I Have NEWS
Oh my gosh guys, I don’t even know where to start. It’s been awhile. How are all of YOU? Let’s see…if you follow CLCW on Facebook you know that I quit my job about a month ago. My last day was in mid-September. I was burnt out, running on empty and frankly kind of miserable. I want to be clear that my former work family was and will forever remain beyond awesome in my book. My decision to leave had nothing to do with them. The company, however, was moving in a direction that didn’t align with my personal goals and the travel was getting to me. 175+ days on the road and I had no time for anything. As you can see I had to step away from the blog just to regain some semblance of life. My health was suffering, it felt like I was making my marriage second to work and I was not becoming part of the community here in Northwest Arkansas; something I really get to focus on now. They treated me very well and the growth I got as both a professional and personally will always mean so much to me, but as scary and hard as it was to make the decision, the clock kept ticking and change wasn’t going to come unless I made it happen. One cannot pour from an empty cup, so I filled my cup and I am beyond happy right now.
How I Quit My Job
When I began telling people I was leaving my position to pursue something else I wasn’t surprised that many of them asked how I did it. While I don’t have a magic formula, I made a decision and I stuck to it. Of course, there are bills to pay and mouths to feed and I couldn’t just up and quit in a day. It took me getting up the nerve to really look at things and say, “Okay. The blog isn’t matching up to exactly what I make, but here is where I need to be to move on.” I know what worked for me won’t work for everyone. I know ripping a safety net away is not easy either. What I also know? Moving forward is completely worth it. Decide what your number is (in dollars) to have set to the side and/or what you need in monthly blog income and how long you want to see steady numbers. My timeline was six months. Yours may be longer or shorter. Write down what is coming in and what is going out. Be disciplined. When I really wanted those new Christian Louboutins I told myself, “NO!” and kept on truckin’. WORK to get there. Most important; stick with it. If you waver or doubt yourself, you’ll have setbacks. I did and I think we all do. It’s perhaps cliché, but believe you can do it and you will. I knew I wanted to keep working, I just wanted a different structure. It was a matter of making the time to find it – or letting it find me.
Refocusing
When I rebranded I wanted to show you, my dear readers, what life is like for me now that I’m out of the city. I’ve kind of sucked as far as this goes. At first I was miserable and I now I relish being here in my little slice of Northwest Arkansas. I wrote this, remember? And now? I can tell you all that I am loving life here. I miss the ocean, sure. And yes, I miss the “life” of the city, but I am good to go visit and come back to my house, my little pumpkin patch and the peace and quiet that is country life.
I have also had the immense pleasure of learning more about the farming community and where our food comes from. Rarely does our meat comes from the grocery store anymore (and I am realllly picky about it when it does). Our primary sources are what the hubs has hunted (as humanely as possible) or what we obtain from farmers. I’m transitioning to 100% of the produce we get being either from our backyard or from our local farmers and coming soon: a bee hive, laying hens and a garden that will be planted on the back of our land. My brother and I will be working on this together. Oh yes – my brother moved to Arkansas! It will be good to have him near.
I mentioned before how important the state of Arkansas is when it comes to our nation’s crops. There is a bumper sticker around here you’ll see from time to time:
No Farms. No Food.
YES!
I want to introduce you all to more of this.
Getting Real’ER’
From Riceland to Arkansas edamame (yep, we grow it here in Arkansas) there is so much to show you. Of course, you’ll still see reviews and giveaways, but you’ll notice in the next month or two they’ll become more honed in on the goals of what I want to do here. I’ll be focusing on being a city girl living in a country world and what this has come to mean to me. I’ll be sharing changes to our house with you; something I went back and forth on, but hey, if I’m inviting you into my world that includes my house, too.
A New Adventure
If you know me, even though I quit my job, you know I didn’t want to abandon working altogether. And sometimes serendipity walks into our lives at just the right moment. It so happens it walked into mine at the Farm 2 Home Event at Moss Mountain Farm last June. This wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t made the decision to start moving forward. So without further ado, I am beyond excited to show you what I am up to now. Click for full size:
I’ve always kept my working world and my blog world separate from one another. Well now they get to complement each other and I couldn’t be more excited! I have time now. I’m happy. Really happy. Expect some very cool things to come. As always, thank you for being here.
XOXO,
Heather
