In my new job I have been talking with families about their priorities with their family, faith and finances. I have come to realize the problem of America today and the high divorce rate that haunts our country every day is that we lack family first.  I talk to people who say family is first, but when it comes down to family it is second or third. Just to give you an idea; the work alcoholics of our society, ego driven personalities; my time is better than your time people.

I wanted to talk about this subject this week because I have a passion for helping others and I want to make sure my readers are not falling into the number one statistic of America today; which is high divorce rate and family suicide. When we say family is first we need to mean it. Our family is in need of one another 24hrs a day which can be as little as a hello or as much as a shoulder to lean on. More and more teenagers are killing themselves because their parents are too busy with their career life and not enough time for their children. Hello America….we need to stop this.

Time Magazine wrote an article about how the number one killer in women is stress related diseases. We are killing ourselves by not taking off time from work and/or not getting help with the family needs from each spouse. We are killing ourselves and we do not even realize it.  I talk about eating healthy, but that does nothing if we are not relaxing and spending quality time with our families.

What can you do to help yourself and your family? Ask yourself; do you spend enough time with your family? Do you take enough family vacations and mom/dad getaways? If you are not sure; this is a place to start. We need to make sure we are utilizing our vacation time. Spending quality time with your family and your spouse is very important. We give our employer back more of our vacation days than we actually take. It is bad enough Americans average 2 weeks a year; let alone giving it back. If you are having troubles with your spouse, then you need address this or get help before with your marriage before it is too late.

The Osmond family just lost their 18 year old son to depression. The family was taken by surprise and had no idea this child was going through so much pain. Why is this? A parent should know when their child is hurting and that was not the case here. Do not let your child escape from you…be involved and love them like there is nothing more important in this world.

I hope I have opened the eyes of those who needed it and for those who know someone who might be facing this challenge; help them before it is too late. As always please share with me your concerns or questions regarding this matter. I love hearing from you and getting your feedback.

The fall semester is near the end and Christmas is right around the corner. During this time things get a little crazy in my life. As I wind down the year 2009 and start finishing all of my last minute school assignments in preparation for the holiday break, things start to get a little intense.  It seems as if I have so much going on and very little time to do anything and then I start to panic. Keep in mind that not only are final assignments due for school, I have to Christmas shopping, start packing as I am moving soon and I have last minute things to wrap up at work before the holiday break. Pressure…

I have done really well this semester as I finish thus far with an A in my Communications class. Things could change depending on my last couple of grades that are awaiting the professors blessing. Usually if I have a B or C I do not tend to panic as much, but when I have an A I prefer to end the term with that A and that causes the pressure to be on. This has been a very interesting semester as I have learned a lot about communicating with others, how others communicate as well as understanding how I communicate individually. This class can play a very integrated part to your career, family life and friendships. Over the last 11 weeks I have implemented some of what I have learned to my work life and it has made things a lot easier when it comes to dealing with my clients.

As for the rest of my stresses I am going to be having a lot going on in my life in 2010. When I sit and think about all the changes I have coming my way I really begin to panic. They are all things for the better which is good, but they are all still very scary, stressful and are making me very nervous. And to top it all off I am getting older with a birthday right around the corner. I use to love birthdays, but the more frequently they seem to come the more I am starting to dislike them.  Some of these things occurring in my life I cannot discuss with you just yet, but I will touch base on a few.  One of them is I am moving in with my boyfriend. We have been dating for almost 4 years and have finally decided to move to the next step. His place is smaller than mine, but I am renting and he owns so you know what that means. If we can survive living in his little condo then we will be good to go. The other stressful thing in my life is I am going to being starting a new career in a different field. It will bring many new endeavors into my life, but it will be scary starting off. I will give everyone more details once I figure everything out.

So nothing like cleaning up the old year and getting ready for a completely new one. This is one way to tackle some of my New Year’s resolutions.  So in the meantime I am trying to keep calm while finishing up a great semester and an okay 2009. I will keep you posted on how the semester plays out as well as how my new life will be starting and when. In the meantime I hope everyone is getting ready for the holidays as it is right around the corner.  I know I am not the only one in life with crazy things going on…What about you? What is going on in your life around the end of the year or this year that throw’s you into a panic? I would love to hear…

As if attending class online for Rasmussen is not enough I signed up for the Florida Real Estate course a couple of weeks ago.  In order to obtain a real estate license in the state of Florida you have to complete a 63 hour course and pre-state exam. Well being my life is extremely busy as is with regular class and working fulltime I went with the night and weekend classes over a period of two and a half weeks.  Let’s just say I did not know what I was getting myself into.

As I am getting near the end I will say it was well worth it, but I had no idea how intense the class was going to be. I did not realize how regulated real estate is until now. I knew there was some government involvement, right because they are involved in everything, but they are all over real estate. It’s good because they are here to protect the public without a doubt and their own pocket of course.   

The class is teaching us about everything from principals, practices and the law. I thought I had a upper hand because I worked in a law real estate law firm for 7 years, but I must say the correlation was very small amounts far few and between. I did recognize some areas when talking about Fair Housing Acts and Civil Rights Act from 1866, but again very small sections. This class did provide me with a lot of history knowledge regarding laws and why the laws were developed. I also learned about financing and mortgage markets, plotting, mapping and zoning. This class also contained a lot of math which makes sense now, but I had no idea in the beginning.

I still have a few more days of class to attend and lots of studying before I take the state exam. I have had many tell me the state exam is not easy and it can take many times to pass. I however would like to pass the first time so I will be wise and utilize all the tools and resources to my advantage to make sure I am fully prepared to pass the exam. I have to get a 75% to pass so I am a bit stressed at this point. However before I can take the state exam I have the exam from the class that I have to pass first. That is the one I am worried about the most right now because I have limited time to study.

Which means I have to run for now, but I will keep you all posted as I pass exams and move along to the next event… If anyone has any stories they would like to share or pointers on preparation and passing feel free to share. I would love to hear what others went through.

 FLORIDA

I cannot believe how quickly this semester is flying by…It seems like I just started a couple of weeks ago, but in all actuality is has been 6 weeks. I am doing very well in my classes although I will admit some weeks are tougher than others. I will tell you that I seem to be having most difficulty with APA formatting and citing sources.

I have been writing papers in school for about a year and a half and while I have improved some; I have not manage to truly perfect APA formatting in all areas. There seems to be so many different rules and it is hard to learn all of them. Just when I think I am doing great…”Bam” – I get docked for citing something improperly.  Also because I am an online student most of our papers are utilizing online sources and I have not found anything that list APA formatting for online articles or pages. Is there a book or something that would give more information?

I have more and more classes wanting you to use resources to write your papers and cite the sources. I am not good at doing this because I like to read something and then put it into my words and how I interrupt what they are saying. I guess this is not what APA is all about. So I ask myself how do I combine the resource into my paper without changing the wording and then remember to cite it….Hmmm. Maybe I am making this out to be more difficult than it is, but I just get way too overwhelmed when it comes to formatting papers correctly.

Other than that school and my online classes are flowing efficiently. I cannot believe there is only 5 weeks in the semester left. My classes this semester are fundamental; Business Ethics and Excel – I love the Excel class because I am truly learning so much more with tables, pivot tables and formulas. And it is with the Microsoft Excel 2007 version which doesn’t get any better than that. I wanted to take Excel before having to take any other Math or Algebra classes. It will be a huge help! My Business Ethics class is going ok, but I will be honest in saying it is not my favorite class. We are allowed to have classes we do not like, right? I am just not all that intrigued by it.

Well I have to run, but I hope things are well on your end. And let me know if you have any suggestions on the APA Formatting because I could really use some help before going into the next semester. Maybe there is a recommend book I can buy or something?     

Okay I know I can not call myself a superstar, but that is what I feel like after this last semester. As you read previously in my blogs; this Accounting Payroll class was defiantly challenging and really took a lot of hard work and dedication. Not to mention the computer nightmare at the end of the semester that drove me bananas.

I spent many of long nights on the computer scratching my head and really trying to understand payroll and all the laws, codes and taxes that come along with it. Not to mention how confusing the test questions were which really brought my grades down.  I do not know what it was, but I was having difficulty really understanding this class. As I had mentioned before; thank goodness for the teacher and her patience with me. The one good thing was I got to write a paper in this class, the paper was about the Family Medical Leave Act. I am pretty good at writing about something once I have the topic of choice so that was a relief. The downside of that was the APA formatting as I am still having difficultly with this. I try to use sites online that help with this, but the citing that I had trouble with was citing internet sources. Still have a lot to learn I guess. 

The Payroll class was great overall and I say this because I learned a lot of great things regarding taxes and how they are figured out. I learned how laws differ from state to state, I learned about what companies have to pay towards your taxes and I learned the break down by city, state and federal. Along with much, much more so if you ever have to take this class I will say it is not easy, but you will learn a lot through out which makes it all worth while at the end of the day.

Here is a funny one for you just to show how learning this stuff can be helpful. I had a meeting with an Insurance person as work the other day. They are now hiring companies from the outside to come in and handle all this insurance. So I meet with this lady and she proceeds to tell me about the hidden paycheck I get from my company. As she asked if I knew what this was I stated no and please explain; she began to tell me what my company contributes for me to Social Security, Taxes that are matched (both state and federal) and the matching of Medicare. Well if it wasn’t for this class I would not have known that all of the above mentioned things are not the employer doing that out of good faith, but they pay or match those things because the law requires it. It kind of upset me because they were making it seem as if they are doing a great thing and I should feel lucky. The audacity of people…

 None the less this was an interesting semester and I am please to announce that I recovered my near failing grade of a D- at mid terms and brought it to a high C. Yes that is right I passed the class and passed it with pride on my back. It was so difficult for me and I ran into so many challenges along the way with getting laid off from work, searching for new employment, computer failing on me three weeks before finals and I had to redo do three weeks of homework to finish the remaining three weeks, but at the end of the day it was all worth it. I Passed and Passed with a C.

Well it’s the New Year and now is a great time to make some New Year resolutions. What are your resolutions for 2009? Do you believe in doing New Year resolutions? I know there are mixed views out there regarding this…some love this time, some people cheat themselves this time of the year and others think New Year resolutions is a joke.  We all have opinions and are free to feel whatever we like, right?

I on the other hand I love this time year. It gives me a start date and end date to really reflect on my life and makes come changes. For me the New Year resolution is a motivator for life changes. I truly take some time to reflect back on my previous year and decide what makes me happy and what bothers me, I then come up with a new plan. I have been doing this even more the last few years because I am getting older and life is quickly passing. I also will make joint changes or goals with mutual friends or with my boyfriend. Then we have each other to push towards our goals for the new Year.

Reflect…

Last year my New Year resolution was to be a better friend. That was a big thing for me because as we grow older we tend to loose sight of the ones we love and care for most. While this needs to be mutual thing, I made an agreement to myself that I would at least try to keep in touch on my end and if my friends do the same great and if not, then there’s not much I can do. While I did do a lot better this year with keeping in touch and even went to visit a few friends. I did not manage to keep in touch with everyone as much as I had hoped.  This year was a challenging year for me mentally, financially and emotionally, while this is no excuse I will not be as hard on myself. However I will continue this resolution into 2009.

This brings me to my new 2009 goals for the year, as always I will continue to keep good health and improve health in some areas. I had a few health problems in 2008 so I am and have been making strides to a better mean. I am also going to try to take more courses during a semester and hope to graduate sooner. It is hard to work 60 hrs a week and make 2 or 3 classes, but I was laid off and trying to find new employment. I only hope I find a good job with a better schedule so I can focus more on school. And for my last goal for 2009, I am going to improve my finances and start to save more money. I am going to really focus on what I spend, make sure I am smart buying and become more stable with my self.

While I hope everyone has goals to work on for 2009, whether you call them New Year goals or just goals in general for a better life…I wish you all the best of luck and a Prosperous New Year!

I finished the summer semester courses and my two week break seemed as if I blinked and it was here and left before I could enjoy it. I guess that stems from working to much and everyday life stresses.  This semester I am adopting another class as I am trying to expedite my time attending school. I try to take additional classes when I can. However; working 60 plus hours a week doesn’t leave to much room for those extra classes. So I will take two for know and see how things go.

My classes this semester at Rasmussen are E-commerce and Customer Service. The E-commerce class is going to help me a lot in my working career now because I do a lot of online recruiting, marketing and searching for new business. Therefore I am actually excited about this class and anxious to learn a lot. The Customer Service I am not real sure about because I did not know they even had this type of course. It makes sense when you think about it because it is great for everyone to learn how to deal with customers whether they are outside of your company or inside. Inside meaning co-workers because we need to learn how to treat one another too.

Of course as I decide to take on more challenges with school, work wants to give me more challenges too. In Orlando we are really struggling with the economy and businesses are laying people off left and right. It has been addressed that I could be one of these people next. These are the times when I wish I could blink my eyes and be finished with my degree.

I was searching for jobs on CareerBuilder.com the other day with my boyfriend. He has his Bachelors degree from University of Central Florida and I am earning my degree now. The difference and stress levels from his search and mine are completely different. He is searching for areas of knowledge and compensation and looking in one field while I am searching for all of those plus education requirements and looking under several different fields. While there are companies out there searching for people with my experience they are requiring a four year degree. Even the sales positions were requiring a degree. What the heck… He was finding things left and right while I kept running into road blocks. This really scares me and I can only pray that I am not put into this difficult situation again.   

If only I had gone to College right after high school things in my life would be so different; however I did not so I have to move on. Thank goodness for the resources we have now which allow me to earn my degree online and work to pay my bills at the same time. Stay with me this semester as I journey through these courses and hope to learn lots – who knows, maybe I can share some things with all of you.

Oh' my, the Holidays are here and there is so much to do and little time to do it. Funny I mention this after posting about time management. I am going out of town for a week starting on Wednesday and will not be back until next Tuesday. If you can only imagine what the last two weeks of my life have been like.

Work… making sure I am caught up and have helped everyone who may need it. School…making sure that not only is this weeks work done and turned in on time, but get myself caught up for next weeks school work… "Ugh" Packing… I am going to New York and had to prepare myself for the cold weather; therefore I had to buy appropriate clothes because in Florida we do not need lots of warm clothing.

Normally in the past when I have traveled I was able to do homework while I was gone. However this time I am going to attend an Indian Wedding and I will be extremely busy for five days. Yea...that is right five days of tradition and celebration. I am pretty excited actually and can not wait to experience a wedding of a different culture. However this leaves me very stressed due to we are coming to the end of fall semester and classes are getting harder and packed full of assignments. I truly have had a lot of difficulty getting my homework done and preparing myself for the week to follow.

When traveling and you want to be able to do school work, I have learned that Courtyard by Marriott is designed for business travelers and have Wi-FI throughout their hotels. This has always worked for me in the past and I highly recommend checking them out next time you travel.

The other important key to traveling is when in school try to plan your trips during our 2 week breaks in between semesters. I know this is not always the easiest thing to do and you can not help it sometimes, but do it when you can. Some people have so much trouble planning vacation and school that they decide not to take vacation, but this is not good because we all need a break here and there. It refreshes us and makes us stronger. Of course I am going to attend a wedding so I had no choice as to when it could take place.

I know that things are going to get difficult as the holidays get near…I just need to learn to pace myself and practice that time management that I seem to focus on so much.

Any suggestions?  Let me know.

Otherwise, I hope everyone has a Wonderful Holiday…Please enjoy your friends and family through these times of Thanks and Joy.

I am half way through the semester and things have been really tough. I am not going to sit here and write posts saying that school and work go well together because that is not true. However if you have the dedication to stick it out, it will all be worth it in the end.

The thing that you have to remember is your normal day to day duties do not disappear. The key is to figure out how to fit them in with your new challenges of school work. The key phrase here is time management, I am sure you have all had this phrase thrown at you several times. The questions for you to ask yourself is have you actually tried it. I found a great website that has some really helpful tips; learning to better utilize your time makes life so much easier. There are a lot of really great tips, so try them out and see what works for you.

I am still learning to juggle school and work. Over the last few semesters I have learned that right about the time you get use to your classes, they are over and new ones are starting. This in turn brings all new challenges. One of the things that work for me is learning how to group the right classes together. What I mean by this is to not take classes at the same time that consist of all writing. This semester I am taking a Computer class and English Composition class. If you are not sure of what a class consist of you can always ask your Student Coordinator. They will generally know if a class does a lot of writing or not or if is a difficult class or relatively easy one. The next thing I do is work an easy class with a hard class. This always helps and lowers my stress levels too.    

The older we get the faster times seems to fly by us. I never have enough time in my day, but I am really trying to figure out how to work the scheduling system and master it. If you have any helpful tips I can give a try please comment my blog and let me know what works for you.  

What do you do for time management?