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100 Days

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April 10th was the 100th day of the year. Doing my overdue first quarterly review, I’d like to keep here my achievements. Here it goes.

In the first 100 days of the year I:

  • Launched 10 podcast episodes.
  • Grew my all-time podcast downloads to +14K and subscribers to +1500 according to player FM.
  • Wrote 69 posts for this blog.
  • Committed to 1-hour LIVE sessions on Instagram for 8 consecutive weeks.
  • Committed to writing and sending my weekly newsletter “The Sunday Spark” (nearly 500 subscribers).
  • Was hosted as a speaker for a 1-hour virtual event at a global company where 300 employees attended live.
  • Appeared on 1 TV interview and 2 radio interviews.
  • Practiced digital decluttering for 45 days.
  • Grew my Instagram followers by +2500 with generous support.
  • Added 20 new members to the Sunrise Winners whatsapp group that I manage.
  • Traveled once.
  • Finished Life of Focus course.
  • Committed to good habits like meditation, reading a course in miracles, 2-min workout, bedtime story and walking.
  • Read and thoroughly enjoyed 4 books (Time Smart, Think Small, Rapt, Girl Stop Apologizing)

P.S. Yesterday I broke the chain of writing daily that I started on Feb 1st. Writing my weekly newsletter gave me the illusion I accomplished this task, and being it a national holiday, my routine was completely disrupted that I only remembered I didn’t post while in bed way after 12am.

100 Days

Work Meetings Rule

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A friend of mine complained to us in the group text we have about working over the weekend instead of spending time with her family. I gave her the below advice and it worked so well with her that it might work well with you.

To avoid the temptation of procrastination, reschedule all your project meetings from the first work day of the week to mid-week or to the morning of the last work day of the week. This will give you enough time to work on the updates you need to share in those meetings, and also be able to close off the week, prepare for the next work week and disengage from work time into family time.

I hope this advice would help you too.

Thank you Seth for reminding us: Happy day 100 of 2021!

Work Meetings Rule

Kind Reminders

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“Stress is caused by being here but wanting to be there.”-Eckhart Tolle

I think this is the kind of quote the describes many of my feelings lately, and our human condition in general.

When I am with my kids, I want to be working. When I am working, I want to be with my kids. When I am creating content I want to make progress on the online workshop I paid for, when I do the workshop assignments I feel I need to create content.

I want to speak kindly to myself so I am writing this post to remind me and also you dear reader:

  • You did super well so far considering all the circumstances.
  • There is no rush.
  • You are exactly where you need to be.
  • You will figure it out.
  • You are not lazy.
  • You are doing your best.
  • Your deadlines are great but remember you made up most of them.
  • You will get there.
  • It’s creatively wonderful to rest.
  • More strolling, less scrolling (Dani Dipiro)
Kind Reminders

Resources about Burnout

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I have done an Instagram LIVE on the topic of burnout, and it resonated with so many people.

I am grateful that sharing my story was this helpful. It was not easy. I have also shared it before in the first episode of my podcast.

Continue reading “Resources about Burnout” →
Resources about Burnout

Morning Fog

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Today I felt as if fog was lifted off my mind.

I have been feeling fuzzy and unfocused for a while and realized that I was not journaling as usual. Maybe it’s due to writing here everyday, maybe it was focusing on the other shorter journaling habits like gratitude practice, maybe it was working on launching more episodes of my podcast. The reason doesn’t matter. I thought I was fine.


Nevertheless, only after writing for 40 minutes in my morning pages did I feel like I can see clearly. Only when I told the paper what I couldn’t tell people did I feel light. Only when my repetitive unhelpful thoughts were locked on paper could I think new creative thoughts.

Same lesson again: don’t think it, write it.

Morning Fog

What’s it for and Who’s it for?

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I seek to improve the degree of clarity in my communications because no one likes to feel confused when they read or listen to something shared with them. Clarity in communication will serve me well in my relationships and also in my work like my podcast and future courses. It is a skill, like any other, that takes practice and requires asking for feedback and implementing small tweaks to improve it.

Two great questions I learned from Seth Godin are:

What is it for? Who is it for?

I can use these questions as filters before writing and sharing an email, a group text or an Instagram caption.

When we ask these questions we will be able to create a clear message that meets the purpose we want to accomplish. I sometimes cancel the whole idea of sending a message when I see that I am only interrupting someone’s day with it and not sharing or adding something valuable.

I invite you to try these questions too. They work super well when designing products and work presentations.

What’s it for and Who’s it for?

Self-Talk to Help Your FOMO

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Whenever my friend feels the Fear Of Missing Out on yet another virtual session about an interesting topic for her usually, she calms herself down by saying to herself:

“It’s ok to not attend this time, you will be able to retrieve the information when you do need it. It would still exist.”

I liked her self-talk a lot and plan to use it next time I choose to skip a virtual event just because I don’t feel like it nor have space for it.

Self-Talk to Help Your FOMO

Digital Hoarding

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Sometimes when I think of all the online courses, audiobooks and kindle books I have access to, I get dizzy and overwhelmed.

When will I ever get through those?

I want to re-frame this question into a gratitude statement:

I am grateful that I am lucky to have such wide access to knowledge.

What I need, though, is to remember:

Digital Hoarding

Evening Ritual Revisited

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While I set a superb evening ritual earlier this year, the changes in the local lockdown hours, and consequently working hours, had me mess it up and it is an area I want to improve in quarter 2 of the year. For example, I used to have lunch at work, now with lunch break cancellation at work to leave earlier, I started having lunch in the evenings so I come home feeling too hungry to take a walk.

Moreover, I have written the ritual steps here in my blog and in my planner, but they were nowhere to be seen at the house. I did not make the steps visible enough, I did not repeat them enough, so I simply forgot them.

Starting this month:

  • I will write the evening ritual steps on several post-it notes and place them in different rooms around the house like the kitchen, bedroom and learning room (laundry room/home office/study room). This will help me know what I need to do next.
  • I will also fine tune my habits according to the updated, albeit temporary, working hours. For instance I started taking oatmeal with me again to work to avoid the evening hunger that tempts me to skip walking.
  • I already track some habits of my evening routine daily, like story time with kids, but maybe I need to dedicate one sheet of my habit tracker to the evening routine steps in order to make crossing off each item rewarding. I will try it and report back.

Evening Ritual Revisited

Weekend Writing

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Two months into my daily writing habit and I still feel challenged to write in weekends more than other days. Simply because my writing habit context changes.

In weekdays I write in my work office right after I arrive. In weekends I don’t have a time for the habit. In the morning I do my long morning routine and sometimes I work on my pdacast.

Last weekend I made it a point to write as soon as I finished my routine and it felt good to get the writing done all day. This weekend I didn’t and it is 11pm.

I will make it a point to write my blog always at the same time to keep my consistency. Learning about habit contexts shifted the way I perceive my commitment to any habit and I am better able to fix any issues I face with this knowledge.

Weekend Writing