Business and Marketing – Page 4 – Coastal Carolina Soap Blog

Better Living Through Technology?

I love my tech, as I’m sure you do, too. And I use it all the time, every day, for something or other. I rely on my computers for work, and we’re currently using YouTube for our study of World War II. I print worksheets for my younger off homeschooling sites online, and all that is just my computers. My phone enables me to keep up with social media, including posting pictures to Instagram and instantly shooting pictures to customers.

Last Wednesday morning, I followed my usual morning ritual – drinking two cups of water while checking email and my social media feeds. It wasn’t long at all before I realized my text messages on my phone weren’t going through. Then I noticed that none of my sites were coming up on my computer. Brief analysis – no internet. I went outside to find a second bar of reception and to call my provider. Joy. An area-wide outage had taken out our internet and crews were “working hard to restore service.”

Thursday morning rolls around, and at 9 a.m., my phone rings. It’s our internet provider informing me that the outage had been cleared up. Woohoo! I zip downstairs and had internet coverage for… two minutes. Another call to our provider informed me that half our neighborhood was still affected and our internet should be restored later that afternoon or by noon the next day at the latest. Yea! Hope!

Thursday night… No internet. Friday morning… No internet. Friday noon… No internet. The great service techs helped me go through all the possible steps to reboot our modem, but in the end, there was no recourse left but to wait for the cable guys on Saturday. Saturday our service was winking in and out, but the fellas came, got me back online, then discovered that there was an issue with the box by the road.

Things flowed smoothly from there. In fact, things were better, because our internet was faster. I had my website access, my social media outlets, my email, YouTube for school, math worksheets for the Wee One, everything I’d been missing.

Let me take a break from the narrative here to say, I decided last week that I needed to take some time away from Facebook, because the hatemongering; injustice-in-the-name-of-Jesus; and horrid, fearmongered comments about a segment of the population were having a very negative effect on my psyche. Truly, the comments were hurting my heart. However, with my internet down, I couldn’t log off completely as I wanted. Alright. Back to the story.

Monday morning, I followed my usual routine, but this time with a twist. I dropped a post on Facebook to let people know I was taking a break, why, and how to reach me. Then I logged off and closed down the tab. To prevent further temptation, I uninstalled the Facebook app from my phone. Yet, my phone was still saying I had low memory, even after uninstalling that and deleting a bunch of pictures. Sometimes, my phone requires a hard boot to register that I’ve freed up memory. So, I disassembled my phone, let it meditate, put it back together, then pushed the power button. No. Power. I tried again. And again. Then I called T-Mobile. Shout out to them for getting me a phone to me the next day!

In the last seven days, technology has hardly been my friend. Well, it’s been perfectly friendly when it’s been working, but when it isn’t, my life nearly comes to a halt. These days have certainly tried my patience! Joy of joy, though, I have a newer model S5 that has cool, new features that weren’t on my two-year-old one, and I don’t have to go phone shopping any time soon, thank goodness!

How to be an Overnight Business Success

Are you ready? Got pen and paper? Here it is…

Buy a kit, make the stuff, price it exactly as recommended by the wholesaler from whom you bought it, rent booth space, sell it (along with at least a half dozen other people who had the same idea as you), and voila! You’ll be a success overnight. Or maybe that’s just for overnight.

My dear artisan friend Denise and I joke, “It takes a long time and a lot of hard work to become an overnight success.” Newbie crafters/hobbyists see what we’ve achieved over years of owning our businesses and want what we have, only without the hard work, trial-and-error, discipline, learning, or experience. It really does take a significant amount of time and unique experiences to achieve success in business, and I’m happy to show those off in my blog, newsletters, website, and social media outlets. Today, though, I thought I’d share with you some of my flubs that have led me to where I am now.

“Do a show!” I was brand new in my business, and the ink on my business license was barely dry when a lady recommended I participate in a huge selling event. It cost me $325 to rent a booth for the 4-day weekend, and I made probably around 1000 bars of soap for it. Imagine my joy – how thrilled I was! – to see this line of people at my booth. Only, they weren’t at my booth; they were in front of it, in line for the gourmet candy apples next door.

Surround yourself by people who want you to succeed. Or something. It was a year later, now 2003, and the memories of that awful event were still plaguing me. It was my first time doing the EPA show with Mom as my sponsor and right-hand woman. We were two hours from the end, and business had been quite good, when Mom started offering discounts without consulting me. I was like, “What are you doing?” She said, “I thought since you weren’t making a profit, yet, that you’d want to liquidate.” It takes 3-5 years to turn a profit in business, and she’s been a super-tremendous help since.

Then there was the grand mal soap seizure that turned the beautiful funnel swirl of my plans into “murdered Mardi Gras clown soap.”

Over the course of a few years, that first EPA show led me to markets and monthly artisan events, which, in turn, began to lead to other opportunities. An artisan potter was opening up an incubator co-op and invited me to join for $100 a month. I was spending $20 a month to sell for 4 hours, and this way, my wares would already be set up, and I wouldn’t have to worry about doing the selling. It seemed like a good idea. It’d be nothing to sell $100 of products a month, or so I thought. I discussed it with my husband – I was so excited! He didn’t really think it was the best idea. I persisted. It was fun doing the Art Walk, chatting up customers, and just being in that atmosphere. I made $100 one month of the six I was there, and I pulled out after six months. That was the only year my net profits went down since my first year in business.

I’m pretty sure at this time I may have still had a few soaps from that first event left over. I’d systematically melted most of the soaps down to cats, because I quickly discovered that cat soaps sell very well.

So many scents! So many soaps to make! And bath salts and bubble bath and bath bombs! And no one in that area really takes tub baths. Plus there was a drought in the state that effected us for a couple of years. So. Much. Inventory leftover! I still have some of those bath salts and bath bombs, because I don’t often get time to take tub baths, either. It’s so important not to get carried away with making stuff. I have over a hundred fragrances still, and I’m selling them or using them in very limited edition soaps – or simply in soap for us.

Event A, Event B, and Event C, all carrying high costs to do. While there is a formula to determine if a show has been poor, fair, good, or excellent, there comes a point where I had to say, “Nope. No more.” Because it’s not just the expense of the booth fees, gas, food, and possibly lodging to take into account, but it’s also the intangibles – child care, labor of workers, and just the pure pain-in-the-butt it is to schlep tables, canopy, and products, set it up, work all day, and tear it down. Given all this “invisible” expenses, it just stopped being cost-effective. The day before the first of these events I gave up, I waltzed around town with the same dopey smile on my face my mom had her first day of retirement.

Selling on consignment is another one of those flubs. The seller doesn’t pay me for my products until they sell them, so they have no personal investment in my wares. I lost inventory to shop-wear, sun fading, and age. It’s so much better financially and for my stress to sell the products myself retail through my website or via one of the two events I do each year, or to one of my stockists and be done with it.

It’s now been almost fourteen years since I officially started my business. I have an online soap boutique, three private label accounts, and I’ve had a number of wholesale accounts as well. My net profits go up every year, which is good; it means I’m selling more products, but also managing to buy smarter. I have faithful, loyal customers. Judging by these factors, you could say I have gained a measure of business success. It hasn’t all been easy, though, and I certainly have made a slew of mistakes, er, “learning opportunities,” along the way,

If you’re in business, what, um, “learning opportunities” have you encountered that have led to your success?

Why Creativity Takes Time + Costs Money

The discussion came up with a customer: The question was, “Why is this soap so much more expensive than this other soap?”

That’s a fair question, certainly. Soap A (the less expensive one) requires a one-time pour with mica accents finger-brushed on top. Soap B (the soap in question) COULD just take a one-time pour of a single color of soap, but this customer was expecting it to be colorful, and “colorful” meant several individual pours of different colored soap. This took time, and since I’m a professional, time = money. And I had to craft each soap individually.

Pelican soap – This is it resting on its mould

And as I make slabs of soaps, the types I can whip up in one glorious pour, I think of what it takes to make various soaps. I’ve made soaps before that are a simple scent and no color, or a scent and just one color. Those are quick and simple to make. Then there are the soaps with elaborate swirls and multiple colors, or soaps that contain interesting botanicals and custom created fragrance blends. Truth is, I could whip out batch after batch of no-color scented soap, but that would be so boring! We LOVE color! And design and fun, unique fragrances, and everything else we bring to our soaps! But creativity, again, takes time, and time is money, even when you enjoy what you do.

I tripped across this great video today that takes a look at the relationship between time and creativity.

https://www.facebook.com/binishkumarks/videos/10150455838601609/

Sure, creativity takes more time to achieve, but we are infinitely more pleased with our results. We’ll continue to take the time to be creative, because it’s just so much more fun.

One Important Trait of Billionaires

Optimist or pessimist? Or just a completely pragmatic realist? I’m determined to go into the coming year letting my Tigger-like optimism merge with my pragmatic strategic thinking to push my business further. No more “what ifs” or “if onlys.”

One Trait of Billionaires from Sara Nesbitt on Vimeo.

Are you a Piglet or a Tigger? Or, like I’m striving towards, a Tigger with some of his bounce tamped down?

Thinking Strategically | Scott Adams Blog

Striking the Work-Life Balance as an Entrepreneur

You just know it would work out this way. Three weeks of fall break, three weeks of fun, canning, movie watching, and not a peep out of my large order customers. We’re talking crickets, folks. Crick-ets! Days before it ended, orders started rolling in right and left. What??? Now?! And it’s not just that orders started rolling in, but they came in with announcements of preorders. Three weeks of “Oh my gosh, I’m so bored!” now has given way to some serious hustle, right as we’re resuming our second term of school.

This past weekend was especially busy as I worked to fulfill last week’s orders. The biggest thing is, though, I wanted to clean off the dinette table. Two batches of soap, lotion bars, and lip balms, and there wasn’t room for a dirty thought on that table, let alone room for a person or four to sit and dine. In the midst of all this, I really want to put forward with the great cleaning-before-decorating thrust, as well as begin our holiday cooking. My girls like helping me cook, but the younger one, especially, just wants to sit down with me and watch a movie, read, or snuggle. It’s so hard finding the time to do everything while still attending to the family as they need, but over the years, I’ve developed my own tricks for making this work for us.

Lists. Lists help me visualize what tasks I need to accomplish in what order. I’m a bit obsessive in my list making, thinking always in a linear fashion: A then B then C then D… And D can’t happen until C happens. Lists are a great way for anybody to square up their work priorities, but it seals the deal when I’m trying to balance work and family life.

Lists are a great way for anybody to square up their work priorities.

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Working ahead. When it’s at all possible, I take an hour or two at a time to knock out something ahead of time. Maybe it’s a batch of soap that’s that customer’s standard order. Or perhaps it’s 100 tubes of lip balm for this customer. Those tasks don’t take a huge amount of time, but doing them sooner rather than later can free up a huge amount of pressure and stress later.

Prioritizing my day. When it comes to my day, what’s most important to me? Usually it’s breakfast, shower, exercise, and the girls’ education. Then what comes next? Production, newsletters, blog posts, marketing, website work. Somewhere in the midst of this comes a huge pair of brown eyes and a sweet voice saying, “Mom, can we _____?” No, not right now… Wait. What. Is. Important. To. Me? Is it crucially, vitally necessary that I change my slider on my website right now, or can it wait til tonight after the girls are in bed? The point at which I start making my business more important than my family is the point where I need to give up the business. The business will be around a while, but my daughters won’t be little girls forever.

The pnt at which I start making my biz more impt than my fam is the point where I need to give up the biz.

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Taking time away from the business. This was probably the hardest decision for me to make. Once upon a time, I was all about doing everything possible for my business and my customers, regardless of the sacrifices I had to make. I started last Christmas when I shut down my business for two weeks. I still received large orders from customers, but all that was required of me at those times was a quick email assuring them I’ll process their orders when we reopen. Once I made this decision, I realized it was the best one I could have made for my stress level and my family.

No. Such a small word with such great power! Actually, I say “no” by saying “yes.” To the last-minute request to add soaps to an order… “Sure, and I will add two days to your order processing time.” “I’ll happily take care of that after my vacation.” “I’ll process your order when we reopen early in January.” These boundaries are my way of saying, “No, I won’t let you make further demands on my time.” Work Me ends here, and Family Me begins here, and Family Me wants to savor this time.

Family Me is now in high demand, so Work Me has to clock out for a while.

How to Get Me to Vend Your Event

You have a spectacular event. It’s well-planned, scheduled at just the right time of year, and you are expecting some crazy-good crowds, You have tripped over my website or heard of me through the show grapevine, and you send me an application in the mail. What will make me say, “Oh my gosh, I will simply perish if I can’t vend this event” and part with a chunk of my hard-earned money? Well, barring a scheduling conflict, here are some things I look for before I sign my name on the line and mail in my booth fee.

One, how long has this event been going on? I’m more likely to toss my hat in the ring for an established event that already has a following. I might consider a first-time event.

Two, What sort of advertising are you doing? If you’re so committed to your event to invest in billboards, TV ads, and radio spots, then I know this is a huge big deal to you. Your striving for success tells me I have a chance to be successful, too.

Three, What other vendors do you have? If you’re an artisan-only show, then I expect vendors to be well-juried to weed out multi-level marketing companies. I promise you, those sellers/representatives are not artisans selling artisan products. If you’re allowing commercial vendors, then what’s your ratio? As an artisan, I personally have no desire to compete against a commercial vendor selling inferior soaps made in some overseas sweatshop in upscale packaging for $3.00 a bar.

Along with that, how many other artisan soap vendors will be joining me? Some competition is great, and I enjoy meeting other soapers. Plus, we might sell different products that appeal to different customer bases, which is cool. However, four soapmakers out of around a hundred vendors, all selling about the same type of product, is a bit much, don’t you think? Yes, that has happened.

Four, what sort of crowds are you expecting? You could be planning a small, cozy event with maybe 200 attendees who will spend lots, or a humongous event with a projected 40,000 attendees who may or may not spend much at all. I have a good reason for asking. My first show was a 4-day event, 44 hours across those 4 days. The event coordinator said that on one day, there could be 20,000 coming through in a few hours’ time period. The “surge” I was expecting was a mere trickle. A veteran vendor said at the end of the night, “I estimate we had 10,000 all day.”

Five, How can I get more information about your event? I would look for things like a Facebook page, reviews of past events by other vendors who’ve done it, or a website. A current Twitter or Instagram feed shows me you tend to be active about keeping your followers up-to-date and are likely to post right before and during the event to draw interest and generate excitement.

Six, Is your booth fee realistic for the duration of the event? Two separate events, same month. One is essentially a one-day event; the other, 3-day weekend. The booth fee for the weekend is just $20 more than the booth fee for the one-day event. Considering other expenses, it’s important for me to determine if your event is cost-effective for my business. Some argue, “But it’s contact. It’s exposure.” Sure it is, but if nothing comes of that exposure, then I’ve wasted a good deal of time and money. I’d rather invest that same amount of time in building and strengthening relationships with my customers.

I love events, speaking to customers face-to-face, seeing their expressions when they smell particular soaps (a little Perfect Man, anyone?), and teaching them about the amazing benefits of artisan soaps. As my business has grown and I’ve matured as its owner, I have learned to be more picky about the events I do. No more selling myself short or cheap chasing after the almighty dollar.

What things do you look for in events you would do?

The Joy of Saying No, pt. 1

The Joy of Saying No, pt. 2

How NOT to Invite Someone to Be a Vendor

Although I do not participate in many shows and events anymore, I still receive letters and applications to my post office box from event coordinators inviting me to participate in their particular events. Occasionally, these come by email, but mostly, it’s snail mail. Perhaps it is an event in which I participated in the past, or maybe it’s an event in a rural county in which I participated in another event. (Sometimes the names are shared, which is fine.) All of these events have some sort of credibility – long standing, well-visited Facebook page, a good reputation, whatever.

It is really rare that I get invited to do an event from out of the blue, and especially an event to which I have no connection whatsoever. On Friday, it happened. It appeared as a tri-folded piece of printer paper taped shut that showed up at my home. Usually, the only business-related stuff that comes to my home are shipments and bank statements (before I went paperless); correspondence goes to my PO box, as that’s the address on my business cards, checks, website and all social media avenues.

The outside of the most unprofessional business mail I've ever received. — The outside of the most unprofessional business mail I’ve ever received.

Wow. Can you believe that? No stamp, no envelope, not even a return address. If they can’t even take care to place the piece of paper in an envelope or slap a stamp on that bugger, then what kind of care do they give to vendors, advertising, and the plethora of other details in being a part of an event?

And... Here's the inside. It's rather confusing. — And… Here’s the inside. It’s rather confusing.

Out of curiosity, I open this letter up and find this. Crossed-out date, no names, no websites, no email addresses, not even a Facebook page. It’s colorful, but sorely lacking in helpful information I would want to have before even bothering with a phone call, let alone committing to participate (on one week’s notice, at that). There is a phone number way down at the bottom of the page which I dialed with the intention of explaining how unprofessional I found their missive. Three times – THREE!!! – the call was cancelled. Finally I gave up and tossed the letter. Later I did a Google search on the sender as it was disclosed on the flyer, and the closest I got was a company down in Georgia that does custom car decals. That’s a far cry from a vendor coordinator offering me space at a huge annual seafood event.

Coming up soon… Ways to entice me to spend my hard-earned money on booth fees at your event.

What’s the worst solicitation you’ve ever seen to participate in a selling event?

Customer Service Excellence

Part of being a business owner and home educator is giving myself permission to take breaks, like escaping to the beach on occasion. There is, of course, great value to this, as I come back well-rested and refreshed, sometimes with new ideas for ways to serve my customers better. When I can experience the epitome of excellent customer service in the search for a much-needed break, all the better.

I first encountered Garison online. No, it wasn’t at any place sordid – no Ashley Madison dot com or match dot com-type places. I first became aware of Garison through Trip Advisor. Garison is the Customer Service Manager for The Winds Resort at Ocean Isle Beach, where Mary and I enjoyed a very relaxing weekend away this past weekend.

A view of the beach through the lush tropical landscaping around the resort

Mary and me in front of one of the cool, kitschy, totally necessary signs directing you places

So, what made this guy stand out? Simply put, it was how he handled all reviews, both positive and negative. While Garison hasn’t been at The Winds very long (18 months or so), he made an effort to address reviews that predate the start of his tenure at the resort. Dealing with complaints from what a predecessor did takes some integrity, and I admire integrity. To reviews that end with, “I’m never coming back!” he replies with a smooth, “Even if you don’t stay with us, we hope you’ll come back to Ocean Isle Beach for your next vacation.” A 5-star review got a response of, “Navigating The Winds’ many pathways can indeed be challenging. (There’s a reason we hand out maps! <g> ).” There are winding paths around the property, so the maps are quite helpful. To another 5-star review, there was this comment, which I found amusing, given that it was overcast and lightly raining until the morning we had to leave: “I do apologize, however, that we failed to maintain sufficient control of the weather for you. I will speak with our staff about that and see if we can’t do better for your next visit.” Garison did more than just blow off the reviews with a “Thanks for staying with us and we look forward to seeing you again soon”; he took the time to read each and every review, and he went so far as to accept responsibility on behalf of the resort for things that truly were their fault or failing and using well-placed humor on issues that weren’t.

My daughter and I were already looking forward to the trip, but looking at the online reviews (interesting to note that there’s only been one bad review in the past year) and reading what people were saying, as well as Garison’s responses, just heightened our anticipation and made me want to meet this guy. As a business owner and one who wants to make sure every customer is happy (not just satisfied), I respect and admire that same quality in others in the customer service sector. Garison helped at check-in, and he was willing to let me get a picture with him. On top of that, he was extremely patient with Mary’s efforts to get a clear picture, even though it was time for him to go home for the rest of the weekend.

Garison and me (Photo credit: Mary Nesbitt)

I have great respect and admiration for all that Garison has done as Customer Service Manager at The Winds – guest services, managing the staff (and giving them their due for good work), and also taking the time to deal with online comments. The pleasure Mary and I had as we enjoyed our mom/daughter weekend led us both to declare, “We’re definitely coming back here!” Garison and his top-notch staff sealed the deal on that.

When’s the last time you took a break from the hustle and bustle of your daily life? What did you do?

When’s a Chemical not a Chemical?

Chemicals surround us. They’re in the food we eat, the drinks we drink, and the air we breathe. Our entire bodies are nothing but chemical processes.

A couple of weeks ago, the girls and I were in a shop where there was a sign that read, “Soaps – Chemical free!” Mary, my older daughter, quipped, “So they left out the lye?” I returned, “And the water, the oils, and the fragrance.” While the “chemical free” sign may entice unwary consumers, it really felt like the creator of the sign is , at best, ignorant of what, exactly, soapmaking is, and at worst, willfully practicing deceptive business practices (given that artificially scented soaps are labeled “all natural” and have “essential oil” on the label, I lean towards the latter).

Unit cell, spacefill model of sodium hydroxide (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Soapmaking is chemistry. The very idea of this amuses me greatly, given how hard I struggled in high school and college chemistry. Sodium hydroxide (lye) mixes with water (usually), and that mixture, in turn, is added to oils in liquid form; they are then emulsified together, either by stirring or blending, before having additives added to the raw soap and being poured into a mould. The magic happens here as the mixture creates heat internally which causes the whole thing to gel. This is a super-cool exothermic reaction wherein the beautifully swirled and designed raw soap changes color, smells funky, and looks like really runny, chunky petroleum jelly. It looks like the soap is a ruined mess at this point, but as the hours pass, the soap cools down, revealing the amazing colors and patterns once more. That process is called saponification. Actually, the gel phase is the heart of saponification, a chemical reaction that starts where the lye mixture meets the oils and ends formally at the end of the curing time. While gel phase only lasts 12-36 hours, saponification can last weeks.

Chemicals coming together to create a chemical reaction and cause a chemical change. Sodium hydroxide is a chemical – NaOH. So is water – H2O. And oils are as well – the formula for olive oil is C52H96O6. You can separate sodium hydroxide from water, allowing water to evaporate and lye crystals to form (9th grade science fair project). However, once that lye mixture combines with the oils, there’s no going back. The change is permanent and irrevocable. This is the hallmark of chemical change – a chemical reaction produces a change that cannot be reversed. Ahhh chemistry.

Well, you may argue, the creator of the “chemical free” sign means no harmful chemicals. What makes a chemical harmful? How natural it is? Cyanide is a naturally occurring chemical element, but I think we can agree it’s very harmful. Sodium hydroxide is a chemical that can be produced from natural processes (pouring water through ashes), and it doesn’t take much – relatively speaking – to dissolve a 300-pound body. Yet, it sometimes appears in cosmetics and pickles. Dihydrogen monoxide! There’s a “safe” chemical. In fact, I add it to every soap, lotion, and cream that I make. Yet, more people die of exposure to DHMO each year than from exposure to all other chemicals combined! Obviously, what makes a chemical “safe” or not is how it’s used and how much is used. A little NaOH or a little salt isn’t harmful, but an abundance of either can cause sickness, death, or complete disintegration.

Bottom line, there is no “chemical-free” soap, because all components of soap are chemicals, and the resulting product is soap and glycerin. Artisan made soaps are proof that there is better living through chemicals.

The Joy of Saying No, pt. 2

This article is part 2 of 2 on the rewards of saying, “no.” You can read the first part here.

As I mentioned in part 1 of “The Joy of Saying ‘No,'” I found joy and a sense of achievement in placing boundaries on my time and preserving my need to rest, sleep, and spend time with my family, even if it meant telling some special large order customers they would have to wait. Last year, I started putting some boundaries on myself, telling myself “no” when everything in me was hollering for “YES!!!”

It began at a local festival I had done faithfully from 2010 to 2014, despite seeing the booth fees increase steadily over that five-year period even as revenues dropped. After 2013’s festival, I crunched the numbers and realized (*gasp!*) I had ended up $150.00 in the hole (and we don’t have to travel more than 2 miles to it). Yikes! I still persevered into 2014 and participated in last year’s festival, again with a booth fee increase and diminished revenue. I decided not to do that event again. It just wasn’t worth it anymore. That was a really difficult decision, as a friend and private label customer is one of my fellow vendors, and I have many local customers who find me there. Deciding to quit had emotional ramifications for me.

The weekend following that event last year saw me at a steampunk convention for the second year. So. Much. Fun!!! I had my costume, I had a fabulous part-time partner to cover my booth, and I was hugging and greeting friends throughout my set-up time. There was so much to see and so many people to talk to, and it was much less tiring than it had been the previous year. Again, though, the participation fee had gone up, paired with travel expenses, and my revenues were down. In fact, it seemed attendance was down for both events. With a very heavy heart, I decided it was no longer financially feasible to participate in this event, either.

I’m a female with a female’s emotions; I feel sad, happy, victorious, frustrated, and angry. The hardest lesson for me in making these choices was, I couldn’t let my emotions run my business. There is room in my business for passion and excitement, but when the ledger books are showing more red than black, then there is no room at that point for emotion-based decisions.

As emotionally upsetting as the necessity of those decisions was, it did not take me long to move past the sadness and embrace the positives. The steampunk convention isn’t happening this year due to “lack of venue.” The booth fee for the other event went up yet again. In addition to that, I found out that attendance really was lower last year, per someone on the committee. Then the weather forecast proved to be the third affirmation that I’d made a smart choice; this Saturday is supposed to have a heat index over 100 deg. No way do I want to be out in that all day!

The rewards for me have been tremendous! This week I’ve supervised my daughter while she made and canned chocolate syrup, made a cover for my older daughter’s Nook, and finished their dad’s Father’s Day gifts. Whereas normally I’d be pulling everything together, doing last-minute wrapping and labeling, and trying to get my daughters ready for a couple of nights at their grandparents’ house, in addition to getting my oldest ready to go off to camp for a week, this week I’m calm, relaxed, and nearly giddy with how not-stressed I am. At random times, I’m dancing around and giggling – yes, GIGGLING!!! – because I’m not doing this festival. I’m not volunteering at our church’s booth at it (this year), I’m not going as a customer, nothing.

Friday we will do Father’s Day, since the oldest leaves at 5 Sunday morning. Saturday morning we will sleep in, have a special breakfast, and stay in our pajamas until close to noon. Sunday morning, instead of waking up late, still dehydrated and suffering the remaining vestiges of heat exhaustion, we’re going to wake up for church and then enjoy lunch with my parents.

The psychological effects of telling myself “no” have been overwhelmingly positive. Sure, there was a little discomfort at first, but like with so many positive changes, those negatives have quickly disappeared in light of the feelings of joy, calm, and excitement I am experiencing this week. If you’re a business owner, a mom, a teacher, a whatever, I encourage you to embrace the word “no” every now and then. You’ll be amazed at how liberating it is.

15 Traits of Emotionally Wealthy People

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