Inspiration – Page 58 – Life In Limbo

Inspiration | November 28

November 28, 2014

I watched this clip of The Daily Show today where Jon Stewart unpacks white privilege. It is so excellent. The clip was reposted by someone on my timeline in the wake of the upsetting decision of a grand jury not to indict the officer who shot and killed Michael Brown in Ferguson.

Bill Gates posts all the books he reads (and reviews most of them!) on his own personal version of GoodReads..

The Spark Notebook looks so wonderful! It’s beautiful and seems very functional as well. Planners and notebooks are really having a moment right now, which I couldn’t be happier about.

I’m planning to take this free Skillshare course on Documentary Photography, it looks amazing.

This article about how to be good at Twitter introduced me to Buffer and my life has never been the same since.

Oh my goodness, the Jurassic World trailer. I wrote to a friend: “I don’t care about the dangerous dinosaurs, I hope this park becomes a reality in my lifetime.”

I have an account on Quora, and the most surprising thing for me is that it is the only email newsletter I get where a) I am excited to see it in my inbox, and b) I almost always click through to something interesting every time even if I didn’t intend to.

This week I added “learn to scuba dive in Koh Tao” to my Southeast Asia bucket list based on awesome articles like this one.

The Book Depository ships free worldwide! Ahh!

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As I write this, my mum’s on a plane to Tokyo. By the time you read it, we will be together! I am so indescribably excited and in a way relieved to see her: it’s been too long, it’s unnatural. I am not going to be posting on the blog next week in order to make the most of our time together but I’ll be back the week after that. To my American readers: Happy Thanksgiving! To everyone else: we all have so much to be grateful for, and I for one am using American Thanksgiving as a happy excuse to practice gratitude. What are you grateful for today? Have an amazing weekend.

Ps. My newsletter comes out on the last Friday of every month (that’s today!). If you’re not someone who likes reading blogs every day and would prefer a roundup of the best posts at the end of each month, you can subscribe by email here. Thanks for reading!

Inspiration | November 21

November 21, 2014

I started listening to the This Is Your Life Podcast this week and have been really inspired by all the episodes I’ve heard so far. It’s all about leadership and productivity and branding.

I cried after watching this video about touchable memories. Such a truly powerful idea.

How cool does the Passion Planner look? I am considering funding the Kickstarter just to get one of my own.

I finished reading The Slight Edge this week and inspired the heck out of me! Seriously, this is one of the more powerful books I’ve read this year. (More book recommendations here)

Inbox for Gmail turns out to be awesome. I signed up to get an invite last week and I’ve been really liking it so far. I like the way they bundle together emails so I can instantly tell what’s important and what’s not (aka what’s in my “Promos” bundle). A side effect has been unsubscribing to a lot of email lists..

This article on how and why to keep a commonplace book was very inspiring. I have always written quotes down in whatever notebook or app I tend to be using at the time, but I love the idea of having a more consolidated and organized system.

I signed up for a free account on Copyblogger and got access to so many awesome ebooks about marketing and and copywriting.

Dylan interviewed his grandparents for their 65th wedding anniversary and it was a really touching article.

Such an awesome piece about traveling or being an expat for years.

On a related note, I loved this article about what you need to move to a new city. It’s giving me ideas for the next stage of my own personal adventure!

This week on Guinea Pigging Green, Laura and I are talking all about yoga teacher training! It was a fun episode to record and I think we touched on a lot of the interesting questions people might have about signing up for a training like this.

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Sometimes I don’t have many inspirational things to share at the end of each week, and sometimes (like today!) my cup runneth over. I was so endlessly inspired this week by so many different kinds of things, and that’s exactly how I like it. You may have noticed already, but I’ve decided to slow down my posting schedule here on the blog and devote more of my time to developing helpful content rather than just working to get something up every weekday. I’m already noticing huge gains in my productivity and planning for the future and this feels like a more sustainable rhythm for me.

This week flew by, and I don’t expect the next one to go any slower! My mom is arriving one week from yesterday and I couldn’t be more thrilled. I cannot wait to give her huge hugs and show her around my corner of Korea. Have a wonderful weekend!

Inspiration | November 14

November 14, 2014

I was super inspired by this post and the accompanying podcast episode about learning to love the middle of things.

How obsessed with Serial am I? Well now I listen to a podcast about Serial. And I listened to an episode of The Gist that had an interview with Sarah. And I read the Reddit threads sometimes (one of the rare times I’ve willingly read a Reddit thread in my life). And my friends and I discuss each episode at length every time it comes out. It’s such a good show, such great storytelling, such a fascinating story.

I love this idea of seeing a long-term blog as a practice that you keep. My blog has shifted its focus and style over time, but throughout it’s always been a place for me to experiment, try new things, practice. It was a good reminder that I can be flexible with this medium I love so dearly.

I found myself back on How Sweet Eats this week, and subsequently pinned like crazy. I especially like this post of 20 weeks of dinners.

There’s a new season of City Ballet!! Yes, I watched it in its entirety. I find ballet totally fascinating. Also ballet-related: Ballet 422.

I liked this article about Taylor Swift’s new video. Here’s another that ties in some of the history of calling women crazy.

The Girls Season 4 Trailer!!!

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And with that, another week has flown by! Life is so good these days, and I just feel happy. The future is uncertain, but my latest mantra is “all good things”. What’s coming next can be scary because it’s uncertain, but all the things I’m deciding between or figuring out? They’re all good things. I’m lucky. (Did I mention that my mom is visiting in less than 2 weeks?!) This weekend I’m thinking about taking it easy, maybe doing a hike, and relaxing. Have a wonderful one.

Inspiration | November 7

November 7, 2014

I had a few different obsessions this week. One of them was itinerary ideas for a 2-month-ish trips to South East Asia, which was so fun to research. This article was awesome, although I probably wouldn’t follow his recommendations to a T. This other great article gave more flexible suggestions and lots of practical information.

Of course if I’m back on trip planning, I have my spreadsheet started and my packing list on the go (another of this week’s obsessions). I really liked this packing list for a round-the-world trip, and this one for digital nomads. This one was awesome too (and very detailed).

I think momondo is my new favourite website for finding cheap, short flights.

Since I live in Korea and see couples in matching outfits all the time, I thought this video explaining the phenomenon was fascinating and really well done.

The new A Beautiful Mess shop is so cool! I love all their new products.

I would love some squash toasts right about now.

This article about being a tourist in North Korea was fascinating.

I picked up some interesting ideas from this mini tutorial about editing photos on your phone.

I was strongly considering doing the teaching assistant program in France this week, and this blog post was quite a help while I was researching the whole thing. As it stands now, I don’t think I’ll do the program (though still may move to France!) but the article was helpful anyways.

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There are so many exciting things on the horizon it’s hard to keep them all straight in my head. As my mom says, I have a hamster brain at the moment, the wheels are always turning a thousand times a minute and new ideas are popping in all the time. It’s crazy how quickly I am running through things and switching off from one thing to the next. I’m excited it’s Friday. I’m happy for the weekend. Have an amazing one yourself!