Welcome to Bliss for Business! If you’re an entrepreneur, small business owner, or career-driven individual, tune in on Wednesdays to join Dani on an adventure to learn how to bring your work life in harmony with the thirteen Bliss Habits.
I don’t know whether Kathy did this on purpose or not, but I love that Thrift is following on the heels of Presence in the Bliss Habits wheel. To me, the two are inextricably linked: in order to enjoy thrift, to thrive in it, you really need to be present in yourself and your world, connected with what’s really important to you.
At its core, thrift is a lot of things. It’s minimalism and simplicity; it’s reusing and recycling; it’s making do with one thing in favor of another, higher-priority thing. And most often, when we think about thrift, we think about money.
But it’s not always about money – especially in business.
I talked a little bit about energy and time during Presence week, and it’s a point worth revisiting – how you spend your time, where you invest your energy, is as important (if not more so) than how you spend your money. Time, energy, and money are in limited supply – as are things like creativity, idea generation, and willingness to do new things.
Most of us can suss out, more or less, how to be thrifty with money, right? Spend on the things that are most important, and as little as possible on the rest. But what about these more nebulous concepts, like creativity? How can you create an overall balance of thrift across all facets of your business (or job)?
Values. Values, values, values.
Above all else, you need to know what’s important to you. Is it flexibility? Integrity? Freedom? Gentleness and flow? Stability? Abundance? Honesty? More time with family? More opportunities to be creative? There’s no “perfect” way to get to your core values, and they will certainly change over time, so it’s important to sit with this question. Brainstorm. Mind map. Meditate. Sing out loud. Whatever clears your head and gets you to your truth.
Once you have that, it’s time to think about how you can thrift your way into alignment with those values (and change your current habits too!). If you want to create a new ebook, for example, but you place a high value on spending time with family, you don’t need to go through the complete idea generation, writing, and editing process. Where else can that product come from? What have you already done, what ideas can you re-use? You can pull from a workshop you’ve taught, a series of blog posts you’ve written, or maybe even your journal entries or conversations you’ve had in your own head.
What do your values tell you about where you should be investing your resources? How can you shift your priorities into thrifty balance? Share with us in the comments!
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Hi! I’m Dani. I’m a writer, teacher, business coach, and signal-booster, and I’m on a mission to help you make your business more awesome, more successful, and more you. (With tea. Tea is always good.)
Join me for resources, wicked wisdom, and other good things at daninelson.com!