Have You Lived Alone?

February 3, 2015 By in Family, Friendships, Health and Wellness Tags: , 7 Comments

There seems to be this idea that if you’re in you’re in your 30s and can afford it, it’s time to say goodbye to roommates and live alone. It’s like there’s a certain period of time for roommates and then it ends. Obviously, this is different in major, expensive cities like NYC (where I think the cheapest studio in a safe neighborhood would begin around $1200 – and that’s a very low estimate. More likely it’s $1300 now.)

A recent NY Mag article, Does Living Alone Drive You Mad? inspired this post today. The article is mostly about older people who live alone, and the author zigs and zags across different ideas, types of people living alone, and varying circumstances. Deep down, the writer seems terrified of living alone for a long period of time, which is understandable as she was married for over 20 years and now has a live-in partner. But it bothered me that the article had a somewhat negative slant.

I lived alone for nearly three years. I loved it! I loved my space, decorating however I liked, coming home to quiet (heaven for an introvert), cooking whatever I pleased, and on and on. But, I guess I assumed, deep down, that it would be temporary. I didn’t know that for sure of course, but I knew that my intention was to meet someone and get partnered up one day. Perhaps that changed my idea then, of what living alone was really like?

I think what the author of the article neglected to talk about was that living alone (if done correctly) forces you to engage with the world outside your door in a more unique, meaningful and appreciative way that living with other people. When I lived alone, I treasured going outside and made a much bigger effort to see friends, go to activities and even just take small walks to the coffee shop.

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Imagine – this is all yours to decorate as you choose. Living alone can be like getting to fulfill all your pinterest board fantasies and needing no feedback from anyone else

The Things We’re Attached To In Our Thirties (or Paste the Space)

February 3, 2015 By in Friendships, Relationships Tags: , , , , , , , 6 Comments

This is not my original post. I have some intense money posts planned for the coming days, but today I just have to talk about the pain of losing something I love.

I never realized how important a certain thing was to my mood until it was gone:

Two days ago, I opened up a bottle of fizzy water and it exploded. What I thought was a small amount of water hit the keyboard of my laptop.

I immediately wiped off the water and put a washcloth on the keyboard to absorb any remaining water. The computer seemed fine. Everything was working perfectly. So I forgot all about it. I went to the hotel gym for the next 45 minutes. When I came back upstairs, a few keys on my keyboard wouldn’t work.

I freaked out. I googled every possible forum on how to get keyboards working again. I turned my laptop upside down. I put it near the air vent in the hotel room (Im working an auto show in Philly). I gave it time. Nothing has happened. My keys (including the spacebar, delete, and tab key- all pretty important) haven’t returned to usability.

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My poor, hurt Mac Air has left me sad and hurting for it.

Since I’m out of town and working all day most days, I haven’t yet taken the laptop to the Apple Store. I’ve heard it’s too expensive to have them fix it anyway (it’s out of warranty), so I’ve been googling about other ways to fix it. No definite decisions yet.

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I was out at dinner tonight with my friend Kate and I realized how much the hurt laptop was affecting my mood. She was talking about her injured cat and dog and I was talking about my injured laptop. Staring at it upside down by my airvent made me not even want to be in my hotel room anymore. It completely changed the happy mood of getting off work and relaxing at ‘home.’

I hadn’t felt so upset about a computer since college, when I had to spend two hundred dollars or so (my life savings at the time) to fix an errant Dell laptop that went kaput. Tonight I didn’t realize how overblown my emotions about the computer were until I was lamenting my sadness about the computer to Kate, and mentioned how I had to use copy/paste to put spaces between words because of my broken spacebar. She started laughing hysterically (though sympathetically).

And then the food arrived and we laughed even harder at how her food was served in a pineapple.

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I suddenly realized that I was missing all the fun of the present moment. I was having tons of fun with a friend I barely see and most of my thoughts were still bordering on obsession with fixing the laptop.

Now that I’m thirty I would hope I could put problems in relative perspective, but apparently little things can happen that still throw me completely off balance. Talking with Kate helped me feel lighter about the whole thing.

Of course I still feel my obsession with the broken keyboard hovering over my other thoughts. And I never think of myself as a very obsessive person.

I’m typing this using a combination of my phone, speech to text (which is something I didn’t know I could do in WordPress), and copy/pasting all spaces. Itshardtogowithoutspacebarordeleteortab.I’ve learned a lot about replacing a keyboard and exactly why my techie ex-boyfriend used to get upset at me for any drinks being within 10 feet of either of our laptops. I learned that even though I hate typing on a phone, it can be done. Im learning and adapting. I’m trying to laugh at myself and the whole situation.

But I must admit, it’s a challenge. Even at 30. Or maybe even more at 30- I’m attached to a certain thing being around and working well, and when it’s not, a whole week can feel messed up. Or a whole two days that feel like a week.

I think it helps to develop an awareness of the little things that can change your mood completely. So then, when youre upset, you can figure out why and break it down.

What do you think? Are there little things you rely upon that would change your days completely if removed or broken? Can you combat this by talking about it or shedding light on it? Do you find yourself taking seemingly ‘little things’ in your life way too seriously?

 

Radical Self-Acceptance

February 1, 2015 By in Health and Wellness Tags: , , 3 Comments

Do you mentally beat yourself up? Maybe you tell yourself you’re not doing enough, not working enough, not being the best you that you can be. I do all of that. A lot. For a long time, I thought the only way to silence this voice in my head was to simply do more. Work harder, write more, exercise more, eat more vegetables, meditate more, and on and on…

But in the past year, I’ve been trying to work on the idea that everything I am right now is enough. Everything I need to be I already am.

I think the thirties is the decade where we do more of this work than ever before – this work of self-acceptance. You realize that you have to embrace and accept your own imperfections. Those negative voices that tell you, “You’re lazy! Be more productive!” and “You need to do more” and all of those voices, don’t serve you at all. You have to be kind to yourself. I wish I knew exactly how to do it, and sadly I really have no idea. But I do know that it begins with loving all the parts of yourself – the lazy parts, the sad parts, the goofy parts, all of them.

“Clearly recognizing what is happening inside us, and regarding what we see with an open, kind and loving heart, is what I call Radical Acceptance. If we are holding back from any part of our experience, if our heart shuts out any part of who we are and what we feel, we are fueling the fears and feelings of separation that sustain the trance of unworthiness. Radical Acceptance directly dismantles the very foundations of this trance.”
― Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha

Is Taking Care of Yourself the New Partying in Your Thirties?

January 30, 2015 By in Grab Bag Leave a comment

Today I fainted on the subway platform. This isn’t like me at all.

I pride myself on having an “immune system of steel.” I have an uncanny ability to always stay well around sick people. I’m the anti-germaphobe- “a little dirt never hurt anyone”- that’s what I say. I travel on planes, trains, and buses (aka “boxes of germs”) more than half the year while getting away with barely a sniffle. I scoff at Purell. I roll my eyes at hypochondriacs (secretly).

However, today something happened and I went down. I started feeling weak when I left my apartment earlier in the day. It was a strange feeling because I’d had two cups of coffee before I left and had slept a full 8 hours the night before. I’d drank my green smoothie in the morning. I’d eaten a vegan burrito for lunch. I was doing all my healthy routines.

But the weakness came anyway. And then it went away just as quickly as it came and fooled me into thinking it was gone. So I continued my day. I met with a friend. I went to Whole Foods. I headed to the gym. But once the subway doors closed behind me, I was taken by the urge to fall to the floor. It was a crowded subway on a freezing day but I got hotter and hotter until I had to remove my hat and my scarf and unzip my coat. I barely made it to my stop. Strangers asked me if I was okay- I was swaying. I didn’t look good. I politely said I was fine, just not feeling so well. But once I got to my stop and took two steps, I realized I couldn’t go any further and fell hard. A stranger rushed up to me and asked if I was okay. He asked if I was pregnant (I am not). He offered to call 911. I couldn’t move, but I felt really embarrassed. Even though I stayed unmoving, I told him I’d be okay. I didn’t want to go anywhere but home. He nicely stayed with me. Bless the kindness of random subway strangers.

Once again, the weakness started to pass. The icy air shook my limbs out of their paralyzed state and I was able to get up and actually walk home. I’m now lying in bed writing this and praying I don’t have the flu. I feel okay right now. I’m hoping it’s maybe an iron deficiency or something. Who knows.

But you better believe I’m taking extra good care of myself. I canceled my trip to the gym. I canceled my fun late night plans. I made myself ginger tea. I took my emergency multivitamins (which I never take). My roommate gave me a shot of apple cider vinegar (“it cures!” she raved to me). I’m trying to stay calm. I had the flu once 6 years ago and it was the worst debilitating illness I’ve ever been through.

A friend of mine told me on the phone tonight, “I hate to say it, but we’re in our thirties now. Even though we may feel good and strong, our bodies are changing and they’re not the same as they were in our twenties. And we have to take extra good care of ourselves. I mean, listen, I just had to get reading glasses. And I’m only 33!”

Oh no! I don’t yet need reading glasses, it’s enough that I need regular glasses…eek.

This got me thinking about the possible shift from your twenties to your thirties regarding how you need to take care of yourself. Perhaps the metaphorical ‘party’ is over? Is there an ‘invincibility notion’ left over from the twenties that needs to fade down in my thirties? I mean, I already take pretty good care of myself (lots of vegetables, lots of exercise, lots of sleep (usually), lots of water) but perhaps there are still big changes coming my way. Changes that I previously thought I could avoid with my healthy behavior.

Maybe I’m not as invincible to the 30’s as I thought, no matter how healthy my lifestyle usually is.

Well, I better go to sleep and dream about strength and energy.

I want to leave you with two articles I found about how our bodies change in our 30s. Haha, first  puberty, now this…

For women- http://www.healthywomen.org/content/article/health-your-30s

For men- http://www.askmen.com/top_10/fitness/maintain-your-body-after-30.html

[Update- I wrote this article yesterday, and still feel weak today, but have not come down with the flu. Behold the power of taking care of yourself: tons of sleep, ginger tea, apple cider vinegar, and lots of love from (and to) friends and family!]

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Did You Get an “Hour” with People you Care About Today?

January 30, 2015 By in Friendships, Health and Wellness Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

As you might have learned from this blog, I love learning about ways to life-hack. Specifically, facts and numbers about how to make my life better. As you can probably guess, I’m subscribed to way too many blogs/newsletters/fan pages of self-help/life-coach gurus and thinkers. I recently got an email with a link to an article by Deepak Chopra titled “Social Media and Your Personal Growth.” The article is worth a read; it’s basically about how to form more meaningful and deep connections when using social media. I was particularly interested in this:

“Psychologists point out that being connected in a positive way for at least one hour a day with people you care about is one key to happiness.”

Do you normally get your hour of this time? I have recently. Today I did, at least. I had a great phone conversation and I felt happy and connected. This “hour” doesn’t have to be in person – you can spend your hour on the phone, or engaged in a video chat, or perhaps just even gchatting online.

It’s fascinating to me that we’re constantly told by doctors and the media that we should exercise a certain amount each day, and eat 5-7 servings of fruits and vegetables a day…But no one talks about setting an exact parameter about social connectivity. So I’d like to propose – get your hour with a close friend(s) a day!

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Technology Burnout In Your Thirties

January 29, 2015 By in Grab Bag Tags: , , , , , 2 Comments

Sometimes I find myself laughing silently while alone in my bedroom.

I’ll look up for a moment and realize that I’m sitting on my massage chair while watching TV while posting a status update to Facebook from my phone while holding my laptop open to a Twitter-linked article.

And I’ll just start laughing. But it’s the kind of laugh that could easily turn into a slow and honest cry.

Those of us in our late twenties through forties that have grown up without cellphones and laptops in our lives are now living in a world where we’re dependent on our portable devices.

What has become of alone time without social media connection? I sometimes find myself anxious over Facebook posts, or wondering if I haven’t been on Twitter enough, or whether I should be posting on LinkedIn more. I actually spend time wondering why Snapchat is so popular and how to get more into Instagram.

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The moment I get up in the morning, I reach for my cellphone. What I see on that phone can influence my mood for the rest of the day. There’s so much going on and so little time. Then right after making some coffee, I’m immediately tempted to turn on my laptop. Once I do, I can get sucked into random article reading for hours on end.

Even in order to simply meditate, I have to open a meditation app on my phone or website on my laptop to access my music or guided meditations. How crazy is it that even to be alone with my thoughts I have to reach for a portable device???

However, when I take time off from social media, things change in my life. As much as I like social media and my laptop and my email, when I gain control and shut things down for awhile, I feel a kind of peace that is unreachable when technology’s buzzing around me at every moment.

My roommate actually disconnected from technology completely. Years before I met her, she gave away her smart phone. She sold her laptop. She has no TV. All she has is an emergency flip-phone and a radio. I can’t imagine myself doing what she’s doing, but she’s one of the most blissful, radiant people I know.

When I manage to disconnect from most technology, even for a few concentrated hours, I actually feel better (after the initial discomfort subsides). Time moves slower. Hot showers feel hotter. I find myself taking walks and feeling more connected to my body and my surroundings. I think harder about what I’m feeling and how it affects the way I breathe.

So I’m of two minds about the whole technology thing. I actually love technology and I do think it’s important and helpful. I’m extremely fascinated by the future of technology and I really want to learn HTML. My laptop is my favorite possession. My phone is my lifeline. Social Media is my way to connect the world. I love that so much information is at my fingertips at all times- I get how important it is to be able to find almost any answer to any question at any time.

Yet I also think it’s important not to get sucked into technology as a dependent habit- the same way it’s bad to get sucked into other dependent habits like smoking or nail biting. There are times when I can’t kick the urge to reach for my phone or check my email. I find it hard to simply be alone with my thoughts and no Facebook. This isn’t a healthy use of technology- it’s a crutch.

As I continue to walk the line between avoiding technology altogether (not gonna happen) and getting sucked in, I try to remember how good it feels to be without it for even just a little while. And even during those times when it feels anxiety-provoking to close the laptop and avoid checking my phone, I know that being able to live my life without technology, for even a short time, is extremely important.

Don’t be afraid to be alone with your thoughts.

 

 

Some Advice on Living Your 30s Well

January 27, 2015 By in Career, Family, Friendships, Grab Bag Tags: , 1 Comment

So true confession. I’m PMS’ing this week. Which for me means that I’m a bit cranky and craving salty foods. And also, those hormones knock my self-esteem down a notch and lead me into funny (in hindsight!), internet rabbit holes. I do random google searching about how I feel, with the goal normally being for me to feel like I’m not alone – that other folks feel the same way I do.

Tonight I googled “thirties and feel lost.” After reading Laura’s post from yesterday, I started thinking about how someone once told me that the chances of my career choice (screenwriting) being successful was like “winning the lotto.” Thinking back on that, what a crappy and mean thing to say! In my low moments, I wonder if he was right. What if I can never monetize my writing? I’ve managed to make money copywriting and writing for corporations but that’s not my goal – I want to write for films and TV. So anyway, I started to think worst-case scenario, what would I do to make money? And that’s when I googled “thirties and feel lost” and this particular Metafilter thread came up, What Do You Wish You Did in Your 30s.

In the thread, lots of 40 and 50-somethings wrote in about the regrets of their 30s. And it was somewhat uplifting. and inspiring, so I thought I’d share some of the thoughts here.

One woman wrote:

I would have divorced my first husband sooner, because I would have somehow woken up to how I was riding a wave of denial through my own life.

I would have spent way more time creating stuff (writing, acting, making art), because even if it had been shit, I’d have been that much more practiced now in my 40s.

I would have spent more time seeking out new and maintaining my existing female friendships (I’m a woman), because that kind of bond is crucial to my well being.

I would have spent those 10 years exercising, instead of taking up weightlifting at age 39 and finally honing and actually feeling my own strength.

I would have cut the few truly toxic people out of my life sooner, including my own mother.

Having said all this, I don’t have any regrets. I only look forward.
posted by ImproviseOrDie at 2:22 PM on February 18, 2014 [8 favorites]

I liked this one a lot:

Choose the happier choice instead of the, seemingly, right choice.
posted by jennstra at 4:59 PM on February 18, 2014 [2 favorites]

Many people talked about saving money. I’m sure Laura would appreciate that 🙂

If you haven’t done it already, make sure you get on top of your retirement savings (getting any matching funds you’re entitled to in your 401k, maxing out a Roth IRA, etc). It’s hard to make up for the loss of compound interest the longer you wait to get your accounts in order.
posted by bcwinters at 1:54 PM on February 18, 2014 [9 favorites]

Can You Monetize It?

January 27, 2015 By in Career, Money Tags: , , , , , , , 3 Comments

My background is in theater. I was a drama major in college who started out as an actor and quickly discovered that I also loved to direct.

After I graduated, I went in search of lots of theater to work on. I quickly found myself directing friends’ plays and also acting in plays for theater festivals and readings all over the city. I was proud of my efforts, even when they took up all my time and didn’t pay anything. Sometimes I would get what’s called a ‘stipend,’ which is a small amount of honorary money for my time and effort. Usually, no money would be involved at all- other than the money I spent out of my own pocket on the production.  I balanced my paying job (working tradeshows) with working on as much theater as I could fit into the crevices of my time off.

Sometimes I would turn down paid tradeshow work because I was in the middle of rehearsals for a production I was directing. The irony of this is that I could sometimes make the equivalent of my entire directors stipend in one day of work at my ‘real job.’

But I found it hard to prioritize tradeshows because theater was my ‘true passion’ and what I ‘really did’…tradeshow work was just a filler job. Theater became this magical universe where being paid a decent rate for your time became something of a joke, and everyone just moaned ‘there’s no money in theater, we need donations’ and continued on.

n the dressing room before a show..I'm not exactly sure what we were doing here.

In the dressing room before a show..I’m not exactly sure what we’re doing here, but bananas were definitely involved.

Then there came a time a few years ago where I reached my breaking point. I needed to put more money towards my student loans and stop turning down paid work. I couldn’t work for free anymore. So I took a hiatus from theater. The hiatus has been going on for about 2 years now…in fact, I’m still on that hiatus.

Amazingly, I’ve been pretty happy during this time off. I still co-run a theater company, so I keep a bit of theater in my life, and I’ve been able to work as much as I can and not double book paid jobs with unpaid rehearsals. I really enjoy my career in tradeshows, so I’m happily going through my days. Things are good, but I sometimes wonder about my real passion.

Now that I’m thirty, I’ve been thinking a lot about paid ‘filler’ work versus unpaid passions. There are so many options here. I kind of turned my ‘filler’ work into my main work, but I could have attempted to monetize my passion. Contrary to what I might have you believe from this post, there are people making some money from theater or theatrical work. And there are lots of people who work on all sorts of passion projects that can be monetized, but haven’t been monetarily figured out yet.

Then there are other friends of mine who know there’s very little money in their passion projects, but are okay with that. When I asked my friend how he replies to people who question his choice to be a playwright even though there’s just about no money in it, he inspired me. He said, “I tell them that I’ve worked lots of jobs that paid me tons of money and none of them made me as happy as I am writing plays. Not everything is about money.”

There’s a lot to think about here.

Do You Journal? The Surprising Health Benefits

January 24, 2015 By in Health and Wellness Tags: , 2 Comments

I’ll admit it – I always thought ‘journaling’ was kind of cheesy and ineffective. I imagined that if I did journal regularly, I’d have lots of entries beginning with “Dear Diary…” and going on to detail boring day-to-day exploits including the pizza I consumed and which Netflix show I watched that night.  I have journaled occasionally, and I have several books filled with my entries dating back to junior high school. Most of these entries are about boys – the boys I liked, the boys I dated and why those boys I dated were being so damn hard-to-decipher. Since I’ve been in a serious long-term relationship, I haven’t journaled as much. In fact, the current notebook I use has entries that date back to 2008, so clearly I haven’t been journaling much. But I do experience a lot of day-to-day anxiety about things in my life: my career, friendships, moving to a new city – all good subjects to journal about.

After reading this article, Writing Your Way to Happiness, in the NY Times, I really felt like it was time I journaled more. The article was the “most emailed article” on the NY Times website for about a week, so clearly people are excited about this research. Basically, the gist of the study is that if you write about your problems, you can more easily tackle them, which leads to better overall health. Essentially, the study is saying that if you write about your problems, you can more easily “edit” the problems in your life.

Here’s a quote from the article that encapsulates the study well:

Much of the work on expressive writing has been led by James Pennebaker, a psychology professor at the University of Texas. In one of his experiments, college students were asked to write for 15 minutes a day about an important personal issue or superficial topics. Afterward, the students who wrote about personal issues had fewer illnesses and visits to the student health center.

“The idea here is getting people to come to terms with who they are, where they want to go,” said Dr. Pennebaker. “I think of expressive writing as a life course correction.” – Tara Parker-Pope

Maybe there’s something about purging your thoughts onto paper that helps. Like a mental detox. Or maybe it’s being able to get a new perspective on your problems that helps you make more effective choices.

What If I Lived Nowhere?

January 24, 2015 By in Career, Health and Wellness Tags: , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

The Detroit Auto Show is going well…I’m more than halfway through working it. When I return from the show, I’ll have 2 days off in New York and then will leave again for a 10 day show in Philadelphia. When I return from that, I’ll leave again for a 10+ day show in Chicago…and so on and so forth.

I travel a lot for work. I work as a professional speaker and product specialist at tradeshows, conventions and auto shows. I used to think I’d simply book work in New York, and then that expanded to simply booking work in the Northeast, then the East coast, then the entirety of America, and then I even began to occasionally book international work.

The blog I used to write before this one was a blog about travel. I enjoyed traveling for work and sharing tips and tricks about how to travel easier, smoother, and cheaper. Travel is so innately built into my life- I can’t really do my job without it- that it has also accidentally become a major part of my identity.

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So after my ex-boyfriend and I broke up last summer, I thought about living nowhere. It seemed like the absolute right thing for me to do at the absolute right time. It seemed to fit perfectly with who I am. I’m away from home so much anyway that it seemed pointless to pay rent every month. And I even considered blogging about my future nomadic living experience. I actually see a lot of travel bloggers of all ages living nowhere- they put their stuff in storage and just travel for a year or more. Sometimes it’s simply cheaper for them to travel the world than to stay in their city and pay the exorbitant rent prices (cough NYC cough SF cough).

Since I’m thirty, it seemed a bit late to start such a major lifestyle change (complete nomad seemed more of a twenties thing to do), but I was ready for some major changes. It seemed like the right time to live nowhere if I was going to live nowhere.

A few of my coworkers at tradeshows/auto shows were already living the nomadic lifestyle and just traveled from show to show without having any kind of home base. They would occasionally crash on friends’ couches and/or with their parents between shows. Or they’d use their numerous hotel points to practically live at the Hilton or the Marriott. It sounded like a fascinating, yet exhausting, life.

Yet after careful consideration, the exhausting part of it led me in search of a nice, peaceful apartment in New York to call home. Some soul searching lead me to the realization that the glamour of living nowhere didn’t hold a candle to a space that’s all mine.

And I thought about something one of my friends said as I had been weighing my options: “you call living nowhere the ‘nomadic lifestyle’ but some just call it ‘homeless.”

Touché.

I love my new little Queens apartment and cannot be happier. Even though I have to pay rent for it every month. Even though I’m not there right now. Just knowing I have a place to call home lends weight to my otherwise very up in the air lifestyle.

Sometimes something may seem like the absolute right thing to do at the absolute right time. But it may not actually be the right thing at all.

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Did You Have a 30th Birthday Bucket List?

January 23, 2015 By in Grab Bag 4 Comments

Did you ever tell yourself, “By the time I turn thirty, I’m going to have _____” and fill in the blank? I didn’t officially make a list, but I do remember wanting to have had a “serious, healthy relationship” and “have a play reviewed in the NY Times” by the time I was thirty. So, one of those things happened. And it wasn’t the play being reviewed in the Times.

There seems to be this idea of accomplishing specific milestones by the time you’re thirty that’s echoed in the media. Check out the below two articles my friend recently sent me:

Things to Do Before You’re Thirty

30 Things Every Woman Needs to Get Out of Her System Before She Turns 30 

Considering I’m nearly three years out of turning 30, I guess I should think about my 40th year milestones. I want to have a child, own property, and have a solid writing career established. I’m trying to imagine my 40-year-old self reading this now, and it makes me smile.

Do you set big-birthday milestones for yourself? Want to share some here?

Throw Money at the Problem

January 22, 2015 By in Money Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , 6 Comments

Right now I’m working an auto show in Detroit.

The day I left to fly to Detroit, I woke up later than I’d wanted to. I’d packed the night before and was mildly exhausted.  After I’d already walked 3 blocks away from my apartment towards the bus to the airport, dragging two heavy suitcases behind me, I realized I’d forgotten my Global Entry card and had to drag the suitcases all the way back home. I live a 15 minute bus ride away from LaGuardia airport, but because of all my delays, I ended up just getting an Uber (these are cabs called from an app, in case you’re unfamiliar with Uber in your city).

I felt sort of guilty about spending $17 on an Uber cab instead of $2.50 on a bus, but the cost of being late and missing the flight would have been much much more. The time, stress, and possibly money spent on a new flight would have been much costlier than just throwing money at the lateness problem.

A much as I love saving money, I’m a big fan of picking your battles and using money when you need to. We have money in order to make our lives easier. Sometimes you need to take that hard earned money and throw it at problems that’ll quickly go away when hit.

Don’t get me wrong- I’m not at all rich…not yet 🙂 If you read some of my other articles you’d know I’m still paying off my student loan debt and definitely am not swimming in money. But a little bit of saving goes a long way toward solving some small problems. Now that I’m thirty, I’ve had a few good years of not desperately eating ramen noodles every day…and I have a slight bit more money to put into my ‘throw money at the problem’ account…which is basically my normal checking account.

Jane touched upon this in her post How Much of Your Life Do You Outsource? She was mentioning how much she hated doing laundry at a laundromat when she had to carry heavy bags. Before I lived in a building that had washers and dryers, I used to pay extra for drop off service at the laundromat a few blocks away. I’d just have the people who worked there clean and fold it. I hated having to go back and forth multiple times to the laundromat…I just wanted to drop my laundry off and pick it up all finished. I used this laundry drop off solution for years- it was worth it to me. I saved money elsewhere…like on taking buses to and from airports mostly. I spent my extra money on laundry problems. And I had no regrets.

Recently, I used another paid service Jane mentioned in her same post– this service is a food delivery program called Blue Apron. Blue Apron basically delivers 3 meals a week to your doorstep- only it doesn’t deliver them cooked and put together. The meals are in the form of ingredients and recipes and you cook the meals yourself. Blue Apron is pretty brilliant in a lot of ways. For one, it basically teaches you how to cook. Secondly, the time consuming act of buying ingredients is out of the picture. Thirdly, you know exactly what’s going into your (fancy) meals.

photo 2 (4)I actually managed to finagle a week of Blue Apron for free. A friend of mine ordered it for herself and loved it. She invited me to try a week of it as a free trial (a special promotion Blue Apron offers which I recommend you look around for 🙂 ). Everyone I know who’s tried Blue Apron loves it. In fact, all the married and engaged couples I met at a BBQ I mentioned in my How To Be A Third Wheel  post were buzzing about using it to cook for their significant others instead of ordering out all the time.

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I enjoyed the 3 meals I received from Blue Apron, and was super impressed with their beautiful delivery and presentation. I learned how to cook three new dishes, and the ingredients were delicious and fresh. However, the cost of 3 meals a week (with 2 servings each) would be $60 a week, which was a bit steep for my tastes. So I canceled the service before I had to pay for it. For me, cooking dinner every night is a problem I’d rather solve with time than money. I know I can cook 3 dinners a week for way less money than $60 and didn’t need to pay for Blue Apron’s services. Still, I think Blue Apron is a great and worthwhile service for certain types of people, the same way laundromat drop off was a great and worthwhile service for me.

Sometimes you just need to throw money at a problem….and sometimes you don’t. Know yourself and your budget. Then choose wisely which one it’ll be.

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Expectations Vs. Reality

January 21, 2015 By in Grab Bag Tags: , 5 Comments

Over a TV show brainstorming session with my friend and classmate tonight, I came to the realization that the struggles of the thirty-something decade (for me, so far) seem to be revolving around the internal battle of expectations vs. reality. Most of the angst I experience now revolves around thoughts like “Am I where I should be for my age?” “Am I behind?” “Should I start planning for children now? “Is it weird that I’m not feeling an intense need for children now?” “Will I ever accomplish my dreams?” “Am I going to have to settle down and get a corporate job?”

Of course, it’s a decade that’s about striving for certain goals, but it’s also a decade about accepting imperfections and appreciating what we have. Learning to “want” the reality we already have. But man oh man, is it tough.

When I used to do yoga at a particular studio in Manhattan, the teacher used to say, “Expectations reduce joy.” It’s a such beautiful statement and it’s applicable to almost every aspect of life. Even relationships. Expecting people to act or treat us a certain way is like asking to be disappointed.

I wanted to share some beautiful quotes about releasing expectations.

“Would you like to know your future? If your answer is yes, think again. Not knowing is the greatest life motivator. So enjoy, endure, survive each moment as it comes to you in its proper sequence — a surprise.” – Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

“Know that everything is in perfect order whether you understand it or not.”
― Valery Satterwhite

“I hope you do not let anyone else’s expectations direct the course of your life.”
― Julianne Donaldson, Edenbrooke

“Before her marriage she had thought that she had love within her grasp; but since the happiness which she had expected this love to bring her hadn’t come, she supposed she must have been mistaken. And Emma tried to imagine just what was meant, in life, by the words “bliss,” “passion,” and “rapture” – words that had seemed so beautiful to her in books.”
― Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary

What To Do With A 401K From Your Old Job

January 20, 2015 By in Career, Money Tags: , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

Since you’re in your thirties, or almost there, I’m going to take a guess and say that you’ve probably changed jobs at least once.

In fact, it’s likely that  you’ve changed jobs multiple times.

So what did you do with the 401ks from your old jobs? Did you even have one then?

When I was looking into this (because I’ve gotten this 401k question a lot), I noticed that not only did many people not know what to do with their old 401ks, many of them didn’t know how to FIND them..or they didn’t know whether they had a 401k with their former job in the first place. 

So first things first: let’s start with what to do with a 401k at an old job when you know where it is and that it exists. Basically, there are 4 options:

1. Leave the 401k where it is (with the old job.)

2. Roll the money into your current job’s 401k

3. Roll the money into an IRA

4. Take the money and run.

I’m going to start with a warning: please don’t do the last one! DO NOT take the money and run!!! It’s a really bad idea, and will cost you a ton of money to do so! If you pull the money out of an old 401k before age 55 (retirement age for 401ks), two things will happen: 1. You’ll be hit with a 10% penalty!! 2. You’ll have to pay taxes on all the money as if it was regular income (which it is)! Just don’t do it! My research found that 25% of people choose this option…don’t be one of them! Anyway, that’s my two cents on that choice.

So now you have three choices left. All of these choices are pretty good- it really depends on what you want.

Two of the choices may not be an option:

1. You may not even be able to roll your money into your current employer’s 401k plan. You’ll have to check with them and see.

2. If you have less than $5000 in an old 401k, your old employer may not let you keep the money there anyway.

So, if you’re looking to have all your accounts in one place and less hassle with paperwork, I’d recommend either rolling your old 401k account into your new 401k account (if your new job allows you to do that), or consolidating everything into a rollover IRA.

But if you’re looking for the best possible investment options and don’t care about the hassle of paperwork from multiple accounts, you’ll have to do a little research. Here’s what you should be thinking about: 

a)Sometimes the 401k at your old job has some special investment options (like company stock) that you can’t get in an IRA.

b) A 401k offers slightly more protection from creditors in certain states.

c) You can withdraw from a 401k penalty free at age 55, but you can’t withdraw from an IRA until age 59.5 without a fee.

So if you have great old company stock or are really worried about creditors or really want to retire by 55, you may want to leave your money alone in the old 401k or roll into the new one (if possible).

But generally, rolling your old 401k into a Rollover IRA is the simplest and most cost-effective way to go. 

Here’s how to set up and roll your old 401k into a Rollover IRA and get started at Vanguard. 

Here’s how to set up and roll your old 401k into a Rollover IRA and get started at Fidelity.

Now, if your 401k is lost or you aren’t sure whether you even have old 401ks lying around from old jobs, see the awesome 401k helpcenter I found!

Hope this helps! I know that’s a lot of info if you’re unfamiliar with IRAs and 401Ks so, as always, let me know if you have any questions or anything to add! Thanks!

Do not take the money and run. You won't be able to hide...the IRS will find you and tax you on it...and take away 10% of it...

Do not take the money and run. You won’t be able to hide…the IRS will find you. And tax you…

How Much Of Your Life Do You Outsource?

January 17, 2015 By in Grab Bag Leave a comment

I spent some of my Saturday night at the coin laundromat two miles from my apartment. I actually find doing laundry to be relaxing, but not when I have to travel a long distance with heavy bags to get to the laundromat. Like tonight. Also, when you’re doing laundry alongside clearly high, strung-out homeless folks, it can be a bit depressing…especially on a Saturday night.

I kept thinking, “Oy! Why didn’t I use just that coupon Washio sent me for $10 off my first order?” Have you heard about Washio? It’s a start-up for laundry. They literally come to your apartment/house, pick-up your laundry and return it in 24 hours. On top of that, they bring you a HOT cookie. And here’s the thing – it’s not that much more expensive that laundry drop-off places. It’s $1.60 a pound for laundry. Many drop off places near me are $1.50. But Washio pick-ups and delivers! To me, $1.60 a pound seems worth it.

I haven’t tried Washio yet, because as a grad student, I can’t yet justify the expense, but I love the idea of it. More and more though, I’ve been contemplating paying the money for the service. I can spend more time writing, more time reading and investing in my education.

I started to think about all these other cool services available in our saturated start-up world. There’s Blue Apron, which brings the ingredients for planned meals to you. Then, there’s a service that picks you up at home and brings you to the gym or your SoulCycle or Pilates class. For more on that crazy trend, check out this NY Times article, “For The Door to Treadmill Service.”

If I had unlimited financial resources, I might take advantage of more of these services.  Right now I’ll stick to Uber and Lyft…But I think Washio is close behind on my list.

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Things I Should Own As a 32-Year Old (Or, How I Should Upgrade My Look)

January 17, 2015 By in Grab Bag 2 Comments

I was inspired by Laura’s post yesterday about mastering specific little skills by her 30s. I thought about how I feel like I don’t dress appropriate to my age. Obviously, it’s subjective, but the way I dress makes me feel younger than I am, and maybe that in turn makes me act younger than I am. Who knows.

The point is though, I feel like I haven’t “mastered” the art of dressing polished and together. I wear ratty black converse nearly every day and most of my shirts are cotton t-shirts from the Gap, with some variation of a horizontal strip pattern. And on top of that, I wear a backpack. I’m comfortable in this clothing, but it doesn’t make me feel confident and strong.

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But when I put myself together in a more thoughtful way, like I did yesterday, when I wore a sweater dress and some nice flats (which is rare, maybe 3 times a month), I FELT better. I felt like a woman, a woman who could be teaching a class at UCLA, which I am. So one of my goals for 2015 is to dress a little better. To dress my age. What does that mean? Well, you tell me! I know there’s a lot of beauty and fashion bloggers out there who read the blog, so I’m open to ideas. I would love to know what clothing items make you feel like an empowered thirty something woman.

For me, I guess I imagine that it would mean having a nice handbag (why does that word make me feel like a grandma?) and wearing more than just Converse everyday. More shirts with nice fabrics like silk. Overall, I guess it means dressing like I’m okay with growing up…and if I’m getting into therapy mode – like I deserve to wear ‘adult’ clothing.