wheel come off the wagon and passengers are heading for a crash. Things have gotten so bad that Chase Bank customers are often told by Chase phone representatives that Quicken is no longer supported (or even approved by the bank), but that story changes on who the support agent is at the time of the call. Quicken’s Own Website Forum Show Chase is the Most Problematic Relationship A quick search of the Quicken website forum https://community.quicken.com/categories/alerts shows that Chase Bank is the most encountered bank error, but Quicken does not seem to be listening to their own customers. Overzealous Quicken Community Admin ‘Natalie’ Deletes All Postings That Show Quicken and H.I.G. Capital in a Bad Light A recent posting from the Quicken community forum highlights just how bad the relationship has become between Chase and Quicken. The board moderator, “Quicken Natalie” is quick to delete any reference on the forums to the failure of her own organization to address the systematic quality problems that appear to pervasive with their Quicken software. “Quicken Natalie” also deletes any reference to their terrible relationship with Chase Bank. The problems between Quicken and Chase Bank have become notoriously bad over the last three years and shows few signs of any abeyance. In a last fit of their attack-dog strategy, “Quicken Kathryn” – The Community Administrator, got involved and has now deleted all references to the overall problem, in some vain hope that this problem will just go away, rather than actually solve the problem. This is a good example of where Quicken is today. Poor product, terrible coding and just godawful support who are mostly doing PR instead of pressing their own development teams to fix problems with the software. BELOW IS THE LOG OF AN EXAMPLE OF A RECENT TROUBLE TICKET WITH QUICKEN A Common Complaint: Using the new version of Quicken I get the error message “OL-301-A” when attempting to send Bill Pay payments through Chase Bank Member ✭July 27 edited 11:47AM in Errors and Troubleshooting (Windows) Hi, I am using Quicken r27.42, the error OL-301-A comes up after attempting to send payments through Chase bill pay. The payments actually still go through on the Chase end, but they appear in Quicken as failed. The “refresh” procedure that is often cited, failed to fix the problem and still comes back with the error on all my accounts So when I try again and again, I end up getting lots and lots of duplicate transactions at Chase which their support team then have to go through and reverse. What a mess Quicken has created. Surprisingly, downloading transactions is fine. Sometimes its better not to do any Quicken upgrade at all, as it is clearly not tested by Quicken or by Chase Bank. The online support team at Quicken treat you like a mental case, until a whole bunch of other people start calling them about the same thing and It is only then that they start taking it seriously. They never accept that they screwed up, again. Regards, Frustrated Quicken User Quicken_Natalie mod 11:10AM Accepted Answer Hello All, Thank you for taking the time to visit the Community and post your issue, although I apologize you’re experiencing difficulties downloading transactions into Quicken. There is a known issue with Chase Bill Pay returning the OL-301 error that has been reported here. An Alert has been created and can be found here . I suggest bookmarking the Alert so that you can be automatically notified of any updates/changes as they’re posted. Thank you, Quicken Natalie Quicken Francisco Moderator mod July 27 Users Try To Avoid Upgrading Quicken Software Due To Problems With Chase Bank Other Quicken Users Reporting The Problems With Chase Bank Interaction robertlstein Member ✭✭July 27 edited 12:34AM Now this is weird. I tried to send payments using direct connect between Quicken and my bank. It has previously worked great. Today, however, I am getting an OL-301A message “your bank rejected the transaction” message. But guess what? The payment in fact is showing on the Chase website and is scheduled as it was in Quicken. Quicken shows the “Send” (not SENT) status in its register. Chase tech support told me that Quicken will no longer support direct connect, which is news to me (I moved my checking to Chase specifically for replacing QBP that’s going away). In any event, Quicken support says talk to Chase, and Chase says talk to Quicken. This is unacceptable if it’s true that Direct Connect is going away. (As a test, I have a Bank of the West checking account with Direct Connect, and payments process normally, so this is a Quicken-Chase issue, but who can we talk with that can fix this?)Did this answer the question? dvatani Member ✭July 27 I am having this issue too. The One Step Update dialog now shows “Chase Error Recovery” and now I am getting a different error code of OL-220-A. I’d also gotten the OL301-A code yesterday. I could not get through to Chase to talk with anyone and am extremely dissappointed to learn that Direct Connect is going away. robertlstein Member ✭✭July 27 The good news is that after I posted, I spoke with Quicken Support. They, of course, have no information that Chase is cancelling Direct Connect and I suspect the Chase support person totally confused QBP wi Direct Connect. I’m guessing that this in fact is a Chase server side problem. garacine Member ✭July 27 I’m having the same issue. My transaction was entered about 10 times at Chase before I went and looked. Chase help line said it was a Quicken issue. I’m a 25+ year Quicken user and this is a big issue for me! garacine Member ✭July 27My errors are OL-301A and OL 393-A . I’m pretty dependent on this interaction between Chase and Quicken working, so if anyone has a solution I’m all ears! robertlstein Member ✭✭July 27 I was disappointed at Chase’s offshore support. Pretty useless, but they promised to escalate. With Citi, all the support/service reps are US based and can access the people who can actually troubleshoot and fix stuff. TracieK Member ✭12:00AM I am having the same issue with not being able to send payments after upgrading to R27.42. I reported the problem through my Quicken software. Any update or fix? ps56k SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭12:20AM edited 12:24AM There is another posting on this brand new Chase error…Be aware, that even though Quicken is posting an error – the uploaded payment transaction may have in fact been received by Chase – Check your payments via the Chase online website. I’ve asked the threads be merged. robertlstein Member ✭✭2:11AM Yes, @ps56k that was mentioned in my OP. Indeed, this can result in multiple duplicate payments received and processed by Chase, while QFW shows “Send” in the transaction, as if it never got to Chase. Joe Member ✭✭9:51AM I am having the same problem w ol-301 after the update. Receive error that states rejected, but when I go to account at Chase it shows payment went through. I have also noticed that since update, one step update is taking forever to complete as it states WAITING for all accounts and then finally starts to proceed. Quicken_Natalie Moderator mod 11:10AM Accepted Answer Hello All, Thank you for taking the time to visit the Community and post your issue, although I apologize you’re experiencing difficulties downloading transactions into Quicken. There is a known issue with Chase Bill Pay returning the OL-301 error that has been reported here. An Alert has been created and can be found here . I suggest bookmarking the Alert so that you can be automatically notified of any updates/changes as they’re posted. Thank you, Quicken Natalie tvmitch Member ✭1:16PM I attempted to pay a bill this weekend via Quicken. I received an error on the transaction and it would not send. Turns out, Quicken actually sent the same transaction 5 times to Chase. On my end, it still says that it is not sent. Chase sent 5 checks yesterday for the same transaction! Thankfully I noticed it today and stopped payment an all of the transactions. What a nightmare! How many hours do I have to spend correcting all the errors that the ongoing dispute between Quicken and Chase Bank continues? What is wrong with these two organizations that means that they cannot get it together. Maybe Chase Bank is just too big and Quicken is just too small to get anything resolved. When you call Chase Bank on the telephone, they forward you to Intuit Inc, which actually sold the product to H.I.G. Capital in 2016 – someone should tell them. This is a mess and its not getting any better. Why can they not get long?

“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.” Leonardo Da Vinci One of the biggest and most common problems with improving your life or the success you want out of it is that you may not take consistent action over a longer time period. Now, consistency isn't the sexiest or most exciting word. But it is, coupled with time, what will give you real results in your life. Sticking with the program and doing something consistently – and not just when you feel inspired or something like that – is very, very powerful. This is something I have struggled with a lot in the past. And on some days I still do. But over the years I have found a few things that really help me with this. 1. When you're taking action, focus only on the process. I use this one, for example, when I do my workouts and when I write. I don’t take responsibility for the results in my mind. I take responsibility for showing up and doing my workout/the writing. That's it. The results come anyway from that consistent action. And this makes it easier for me to take this action because: I know that is all I need to focus on. And so my energy and attention is only focused in one direction and I do a better job. I feel a lot less pressure on myself. And so I'm more relaxed and prone to continue compared to if I stare myself blind on the potential results that never come as quickly as I may want and if I'm on an emotional roller coaster from day to day. 2. Remember why you are taking action. Find your top priorities and reasons for why you are doing what you are doing. It could be to provide for your family, to save up for traveling, to get the job you really want or to improve your self-confidence. Or something else. To not lose track of why you are taking action and to stay focused: Write down your most important reasons. Take a few minutes, sit down with paper and a pen and write down the top 1-3 reasons for why you take action and want to keep doing that in your life right now. Put that note where you can see it every day. Like for example in your workspace or near your bed so that you see it every morning when you wake up. 3. Reminder: you don’t want to hurt yourself. When you disappoint yourself and don’t think and do as you really deep down want to you hurt yourself by lowering your self-esteem . Whatever you do during your day sends signals back to yourself about what kind of person you are. Do the right thing like being effective, kind, going to the gym or simply rest and you feel good. Get lazy, negative or just plain mean and you tend to feel worse after a while. You don’t get away, there is no escaping yourself. And there is always a price to pay. 4. Take smaller steps on the days when the big ones seem to daunting. On some days getting started with any of the the most important tasks may seem daunting. And so you start to procrastinate. When that happens, one thing that has worked for me is to be kind. To nudge myself forward instead of beating myself up. So at such times I take: A small step. I may make a deal with myself to just work for 5 minutes on a piece of a bigger and more difficult task. An even smaller step. If that small step feels like too much and I start to procrastinate I make a deal with myself for 1 or 2 minutes of work. Sometimes that results in a few dents put into a big task, a couple of smaller tasks being completed and many breaks being taken throughout the day. And sometimes the easy start or restart to the day is all I need to get going again and to have a good and very productive time before the evening arrives. Either way, I move forward instead of standing still. 5. Celebrate what you did today. When you appreciate your good work you feel even better about your life and yourself. And over time taking more action with less inner resistance becomes possible and you associate action with more positive emotions than you may at this time. So…. Take two minutes at the end of the day to think about what you can appreciate about what you did today. Or write down a couple of self-appreciative things in your journal. Have a tasty treat or a bigger celebration. Tell someone how nice something turned out , how you learned a good lesson or how proud you are over something important you did today. Reward yourself for the things you did right today to strengthen your action taking habit. And remember to be kind to yourself for the things you may have missed or not gotten done. No point in trying to beat yourself up. No point in trying to be perfect. See what you can learn from it and perhaps try another solution tomorrow and see if that works better.

Let’s talk about core strength. First, a few misconceptions about what it means to have a strong core: The best way to get a strong core is to do a lot of sit-ups Strong abs = a strong core A flat tummy/thin midsection = a strong core Nope, nope, nope. The truth is: Traditional sit-ups (as we knew them back in gym class) are NOT the most efficient way to build a strong core. Strong abs are important, but a strong core goes beyond the “6-pack” muscles. Building a strong core means strengthening muscle groups related to the glutes, lower back, abdomen (including hip flexors & pelvic floor), adductors (think hips & outer thighs), and the transverse abdominis (deep core stabilizers). The size of your midsection does not determine the strength of your core. Pilates is widely known as one of the most effective ways to build and maintain a strong core. Primarily because Pilates teaches you how to engage the right muscles, in the right way, at the right time. It also teaches you how to move with intention, precision, and control. That’s why you can get an AMAZING core workout in a short amount of time. Additionally, through Pilates we learn how to breathe. Breath is important because it affects the way we move and the way we use our muscles. For example: pelvic floor issues, are often related to poor posture and improper breathing. But the good news is, this can be greatly improved through consistent Pilates workouts! We all know that core strength is important, but where do we start? This 7-minute Pilates Core Workout is a perfect addition to your regular routine. Click here to access this quick routine on YouTube! Sisterhood members: for your convenience, we’ve added this workout to your Workout Library! You can find it in your app along with other full-length workouts to build a strong core: Core Strength and Posture + Pelvic Floor are two community favorites! xo, PS: Not yet a member of The Balanced Life Sisterhood? Click here to get on the list to be notified about exclusive opportunities to join us! Ready to BUILD STRENGTH & FEEL GOOD in just 15 minutes a day? Join the FREE 5-day Pilates Strong challenge! JOIN THE FREE CHALLENGE!

“Certain flaws are necessary for the whole. It would seem strange if old friends lacked certain quirks.” Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe “People throw away what they could have by insisting on perfection, which they cannot have, and looking for it where they will never find it.” Edith Schaeffer One of the most common challenges that people email me about – and I myself have had quite a bit of trouble with – is perfectionism. It's an issue that can hold you back in life. Not only from achieving and finishing what you want. But sometimes from even getting started . While at the same time draining your self-esteem, causing self-doubt and getting you stuck in a negative spiral where it can become harder and harder to start moving forward. So today I'd like to share 6 things that have helped me – and still helps me to this day – with this destructive and distracting thought habit. 1. Go for good enough. Aiming for perfection usually winds up in a project or something else never being finished. So go for good enough instead. Don't use it as an excuse to slack off. But simply realize that there is something called good enough and when you are there then you are finished with whatever you are doing. So find a balance for yourself where you do good work and don’t slack off but at the same time don’t get lost in trying to improve and polish something too much. How to find that balance? I have found my own balance through trial and error and experience. 2. Realize that you hurt yourself and the people around you by buying into myths of perfection. By watching too many movies, listening to too many songs and just taking in what the world is telling you it is very easy to be lulled into dreams of perfection. It sounds so good and wonderful and you want it. But in real life it clashes with reality and tends to: Cause much suffering and stress within you and in the people around you. Harm or possibly lead you to end relationships, jobs, projects etc. just because your expectations are out of this world. I find it very helpful to remind myself of these simple facts. Whenever I get lost in a perfectionist headspace I remind myself that it will cause me and my world harm. And so it become easier to switch my focus and thoughts because I want to avoid making destructive choices and avoid causing myself and the people closest to me unnecessary pain. 3. Accept that you are human and so are everyone else. Set human standards for everyone and accept that life is like that. Everything and everyone has flaws and things don’t always go as planned . You can still improve things but they will never be perfect. And realize that you won’t be rejected if things or you aren't perfect. At least not by reasonably well-balanced human beings, like most people actually are in reality. 4. Compare yourself to yourself. Comparing yourself to other people on a regular basis can easily lead to feeling inferior. There will always be a lot of people ahead of you in any area of life. So compare yourself to yourself… See your improvement and how far you have come. Look back at what you have overcome. Appreciate yourself and focus what you have done and are doing rather than what everyone else is doing. 5. Do what you think is the right thing. So you realize that perfectionism will harm you and you try to avoid it. But people and media and the society around you have an influence over how you think and feel. One of the best ways I have found to practically lessen that influence is by doing the right thing as much as possible. When you do that other people’s expectations have less and less power over you and you take more charge of your life. Because by doing the right thing your self-esteem and self-confidence goes up and other people’s opinions about you and life will matter less to you. You have become stronger, more certain in who you are and you are not so easily swayed by external forces. 6. Shape an environment of human standards around you. Emotions are contagious. So is perfectionism. And even though you can lessen the impact that your environment has you can also work at the other end of things. You can reshape your environment by for example: Reducing or cutting out the sources that try to reinforce perfectionism in you. Take a little time to review what websites, magazines, podcasts, TV-shows and books you spend a lot of time with. Take a look at if they have realistic and positive expectations or views on you and on life. And if not, choose to spend more of your time with the sources that lift you up and support you . Spending less time with nervously perfectionistic people. And more of your time each week with people who are trying to improve themselves and/or are living a good life in a positive, healthy and relaxed way. You may also like: 101 Courage Quotes That Will Motivate and Inspire You 71 Inspirational Quotes on Understanding 201 Short Quotes and Sayings about Life 110 Never Give Up Quotes (+ My 5 Favorite Tips)

2020 has been quite the year so far, hasn’t it? When I reflect on the goals and vision I set for myself back in January, it feels like a lifetime ago and it all feels a bit fuzzy. 2020 has forced many of us to let go of our plans, adapt to unexpected changes, and do our best to stay afloat. I don’t know about you, but dreaming and goal setting has felt nearly impossible with all of the unknowns we’ve been facing. And now here we are, halfway through the year ( how is that even possible ?), and if you’re like me and many of the women I’ve been chatting with inside The Balanced Life Sisterhood – you may be thinking, “where do I go from here?” Here’s what I know for sure… No matter what life throws our way, the importance of taking care of our health and well-being remains the same. So while we may not be in the mood to make big plans and dream big dreams – we CAN reflect on the past 6 months, learn from what we’ve been through and create a vision for how we want to take care of ourselves between now and the end of the year. I invite you to join me for a mid-year reset… I put together a free downloadable guide (based off of our 2020 Vision Guide that was sent out in January) to help you create a vision for the second half of the year. CLICK HERE to download the free guide. And to listen to this week’s podcast episode where I walk you through this guide step-by-step, CLICK HERE . Carve out 20 minutes for yourself, treat yourself to your favorite beverage and take a little time to reset. You’re worth it. xo, PS: When you’re done, come on over to Instagram and let me know how it went! 🙂 Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

While 2020 has brought an array of unanticipated events, we still have the power to harness our visions and direct where we are at the end of the year. In today’s episode, Robin shares her 2020 vision guide and walks us through how to reset and reevaluate our end-of-the-year goals. Taking time to reflect on our values and have compassion for ourselves as we journey through this season is going to be crucial for all of us. Despite facing unconventional times, the power to create the life you want is still yours. Join Robin Long in this episode to learn more about how you can reset your goals and shift your habits to achieve the results you want. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! 2020 has thrown us more loops than we anticipated but good things have been revealing themselves as we lean into the new “normal” Creating values and intentions can help you live out the mid-year vision we set for ourselves Now is a time for compassion for ourselves and we may need time to reset our intentions Take time to reflect on habits that did and didn’t work well over the past 6 months and set clear goals on how you want to shift those habits for the rest of the year Robin reviews her 2020 vision guide and shares actionable steps on how you can make your vision a reality Links in this episode: Download your mid-year 2020 Vision Guide here! The Balanced Life Sisterhood Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge The Balanced Life on Instagram Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

“To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.” Henry David Thoreau “Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant.” Robert Louis Stevenson Some days are great, better than you would have expected when you rolled out of the bed in the morning. Quite a few days are just good and OK days. And then we have the other ones. The days that just wind up being bad. What do you do then? I used to let them drag me down and I often wound up having not just one but a couple of bad days because of whatever happened. Nowadays I do things a bit differently. And this week I'd like to share how I do that. This is 9 tips and habits that help me to turn a bad day around. Most of the time I use more than one of these habits to do that. 1. Breathe. I usually start turning my day around with shaking things up by using my body in some way. The first thing I almost always do is to just breathe. I breathe deeply through my nose by using my belly. I focus only on the air going in and out for 1-2 minutes. This calms my body and mind. 2. Do a power pose. Then I sometimes follow that up by striking what Amy Cuddy calls a power pose for about 2 minutes ( check out her TED talk , it’s really good). The simplest way to strike a power pose is to stand up confidently like Wonder Woman or Superman with your legs apart, head up and your hands on your hips. It might sound odd but it can really change how you feel in a quick and positive way. 3. Work out. Another habit I use several times a week to shake things up by using my body is to lift free weights in my home. I do this for about 30-40 minutes and it helps me to release tensions and worry. And after I am done I feel more powerful, focused and energetic. 4. Hug. Just by hugging someone quickly you can feel safer and more optimistic again. And an embrace that lasts 30 seconds or a minute or more can recharge your batteries and release an unexpectedly large amount of stress and tensions. 5. Pet an animal. If you don't have anyone close by to hug during a bad day then pet your cat, dog, bird etc. It has a very similar calming and stress reliving effect. And it makes your animal companion happy and that in turn will boost your mood too. 6. Find a new viewpoint. The body tips above often work well to change my perspective by altering my emotional state and energy level. Sometimes something more is needed though. So I start looking more actively for a better and more helpful viewpoint on the situation at hand by asking myself a couple of questions. Three of my most commonly used questions that help me with that are: Will this matter 5 years from now? Who cares? What is one small action, one small and practical step I can take to start turning this day or situation around? 7. Go out into nature and enjoy the summer. Leave your couch or workspace for a little while. Talk a walk and just soak in the summer sun and warmth. Enjoy the birds singing and the nature blossoming. Just being out there in nature tends to make it easier to think optimistically again and to start looking for practical solutions or upsides. Or you can simply be there in the moment fully and let your thoughts about for example work rest for a while (and then later on you can return to that with fresh eyes and a calmer mind). Another upside is that the sunshine and exercise during this 20-30 minute pause in my day also recharges my energy. 8. Accept what is. One thing that sometimes work better than just about anything is simply to accept what is at this moment. To not deny or try to push away negative feelings or thoughts that show up. Even though you may feel an impulse to do so. Instead, just accept what is right now. The thoughts and feelings within you. And just be with them fully and observe them flowing through you. By doing so you are not giving up. No, because when you accept what is then you stop feeding the negative thoughts in your mind with more energy. And so they become weaker. They start to lose their grip on you after a while and then they float away. And so you feel more open and are able to think more clearly again. 9. Remember: sometimes a bad day will just be a bad day. Now, from time to time, even if you use several of the techniques above – one after the other – you won’t be able to turn a bad day around. That has been my experience at least. Because no matter what habits you adopt, life will never be perfect, positive or awesome all the time. And this website was never about living some kind of life that only exists in a perfect dream anyway. This website is about replacing unhelpful habits with better ones. It is about raising the percentages of times where you can handle things in a better way. In your regular, everyday life. And when bigger things happen. Because that will make a huge difference. But still, life will have natural valleys. And a bad day will sometimes just be a bad day. And that’s OK. That’s life. But the interesting thing is this: if you accept that life is like this sometimes – and let go of the dream of perfection – then you’ll create less suffering for yourself and life will become lighter, simpler and happier. So in the long run there is an upside even to a bad day that you may not be able to turn around.

“When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everybody will respect you.” Lao Tzu Today I’d like to focus on a negative habit that creates insecurity within, erodes self-esteem and can make you feel quite unhappy with your own life . It’s something that has sprung up as we have moved a part of our lives on to the internet and social media. And that habit is to compare yourself and your life to other people’s highlight reels. What do I mean by that? That it’s so easy to start comparing your life to the lives of friends, old classmates or celebrities of all sizes as you each day see how perfect their homes, kids, love lives are and how filled their lives are with wonderful moments. But is that their whole lives that is shared on Facebook and Instagram? Usually not. It's just the highlight reel of that person’s life. The positive moments. And it’s natural thing really, to want to share such moments or days with your friends or followers. Now, for some people this may develop into something destructive. Into a way of creating a more perfect image of one’s life to get that hit of instant gratification as people add positivity via comments, likes and upvotes. But everyone has problems at times. They fail. Get sick. Have flaws, bad days or negative habits. No matter who you are or what you look like or do. I have those issues too. Just like anyone else. I still stumble and fall on some days. Doubt myself or am pessimistic from time to time. That’s human. So don’t strive for being perfect or measuring yourself against someone else’s highlight reel. Here are three healthier steps you can take instead: Step 1: Compare in a smarter way. There will always be people who have more or nicer things than you. Or are better than you at something. No matter what you do. So if you want to compare then do it in a way that won't make you feel envious and inferior. Do it by comparing yourself to yourself. See how far you have come. Look back at the obstacles you have overcome, what you have learned and how you have grown. Step 2: Spend your energy and time on what matters the most. Step by step spend the hours in your day and week on building habits that will make you a better person and a happier one too. For example, aim at being optimistic 70% of the time if you have been it maybe 50% in the past month. Or spend more of your weekly free time on your favorite hobby or on sharpening a valuable skill. Step 3: Let go of what drags you down. If necessary unsubscribe or remove social media accounts from your flow if you feel they are dragging you down and lowering your self-esteem. Even if those things might also be entertaining right now. Life isn't just a highlight reel no matter who shares it. So look beyond that, remember that everyone is human and stop comparing yourself to that limited view of someone. In the long run you’ll be happy that you did.

“Three Rules of Work: Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” Albert Einstein “Think simple” as my old master used to say – meaning reduce the whole of its parts into the simplest terms, getting back to first principles.” Frank Lloyd Wright The daily work we do – in school, at work or in a business – can easily become overwhelming, ineffective and suck the energy and joy out of what you are doing. So how can you work in a lighter, simpler way that helps you to get more of what truly matters done in less time and with less stress? Let me share 12 habits that I've discovered over the years that help me to do just that. 1. Prepare your day the evening before. Pack your bag or suitcase. Pack the leftovers from your dinner in a container and put it in the fridge. Put your keys, wallet etc. in a place where you can easily find them as you head out. This preparation will help you to have a less stressful morning. 2. Be 5-10 minutes early for appointments. This will make your time of travel during the day into a time of relaxation and recharging. Instead of a time of stress and anxiety. Plus, people tend to like when other people are on time. 3. Work on just one thing at a time. It will be easier to focus and to do a good job. And to do it in less time compared to if you try to multi-task (at least if you are anything like me). 4. Work in a cone of silence. Just before you start working on that one thing shut down your email program and instant messaging programs. Shut the door to your office. Put your cell phone in silent mode and put it in a drawer. If possible, shut down your internet connection. Or use an extension for your browser like StayFocusd . 5. During your day regularly ask yourself questions for simplicity and focus. It is easy to get off track during a regular workday. To stay on track or to get back there if you get lost use questions like: What is the most important thing I can do right now? Is doing this bringing me closer to my goal? Am I keeping things extremely simple right now? 6. Let your lunch time be a time of relaxing. Eat slowly. Put down the fork between bites to make that easier. Eat mindfully and savor each bite. Eating your lunch this way can help you to relax and to release quite a bit of stress in the middle of your workday. Plus, it can help you to not overeat because it takes your brain 20 minutes to register that you are full. By slowing down your eating your brain can stop you before you eat too much. 7. Spend 80% of your time focusing on a solution. And only 20% of your time on dwelling on your issue, challenge or problem. Instead of doing it the other way around. This makes it easier to live a lighter and more action-filled life and to not fall down into a pit of self-pity or get stuck in a mental habit of perceived powerlessness . 8. Ask for help. You don’t have to always go it alone. You can ask for help. You may not always get it but you might also be surprised at how helpful and kind people can be in helping you ease your burdens and solve a challenge. Just don’t forget to do the same for them as best you can when they ask. 9. Just check your email once a day. Checking email or social media accounts many times a day tends to drain a lot of time, energy and can leave you unfocused and stressed. Try checking and processing all of those things just once a day instead. I do it at the end of my workday. If that is not possible for you then try to postpone it for a few hours at least. And put your morning energy and focus into your most important task of the day. 10. Write shorter emails. Limit your emails to 1-5 sentences when possible. You can also have some canned responses for common questions saved in a folder in your email program. This will help you to spend less time and energy on your daily email processing. 11. Consciously set and maintain firm boundaries between your work and personal time. Have a set stop time for your daily work (mine is 7 o' clock). Don't work on weekends. Consciously manage your boundaries and you’ll have less stress and more energy and focus both to do better work and to have a personal life of higher quality. This is one of the most important and often overlooked habits in this article. 12. Be smart about the 3 fundamentals of energy. By that I mean getting enough sleep, exercising a couple of times a week and eating healthy. This may seem very obvious in theory. But in practice it makes a world of difference for your optimism and self-talk , energy levels, ability to handle stress and to think clearly.

When it comes to our health, we all have beliefs that may be holding us back from being the healthiest versions of ourselves. Sometimes we have to learn from those mistakes to grow, but sometimes we get an outside perspective so we don’t have to make the same mistakes.  Today, Robin shares the biggest mistakes she’s made in her fitness journey that held her back from being the healthiest version of herself. In this episode, she discusses many beliefs she had that proved to not only be untrue, but detrimental to her growth. She also shares the importance of nourishing your body and how to positively connect with your body to improve your physical and mental health.  Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! One of the biggest mistakes you can make is thinking that eating less means being healthy  Working out more is not always the healthiest option  Focusing on nutritional value and how food makes you feel is more important than the calorie count Expecting quick results and quitting when they don’t work immediately is a mistake  Overlooking the importance of mental and emotional health is a common mistake when looking at health  If your workout goals are making you miserable and putting extreme pressure on you, it’s important to take a step back and re-evaluate your approach  Looking at your body only as something to improve can lead to disconnect and a negative relationship with your body  Links in this episode: The Balanced Life Sisterhood Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge Share this Podcast Episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

One of the most powerful habits that I’ve picked up in the past 10+ years is to stop being pessimistic and to think in a more optimistic and constructive way instead. It makes life feel lighter and not so burdensome. It opens up new paths towards where you want to go and it helps you to more easily overcome setbacks (and often get something good out of them). You’ll feel less worried and sorry for yourself and more motivated to keep taking action. So the benefits of optimism are great. But how do you adopt this habit? Well, learning to think in a less pessimistic and more positive way may sound a bit vague. So in this week’s article I want to break it down into 10 practical tips and smaller habits that you can start using today. 1. Start replacing the negativity in your surroundings and life. What you let into your mind during your regular day will have a big effect on how you think and feel. So start questioning what you let into your mind. You can do that by asking yourself: What are the top 3 sources of negativity in my life? It could be someone close to you or at work or in school. A website you visit often. A magazine, TV-show, podcast, music and so on. Then take out a piece of paper and or an empty document on your smart phone and ask yourself: What can I do to spend less time with these 3 sources this week? Come up with ideas and action-steps for doing that on your piece of paper or in your phone. If you can’t come up with steps for doing that with all 3 right now then focus on doing it with just one of the sources. And then, during the next 7 days, spend the time you’ve now freed up on the most positive sources and people in your life. 2. When you’re in what looks like a negative situation, find what’s good or helpful about it. One of the biggest differences between an optimist and someone who lets pessimistic thoughts cloud his mind is how that person perceives a setback or obstacle in life . I used to, for example, feel like giving up and going home when I stumbled into a negative situation. It felt like it was permanent place I got stuck in and that whatever I did it would not make much of a difference anyway. And so my mind filled up with pessimistic thoughts and I often beat myself up for whatever I had done. These days I go about things a differently. When I find myself in a situation that looks bleak or negative I ask myself questions that will empower me and help me to grow. Questions like: How would my best friend or parent support and help me in this situation? What’s one good thing about this situation? What’s one thing I can learn from this? What’s one thing I can do differently the next time to likely have a better outcome? 3. Work out regularly. When I have a tough time thinking myself out of negative thoughts then a short 20-30 minute workout with free weights can help me to change my headspace. It is time well spent because it releases so many inner tensions and stress , worried feelings and makes me feel stronger again. It focuses my mind and when I’m done with the workout then I’m in a much better place to handle what is going on in my life right now. Working out several times a week on a regular schedule also helps me to prevent getting stuck in a pessimistic funk in the first place. 4. Stop making mountains out of a molehill. This used to be one of my biggest issues. I blew up small or medium-sized issues or challenges into monsters in my mind. Not a good habit if you want to take action to move forward or if you don’t want a lot of worries and fear in your daily life. The easiest way to ground yourself in a situation where you start to sense that you may be making a mountain out of a molehill is in my experience to zoom out a bit on your life by using a question like: Will this matter in 5 years? Or even 5 weeks? I have found that answer for me is almost always that it honestly won’t. 5. Be grateful for a few of the things you may often take for granted. When your lens that you view your daily life through is tinted in a negative way then it’s easy to miss the things you can actually be grateful for . The things you have that many, many in the world do not have or things you may take for granted. Take a minute as you get out of bed in morning or get into it in the evening and put your attention on a few such things. A handful of the ones I most often come back to are: Three steady meals a day. A roof over my head during the rainy days and long, cold seasons here in Sweden. As much clean water as I want. The kind and helpful family and friends I have in my life. This one is also a great way to change your perspective when you have a setback or a failure. Take a minute or more then to reflect on what you can be thankful for. 6. Come back to this moment (and stay here). When you’re on the train of negative thoughts then you’re often thinking about something that happened. You’re reliving it. Thinking again and again about what you could or should have done or said. Or you’re thinking about something that could happen. Or maybe a mix of the two of them as a past experience or two build a monster in your mind about what the future may bring. To get out of any of those places snap back into this present moment . To what is right here, right now. If you make this a habit and try to spend more of your day in this present space then you’ll have a fewer negative thoughts and be more focused on what is good and what you can do in this very moment in time to move forward. So how do you do it practically? A couple of my favorite ways to bring myself to back to being mindful and into this moment are: Spend 1-2 minutes on just taking in the world around you. Take a very quick break and just focus to 100% on what is around you right now. The sights. The smells. How the sun warms your skin or how your clothes feel. The people walking by your window and the sounds of the kids playing a little further away. Spend 1-2 minutes on just focusing on your breathing. Take a little deeper breathes than you usually do. Make sure you breathe with you belly and through your nostrils. During this short break only focus on the air going in and out of you and nothing else. 7. Let it out. If you let negative thoughts bounce around in your mind then they’ll drag you down. A workout can help you to release them. Or you can use questions that promote optimistic thinking as described above. Another thing that works really well is to just let it out. To talk the negative situation over with someone close to you. Venting for a few minutes can really help to find a new and more grounded perspective on the situation. As the other person listens you can figure things out for yourself and what you want to do about it. Or you may want more active help. If the two of you have a conversation about the situation then you can together find a more helpful perspective and perhaps even the start of an action-plan for what you can do to make things better. 8. Bring the positivity to someone else’s life. When you get stuck in a pessimistic mindset or victim thinking then one of the simplest ways to get out of that and out of your own head is to bring the positivity to someone in your life . By adding it and seeing him or her light up and become happier you’ll feel better about yourself and more optimistic again. Here’s three ways you can do that: Be kind. Give a genuine compliment about her great taste in music or his cooking, hold up the door or let someone into your lane while driving your car. Help out. Give some good advice that has worked well for you when you’ve been in the same situation that your friend or co-worker is in right now. Or help out with setting up your friend’s party this weekend or as he’s moving to a new apartment next week. Just be there. Listen as she vents. Or talk her difficult challenge or situation over to help her to start finding her way out of it. 9. Go slowly. When I go too fast, when I think, talk and move around too fast then things don’t go that well. Stress builds up and it becomes harder to think clearly and level-headedly. Negative thoughts start to swirl around in my mind more often and it’s tough to handle or put a stop to them. If I on the other hand slow down then my mind and body calms down too. It becomes easier to once again find the optimistic perspective and a constructive way forward towards what I want. 10. Get a positive start to your day. The first few things you do in the morning often set the tone for your whole day. If you get off to a negative or pessimistic start then it can be quite hard to shake those feelings or perspective. But if you get your morning off to a positive start then it becomes a lot easier to stay with that emotion and the optimism all the way to when it’s bedtime. A couple of simple ways to get your day off to a positive start is: A quick reminder on your bedside table or bathroom mirror. It could be a quote that truly inspires you. Or your most important focus or dream right now. Write it down on a piece of paper and put it where you’ll see within the first 1-3 minutes after you wake up. Get some positive information or conversation flowing into your mind. You can do that by watching a motivating Youtube video, listening to a podcast or some of your favorite music, by reading an uplifting blog post or a chapter in a book that makes you laugh. Or you can have a fun or motivating conversation with your kids, partner, co-worker or friend over breakfast or as you ride the bus to school or work.

When we think fitness, we tend to jump to workouts and diets, but mental health is a major and important aspect of fitness. Having a healthy relationship with our thoughts and patterns is the most fundamental step to creating a happier and sustainable lifestyle. Todays guest, Tina Lifford, is not only a critically acclaimed Hollywood actress from Parenthood and Queen Sugar, but is also the CEO of the Inner-Fitness Project. The Inner-Fitness Project gives people the strategies and tools they need in order to properly self-reflect and create awareness within themselves. Join Robin in this fascinating episode to learn more about how to interrupt old thought patterns and exercise your internal choices. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! What a typical day looks like for Tina Maintaining habits when traveling Incorporating movement into daily life that fits your personal preferences Deepening awareness of your thoughts and how you can challenge your thinking How to dismantle old beliefs and establish a new way of thinking The importance of recognizing how thoughts manifest and how to let go of thoughts that are not serving you Creating awareness for past experiences in order to manage sabotaging cycles Creating strategies to interrupt old patterns and engage with it in a way that will create healthier patterns What is an inner-fitness workout and how to practically make change Links in this episode: The Little Book of Big Lies by Tina Lifford The Inner Fitness Store – Enter code “BalancedLife” at checkout for $10 off any of Tina’s workout classes for 2020! Get 5 free workouts delivered to your inbox with the Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge – sign up here ! Keep in touch with Tina! tinalifford.com @tinalifford on Instagram Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

As a member of The Balanced Life community, we want to make sure you know that we are committed to inclusion, diversity, awareness, and anti-racism within our team and community. We are individuals who care deeply about social justice and recognize that diverse backgrounds and perspectives are not only valuable, but necessary to fulfill our mission at The Balanced Life. We invite you to join us as we build an organization that promotes a diverse culture and community where people are welcomed, valued, and included. What that looks like: Inclusion and representation within our online Pilates membership community, The Balanced Life Sisterhood. Collaborations and partnerships with people and brands that diversely represent women in body shape, size, race, ethnicity, and age. Support for BIPOC within The Balanced Life Team. Investment in anti-racism education for The Balanced Life team members. Stewardship of our platform to include diverse voices, share resources from diverse sources, and represent a diverse community within our content and marketing materials. Creation of an internal committee to ensure accountability and continued action for fighting racism. Continued commitment for increasing diversity within our team and leadership. Donations to causes and organizations that support the health and wellness of BIPOC women and girls. Here at The Balanced Life, we have a voice and a platform, but we also have work to do. We are committed to listening, learning, and taking action. It’s our mission to support and encourage ALL women to take care of their mental and physical health through providing high-quality online Pilates workouts, wellness resources, and uplifting community. For questions or comments, please reach out to our team at hello@thebalancedlifeonline.com. Get 3 FREE Pilates workouts in your inbox now! YES PLEASE!

One of the most destructive daily habits I carried with me for a long time and I think is a very common one for many people was the thought habit of catastrophizing. What is catastrophizing? This is when you build up a nightmare scenario of how everything could go totally wrong in some situation and imagine a big catastrophe in your mind. You may have a presentation tomorrow and your mind starts to pull up a scenario where you have left your notes at home, you make a fool of yourself, you are embarrassed in front the whole company and your boss yells at you for 20 minutes after the meeting. Scary stuff for sure. So how did I learn to handle this one? Let me share 7 steps that have really helped me out. Step 1: Loudly say stop to your inner critic. The catastrophe that has started to brew in your mind comes from your inner critic . He is telling you: “You will fail because it is what you always do.” Or that you have not prepared enough. Or that your boss will not be pleased with your presentation for some reason or other. Or all of that. So stop the inner critic quickly. In your mind, as soon as these thoughts pop up, shout: “NO!” Or: “NOPE, we are not going down that path again!” This will disrupt that train of thought and help you to start feeling more level-headed again. Step 2: Focus on your breathing. After disrupting the thought be still for a minute or two. Sit down if you can. Focus on just your in-breaths and out-breaths. Nothing else. This will calm your body down from the stress and it helps your mind to think more clearly and to return to what is happening right now in this moment instead of being lost in future nightmares. Step 3: Look to the past for the truth. Think back to your past. How many times in the past have these catastrophe scenarios that your mind throws at you actually become reality? Never or very few times I would imagine. That has certainly been the case for me. So remind yourself of the actual facts from the past to calm yourself down even more and to draw yourself back to the more centered version of yourself. Step 4: Talk it through and get input from a level-headed friend. In many situations in my own life the first three steps have helped me to snap out of the catastrophe scenario and to think more calmly and clearly. But sometimes that combination isn't quite enough. Maybe there are still some lingering negative thoughts and inner tensions that could start snowballing again. If that’s the case then one thing I like to do is to let the catastrophe out. I talk it over with someone close to me. By doing so, by just venting and having someone listening for a few minutes I can often see the situation for what it truly is . And so I calm down. Or the person listening can help out me out a bit more if needed and lend me his or her perceptive. That helps me to ground myself in reality again and it has also helped me many times to find a solution or a first step that I can take to start changing this situation into something better if that is needed. Step 5: Stop making a mountain out of a molehill. Another thing that often helps me is to ask myself a question that lets me zoom out and see if I'm honestly just making a mountain out of a molehill here (or out of nothing at all). So I ask myself: Will this matter in 5 years? Or even in 5 weeks? The answer is usually that it won't. Even though it might at first seem that way when you're in a stressed out and anxious headspace. Step 6: Say stop to yourself when you know you simply can't think straight. When I'm hungry or I need to go to bed and get some sleep then I know from experience that I'm vulnerable to catastrophizing and pessimistic thoughts. So what do I do? I tell myself this: No, no, no, we are not going to think about this now. We will think about this situation or challenge later, after getting some sleep or food. Doing that simple thing helps a lot. Because when I'm not hungry or I'm well rested once again then my issue that I was getting worked up about will most often be small to non-existent when revisited with some clear-headed thinking. Or it will at least be a lot easier to find a solution or a plan to improve things if there's actually a real challenge here that I need to face. Step 7: Reduce any weekly input that pushes these disaster scenarios into the forefront of your mind. The people and the other sources out there like TV, social media and various websites or forums have a big influence over your thinking. So be careful about what you let into your head on a daily and weekly basis. Ask yourself: Is there a person or source in my life that strengthens my catastrophizing habit? Examples of such sources could be someone who is very pessimistic or news online or a social media platform that you find is feeding too much negativity into your mind. When you've found something like that in your life ask yourself: What can I do this week to spend less or no time with this person or source? Then take action on that and spend the time you've now freed up during this week with one or a few of the most optimistic sources / people in your life. Do this – in the coming weeks or months – with as many sources as needed to piece by piece build a healthy environment for yourself and for your thoughts.

“Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.” Albert Schweitzer “A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees.” Amelia Earhart A very simple way to spread more happiness in your own little world is through kindness. It's often an easy and quick thing you can do as you move through your daily life. But we sometimes forget about it. Or don’t remember how it can help us all. Three things that I like to keep in mind and that help me to try to be a kinder person are these: I get what I give. Yep, some people will be ungrateful, miserable and not reciprocating no matter what you may do. But most people will over time treat you as you treat them. By being kinder to others I am more likely to be kinder to myself. It may sound a bit odd but my experience is that when I am kinder towards others then my self-esteem goes up . It creates a happier place to live in. Being kinder simply makes my own little world a nicer and happier place to live in. So how can you start spreading the kindness and happiness in your daily life? Here are 15 simple ways to do it. Pick one of them that resonates with you and start using it today. 1. Express your gratitude. Think about what you can be grateful for about someone in your life. Maybe that he is a good listener, that he often is quick to help out or that he always adds great songs to a Spotify playlist. Or simply that he held up the door for you. Then express that gratitude in a simple “thank you!” or in a sincere sentence or two. 2. Replace the judgments. No one likes to be judged. And the more you judge other people the more you tend to judge yourself. So despite the temporary benefit of deriving pleasure from the judgments it is not a good or smart long-term habit. When you feel the urge to judge ask yourself: what is one kind thing I can think or do in this situation instead? 3. Replace the unconstructive criticism. Try encouragement instead of excessive criticism. It helps people to both raise their self-confidence and to do a better job. And it will make things more fun and more light-hearted in the long run. 4. Put yourself in the other person’s shoes. It is quite easy to resort to unkindness when you see things just from your perspective. Two questions that help me to see and to better understand other viewpoints are: How would I think and feel it if I were in his or her shoes? What parts of this person can I see in myself? 5. Recall how people’s kindness made you feel. Just sit down for a few minutes and try to recall one time or a few times when other people’s kindness really touched you and helped you out. Then think about how you can do those very same things for someone in your life. 6. Express kindness for something you may often take for granted. It is easy to remember and to feel motivated to express kindness when someone is having a rough time or have just finished an important project. But also remember to express kindness and encouragement for how someone continues to put so much love into the dinners you eat. Or for being on time every day and doing their job well and keeping deadlines. 7. Hide a surprising and kind note. Leave a small note with a loving or encouraging sentence in your partner’s or child’s lunchbox, hat, tea-container or book that he or she is reading right now. That minute of your time will put a smile on her face and joy and motivation in her heart. 8. Just be there. Listen – without thinking about something else – when someone needs to vent. Just be there fully with your attention. Or have a conversation and help someone find his or her way out of fear and to a more constructive and grounded perspective. 9. Remember the small acts of kindness too. Let someone into your lane while driving. Let someone skip ahead of you in a line if he's in a real hurry. Hold up the door for someone or ask if they need help when you see them standing around with a map and a confused look. 10. Give someone an uplifting gift. Someone in your life may have a a tough time right now . Then send him or her an inspirational book or movie. Or simply send an email with a link to something inspiring or funny that you have found like a blog, podcast or a comic . 11. Help someone out practically. Give them a hand when moving or with making dinner or arrangements before a party. If they need information, then help out by googling it or by asking knowledgeable people that you know. 12. Help the people in your life see how they make a difference in their lives. When you talk to someone about his or her day or what has been going on lately then make sure to point out how he or she also has spread kindness and happiness. People are often unaware of the positive things they do or they minimize them in their own minds. So help them to see themselves in a more positive light and to improve their own self-esteem. RELATED: 160 Deep Quotes That Make You Think 13. Remember the 3 reasons for kindness at the start of this article. It will help you to be kinder even when you may not always feel much like it. If you like, write those reasons down on a piece of paper and put that note where you can see it every day. 14. Pay it forward. When someone does something kind for you – no matter how big or small – then try to pay that forward by being kind to someone else as soon as you can. 15. Be kinder towards yourself . Then you will naturally treat other people with more kindness too. It is truly a win-win habit. A simple way to start being kinder toward yourself is to each evening write down 3 things you appreciate about yourself and about what you have done that day in a journal.

While many of us are currently staying home and being forced to slow down, it isn’t going to last forever. Learning how to avoid the “go-go-go” in our daily lives is vital to avoid burnout. We’re conditioned to think that more is better, but sometimes it comes at the expense of our health. Today, Robin Long shares how we can prevent reaching this place of burnout and jeopardizing our health and goals. There is an array of simple and achievable habits we can practice in our day-to-day lives in order to build strength and reduce stress without burning ourselves out. Join Robin in this conversation to learn more about how you can optimize your wellness, increase productivity, and avoid burnout. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! Quarantine has provided an opportunity for life to shift and change our rhythms What it means to have a “go-go-go lifestyle” and how can we slow down The mental and physical consequences of go-go-go What can we do to avoid burnout and optimize our health The ways we can learn to tune into our bodies and honor our needs Different aspects to health and fitness outside of diet and exercise that impact our well-being more is not always better How regular Pilates workouts have helped Links in this episode: Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge The Balanced Life Sisterhood Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

Today I'd like to share a collection of quotes about new beginnings. This one's for you that wants to make a change in your life. Get a fresh start. Let go of something and move on to something better and more fulfilling. No matter if that's at work, in your business, in a relationship or in some other important area of your life. I hope you'll find something here that will both inspire you and help you practically to make that change and get that new beginning you need. You may also find this collection of confidence quotes and this one filled with quotes on having a growth mindset helpful for the process of moving forward . Inspiring Quotes About New Beginnings “Celebrate endings—for they precede new beginnings.” Jonathan Lockwood Huie “Every day is a new beginning. Treat it that way. Stay away from what might have been, and look at what can be.” Marsha Petrie Sue “Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over.” Guy Finley “If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.” Flavia Weedn “Nothing is predestined. The obstacles of your past can become the gateways that lead to new beginnings.” Ralph Blum “To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself.” Soren Kierkegaard “No matter how hard the past is, you can always begin again.” Buddha “Forgiveness says you are given another chance to make a new beginning.” Desmond Tutu “When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” Alexander Graham Bell ”Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” Richard Branson “The first step towards getting somewhere is to decide you’re not going to stay where you are.” J.P. Morgan “Every day is a chance to begin again. Don’t focus on the failures of yesterday, start today with positive thoughts and expectations.” Catherine Pulsifer “It is only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth – and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up – that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had.” Elizabeth Kubler-Ross “There are things that we never want to let go of, people we never want to leave behind. But keep in mind that letting go isn’t the end of the world, it’s the beginning of a new life.” Unknown RELATED: 110 Never Give Up Quotes for When Life is Hard and Tough “The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.” Steve Jobs “Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Martin Luther King, Jr. “And now let us welcome the new year, full of things that never were.” Rainer Maria Rilke “The chief beauty about time is that you cannot waste it in advance. The next year, the next day, the next hour are lying ready for you, as perfect, as unspoiled, as if you had never wasted or misapplied a single moment in all your life. You can turn over a new leaf every hour if you choose.” Arnold Bennett “It happens to everyone as they grow up. You find out who you are and what you want, and then you realize that people you’ve known forever don’t see things the way you do. So you keep the wonderful memories, but find yourself moving on.” Nicholas Sparks “Don't wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what. Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.” Mark Victor Hansen “You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call ‘failure’ is not the falling down, but the staying down.” Mary Pickford “A very wise man once told me that you can’t look back – you just have to put the past behind you, and find something better in your future.” Jodi Picoult “There will come a time when you believe everything is finished; that will be the beginning.” Louis L'Amour “Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go.” Hermann Hesse “Isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?” L.M. Montgomery “Never underestimate the power you have to take your life in a new direction.” Germany Kent “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” Arthur Ashe “Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.” Lyndon B. Johnson “The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny.” Albert Ellis “Perhaps that is where our choice lies—in determining how we will meet the inevitable end of things, and how we will greet each new beginning.” Elana K. Arnold “The beginning is the most important part of the work.” Plato “Do not wait until the conditions are perfect to begin. Beginning makes the conditions perfect.” Alan Cohen “If you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.” Jim Rohn “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” C.S. Lewis “Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.” Terry Pratchett “Let go of certainty. The opposite isn’t uncertainty. It’s openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow.” Tony Schwartz “Challenges are gifts that force us to search for a new center of gravity. Don’t fight them. Just find a new way to stand.” Oprah “When we go back in to the past and rake up all the troubles we've had, we end up reeling and staggering through life. Stability and peace of mind come by living in the moment.” Pam W. Vredevelt “Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.”' Henry Ford “Your past does not equal your future.” Anthony Robbins “Laughter gives us distance. It allows us to step back from an event, deal with it and then move on.” Bob Newhart “Today expect something good to happen to you no matter what occurred yesterday. Realize the past no longer holds you captive. It can only continue to hurt you if you hold on to it. Let the past go. A simply abundant world awaits.” Sarah Ban Breathnach “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” George Eliot “Life moves forward. The old leaves wither, die and fall away, and the new growth extends forward into the light.” Bryant McGill “Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.” Seneca “Let go. Why do you cling to pain? There is nothing you can do about the wrongs of yesterday. It is not yours to judge. Why hold on to the very thing which keeps you from hope and love?” Leo Buscaglia “Every moment is a fresh beginning.” T.S. Eliot “You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present.” Jan Glidewell ”You have to let go of who you were to become who you will be.” Candace Bushnell “The most difficult aspect of moving on is accepting that the other person already did.” Faraaz Kazi “Let go of your attachment to being right, and suddenly your mind is more open. You're able to benefit from the unique viewpoints of others, without being crippled by your own judgment.” Ralph Marston “No matter how hard the past is, you can always begin again.” Jack Kornfield “We can’t be afraid of change. You may feel very secure in the pond that you are in, but if you never venture out of it, you will never know that there is such a thing as an ocean, a sea. Holding onto something that is good for you now, may be the very reason why you don’t have something better.” C. JoyBell C. “People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.” Thich Nhat Hanh “It’s hard to be clear about who you are when you are carrying around a bunch of baggage from the past. I’ve learned to let go and move more quickly into the next place.” Angelina Jolie “Be willing to be a beginner every single morning.“ Meister Eckhart “Even the greatest was once a beginner. Don't be afraid to take that first step.” Muhammad Ali “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” Walt Disney “If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.” Dolly Parton “All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant's revolving door.” Albert Camus “We are meant to keep focused for new life, for new beginnings, for new experiences, and to use our abilities to move beyond all those things that may serve as excuses to confine us to the now.” Byron Pulsifer “I discovered that a fresh start is a process. A fresh start is a journey – a journey that requires a plan.” Vivian Jokotade “If I must start somewhere, right here and now is the best place imaginable.” Richelle E. Goodrich “If all you can do is crawl, start crawling.” Rumi “You can learn new things at any time in your life if you're willing to be a beginner. If you actually learn to like being a beginner, the whole world opens up to you.” Barabra Sher “Don’t live the same year 75 times and call it a life.” Robin Sharma “Asking is the beginning of receiving. Make sure you don't go to the ocean with a teaspoon. At least take a bucket so the kids won't laugh at you.” Jim Rohn “The distance is nothing; it's only the first step that is difficult.” Marquise du Deffand “It’s humbling to start fresh. It takes a lot of courage. But it can be reinvigorating. You just have to put your ego on a shelf & tell it to be quiet.” Jennifer Ritchie Payette “Never allow waiting to become a habit. Live your dreams and take risks. Life is happening now.” Paulo Coelho “Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.” Oprah Winfrey “Making the beginning is one third of the work.” Irish Proverb “Life is about change, sometimes it’s painful, sometimes it’s beautiful, but most of the time it’s both.” Kristin Kreuk “Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over again, and you will grow stronger until you have accomplished a purpose – not the one you began with perhaps, but one you’ll be glad to remember.” Anne Sullivan “I have always been delighted at the prospect of a new day, a fresh try, one more start, with perhaps a bit of magic waiting somewhere behind the morning.” J. B. Priestly “Although no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.” Carl Bard “You can’t be that kid standing at the top of the water slide, overthinking it. You have to go down the chute.” Tina Fey “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” Karen Lamb “20 years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Lao Tzu Inspiring Quotes About Endings, Starting Over and New Beginnings “The secret to a rich life is to have more beginnings than endings.” Dave Weinbaum “New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings.” Lao Tzu “What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.” T.S. Eliot “The doors we open and close each day decide the lives we live.” Flora Whittemore “From the end spring new beginnings.” Pliny the Elder “It’s never too late to become who you want to be. I hope you live a life that you’re proud of, and if you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start over.” F. Scott Fitzgerald “Don't let the lessons, the experiences of the past, dampen your enthusiasm for beginnings. Just because it's been hard doesn't mean it will always be that difficult.” Melody Beattie “To greet a lovely morning, we must leave the night behind.” Tarang Sinha “New beginnings are starting daily through every new morning opening new wonders and mercies of healings and blessings of opportunity to nurture the soul.” Rosalee Ervin “Arriving at one goal is the starting point to another.” John Dewey “The bad news is that most people give up; they settle for second best; they don't start over; they stay stuck. Please don't allow that to be you.” Doug Fields “Let’s forget the baggages of the past and make a new beginning.” Shahbaz Sharif “The secret to change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” Socrates “There is always an opportunity to start again and again, if the old ways are not working last year, look for better ways of doing it in the new year and start again afresh.” Bamigboye Olurotimi “Traveling is not just seeing the new; it is also leaving behind. Not just opening doors; also closing them behind you, never to return. But the place you have left forever is always there for you to see whenever you shut your eyes.” Jan Myrdal “Dreams are renewable. No matter what our age or condition, there are still untapped possibilities within us and new beauty waiting to be born.” Dale Turner “When faced with a large project, remember you move a mountain one stone at a time.” Catherine Pulsifer “It isn’t always a change of scenery needed to make life better. Sometimes it simply requires opening your eyes.” Richelle E. Goodrich “After you've done a thing the same way for two years, look it over carefully. After five years, look at it with suspicion. And after ten years, throw it away and start all over.” Alfred Edward Perlman “We grow up with such an idealistic view on how our life should be; love, friendships, a career or even the place we will live ~ only to age and realise none of it is what you expected and reality is a little disheartening, when you've reached that realisation; you have learnt the gift of all, any new beginning can start now and if you want anything bad enough you'll find the courage to pursue it with all you have. The past doesn't have to be the future, stop making it so.” Nikki Rowe “Discontent is the first necessity of progress.” Thomas Edison “The greatest of all capabilities of a human being is to become born again.” J.R. Rim “Everything begins at the beginning, and quite often the beginning begins when you shift your mind in a new direction.” Louie Herron “What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it. Don't complain.” Maya Angelou “Retirement is not just walking away from work; it is also walking toward something new.” Sara Yogev “Your life does not get better by chance. It gets better by change.” Jim Rohn “New Year's eve is like every other night; there is no pause in the march of the universe, no breathless moment of silence among created things that the passage of another twelve months may be noted; and yet no man has quite the same thoughts this evening that come with the coming of darkness on other nights” Hamilton Wright Mabie “All great beginnings start in the dark, when the moon greets you to a new day at midnight.” Shannon L. Alder “Don't be afraid if things seem difficult in the beginning. That's only the initial impression. The important thing is not to retreat; you have to master yourself.” Olga Korbut Quotes About New Love and New Relationship Beginnings “The draft you feel after your heart has been broken is simply the essential airing out of your soul to help establish fresh, new beginnings.” Michelle C. Ustaszeski “You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.” Frederick Buechner “If you spend your time hoping someone will suffer the consequences for what they did to your heart, then you’re allowing them to hurt you a second time in your mind.” Shannon L. Alder “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come.” Joseph Campbell “Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all. When there's a big disappointment, we don't know if that's the end of the story. It may just be the beginning of a great adventure. Life is like that. We don't know anything. We call something bad; we call it good. But really we just don't know.” Pema Chödrön “You must be strong enough to know that love will come to you when you are ready. You must be strong enough to know when to say goodbye, and know that letting go is not weak.” Marisa Donnelly “Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.” C. S. Lewis “The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.” Thomas Merton “When we think we have been hurt by someone in the past, we build up defenses to protect ourselves from being hurt in the future. So the fearful past causes a fearful future and the past and future become one. We cannot love when we feel fear…. When we release the fearful past and forgive everyone, we will experience total love and oneness with all.” Gerald G. Jampolsky “Starting over is an acceptance of a past we can’t change, an unrelenting conviction that the future can be different, and the stubborn wisdom to use the past to make the future what the past was not.” Craig D. Lounsbrough “All discarded lovers should be given a second chance, but with somebody else.” Mae West

As you’re spending more time at home these days, it’s more important than ever to continue taking care of your health. Here at The Balanced Life, we’ve been providing online Pilates workouts that can be done anytime, anywhere for 10+ years. So I thought it might be helpful to share a few quick tips to help you stay on track and see results as you’re figuring out how to make it all work right now. Tip #1: Choose workout wear wisely The beauty of home workouts is you don’t have to get dressed for a public outing. You can wear whatever you want! I’ve been known to work out in my pajamas more often than not and inside The Balanced Life Sisterhood , #PJPilates is often trending. But I’ve also found there are times when my clothes affect the way I show up on my mat. Some days pajamas work just fine, other days changing into actual workout clothes gives me a boost that encourages me to show up with more intention and focus on my mat. Pay attention to how you feel during your workouts and choose what works best for you! Tip #2: It’s okay to hit pause Unlike a traditional class setting, you have the ability to hit the pause button anytime you need to – so don’t be afraid to use it! Whether you need to take a breather and grab some water, break up a sibling squabble, or go back to work with the intention to finish the workout at a later time – use it to your advantage! No guilt, no shame. Hit pause whenever you need to, and embrace the flexibility and convenience of working out at home. Tip #3: Keep it simple It’s easy to think that you need all kinds of equipment at home to get a good workout and establish a solid routine. But I have good news…this isn’t true! The more simple you keep your routine, the more likely you are to stay consistent – and consistency leads to results. Nearly all of the workouts here at The Balanced Life use your bodyweight to build strength and don’t require expensive equipment or a fancy setup. If you want to stick with your routine for more than a few days – keep it simple. Tip #4: Have a plan A quick search on YouTube will pull up thousands of free workouts, but it’s hard to know where to start. That’s why I put together clear plans and calendars you can follow from home – so you don’t have to make decisions when you’re already short on time and energy. You’ll know what to do each day, what equipment is needed, and how to see results. If you haven’t already, I encourage you to check out the FREE Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge. I released this 5-day series back in March and it was so popular, we decided to bring it back. You can start any time, there’s no equipment necessary, and all it takes is 15 minutes a day! You can totally do this and you’ll love the way it makes you feel. CLICK HERE to get the free workouts delivered straight to your inbox. You’ll love these quick & effective Pilates routines, ~Contact.FirstName~! It’s going to feel so good to build strength and reduce stress right now. See you on your mat soon! xo, Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS! Ready to BUILD STRENGTH & FEEL GOOD in just 15 minutes a day? Join the FREE 5-day Pilates Strong challenge! JOIN THE FREE CHALLENGE!

Complete List of All The Floating Dock Cube Companies, Products, Prices and Compatibilities. Plastic dock cubes are a great way to build a floating dock. These docks can be modified and added to in the future, which is its greatest advantage. The biggest downside to this style of dock is stability, which can vary depending on the type and brand. Compatibility between dock cube manufacturers can also be an issue. Often called cubes, most floating dock blocks measure 20″ x 20″ square and are 16″ usually high, see the Floating Dock Cube Standards . With these dimensions, the blocks are not actually cubes at all. There are a few modular floating dock manufactures and each of their products may be a slightly different size. This means that they may not integrate well with other manufacturers cubes, if at all. Some are a variations on the theme, while others are significantly different. Below is the list of all the current cube dock manufacturers and distributors: Surf Dock in Bali Featuring the Candock Dock Technology Candock: Plastic Modular Floating Docks www.candock.com This company produces interlocking plastic dock cubes that are about 20 inches square. Candock are famous for putting together the surf-dock featured in the 2017 YouTube video at Kuta Beach in Kuta, Bali. The dock was as a surf pier in the ocean. The winning dock for this stunt was the Candock cube dock system. Surfers ran and launched themselves into the breaking waves. The concept photo shoot in Bali was arranged between Stab magazine and Candock. The surf dock was a temporary installation that became popularly known as “The Dock”. Typical installations of this type dock are far more pedestrian and dock owners have found the Candock product to be reliable, but unable to work with any other kind of floating cube dock. As a relative newcomer to the market, the Candock organization may suffer with long term quality issues, but they have built a large dealer network in both the United States and Canada. These suppliers appear to be ready to deal with issues of cube cracking and dock sinking as time goes on, but it remains to see how well the product lasts. Candock Summary Opinion: Candock Cube Prices: $125 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $75 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: Poor The Original Jet Float Boat Dock Cube Jet Float: The Original Modular Docking Supplier www.jetfloat.com Jet Float began providing their plastic dock cubes in 1976 and they claim to be the industry pioneer and original modular docking and dock cube company. The organization is based in Ontario Canada, but it is no longer the powerhouse it once was. The company suffers from so much competition, competitive product confusion and a complete lack of innovation that they have now fallen into a proverbial commercial backwater. Recognized by their classic grey color, the maple leaf logo on the top center of the block and their black center pins, Jet Float dock cubes can be seen all over the US and Canada. The longevity of the product is evident with many of their older dock cubes still being seen on Craigslist nearly twenty years after their original manufacture. The product and organization are no longer seen as the industry leader due to a lack of product development and a poor support and dealer network, but are still in business. Jet Float Inc. calls their basic product the “Standard Jetfloat”. While they do offer a double unit which has greater buoyancy and stability, the single cubes can often feel a bit rocky when a person walks on them when attached to other single cubes. The company also offers a lower profile unit, that can be used for Jet Skis, row boats, small sailboats like the Sunfish and kayaks. The Standard Jetfloat dimensions are 20in x 20in x 16in (50.8 cm x 40.64 cm) which is just slightly bigger than other similar dock cubes that measure in at 50cm x 50cm x 40cm (in metric terms). The Jetfloat dock cube became the international gold standard for all other dock cubes. However, this does not mean that other brands are interchangeable with the original Jetfloat, as boat dock owners may have discovered much to their chagrin. JetFloat Summary Opinion: JetFloat Cube Prices: $115 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $55 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: Excellent Jet Dock Floating Dock Cubes Jet Dock www.jetdock.com Jet Dock is often confused with the original Jet Float organization that makes the Jet Float dock cubes. The Jet Dock cube even looks the same in many ways to the Jet Float variety. Jetdock steers clear of actually using the traditional grey color of their competitor “Jet Float”. But, in many ways their cubes appear quite similar. Jet Dock company also manufactures floating boat lifts and drive-on docking systems and they are located in Cleveland, Ohio. One of the major differences with this dock to the original Jet Float Dock is that they make a cube that allows a holding pole to travel directly through the center of the cube/ This provides much better stability for the dock, but this can detract from the overall aesthetics. This organization also tries to push their “Drive on Docking” solution to boat owners. This solution compares well to boat lifts, that can run into tens of thousands of dollars. The drive-on boat solution is their biggest seller. Using a brand name that is so close to another competitive product confuses buyers and detracts from this organization’s credibility. What is even more frustrating is that this product does not even work well with the competitive Jetfloat product, of which they have borrowed so much. Jetdock Cube Prices: $135 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $65 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: Good Dock Blocks With Center Pin Dock Blocks www.dock-blocks.com With a big variation on the theme, Dock Blocks offers a product that may still be floating dock blocks, but the they connect in a radically different way compared to its competition. This can lead to integration issues with other systems and visual aesthetic problems. The shape of the block is no longer a cube and the connector is located on the sides/center of the block, not at the corners. This does provide a stronger joint between the blocks and a more stable walking area than other traditional cube block products. This more stable design means that this system will not work with any other kind of floating dock, but does provide a better product. History has shown that the joint part of the floating dock cube has never been a safety weakness of the other dock cube design, unless the dock is in a category 1 hurricane type seas and winds. This design may be an improvement on the original, but its departure from the norm has not been well received, despite it being technically superior. This block structure is less likely to break apart in extreme weather conditions and will not become a dangerous missile capable of causing catastrophic damage during intense storms. The car in the driveway may however blow away long before this dock ever does, so there seems little point in making it so bulletproof. Dock Blocks Cube Prices: $129 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $79 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: No Compatibility Cube Dock With Rounded Corners Cube Docks www.cubedocks.com Cube Docks is another cube dock manufacturer with a few of features that set them apart from other manufacturers. They offer a 45 degree corner cube which is designed to improve the docks looks. It may even make the dock stronger. Cube docks do not generally suffer from weak spots unless they are in placed compromising situations. These can include raging rapids or in hurricane winds. Cube Docks also offer a service and lighting cube unit. This allows cube owners to run wiring or lighting onto the cube dock . They also have a hole cube, that allows a pole through the center of the cube. This is done rather than at the tabs. which are really meant for connecting the cubes. Cube Docks Cube Prices: $130 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $65 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: Poor Imported Chinese-Made Floating Cube Dock Knock-Off Products Various Chinese Knock–Off Brands Alibaba in China If price is the most critical concern for buyers, then there are a few cheaper Chinese knock-off brands. They do not have the track record or support of the more established brands and no support network. Some of these Chinese brand names adopt Western sounding names, but they are really manufactured in the Republic of China. They include: Patriot Cubes Seaflo Cubes Clark Cubes Zhejiang Zhongya Industrial Cubes The size of these cubes can be slightly different from the standard US and Canadian dock cube sizes. Owners of these cubes may have problems integrating the cubes with other dock systems. The Chinese varieties often come in at a metric measurement of 50 cm square (which is 19.685 inches) and 40 cm high (which is 15.748 inches). Long term reliability and support may be poor, but the low, low price can often be just about right. Chinese Knock–Off Floating Dock Cube Prices: $15-30 Per Cube Used Cube Pricing: $10 Per Cube Compatibility With Other Brands: Good

“Do not anticipate trouble or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.” Benjamin Franklin One very common question I've gotten over the years goes something like this: “I always get nervous before a date/meeting/social gathering and that holds me back from being my true and best self and from doing and getting what I want. What can I do to overcome this?” This is an issue that used to hold me back in the past and I've more experience with it than I would have ever wanted. Back when I was still single I often got quite nervous before a date. And before that, when I didn't have a date at all in a long time, I got nervous before most social situations. It was no fun. Things weren't hopeless though. And today I would like to share three small habits and steps that, simply put, totally changed my life. Step 1: Slow down. A few minutes before you step into the meeting, job interview or date that makes you nervous slow down. Walk slower to the meeting place. Move slower. Then stop. Step 2: Breathe. Stand still or sit down for a minute. And then just breathe. Take a little deeper breaths than usual. Make sure you breathe through your nostrils and with your belly. Focus on just your slow in-breaths and out-breaths for 1-2 minutes. This will calm your mind and body down and make it easier to think clearly and normally again. Plus, that singular focus on your breathing will draw you back into this moment instead of leaving you lost in the thoughts of past failures or destructive worries about your near future. Step 3: Assume rapport. Assuming rapport means that just before you met someone you pretend and think to yourself that you are meeting one of your best friends. Doing this will allow you to naturally slip into a much more relaxed, comfortable, confident and enjoyable emotional state and frame of mind. In this frame of mind the conversation and smiles tends to flow naturally, without much thinking. Just like with your best friends. It's, in my experience, a very simple habit to adopt but at the same time it's also an incredibly powerful habit for tapping into your best social self. By using these three steps over and over they will become habits that are easy to use. And over time as you get good results in social situations the old normal of feeling nervous will be replaced by a new normal. A normal where you're – at least most of the time – relaxed and confident in social situations because all your recent experiences put together have changed how you view yourself and what you expect on dates, in meetings and other such situations.

Hi Beauties! It’s been a while, but the monthly teaser is BACK and arrived in your inbox first thing this morning with a fresh new look + round up of all our faves over the past few months! (If you’re not signed up for our monthly roundup, you can sign up  here .) We have so much fun compiling our favorite things each month and sharing them with you! We hope you find something fun, a new book, or a delicious recipe to try as we start a brand new month. Currently Listening to: “I get asked about weight loss often, but the answer is rarely as straight forward as we’ve been told over the years. This podcast was really insightful: Why Eating Less and Exercising More is a Recipe for Weight Gain with Dr. Elizabeth Boham” – Robin “I’m loving the That Sounds Fun with Annie F Downs Podcast – she’s been doing a daily quarantine series where she and a friend talk about life that day, how they’re feeling and other random things. I look forward to it each day!” – Jaclyn “The team got together for a fun bonus podcast episode recently, sharing how we all work from home – our tips and things we don’t do. It was a fun conversation, have a listen here !” – Jordin “I found this episode of The Rise Podcast with Gretchen Rubin about choosing joy even in this current season to be very encouraging and full of great practical tips.” – Susan We also just created a TBL spotify account . Come follow along for our current faves we have on repeat and see some of our favorite playlists that we love to listen to throughout the work day. 🎧 Currently Reading: “I’ve been reading “ Stillness is the Key ” by Ryan Holiday. It seemed like the perfect time to start a book about the importance of slowing down and being present.”  – Robin “After years of wanting to, I finally joined the Book of the Month club …and first up in my stack is “ Valentine ” by Elizabeth Wetmore and “ The Guest List ” by Lucy Foley.” – Martha “I just read “ We Came Here to Forget “ by Andrea Dunlop. It was a great book with some wonderful characters that I missed when it was over.” – Jordin “I recently finished John Mark Comer’s book, “ The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry .” It opened my eyes to so many ways I can shift my mindset and schedule to enjoy the present more.” – Susan Wardrobe: “I’m living in this cozy PJ set from Target – the shirt doesn’t even look like PJ’s if you’re on a zoom call!”  – Robin “I basically have a new wardrobe during these quarantine months and on top is almost always my TBL Deep Breaths + Pilates sweatshirt .” – Martha “I’ve been wearing these slippers non-stop since I’ve been home so much! Keep my feet cozy but have a decent sole so still getting some support for my feet!” – Jaclyn “All of my purchases have been, “for summer!” 🙂 I’m loving these comfy reef flip flops + adorable new earrings – perfect for when things settle down and I can go on a beach vacation!” – Jordin Self-Care: “I’ve been loving this skin serum + miracle mist from Lumion. And you can use THEBALANCEDLIFE at checkout for 15% off!” – Robin “Taking a bath is my favorite way to unwind and I’ve been loving this coconut milk bath soak . I love sipping on this hot tea in the evening as well – both of these products help me relax and sleep well.” – Jordin “I’m still loving the quick workouts from the Pilates Strength + Stress Relief challenge we ran in March! It’s been re-released if anyone wants to give them a try – and they are free!” – Becky In the Kitchen: “We’ve added “cooking class” into our home school routine. And by that, I’m teaching the kids to do basic skills such as toasting bread, making sandwiches, slicing bananas, spreading peanut butter, etc. I surprised them with these kids knives to get them excited about the new responsibility. My goal is to have the older two making their own breakfasts and lunches by the time time they’re back in school!” – Robin “These pickled red onions are upping our salad and sandwich game when we are trying to add some extra flavors to our meals at home.” – Becky “My sister shared this recipe with me and I’m so glad she did – I’ve been making Bri McKoy’s Sticky Honey Chicken once a week for at least a month!” – Martha “Like most people, I am trying to get creative in the kitchen to use what I have on hand and keep leftovers for easy access! We’re loving this baked spaghetti recipe , and this lentil chili + gluten free cornbread .” – Elisabeth “I love following the Natural Nurturer right now. She has great tips for helping your kids try + enjoy new recipes. She’s also sharing how she’s adapting recipes in this time to work for her family based on what they have on hand.” – Jaclyn Did you find anything new from our monthly favorites? Let us know in the comments! We would also love to hear what you are currently loving during this crazy season. It’s so much fun to share good things! xo, Robin + The Balanced Life Team Get 3 FREE Pilates workouts in your inbox now! YES PLEASE!

It’s the deeper conversations that bring much of the richness to life. Unfortunately, many of us aren’t getting to the deeper layers within ourselves because we’re too busy trying to keep up, do all the right things, and get everything done. So we end up becoming more superficial, more anxious, and less content, with very little balance in our lives. Today, we’re taking a peek behind the scenes in the life of Laura Tremaine. Laura brings a great deal of depth to the online space, with her honest conversations about the real things in life that truly matter. In today’s episode, she talks about her life, about juggling motherhood and working, and she discusses her experience with and her passion for Pilates. Be sure to tune in, to hear our frank and sincere conversation with Laura. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! Keeping up is an impossible goal Our need to pause, re-evaluate, and go deeper A typical week in Laura’s life It’s hard to be present when you’re feeling depleted Laura shares her top priorities Giving your kids a healthy view of you, as a working parent Laura talks about her relationship with her body The enormous shift in her spirit from doing Pilates Links in this episode: The Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge @thebalancedlife on instagram The Miracle Morning L’Oreal Vouminous Mascara Keep up with Laura! @laura.tremaine on instagram @10thingstotellyou on instagram 10 Things to Tell You Laura’s website Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

Are you also working from home now? If so, how have you been coping with the change? There are so many people working unexpectedly from home at the moment, so we decided to create a fun, bonus episode for you, to talk about what it’s like to work from home in the longer-term. Because staying at home can be awesome, but it’s not without its challenges. Listen in today, to hear what Becky, Elizabeth, Jaclyn, Martha, Jordin, and Susan have to share. At The Balanced Life, we work as a remote team, and we have some of the members of the team here today, at the recording of this episode. We have all been working remotely for a while, and we’re all used to connecting with our co-workers digitally. So we thought it would be a fun idea to bring us all together today, to talk about what we have learned from working at home for the last few years. Stay tuned to hear about our lessons learned from working at home. Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! Feeling healthy, balanced, and productive is very important when working from home. Priorities are vital. Setting up a routine, structures, and communications from home. Planning for productivity. Defining your workspace. Creating healthy work boundaries. Keeping a routine of healthy eating. Some practical tools to help teams working from home. Links in this episode: Asana Slack Zoom At-home Pilates workouts through The Balanced Life Sisterhood FREE Pilates workouts delivered to your inbox! Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

Today I'd like to share a collection of quotes on perseverance. Because to me this is one of the most underrated things in life and one of the most powerful qualities a person can have. People often focus on talent, inspiration and intelligence when they talk about achieving success (or overcoming tough times). But perseverance often is forgotten. So this post is all about that. I hope you'll find something here that helps you to keep moving forward and to achieve what you want – and need – in your life. And if you want more motivation and tips that will help you to keep going and to keep growing then check out this collection of quotes on never giving up and these two with quotes on moving forward and growth mindset quotes . 84 Perseverance Quotes to Renew Your Motivation and Energy “Nothing in the world can take the place of perseverance. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost legendary. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Perseverance and determination alone are omnipotent.” Calvin Coolidge “A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” Christopher Reeve “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.” Marie Curie “Success comes from curiosity, concentration, perseverance and self-criticism.” Albert Einstein “In the realm of ideas everything depends on enthusiasm… in the real world all rests on perseverance.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe “The people who stick with things for years and never stop almost always win the race.” James Clear “The extent of the struggle determines the extent of the growth. The obstacle is an advantage, not adversity. The enemy is any perception that prevents us from seeing this.” Ryan Holiday “Persist and persevere, and you will find most things that are attainable, possible.” Lord Chesterfield “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” Winston Churchill “Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.” Arnold Schwarzenegger “Tough times never last, but tough people do.” Robert H. Schuller “Courage isn’t having the strength to go on – it is going on when you don’t have strength.” Napoléon Bonaparte “When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it.” Henry Ford “Through perseverance many people win success out of what seemed destined to be certain failure.” Benjamin Disraeli “You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” Maya Angelou “In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins – not through strength but by perseverance.” H. Jackson Brown “It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.” Albert Einstein “We can do anything we want to do if we stick to it long enough.” Helen Keller “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” Harriet Beecher Stowe “Anyone can give up, it's the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone else would understand if you fell apart, that's true strength.” Unknown “Anyone can hide. Facing up to things, working through them, that’s what makes you strong.” Sarah Dessen “The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.” Randy Pausch “I’ve always made a total effort, even when the odds seemed entirely against me. I never quit trying; I never felt that I didn’t have a chance to win.” Arnold Palmer “Three tips for becoming successful: consistency, consistency, and consistency.” Joe De Sana “There is no armor like perseverance.” Sogyal Rinpoche “Adversity is always the partner of progress.” John C. Maxwell “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.” Thomas Edison “At any given moment you have the power to say: This is not how the story is going to end.” Christine Mason Miller “An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he’s in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.” Charles F. Kettering “Like success, failure is many things to many people. With positive mental attitude, failure is a learning experience, a rung on the ladder, and a plateau at which to get your thoughts in order to prepare to try again.” W. Clement Stone “All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me… You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.” Walt Disney “I am not judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times I succeed: and the number of times I succeed is in direct proportion to the number of times I fail and keep trying.” Tom Hopkins “Adversity, and perseverance and all these things can shape you. They can give you a value and a self-esteem that is priceless.” Scott Hamilton “Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.” James A. Michener “One of the most astonishing human traits: our ability to keeping getting up, lugging ourselves around and doing our stuff day after day.” Alain de Botton “The three ordinary things that we often don’t pay enough attention to, but which I believe are the drivers of all success, are hard work, perseverance, and basic honesty.” Azim Premji “What do you first do when you learn to swim? You make mistakes, do you not? And what happens? You make other mistakes, and when you have made all the mistakes you possibly can without drowning – and some of them many times over – what do you find? That you can swim? Well – life is just the same as learning to swim! Do not be afraid of making mistakes, for there is no other way of learning how to live!” Alfred Adler ”Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” Richard Branson “When I was young, I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. So I did ten times more work.” George Bernard Shaw “In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” Albert Camus “Perseverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th.” Julie Andrews “A failure is not always a mistake. It may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying.” B. F. Skinner “The further the reward from the effort, the thinner the competition. Patience is the gatekeeper.” Johnny Uzan “Let me tell you the secret that has led to my goal. My strength lies solely in my tenacity.” Louis Pasteur “Men fail much oftener from want of perseverance than from want of talent.” William Cobbett “Inside of a ring or out, ain’t nothing wrong with going down. It’s staying down that’s wrong.” Muhammad Ali “You build on failure. You use it as a steppingstone. Close the door on the past. You don’t try to forget the mistakes, but you don’t dwell on it. You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.” Johnny Cash “We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it. But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it.” John Newton “I am not afraid of storms, for I am learning how to sail my ship.” Louisa May Alcott “If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.” Flavia Weedn “You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” Marcus Aurelius “It’s always to soon to quit.” Norman Vincent Peale “The most important thing is to keep going. The second most important thing is to choose the right direction.” Maxime Lagacé “‘Tis a lesson you should heed. Try, try, try again. If at first you don’t succeed – try, try, try again.” William Edward Hickson “Perseverance, secret of all triumphs.” Victor Hugo “Amateurs give up at the first sign of trouble and assume they’re failures. Professionals see failure as part of the path to growth and mastery.” Shane Parrish “Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of a greater or equal benefit.” Napoleon Hill “All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.” Sophocles “Failure isn’t fatal, but failure to change might be.” John Wooden “Most great people have attained their greatest success one step beyond their greatest failure.” Napoleon Hill “I like criticism. It makes you strong.” LeBron James “Fall seven times, stand up eight.” Chinese Proverb “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.'” Eleanor Roosevelt “Things work out best for those who make the best of how things work out.” John Wooden “Try a thing you haven’t done three times. Once, to get over the fear of doing it. Twice, to learn how to do it. And a third time to figure out whether you like it or not.” Virgil Thomson “The most essential factor is persistence – the determination never to allow your energy or enthusiasm to be dampened by the discouragement that must inevitably come.” James Whitcomb Riley “Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another.” Walter Elliott “Perseverance is a positive, active characteristic. It is not idly, passively waiting and hoping for some good thing to happen. It gives us hope by helping us realize that the righteous suffer no failure except in giving up and no longer trying. We must never give up, regardless of temptations, frustrations, disappointments, or discouragements.” Joseph P. Wirthlin “The magnitude of a progress is gauged by the greatness of the sacrifice that it requires.” Friedrich Nietzsche “I did not succeed in life by intelligence. I succeeded because I have a long attention span.” Charlie Munger “Just remember, you can do anything you set your mind to, but it takes action, perseverance, and facing your fears.” Gillian Anderson “If you fell down yesterday, stand up today.” H.G. Wells “Most of us, swimming against the tides of trouble the world knows nothing about, need only a bit of praise or encouragement – and we will make the goal.” Jerome Fleishman “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.” Samuel Beckett “In times of great stress or adversity, it’s always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.” Lee Iacocca “So many of our dreams at first seem impossible, then they seem improbable, and then, when we summon the will, they soon become inevitable.” Christopher Reeve “The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassions, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.” Elizabeth Kubler-Ross “When you have exhausted all possibilities, remember this: you haven’t.” Thomas Edison “Your dream doesn’t have an expiration date. Take a deep breath and try again.” Unknown “Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.” Lou Holtz “Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.” Mahatma Gandhi “Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.” Dale Carnegie “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, “I will try again tomorrow.” Mary Anne Radmacher “When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill, When the funds are low and the debts are high, And you want to smile but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit Rest if you must, but don’t you quit. Success is failure turned inside out, The silver tint on the clouds of doubt, And you can never tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems afar. So, stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit It’s when things go wrong that you mustn’t quit.” Edgar A. Guest

Pilates Day is coming up on Saturday, May 2nd and to celebrate, I’d love for you to join me for a morning of Pilates & self-care! Pilates Day is an opportunity for the Pilates community to come together and share Pilates with the world – so EVERYONE can experience the joy, health, and quality of life that can be found through this empowering form of exercise. To celebrate, I’ll be hosting a FREE morning of  Pilates & self-care  and I’d love for you to join me and invite your friends! Here at The Balanced Life, we take a different approach to self-care… Our celebration will center around a LIVE 30-minute Pilates class over on Facebook you can do from the comfort of your own home. (Don’t worry, if you don’t have a Facebook account, you can still watch!)  We’ve also put together ideas to treat yourself to a restorative morning of self-care based on how much time you have available. CLICK HERE  for all of the details and to choose how you’ll spend your morning of self-care. I can’t wait to lead you through a LIVE 30-minute routine to celebrate Pilates Day and to continue supporting you in this season. Take a moment to add this event to your calendar – it’s going to be so much fun! I’ll see you on your mat soon! xo, Ready to BUILD STRENGTH & FEEL GOOD in just 15 minutes a day? Join the FREE 5-day Pilates Strong challenge! JOIN THE FREE CHALLENGE!

I like deep quotes. The ones that set my mind off in a new direction. Or make me think a little extra (or sometimes a lot). So in this post I'd like to share 160 of the most thought-provoking quotes I've found over the past 10+ years. I've divided this big post into a few different sections on for example life, love ( for yourself and others) and motivation to make it easier to navigate and use. I hope you'll find something here that helps you to find a new perspective and improve your own life. And if you need more motivation and help then I recommend this post with quotes on never giving up and this one filled with quotes on moving forward in life . Deep Quotes About Life and Happiness “Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” Buddha “There are more things to alarm us than to harm us, and we suffer more often in apprehension than reality.” Seneca “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” Marthe Troly-Curtin “When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” Helen Keller “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.” Maya Angelou “The pleasure which we most rarely experience gives us greatest delight.” Epictetus “Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.” Epicurus “Men spend their lives in anticipations, in determining to be vastly happy at some period when they have time. But the present time has one advantage over every other – it is our own. Past opportunities are gone, future have not come. We may lay in a stock of pleasures, as we would lay in a stock of wine; but if we defer the tasting of them too long, we shall find that both are soured by age.” Charles Caleb Colton “Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow “A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed.” Henrik Ibsen “Perhaps they are not stars, but rather openings in heaven where the love of our lost ones pours through and shines down upon us to let us know they are happy.” Eskimo Proverb “Just because it didn’t last forever, doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth your while.” Unknown “Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.” Winnie the Pooh “When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened.” Winston Churchill “Don't rely on someone else for your happiness and self-worth. Only you can be responsible for that. If you can't love and respect yourself – no one else will be able to make that happen. Accept who you are – completely; the good and the bad – and make changes as YOU see fit – not because you think someone else wants you to be different.” Stacey Charter “It's been my experience that you can nearly always enjoy things if you make up your mind firmly that you will.” L.M. Montgomery “You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else.” Albert Einstein “The more you know who you are, and what you want, the less you let things upset you.” Stephanie Perkins “The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance, the wise grows it under his feet.” James Oppenheim “The reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was, the present worse than it is, and the future less resolved than it will be.” Marcel Pagnol “Happiness is within. It has nothing to do with how much applause you get or how many people praise you. Happiness comes when you believe that you have done something truly meaningful.” Martin Yan “If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.” Epicurus “If you want happiness for an hour — take a nap. If you want happiness for a day — go fishing. If you want happiness for a year — inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime — help someone else.” Chinese Proverb “Our envy always lasts longer than the happiness of those we envy.” Heraclitus “The greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances.” Martha Washington “On a deeper level you are already complete. When you realize that, there is a playful, joyous energy behind what you do.” Eckhart Tolle “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” George Bernard Shaw “Follow your bliss and don’t be afraid, and doors will open where you didn’t know they were going to be.” Joseph Campbell “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven? And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives? When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see in truth that you are weeping for that which has been your delight.” Kahlil Gibran “Until you value yourself, you won't value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.” M. Scott Peck “The reason why we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind the scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.” Stephen Furtick “Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.” Soren Kierkegaard “If you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.” Jim Rohn “It is only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth – and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up – that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had.” Elizabeth Kubler-Ross Deep Quotes About Love “Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.” James Baldwin “The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.” Morrie Schwartz “Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky.” Rainer Maria Rilke “The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost.” Gilbert K. Chesterton “Love is a friendship set to music.” Joseph Campbell “Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.” Lord Byron “The only thing we never get enough of is love; and the only thing we never give enough of is love.” Henry Miller “Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.” Vincent Van Gogh “I love you not because of who you are, but because of who I am when I am with you.” Roy Croft “If you would be loved, love, and be loveable.” Benjamin Franklin “You know it's love when all you want is that person to be happy, even if you're not part of their happiness.”* Julia Roberts “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” Rumi “The art of love is largely the art of persistence.” Albert Ellis “Love is an untamed force. When we try to control it, it destroys us. When we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. When we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused.” Paulo Coelho “It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death.” Eleanor Roosevelt “If you aren’t good at loving yourself, you will have a difficult time loving anyone, since you’ll resent the time and energy you give another person that you aren’t even giving to yourself.” Barbara De Angelis “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.” Anaïs Nin “Love does not dominate; it cultivates.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe “When you adopt the viewpoint that there is nothing that exists that is not part of you, that there is no one who exists who is not part of you, that any judgment you make is self-judgment, that any criticism you level is self-criticism, you will wisely extend to yourself an unconditional love that will be the light of the world.” Harry Palmer “Love is what you've been through with somebody.” James Thurber “For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.” Seneca “Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.' Mature love says ‘I need you because I love you.'” Erich Fromm “Loving people live in a loving world. Hostile people live in a hostile world. Same world.” Wayne Dyer Deep Motivational Quotes “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” Arthur Ashe “Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn’t arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I’m going to be happy in it.“ Groucho Marx “One of the best pieces of advice I ever got was from a horse master. He told me to go slow to go fast. I think that applies to everything in life. We live as though there aren't enough hours in the day but if we do each thing calmly and carefully we will get it done quicker and with much less stress.” Viggo Mortensen “It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop.” Confucius “Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” Albert Einstein “Just one small positive thought in the morning can change your whole day.” Dalai Lama “If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend six hours sharpening my ax.” Abraham Lincoln “If you don’t pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, it will take more of your attention than it deserves.” David Allen “Morning is an important time of day, because how you spend your morning can often tell you what kind of day you are going to have.” Lemony Snicket “Follow effective actions with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.” Peter Drucker “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” Albert Einstein “If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right.” Henry Ford “Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” Richard Branson “Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.” Wayne Dyer “A ship is always safe at shore but that is not what it’s built for.” Albert Einstein “Show me a person who has never made a mistake and I'll show you someone who has never achieved much.” Joan Collins “Either you run the day or the day runs you.” Jim Rohn “Like success, failure is many things to many people. With positive mental attitude, failure is a learning experience, a rung on the ladder, and a plateau at which to get your thoughts in order to prepare to try again.” W. Clement Stone “Dreams can come true, but there is a secret. They're realized through the magic of persistence, determination, commitment, passion, practice, focus and hard work. They happen a step at a time, manifested over years, not weeks.” Elbert Hubbard “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.” Mark Twain “I have had dreams, and I’ve had nightmares. I overcame the nightmares because of my dreams.” Jonas Salk “Much of the stress that people feel doesn’t come from having too much to do. It comes from not finishing what they started.” David Allen “The best way to succeed in this world is to act on the advice you give to others.” Unknown “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.” Stephen King “There are two types of people who will tell you that you cannot make a difference in this world: those who are afraid to try and those who are afraid you will succeed.” Ray Goforth “Nothing in the world can take the place of perseverance. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost legendary. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Perseverance and determination alone are omnipotent.” Calvin Coolidge “Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.” Earl Nightingale “Aim for success, not perfection. Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life. Remember that fear always lurks behind perfectionism.” David M. Burns “All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.” T.E. Lawrence “Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly.” Stephen R. Covey “To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children… to leave the world a better place… to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.” Ralph Waldo Emerson “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain Deep Quotes That Make You Think “Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” Thich Nhat Hanh “If men would consider not so much wherein they differ, as wherein they agree, there would be far less of uncharitableness and angry feeling in the world.” Joseph Addison “Most people would rather be certain they’re miserable, than risk being happy.” Dr. Robert Anthony “When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.” Peter Marshall “You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.” Clay P. Bedford “The fullness of life is only accessible in the present moment.” Eckhart Tolle “If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.” Abraham Maslow “Life's real failure is when you do not realize how close you were to success when you gave up.” Unknown “The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.” M. Scott Peck “For most of life, nothing wonderful happens. If you don’t enjoy getting up and working and finishing your work and sitting down to a meal with family or friends, then the chances are you’re not going to be very happy. If someone bases his/her happiness on major events like a great job, huge amounts of money, a flawlessly happy marriage or a trip to Paris, that person isn’t going to be happy much of the time. If, on the other hand, happiness depends on a good breakfast, flowers in the yard, a drink or a nap, then we are more likely to live with quite a bit of happiness.” Andy Rooney “You can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses.” Tom Wilson “I don't want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well.” Diane Ackerman “After every difficulty, ask yourself two questions: “What did I do right?” and “What would I do differently?” Brian Tracy “Never idealize others. They will never live up to your expectations. Don’t over-analyze your relationships. Stop playing games. A growing relationship can only be nurtured by genuineness.“ Leo F. Buscaglia “The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny.” Albert Ellis “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” Winston Churchill “Nothing is less productive than to make more efficient what should not be done at all.” Peter Drucker “When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.” Ralph Waldo Emerson “Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow. It only saps today of its joy.” Leo Buscaglia “If people did not do silly things, nothing intelligent would ever get done.” Ludwig Wittgenstein “Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it.” Andy Rooney Short Deep Quotes “No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.” Aesop “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” Eleanor Roosevelt “And remember, no matter where you go, there you are.” Confucius “Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.” Dalai Lama “There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will.” Epictetus “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.” Anaïs Nin “Success is largely a matter of holding on after others have let go.” Unknown “The best revenge is massive success.” Frank Sinatra “We become what we think about.” Earl Nightingale “New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings.” Lao Tzu “To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others.” Albert Camus “Love is a better teacher than duty.” Albert Einstein “There is more to life than increasing its speed.” Mahatma Gandhi “The unhappy derive comfort from the misfortunes of others.” Aesop “The two enemies of human happiness are pain and boredom.” Arthur Schopenhauer “Your work is discover your world and then with all your heart give yourself to it.” Buddha “If you are too busy to laugh, you are too busy.” Proverb “The best proof of love is trust.” Joyce Brothers “Your problem is you’re… too busy holding onto your unworthiness.” Ram Dass “It ain't what they call you, it's what you answer to.” W.C. Fields “The better you feel about yourself, the less you feel the need to show off.” Robert Hand “Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.” Abraham Lincoln “Success comes in cans; failure in can'ts.” Unknown “For success, attitude is equally as important as ability.” Harry F. Banks “A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval.” Mark Twain “Too many people overvalue what they are not and undervalue what they are.” Malcolm S. Forbes “Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” Jack Canfield “Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory.” Albert Schweitzer “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” George Bernard Shaw “It is more fitting for a man to laugh at life than to lament over it.” Seneca “I don’t think of all the misery but of the beauty that still remains.” Anne Frank “What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise.” Oscar Wilde “There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” Anaïs Nin “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” Karen Lamb Deep Friendship Quotes “Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, ‘What! You too? I thought I was the only one.” C.S. Lewis “Sweet is the memory of distant friends! Like the mellow rays of the departing sun, it falls tenderly, yet sadly, on the heart.” Washington Irving “I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen.” Ernest Hemingway “There’s not a word yet for old friends who’ve just met.” Jim Henson “You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.” Dale Carnegie “A loyal friend laughs at your jokes when they’re not so good, and sympathizes with your problems when they’re not so bad.” Arnold H. Glasgow “One measure of friendship consists not in the number of things friends can discuss, but in the number of things they need no longer mention.” Clifton Fadiman “I don’t need a friend who changes when I change and who nods when I nod; my shadow does that much better.” Plutarch “Friends are those rare people who ask how we are and then wait to hear the answer.” Ed Cunningham “The real test of friendship is can you literally do nothing with the other person? Can you enjoy those moments of life that are utterly simple?” Eugene Kennedy “No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.” Alice Walker “Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.” Anais Nin “Some of the biggest challenges in relationships come from the fact that most people enter a relationship in order to get something: they’re trying to find someone who’s going to make them feel good. In reality, the only way a relationship will last is if you see your relationship as a place that you go to give, and not a place that you go to take.” Anthony Robbins “If you go looking for a friend, you’re going to find they’re very scarce. If you go out to be a friend, you’ll find them everywhere.” Zig Ziglar “There’s one sad truth in life I’ve found While journeying east and west – The only folks we really wound Are those we love the best. We flatter those we scarcely know, We please the fleeting guest, And deal full many a thoughtless blow To those who love us best.” Ella Wheeler Wilcox “How many slams in an old screen door? Depends how loud you shut it. How many slices in a bread? Depends how thin you cut it. How much good inside a day? Depends how good you live ’em. How much love inside a friend? Depends how much you give ’em.” Shel Silverstein

In this post I'd like to share a collection of quotes about mistakes. Because sometimes making a mistake is a natural part of a life well-lived. It's OK to make them (despite what you may have heard from some people). And because it is so important to have a healthy perspective on mistakes so that you can use them to your advantage and bounce back from a setback (and regain your self-confidence ). I hope you'll find something motivating and helpful here. And if you need something more when you're in a tough situation then have a look at this post filled with quotes on self care . Inspiring Quotes about Mistakes “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Albert Einstein “You make mistakes. Mistakes don’t make you.” Maxwell Maltz “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” Henry Ford “The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” Elbert Hubbard “No matter how many mistakes you make or how slow you progress, you’re still way ahead of everyone who isn’t trying.” Tony Robbins “All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.” Sophocles “A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.” John C. Maxwell “You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don’t try to forget the mistakes, but you don’t dwell on it. You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.” Johnny Cash “What do you first do when you learn to swim? You make mistakes, do you not? And what happens? You make other mistakes, and when you have made all the mistakes you possibly can without drowning – and some of them many times over – what do you find? That you can swim? Well – life is just the same as learning to swim! Do not be afraid of making mistakes, for there is no other way of learning how to live!” Alfred Adler “A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent in doing nothing.” George Bernard Shaw “It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.” Winston Churchill “Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes.” Oscar Wilde “Any action is often better than no action, especially if you have been stuck in an unhappy situation for a long time. If it is a mistake, at least you learn something, in which case it's no longer a mistake. If you remain stuck, you learn nothing.” Eckhart Tolle “The proactive approach to a mistake is to acknowledge it instantly, correct and learn from it.” Stephen Covey “Thinking too much just brings it back to me, me, me—but thanking takes my eyes off myself and my mistakes and puts them on others, on things bigger than myself. I can’t stand here very long without being humbled at how small I am and amazed at how big and beautiful our world is.” Elizabeth Musser “The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything.” Theodore Roosevelt “Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.” Mahatma Gandhi “In the real world, the smartest people are people who make mistakes and learn. In school, the smartest people don’t make mistakes.” Robert T. Kiyosaki “Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” Conrad Hilton “We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are here now with the power to shape your day and your future.” Steve Maraboli “Well, we all make mistakes, dear, so just put it behind you. We should regret our mistakes and learn from them, but never carry them forward into the future with us.” L.M. Montgomery “It ain’t as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning.” Colin Powell “A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.” Douglas Adams “Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time.” George Bernard Shaw “You can't really be strong until you can see a funny side to things.” Ken Kesey “When you make a mistake, there are only three things you should ever do about it: admit it, learn from it, and don’t repeat it.” Paul Bear Bryant “Sometimes you don’t realize your own strength until you come face to face with your greatest weakness.” Susan Gale “ Anyone can give up, it's the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone else would understand if you fell apart, that's true strength .” Unknown “It takes guts and humility to admit mistakes. Admitting we're wrong is courage, not weakness.” Roy T. Bennett “The man with a toothache thinks everyone happy whose teeth are sound. The poverty-stricken man makes the same mistake about the rich man.” George Bernard Shaw “Life is very interesting. In the end, some of your greatest pains become your greatest strengths.” Drew Barrymore “If you want to grow, you need to get over any fear you have of making mistakes.” John C. Maxwell “Anyone can hide. Facing up to things, working through them, that’s what makes you strong.” Sarah Dessen “Learn from other people’s mistakes.” Tai Lopez “The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake.” Meister Eckhart “Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.” Rita Mae Brown “All the adversity I’ve had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me… You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.” Walt Disney “All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes.” Winston Churchill ”Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” Richard Branson “A man may fail many times but he isn’t a failure until he begins to blame somebody else.” John Burroughs “Mistakes are the portals of discovery.” James Joyce “Part of being a man is learning to take responsibility for your successes and for your failures. You can’t go blaming others or being jealous. Seeing somebody else’s success as your failure is a cancerous way to live.” Kevin Bacon “It’s not how we make mistakes, but how we correct them that defines us.” Rachel Wolchin “I’ve come to believe that all my past failure and frustrations were actually laying the foundation for the understandings that have created the new level of living I now enjoy.” Anthony Robbins “Fall seven times, stand up eight.” Chinese Proverb “It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you have failed by default.” J.K. Rowling “Things work out best for those who make the best of how things work out.” John Wooden “If you so choose, every mistake can lead to greater understanding and effectiveness. If you so choose, every frustration can help you to be more patient and more persistent.” Ralph Marston “There are no mistakes or failures, only lessons.” Denis Waitley “Your best teacher is your last mistake.” Ralph Nader “One of the disadvantages of wine is that it makes a man mistake words for thoughts.” Samuel Johnson “Most great people have attained their greatest success one step beyond their greatest failure.” Napoleon Hill “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.” Marie Curie “Inside of a ring or out, ain’t nothing wrong with going down. It’s staying down that’s wrong.” Muhammad Ali “Don't think in the morning. That's a big mistake that people make. They wake up in the morning and they start thinking. Don't think. Just execute the plan. The plan is the alarm clock goes off, you get up, you go work out. Get some.” Jocko Willink “Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.” Lou Holtz “Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.” Arnold Schwarzenegger “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” Theodore Roosevelt “Make glorious amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody has ever made before. Do not freeze, do not stop, do not worry. Whatever you are scared of doing, do it.” Neil Gaiman “There is no sense in punishing your future for the mistakes of your past. Forgive yourself, grow from it, and then let it go.” Melanie Koulouris “Don’t brood. Get on with living and loving. You don’t have forever.” Leo Buscaglia “Even a mistake may turn out to be the one thing necessary to a worthwhile achievement.” Henry Ford “Don’t let the mistakes and disappointments of the past control and direct your future.” Zig Ziglar “We all make them, the difference is what we do after we make the mistake, how we see the mistake – a learning experience or a failure.” Catherine Pulsifer “The mistakes we regret the most are the ones we were too scared to make.” Ollie Slaney “Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not. ” Carl G. Jung “Don’t be ashamed by your mistakes, they only prove that you try hard and never give up.” Riley Czarkowski “To make no mistakes is not in the power of man; but from their errors and mistakes the wise and good learn wisdom for the future.” Plutarch “It’s not a person’s mistakes which define them – it’s the way they make amends.” Freya North “Forget your mistakes but remember what they taught you.” Vannetta Chapman “Admitting to a mistake means refusing to use other people as scape-goats to avoid responsibility but rather courageously owning up to every single one of them.” T. Whitmore “We make our discoveries through our mistakes: we watch one another’s success: and where there is freedom to experiment there is hope to improve.” Sir Arthur Thomas “Embrace being perfectly imperfect. Learn from your mistakes and forgive yourself, you’ll be happier.” Roy T. Bennett “An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field.” Niels Bohr “A mistake repeated more than once is a decision.” Paulo Coelho “What type of language do you use with yourself when you notice some flaw or make a mistake – do you insult yourself, or do you take a more kind and understanding tone?” Kristin Neff “And a step backward, after making a wrong turn, is a step in the right direction.” Kurt Vonnegut “My greatest hope regarding the future rests on the mistakes I’ve made in the past, for those are the most effective things I’ve got to build with.” Craig D. Lounsbrough “Always make new mistakes.” Esther Dyson “Many people make the mistake of basing the quality of their own successes on other people's standards and expectations. You'll achieve far more personal satisfaction trying to impress yourself than you will trying to impress someone else.” Kory Livingstone “Let all your regrets and mistakes become your sails and your rudders, and not your anchors” Sotero M Lopez II “Mistakes are the usual bridge between inexperience and wisdom.” Phyllis Theroux “A man must learn from his own mistakes, to be what he wishes to be.” Lailah Gifty Akita “The greatest mistake you can make is to believe that you have to do everything on your own power. Do not assume that asking for help or guidance is to admit defeat. In fact, it is just the opposite. To ask for help or to accept help to accomplish a goal is to also ingrain into your own spirit that you will help others over obstacles or hurdles as well.” Catherine Pulsifer “There are no mistakes in life, only lessons. There is no such thing as a negative experience, only opportunities to grow, learn and advance along the road of self-mastery. From struggle comes strength. Even pain can be a wonderful teacher.” Robin Sharma Mistake Quotes About Relationships and Love “At an early age I learned that people make mistakes, and you have to decide if their mistakes are bigger than your love for them.” Angie Thomas “Honesty is the fastest way to prevent a mistake from turning into a failure.” James Altucher “If you spend your time hoping someone will suffer the consequences for what they did to your heart, then you’re allowing them to hurt you a second time in your mind.” Shannon L. Alder “A mistake made with good in your heart is still a mistake, but it is one for which you must forgive yourself.” Linda Sue Park “You make mistakes. You try to learn from them, and when you don't, it hurts even more.” Aretha Franklin “Girls you’ve gotta know when it’s time to turn the page.” Tori Amos “One who makes no mistakes makes nothing.” Giacomo Casanova Funny Mistake Quotes “Smart people learn from their mistakes. But the real sharp ones learn from the mistakes of others.” Brandon Mull “I have learned from my mistakes, and I am sure I can repeat them exactly.” Peter Cook “Laughing at our mistakes can lengthen our own life. Laughing at someone else’s can shorten it.” Cullen Hightower “Mistakes are a part of being human. Precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way. Unless it’s a fatal mistake, which, at least, others can learn from.” Al Franken “To make a mistake is human, but to blame it on someone else, that's even more human.” Unknown “Do not make the mistake of treating your dogs like humans or they will treat you like dogs.” Martha Scott “I was born to make mistakes, not to fake perfection.” Drake “A failure is like fertilizer; it stinks to be sure, but it makes things grow faster in the future.” Denis Waitley “I never made a mistake in my life. I thought I did once, but I was wrong.” Charles M. Schulz “I have learned all kinds of things from my many mistakes. The one thing I never learn is to stop making them.” Joe Abercrombie

Hi Beauties, Are you feeling stressed, anxious, or overwhelmed? Or maybe just exhausted from the thoughts that have been running around in your head each day? You’re not alone. If you’re looking for a way to create more calm in your life right now…here are 3 easy things that will help: Step outside for fresh air + deep breaths. Leave your phone inside and and as you breathe, focus on what you see, hear, and feel. This will help to calm your mind and your nervous system as a whole. Find one little space in your home that you can declutter. Our “off the mat” mission in The Sisterhood this month is all about decluttering (we just kicked off a new month and re-opened enrollment for you, it’s not too late to  join us ! Creating a little more calm in our surroundings can help create more calm in our minds. Turn off the news and create a plan for how you will consume it moving forward. We can stay informed without being glued to the latest headline. Limiting our news consumption can have an immediate impact on how calm we feel throughout the day. Pay extra attention to the pop up notifications and accounts that you follow that may feed you unsettling news when you’re not ready for it.  (I personally turn off all news notifications so I am 100% in control of what I see and when I see it .) And you  know  I have one last recommendation for you that can shift your mood from stressed and exhausted to calm and energized today…. take 10-15 minutes to do  Pilates ! Keep taking it one day at a time. I will continue to do all that I can to support you and provide the positivity & encouragement you need to make it through this challenging time. xo, PS – Do you know someone that is on the front lines serving as an essential worker right now? I’ve partnered with Parker Clay and a handful of other incredible brands to give away a bundle of amazing gifts to a new winner each day for 30 days!  Click here  to nominate someone you love! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

We often overcomplicate exercise and eating healthy, but finding a balanced routine that benefits and compliments your individual needs doesn’t have to be difficult. In this conversation, April Perry interviews Robin Long on how to create an optimal health routine and integrating habits that honor your season of life. Robin discusses how to build strength in all areas of life by using small wins to motivate and build confidence, as well as many other tips you can implement into your own daily routine. Join Robin and April in this enlightening and motivating conversation! Show highlights: what you can look forward to in this episode! Creating an optimal health routine that’s reflective of personal needs How to re-center when life throws you off balance and the many factors of finding a healthy routine Being conscious of your tell-tale signs of being off balance Integrating small steps to add more movement into your day How to establish maintainable habits and challenge yourself without getting discouraged Why Pilates is so effective and beneficial for the body How to get started doing 15 minutes of Pilates a day Results and benefits you’ll see from incorporating physical activity in your life Learning to have a healthy relationship with food and nourishing your body Links in this episode : The Balanced Life Sisterhood Join the FREE Pilates Strength + Stress Relief Challenge Check out April’s FREE training: How to finally stop drowning in piles or paper, clutter, emails, and to-do lists Share this podcast episode! Ready to finally stay consistent with exercise – even when you’re short on time & energy? Join me for the FREE Creating Healthy Routines Workshop & walk away with an exercise routine you can put into action immediately! I'M READY FOR THIS!

Today I'd like to share a collection of quotes on moving forward. To help you to let go of the past. Of what you need to move on from. And to confidently keep moving forward towards new things in life, your goals, dreams and what you deep down need and want. I hope these quotes will be as helpful for you as they have been for me when I've been stuck or felt like giving up on my own dreams and goals . That's what you'll find in the first section of this post. In the second part I'll share with you my 5 favorite tips that I use to let go of the past and move forward in my own life. 40 Inspiring and Motivating Moving Forward Quotes “Don’t dwell on what went wrong. Instead, focus on what to do next. Spend your energy moving forward together towards an answer.” Denis Waitley “The only thing a person can ever really do is keep moving forward. Take that big leap forward without hesitation, without once looking back. Simply forget the past and forge toward the future.” Alyson Noel “If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.” Martin Luther King Jr “When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” Alexander Graham Bell “The answer to every adversity lies in courageously moving forward with faith.” Edmond Mbiaka “If we fail to adapt, we fail to move forward.” John Wooden “Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in.” Napoleon Bonaparte “Life is like riding a bicycle, to keep your balance, you must keep moving.” Albert Einstein “There are things that we never want to let go of, people we never want to leave behind. But keep in mind that letting go isn’t the end of the world, it’s the beginning of a new life.” Unknown “Your past does not equal your future.” Anthony Robbins “Even a rock moves on.” Anthony Liccione “You can’t expect to move forward if your emergency break is on.” Angela Cecilia “The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.” Steve Maraboli “March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection. March on, and fear not the thorns, or the sharp stones on life's path.” Kahlil Gibran “You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Martin Luther King, Jr. “I demolish my bridges behind me…then there is no choice but to move forward.” Fridtjof Nansen “You are always a student, never a master. You have to keep moving forward.” Conrad Hall “In a moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing to do, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.” Theodore Roosevelt “Life moves on and so should we.” Spencer Johnson “If you’re not moving forward, you’re falling back.” Sam Waterson “Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.” Jim Rohn RELATED: 140 Funny Quotes to Lighten Your Mood and Reduce Stress “Time is an equal opportunity employer. Each human being has exactly the same number of hours and minutes every day. Rich people can't buy more hours. Scientists can't invent new minutes. And you can't save time to spend it on another day. Even so, time is amazingly fair and forgiving. No matter how much time you've wasted in the past, you still have an entire tomorrow.” Denis Waitley “We must be willing to let go of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” Joseph Campbell “A very wise man once told me that you can’t look back – you just have to put the past behind you, and find something better in your future.” Jodi Picoult “We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things because we’re curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” Walt Disney “When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need.” Lao Tzu “Every minute you spend in planning saves 10 minutes in execution; this gives you a 1000 percent return on energy.” Brian Tracy “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.” Steve Jobs “You can spend minutes, hours, days, weeks, or even months overanalyzing a situation; trying to put the pieces together, justifying what could’ve, would’ve happened… or you can just leave the pieces on the floor and move on.” Tupac Shakur “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus. “ Alexander Graham Bell “Follow effective actions with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.” Peter Drucker “Rehashing the past wouldn’t change anything. Time to move forward.” Zena Wynn “You really don’t have to burn any bridges to let go… You don’t have to destroy anything. You can just decide to cross over and move on.” Marta Mrotek “Set your goal and keep moving forward.” Georges St-Pierre “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus. “ Alexander Graham Bell “It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.” Theodore Roosevelt “Stop acting as if life is a rehearsal. Live this day as if it were your last. The past is over and gone. The future is not guaranteed.” Wayne Dyer “You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present.” Jan Glidewell “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” Karen Lamb “Don't wait. The time will never be just right.” Napoleon Hill My 5 Favorite Tips for Moving Forward 1. Know the benefits of letting go of the past. Why is it sometimes so hard to let go of something or of the past and move forward in life? One powerful reason is simply that there are benefits and advantages of not letting go. At least to get some instant gratification and if you’re just focused on the short run. You get to keep feeling like you’re right. And like the other person is wrong. And that can be pleasurable in it’s own way. You can stay in the victim role. And get support and attention from other people. You don’t have to go outside your comfort zone and into the scary unknown. You can stay with what you know and what feels familiar and safe even if it is not good or healthy for you. I know that this is what I get out of not letting go. I also know that is not worth it in the long run. Because: What will the long-term consequences be in my life if I do not let this go? How will it affect the next year in my life and the relationships I have with other people and with myself? Understanding that there are indeed benefits of not letting go but that they are just short-term upsides and that I will gain much more in the long run by letting go helps me to move forward instead of getting stuck. 2. Get a boost of optimism. Give yourself a kickstart to begin moving forward by getting a boost of optimism. Spend 10-15 minutes with a podcast, Youtube-video, book or website that gives you a shot of constructive optimism, enthusiasm and new energy. Audio books by Brian Tracy and the podcast from Tim Ferriss have helped me with that many times over the years. I have more recently also started to watch foodtraveler Mark Wiens for his enthusiasm and positive mindset and I like the upbeat and constructive energy of Youtuber Ali Abdaal . 3. Focus on what you CAN do something about. You do not have control of the past. So don’t get stuck in reliving it over and over again and in thinking about what you should have done differently. Learn from what mistakes were made and course-correct based on that. But then ask yourself this to move forward: What CAN I focus my time and energy on to actually make positive progress or a change in my life? 4. Start with just a small step. After you have found what you can do to move yourself forward instead of being stuck in worries or regrets ask yourself this: What is one small – or tiny – step I can take today to get started with that? This will help you to not get stuck in procrastination. Find just one small 5-minute step you can take to start your journey towards something new and better. If that still lands you in inner resistance and procrastination then find a tiny 1 minute step and get that done. The important thing is to get started and to not lapse back into the past or get lost in daydreams about the future. 5. Celebrate your small step forward and success. After you have accomplished your first small or tiny step and begun moving forward on your journey then celebrate that win. Have your favorite food for lunch. Eat a tasty snack. Spend a bit of time on your favorite hobby. Or buy yourself something you have wanted for some time. This will help you to recharge your energy and to up your motivation and confidence in yourself. And that will make it easier to keep taking small steps forward toward what you want and need in life.

What is a growth mindset? It is to keep on learning throughout life and improving your mindset, habits and yourself so that you can reach and achieve your goals and dreams. To grow as a person and understand that you can change and that you, your thoughts and emotions and your life situation is not set in stone. I hope this collection of 86 growth mindset quotes can inspire and help you to create and strengthen such an empowering and confidence-building mindset in your own life. Growth Mindset Quotes to Help You Towards Success “A man's mind, stretched by new ideas, may never return to its original dimensions.” Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. “Why waste time proving over and over how great you are, when you could be getting better? Why hide deficiencies instead of overcoming them? Why look for friends or partners who will just shore up your self-esteem instead of ones who will also challenge you to grow? And why seek out the tried and true, instead of experiences that will stretch you? The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset. This is the mindset that allows people to thrive during some of the most challenging times in their lives.” Carol Dweck “You will either step forward into growth, or you will step backward into safety.” Abraham Maslow “The only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn …and change.” Carl Rogers “It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.” Epictetus “Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting; in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be.” Zig Ziglar “If a man empties his purse into his head, no man can take it away from him. An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.” Ben Franklin “Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” Malcolm X “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Albert Einstein “The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.” Mark Twain “What we learn with pleasure we never forget.” Alfred Mercier “People learn something every day, and a lot of times it's that what they learned the day before was wrong.” Bill Vaughan “You can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.” Clay P. Bedford “Too often we give children answers to remember rather than problems to solve.” Roger Lewin “Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” Richard Branson “The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think — rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with thoughts of other men.” Bill Beattie “Do not train children to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each.” Plato “Education would be much more effective if its purpose was to ensure that by the time they leave school every boy and girl should know how much they do not know, and be imbued with a lifelong desire to know it.” William Haley “The best years of your life are the ones in which you decide your problems are your own. You do not blame them on your mother, the ecology, or the president. You realize that you control your own destiny.” Albert Ellis “Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand.” Chinese proverb “Follow effective actions with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.” Peter Drucker “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” Aristotle “A well-educated mind will always have more questions than answers.” Helen Keller “The difference between school and life? In school, you're taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you're given a test that teaches you a lesson.” Tom Bodett “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.” Walt Disney “Action is the foundational key to all success.” Pablo Picasso “Never limit yourself because of others’ limited imagination; never limit others because of your own limited imagination.” Mae Jemison “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” Arthur Ashe “Striving for success without hard work is like trying to harvest where you haven't planted.” David Bly “Nine tenths of education is encouragement.” Anatole France “We learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself.” Lloyd Alexander “Aim for success, not perfection. Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life. Remember that fear always lurks behind perfectionism.” David M. Burns “You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else.” Albert Einstein “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.” Samuel Beckett “To teach is to learn twice.” Joseph Joubert “If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend six hours sharpening my ax.” Abraham Lincoln “Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” Harriet Tubman “Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.” Zig Ziglar “Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” Mahatma Gandhi “Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.“ Jim Rohn “In a moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing to do, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.” Theodore Roosevelt “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.” Mark Twain “If you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.” Jim Rohn “It is in fact a part of the function of education to help us escape, not from our own time – for we are bound by that – but from the intellectual and emotional limitations of our time.” T.S. Eliot “Keep on going, and the chances are that you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I never heard of anyone ever stumbling on something sitting down.” Charles F. Kettering “The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.” Alexandra K. Trenfor “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.” James Baldwin “Much education today is monumentally ineffective. All too often we are giving young people cut flowers when we should be teaching them to grow their own plants.” John W. Gardner “After every difficulty, ask yourself two questions: “What did I do right?” and “What would I do differently?” Brian Tracy “Nothing in the world can take the place of perseverance. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost legendary. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Perseverance and determination alone are omnipotent.” Calvin Coolidge “If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much.” Jim Rohn “You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Martin Luther King, Jr. “Doing the best at this moment puts you in the best place for the next moment.” Oprah Winfrey “Real learning comes about when the competitive spirit has ceased.” Jiddu Krishnamurti “There’s no such thing as failure, only results.” Tony Robbins “It’s not that I’m so smart. It’s just that I stay with problems longer.” Albert Einstein “If you find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere.” Frank A. Clark “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.” Thomas Edison “Mindset change is not about picking up a few pointers here and there. It's about seeing things in a new way. When people change to a growth mindset, they change from a judge-and-be-judged framework to a learn-and-help-learn framework. Their commitment is to growth, and growth take plenty of time, effort, and mutual support.” Carol Dweck “Be so busy improving yourself that you have no time to criticize others.” Chetan Bhagat “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So sail away from the safe harbour. Explore, Dream, Discover.” Mark Twain “Work hard now. Don’t wait. If you work hard enough, you’ll be given what you deserve.” Shaquille O’Neal “You have to apply yourself each day to becoming a little better. By becoming a little better each and every day, over a period of time, you will become a lot better.” John Wooden “Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure.” Thomas Watson “Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” Jack Canfield “Challenges are what make life interesting. Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” Joshua J. Marine “May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.” Nelson Mandela ”Spend eighty percent of your time focusing on the opportunities of tomorrow rather than the problems of yesterday.” Brian Tracy “True self-confidence is “the courage to be open—to welcome change and new ideas regardless of their source.” Real self-confidence is not reflected in a title, an expensive suit, a fancy car, or a series of acquisitions. It is reflected in your mindset: your readiness to grow.” Carol Dweck “I am always doing what I cannot do yet. In order to learn how to do it.” Vincent Van Gogh “Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” Warren Buffett “The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.” B.B. King “We become what we think about most of the time, and that's the strangest secret.” Earl Nightingale “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” Karen Lamb Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids and the Classroom “He who opens a school door, closes a prison.” Victor Hugo “If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That way, their children don’t have to be slaves of praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence.” Carol S. Dweck “Who questions much, shall learn much, and retain much.” Francis Bacon “Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.” Leonardo da Vinci “Minds are like parachutes, they only function when they are open.” James Dewar “Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance.” Will Durant “They cannot stop me. I will get my education, if it is in the home, school, or anyplace.” Malala Yousafzai “The very best thing you can do for the whole world is to make the most of yourself.” Wallace Wattles “No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.” Voltaire “Learning is like rowing upstream: not to advance is to drop back.” Chinese proverb “Look for the good in every situation, seek the valuable lesson in every setback, look for the solution to every problem. Think and talk continually about your goals.” Brian Tracy “It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.” Confucius