motivational mondays

The motivational door.

One of the reasons why I named this blog "Springcleanmylife" instead of "Springcleanmyhouse" was because I realized that there was a lot of junk in my life that I needed to clean out - including concerns in my life ranging from educational pursuits, half-done projects, and all sorts of issues that I've struggled with, but always took a defeatist attitude toward. But not anymore!

One of the areas in my life that I realize that causes me a lot of stress is how my family is doing in their lives as well. It's surprising, really, because out of all my siblings I'm pretty much the most independent one. If there's any one distant from the unit, it'd probably be me. However, as I reflected on my discomfort in the way some things in my family are handled, I've found that my discomfort actually stems from a fact that I actually care for them.

One of the biggest problems that I fear when it comes to my family is poor decision making in life. Not that I'm an expert at such things, but what I've observed is that a lot of poor decisions are made due to a lack of knowledge. And when I say knowledge, I mean a range of topics from the more complex ones of financial management, and understanding tax and insurance policies, to that of simple "how to use electricity efficiently" and caloric counts. There is wisdom in the verse in Isaiah that says "My people are gone into captivity for lack of knowledge" (Isa 5:13), for a lack of knowledge in these topics could easily bring someone into "captivity" - be in financial distress, or weight and self-image issues.

My solution to this problem: Motivational Mondays.

It's been two weeks now that I've taken on this project of posting things on my bedroom door that I've found pertinent to educate my family about. The process of is pretty simple - I select a topic (which could be from a discussion, a question that was raised, or a problem I see arising in one of our lives), I do the research, and I post the best articles on my door on Mondays. The articles are then left there throughout the week till next Monday (and a new topic) comes along. Because all our bedrooms are on the second floor of my house, it's a pretty good chance everyone will read it. Not to mention that having my other family members read things on my door might encourage them to open it and catch up a bit with us - perhaps encouraging family communication (which is severely lacking in my very busy family).

It's a really great family-project though, as it forces me to get educated on these issues as well. Not to mention that it also caters to the needs of my family, and hopefully helps them in their lives as well. It's also great because everyone's learning together in little chunks. I'm pretty excited about it as it's a proactive stance toward some of the lack-of-knowledge issues that I have been concerned about. And it's proactive in a positive manner too - without anyone getting defensive if I were to approach them directly. Imagine all the topics we could cover! I'll prolly even post up random stuff on a couple of weeks. Perhaps on the origins of the Mooncake Festival, or some random topic like "The worst pick up lines ever" (prolly have to filter a lot of them so that I won't get an earful by the daddy about the types of things I've been reading though). :)

This past week was on the topic of understanding your credit score, and the week before was on how clutter could make your butt look fat. I've linked some of the articles I posted up. For Singaporeans, in case you didn't know, we all have credit reports in Singapore too.

This week, our topic is going to be on Exercise and Dieting as it has been a topic that has been coming up for a while now. Here are the links to this week's Motivational Monday articles. Enjoy.

1. 5 Dieting Excuses You Can Beat Today
2. 13 Big Fat Dieting Myths
3. Debunking Time Magazine's "Why Exercise Won't Make You Thin." (I actually did read the original Time article and found it to be a load of rubbish too.)

And yes, I do encourage you to subscribe to Diet-blog if you're interested in exercise and diet. They've got some pretty good material.

If you've got a question that you always wanted answered, or a topic that you think you need to get more knowledgeable about, feel free to tell me about it and I'll see if I can do some searching for you too. Perhaps it'd be a topic that my family could learn from as well.

After-post note:

I will definitely have to do a week on pick-up lines. I've found some interesting CHRISTIAN ones. Some of them are actually really cool. :) Prolly will help...the brother with the girlfriend...or something. :)