Tag Archives: Kelowna

Traveling for Work

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airportBecause I’ve recently moved into management in my day job, I have to travel a little bit to some of our branch offices.  I know quite a few people who travel a lot in the IT industry for work and travel far more than I do.  So much they’ve received super elite status with airlines like Air Canada.  That’s a lot of flying, try 100,000 miles or 95 segments. CRAZY!  Thankfully I don’t have to travel that much and may only reach the “prestige” level.  Not that I’m counting…

Anyway I’m thankful that I am in control of when I fly out and can work our family schedule around it so that I don’t inconvenience my family when I’m away and also so we can keep our options open for building our business in the evenings.  There is a silver lining though to my traveling and that is getting out and meeting new people with the possibility of having business at a distance.  One of our goals is to have a distance leg this year so that we can expand our business into another city.  While building business in Edmonton is awesome and we are ever so thankful that we have a kick butt team there, we wouldn’t mind expanding into British Columbia as we eventually want to move out there to the Kelowna area. 

When travelling you’d be surprised at how many people you meet and how open they are to talking.  When on the plane try talking to the person beside you (if they are open to it) and just strike up a conversation.  You never know where that conversation may lead to.  I’m not saying you need to try and “prospect” the person sitting beside you but having a casual conversation with the person next to you helps pass the time and also you’ve met someone new.  I love that about this business, it allows you to stretch your comfort zone (if you have issues with talking to people) and allows you to geniunly have conversations with strangers you may not have had before. 

With that I think more people could be more friendly especially with the way the world is going these days.  Anyway my plane is here and they are calling of boarding. 

If you travel for business, safe travels!

Choosing Your Attitude

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Today I woke up and looked outside and it was cloudy, +13 (COLD), and dreary outside.  It’s August and I always think of August still being warm but not this year.  Apparently Edmonton has had a pretty crappy summer this year, the crappiest since the mid 90’s I heard from my brother in-law.  So weather usually affects me in a bit way, it determines my attitude sometimes and really can put me in a great mood if its blue skies and sunny and WARM, or a crappy mood if it’s like today.  I know it shouldn’t do this but it does and has for years. 

I recently heard a audio file or maybe read in a book recently (cannot remember where, doesn’t really matter) about your attitude is what you choose it to be.  You are 100% in control of your attitude and how you feel about the things around you.  Weather as we all know is out of our control and yet so many people are affected by it.  I was so pissy this morning that I went on a tweet tyrant (maybe just one tweet) about how pissy I was and just needed to get it off my chest.  Did it do anything?  Not really, however it did make me instantly realize what I had just done and how I should be in better control of my attitude.  I reflected back on what I had heard/read about how you choose your own attitude. 

bad_attitude So I guess that’s my inspiration for this blog entry today and why I’m writing about it.  First it’s helping me understand just exactly why my attitude is the way it is, or was. I’ve since changed my attitude this morning. And second what I can do about it.  I can continue to be a grump ass and just be pissed at the world because the weather is crappy or I can look on the bright side and choose to have a better attitude about it.  Like I’ve said I decided to be a bit more positive about it.  So how did I do that?

Well It’s been smoky in Edmonton since Thursday and because it has been cooler it’s been easier to deal with because its not hot and muggy.  Smoke + Hot + Muggy = The Suckage.  It also rained last night which helped get rid of the smoke and with that makes for a much better day.  So I guess there really is a positive in everything.  Do I still wish it was hotter, heck yeah.  I love the heat and I love summer.  Can we do something about that? Yup.  In 3 years we plan to move to Kelowna where they actually have a longer summer than in Edmonton and consistently have +30’s and above through the summer.  So while I bitch and complain about the weather here (or bitched and complained) I am actually going to do something about that in a few years.  :)

Its pretty awesome the power of reading as I mentioned in a previous post, it is what has helped me understand a lot about myself and how I deal with certain things.  So what I’m really getting at with this whole post is choose your attitude.  Is it really worth being all grumpy over something you cannot control?  Even if you can control it, is it worth all that energy to be pissy?  Nobody wants to hang around a pissy person.

Have a great Sunday!

 

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Check out these non-pissy bloggers – Cliff – Peer Pressure Works, Chad – The Grind, Kelly – ‘Round the Bend, Kim – In Desperate Need of Entertainment, Kyle – Teacher, Tinkerer, Farmer, Geek, Liam – In the Now, Brad – Kick Me Out Soon, Tammy – Tam I am, Erron – From The Inside Looking In, James – Feelings of White, Vlad – Analog Coast, Janine - Because

Got Our Keys!

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house-keysWe got our keys after our walkthrough of our new home.  I could not be happier and more excited about  it as we start a new chapter in our lives.  This is pretty much the last home we will ever occupy here in Edmonton.  Our next step will be Kelowna which is the feature picture in my blog header.

Our landlords are amazing and we cannot wait to work with them on where 15% of our rent will go to charity.  Who does that?  I still cannot get over that.  Sure they will probably get a tax deduction but big deal, they are doing what most wouldn’t do.  Most would just keep the rent money and spend it on something probably less giving.  The new grass around the whole place looks awesome, and the house is just in perfect shape for an older home.  They really put some work into it and it shows.

I’ll try and keep this updated as we move into our place this weekend! OH YEAH!! 

Packing Isn’t Fun

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Packing isn’t fun however it’s a means to an ends.  This week we started to go hard on packing up the condo.  It’s quite a change for us going from a place we owned to a place we are now going to rent.  Which by the way is a great place with great landlords.  Landlords that want to donate 15% of our rent to a charity that we get a hand in helping pick.  Who does that these days?  That is quite impressive.  I think it’s a sign that we are doing the right thing.

So renting isn’t a bad thing.  I’ve crunched the numbers and we will save more money then our condo will ever appreciate in value and for damn sure more then we will ever pay off on our mortgage in the first 10-15 years.  Almost all mortgages are front loaded where the bank will get all their interest at the beginning.  I’d rather give someone who is going to donate part of my rent to a charity then give it to some money hungry bank that doesn’t give a rats ass about us. 

I also have to give a shout out to a friend who rented before they purchased or are purchasing their house.  I used to bug him so much about renting, saying why don’t you own, why are you renting, blah blah.  He had it right, he was doing what successful people do, save up BEFORE getting a mortgage.  I don’t know if he saved up enough to buy the whole house in cash however I do know he’s FAR better off then most people.  I have to give him credit because he did the opposite of the masses and despite ridicule he stuck to his guns.  Same idea for what we are doing, sticking to our guns and doing what we know is right and what most are not willing to do.

We will rent for the next few years debt free.  We will only have the car payment for another few months and then we will be 100% debt free. The stress that will be lifted with that will be unreal.  I cannot wait for this.  Being in debt is NOT something we will repeat.  So we will be renting here in Edmonton for the next 2-3 years and then move out to Kelowna where we have been wanting to raise our family.  As we move out there we will rent for a few more years, get an idea of where we want to build or buy a place and build it in cash.  Mock me, say it won’t happen, say I’m crazy, but I will do it.  The more you say I cannot do it, the more it will just fuel my fire to do it. So bring it on ;)

Kelowna here we come…

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Dreambuilding with Friends

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Last night we had some amazing friends over who are building this amazing business with us and we asked them to share what their dreams and goals were and why really they are building this business.  It was pretty inspiring and you really don’t fully understand your friends or people for that matter until they open their heart and share the dreams and goals they have for life and where they want to end up. 

We also had the chance to share with them because they had asked us and when I watch my amazing wife share what she wants in life it’s pretty amazing.  She really opens up her heart and ends up getting teary because she wants it so bad.  That’s what it takes, you really need to want something bad enough that it hurts in order for it to come to fruition.

It really got me thinking again about our goals and what we want in life and I figured I’d put those things down again.  I always love writing them out because it really gets me thinking and honestly just shows you the kinds of things that will be available in what we are doing.  We know this because we’ve seen it first hand in our coaches and also their coaches and beyond.

This year we will have Lindsay retire from her job and never have to work for another man again.  She will no longer have to work for someone that tells her when she has to be in to start her day, no longer tells her when she can have lunch and really no longer has control over her paycheque.  Of course she will still work but it will be working on our future through our business. So maybe it’s semi-retired.  :)   Either way she will now be home to raise our kids when we have them and won’t need to drop them off at a dayhome or daycare.  WE will be raising our kids and instilling our values into them, not someone else.  That is goal number one for us right now and why we are spending a lot of time building our business. 

We also want to become debt free as some of my previous posts have shown and we will achieve that this year.  We are making some tough choices and really streamlining our life so that we can get the most out of it for the short term.  There will be some sacrifices however having a shot term mentality doesn’t work for us because we have HUGE long term goals and the old adage small term pain for long term gain really applies.  I know some people reading this know that for sure.

Moving on with our life we want to move out to Kelowna where we may end up renting for another year or two while we have our house built and paid for in cash.  Renting isn’t necessarily a bad thing as we will end up saving far more then what equity would be build up in our house and with how much we’d be paying down in our mortgage.  We will end up raising our kids out in Kelowna and either put them in private school or have them home schooled with a personal teacher.  Our kids will get first hand teaching instead of being in a school full of 30-40 kids where it takes 10 times longer to teach kids because the class can only go as fast as the slowest kid.  By this time I will have also walked away from my job and will be at home raising my kids as well.  Being able to take them out in the afternoon and go hiking or skiing for their physical education instead of a 60 minute class at school.  How cool is that?

Lastly family is key for us and we want to be able to spend a lot of time with our family so as we continue to grown our business we will help to retire our parents before they need to.  When you really look at what it would take to retire them you start to get a sense of, we can do that.  They don’t need to work or be on the “Work till you die program”.  We want our parents to enjoy as much time with our kids and our family as possible.  No longer will their be handcuffed to their jobs so they cannot see their grandchildren grow up. 

These are just some short term goals that we have in the next little while and as we continue to grow this business where the work we did a year ago is still paying us today, we will continue to help other people do the same as us and help them realize they too can achieve dreams and goals like this or whatever their dreams and goals are.  We fully believe this is possible and we will make it happen.

Obviously we have much more dreams and goals then this, but this is just the start for The Guthrie’s and we could not be more excited to be doing what we are doing.  We have been blessed for sure!