I had BIG plans for the month of May in Bettie-land!

                                      Bettie Danielle with her daughter and our first Bettie Baby.

In honor of Mother’s Day, my plan was to feature our Betties who are also moms and to truly live it up this month in the blog and on our Facebook page by celebrating these women who are leading the family way. And then a few life things happened to derail me, which became good learning lessons for those out there trying to build a business or a blog!

The first thing:

While I proudly put my ask out for articles almost a month and a half in advance, I remembered quickly that moms are incredibly busy women. For moms to grab a moment to set one uninterrupted finger to a keyboard is an incredible feat; to get to fully write something cohesive is monumental! We hear this, we know this; even I lived it. Earlier this month, Bettie Keena and her husband entrusted me with watching their first born for a whole three hours. I showed up ready to watch and with laptop and book bag in hand. While I did take out the laptop and set it up, I never got a chance to write anything. My idea had been that I’d write while he slept, but then, instead, I basically stared at him during sleeping time to make sure he was still breathing and then during the rest of the time (to umm, make it easier on me), I decided to just hold him on my chest so he’d be closer for me to stare at in complete awe. Suddenly, my three hours were up and it was time to leave. Imagine this distraction happening every day, every hour in some form or fashion?

The lesson? People are building lives. In order to keep blog content coming, schedule out farther in advance, especially for tasks and for asks that are being made of busy people. And, in order to make this ask, you have to be that much more planned out yourself in order to make your deadlines and keep your business or your blog flourishing. This seems so rudimentary, but when things get busy and life starts happening, suddenly all of your time is eaten up and you’re left with nothing but a good idea that never got executed and that’s no fun.

The second thing:

I didn’t have a back up plan! Back in late March, I was so proud of myself to have been preparing for May that I didn’t think even further ahead to give myself a contingency plan nor did I factor in …

The third thing:

Plan for your own life. I knew I was going to Europe for three weeks in May. I did think that I’d be able to write and manage my life from Europe; there are outlets and internet there after all. However, my first week in Prague was eaten up with severe jet lag, brain fog and time spent in a few meetings for work and certainly pleasure. The second two weeks in Vienna and Spain were the actual vacation and as each date of the motherly month passed, I got more and more discouraged with myself and kept thinking, “Ugh, what’s the point now?”

My personal goal this year is to not beat myself up so much, so I’ll stop looking at the coulda shoulda’s and acknowledge that this month I chose to build my life rather than my blog. I’m also going to choose to be happy that I’m writing *this* helpful post on the last day of May in an effort to meet my Bettie goal of having new and meaningful content each month! Howeves, for those looking to start on this journey of building a brand and speaking to an audience, take time to heed my three things and take real time to make a planned out plan that keeps you on task, on schedule and full of happiness!

                                                    Málaga, Spain