Beauty Products

If you are busy building tons of backlinks, worried about your keywords and pulling your hair out about SEO, shaking in your boots about thousands of competitive websites, and crying in your sleep over Google updates. Then you are not alone.

If that is you and you really are worried about any or all of the above, then I am here to say this, do not ever rely on any other company, website or search engine to get you results.

Terms Change

Over time, terms always change and if you do not keep up with those changes you may well fall by the wayside and lose customers, readers and ultimately money. Only if you are relying on those very websites for traffic.

New and Unique Content

All websites and blogs are crying out for new and unique content all the time. Google is a company just like any other and they want to offer the best and most relevant and unique content to give to their users. If it’s old and perhaps outdated content then that web page will ultimately end up not being ranked.

Outdated Websites

If your website looks a little outdated, then this will turn people off and they may leave without even reading what you have to say. The obvious answer to that is to keep your website looking current and new.

To keep up with all the changes and updates you will find yourself spending more time worrying about things like SEO and keywords along with the content you are trying to write.

This is an extra worry. Because in two or three years time it all starts over again. They make some change and you have to check your content, your keywords and a whole host of other stuff they now expect of you!

What can we do to combat this and stop worrying what they expect?

The first solution is to not rely on them. Don’t put all of your eggs into one basket, a good cliché that you should remember.

Do not only rely on Google’s PR system to get you traffic. Or any of the other stuff that is relevant right now.

Instead think outside the box. Here are a few alternatives you can think about.

Magazine and Newspaper Promotion

Is the internet the only place you can advertise your services? Have you ever thought of looking in real magazines or newspapers for promotion? Picking the right magazine which is relevant to your business is imperative.

Email Lists

Look into getting your business promoted using ezine publishers lists. A lot of ezine lists are always looking for content to send to their subscribers. Contact them and offer to write some content for them, promoting your website at the end of the article.

Forum Marketing

There are some internet marketers who make a killing by only promoting their products and services using forums. This one is not a quick fix, you will have to spend a lot of time there using the forum before you are trusted by other users.

Partner with Someone

You can partner with another business who is in the same niche as your own and cross promote each others products. How about building a joint venture product to offer to both of your existing customers. This can yield you very good results.

PPC

Of course it goes without saying the PPC will give you the fastest results, but Google is not the only place to advertise your wears. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter and even YouTube are great alternatives.

I am not trying to convey that using SEO or Keywords is unimportant, what I am trying to say is don’t worry so much about it and concentrate your efforts on what you do best, not what other companies want you to do.

Give your readers the best experience you can and they will come back for more.

It is clear that having a website is absolutely essential in today’s technological world. Businesses are having to adapt to the fact that the Internet is making it mandatory, that every business have a website in order to stay current with technology and society. It is so essential that you have a web presence, even if you have a brick-and-mortar store.

Having a website is one thing, but knowing what a website is about, is completely different. What do you do with this online thing and what else is there to do to make sure that your business has a presence on the web? Now let’s look at a few strategies for effectively building your online presence through the use of your new website.

A website is important, but what also has to be said, is that you need more than just a single page that has your business name and your business address and phone number on it. You need to have this website present many other details about the business and the products that you market. Every site should have at least three pages on it. When it comes to the business owner, and the employees, you need to have a special page that tells people what they do for the business.

You should choose another page that will tell you what the business does and how the operation of the business actually occurs. You need a page that displays your business contact information (address, phone number, hours of operation) and a contact form that people can use to contact you through the website.

Open up a LinkedIn profile for yourself. You don’t actually have to set up the profile for your business but as the business owner, need to make absolutely sure that you have an engaging profile on this most popular business network. Interacting with other business owners is one option for making use of it. You can also make use of the forums on the system to show off your expertise.

You must have a Twitter account as well. People have a lot of experience with social websites today. In the initial stages, Twitter might seem a little overwhelming and more than likely, you feel like an outsider, looking at this stuff from an external view. Even if you don’t know what you’re doing right away, it’s still something you need to do.

Set up an account and tweet about your business at least once a day. Starting out, you need to only post once an hour at the very most. Using Twitter for your business is something that you should do. There is a lot of info to help you on specific techniques. All you have to do is read and apply the information that you find, whilst realizing that you have to do a lot when building a secure and trustworthy presence online.

There is quite a bit more than just building a single web page and than sitting back and waiting. Even though it is okay to start there, it shouldn’t be the only thing you end up doing. In this day and age, the Internet is so fundamental in our lives that if we don’t display our business online, then we are actually doing more harm than good for profit margins.

Why should you take the time to market on YouTube? There are a lot of other sources for advertising that you can consider, so why would YouTube be one of the options that you put on your list. There are actually the number of reasons why YouTube can work so well, sometimes way better than the other avenues, and this can be true no matter what type of product or service you are trying to sell.

Free marketing!

Firstly, and importantly if you don’t have a large marketing budget, YouTube is free. While you will need to invest a bit of your time to figure out your target audience and to create the videos that you want to use, being able to upload and even make the videos that you want to upload will be completely free. What is another advertising source going to be free?

Video content is really powerful

In a world that is moving more and more online, content is king. And out of all this content, video content is some of the best. Many times people would rather watch information about a product or service online rather than read about it. Also, there is a chance that your video could go viral. If you make a video that is particularly good, emotional, funny, or something else, your video could have the potential to go viral in no time. What going viral means is that there could be thousands of people who will share your video with others they know. If it does really well, this could mean that your business is exposed to an infinite amount of people.

YouTube also appeals to a global and a local audience (perfect for local search success. Based on the types of keywords that you use, your video could be seen by people all over the world. You could even end up with clients from other countries if it all goes well. If you are worried about the reach going too far because you are just a local business, it is possible to change this so that you are only found by people in your region.

Demonstrate your expertise on YouTube

YouTube is fabulous for demonstrating your expertise. You can spend your videos giving away great tips, which help to show your viewers that you are the expert in your particular field. For many customers or clients that you are going after, they will have a choice between two businesses and you want to make sure that they pick you. If you have videos on YouTube that show why you are a good choice, this will help your business to stand out.

Make it once and let it sell for you

Just because you just spend a little bit of time on a video and then post it doesn’t mean the work your video is doing is all done. Making a video is like one of the best salespeople in the world. You only have to make the video once and then load it to YouTube. Then the video can go to work, being available any time of the day or night that someone wants to take a look at it. And for each new video you create, you are making a new salesperson. There is really no limit to what you can do with this.

YouTube provides the customer with a face

Sometimes what you need is to provide the customer with a face, a person they can trust, in order to form that connection to make the sale. And since it is impossible for you to go out there and meet all of your customers, creating a video that can do this work for you can really help If you are camera shy, you can make a video that is in PowerPoint and then add in a headshot so people can still see how you look.

Search engine friendliness

Videos on YouTube are very SEO friendly as YouTube is owned by Google. This is really important. When someone is doing a search online, it is likely that a video is going to hold onto a top spot during the organic searches. If this ends up being your video, this is a big deal because for one reason or another, and your hard work, your video is standing out above the other links. And of course, more people are going to see your video if it is a ranked high in search results, however much you concentrate on your onsite SEO tactics.

Link building is one of the most critical factors of search engine optimisation or SEO. If you want to stay ahead of the competition, you need to implement result-driven link building techniques that will fetch you better links than others. So, take a look below at some of the potent link building strategies that you can consider using.

# Blog Commenting

Even though this link building method is a topic of debate amongst SEO, its effectiveness has never been denied. You simply have to steer clear from partnering with professional link builders who employ use commenting software. Also, you must not try too hard to push in keywords in your comment.

# Internal Linking

Internal linking is one of the easiest of all link building tactics. This is because the location of the link is within your website and that provides with free reign to manipulate the links for the search engine crawlers. When done correctly, internal linking assists search engine spiders in finding new content in your website. Furthermore, it makes it easier for your visitors to navigate your website and quickly find the information that they are looking for. The best place to insert internal links is inside of your article, but make sure not to cluster them at the end of your content.

# Paid Links

Paying for links can significantly increase the chances of your website in obtaining a top position on search engine rankings. However, you need to be careful when selecting the blog or website, the best webpage and the ideal spot on the page for your link. If the link is placed within an article itself, it will be best for you. Make sure not to use link brokers as they never provide any good links. Refer to professional SEO experts to understand the finer details of how paid links work.

# Social Media

Social media links are all nofollowed, which means that when it comes to building page rank, they are practically useless. However, when making use of social media, building page rank is not the motive. The main purpose is for your links to grab the attention of the people in various social networks. With this link building tactic, you can look forward to getting links from outside of the social networks, via the people who are inside them.

# Guest Blogging

Guest blogging continues to be the simplest and effective of all link building techniques. They are also the most popular. But, guest blogging has changed over the years. In order for your blog to be published on a high authority website, you need to make sure that the blog is meaningful, relevant and provides value to the readers. You need to thoroughly browse the Internet to find websites in your niche that accept guest blog submissions. Your blog must be crafted in such a way that it compels readers to know more by clicking on your company link provided in the author bio. Alternatively, you can also find and request an influencer to become a guest blogger for your own blog section. With an influential person blogging on your website, links will follow quite naturally.

# Infographics

In the realm of SEO, link building using infographics have been quite effective. However, a successful infographic link building campaign is only possible if you pick a topic that is relevant to your domain and also interesting with a lot of information. Once you have put together an infographic, building backlinks will be as easy as reaching out to popular bloggers and submitting it to their directories.

The above-mentioned strategies are generalised and not specific to any one industry. If you want a more tailored solution for your business, it is highly recommended that you reach out to a link building agency with experience.

In today’s global world we are totally depend on web so it is very necessary that we can easily create Backup, Restore & Recover so here basically we are going to discuss that how to create WordPress website Backup, Restore & Recover it.

How To Backup Your WordPress Site

Backup Means you save your WordPress Site and the event of the problem, Restoring things back to normal. It is very important to create website backup and restoring it because it safeguard you from the possibility of losing everything.

How to Restore WordPress from Backup

Sometimes it happens that you are working on your site but it is not working perfectly anymore or has been hacked, you may want to restore the website to a previous version. Restoring your site can be quite difficult. So, we provide WordPress support services for manually restoring or with the help of best WordPress backup plugins. It is fully depends on how you created the backup.

A big no. of users don’t back up their entire websites. It is also important while moving WordPress site to new host, server or domain. Instead of it they only backup their theme, uploads directory, and their database. This minimizes their backup size but increases the steps needed to restore the site.

Our WordPress backup and restore Services

Automatic daily backups, one-click site restoration.

World-Class support for scheduling your backups to run daily weekly or monthly.

Restoring WordPress using Backup Buddy backup file.

Troubleshooting backup restore issues and WordPress maintenance.

When are backups necessary?

If a WordPress/plugin/theme upgrade causes a clash and breaks your website.

If you’re website gets hacked and your database or files get corrupted see our guide: Fix your hacked WordPress site.

In case your hosting account gets hacked and all your files and database are negotiated.

In case you decide to move hosting companies.

popular WordPress backup plugin

UpdraftPlus Backup and Restoration

Duplicator

BackUpWordPress

BackWPup Free

WP-DB-Backup

these are some popular WordPress backup plugin

Conclusion

After all above discussion we can say that, we can easily backup, restore and recover our website. it the above blog we discussed how can we backup, restore and recover our WordPress site.

Our businesses also differ in terms of interface with clients. If you do “business to business” transactions, the number of people you interact with on a daily basis may differ from someone whose business relies on interacting with consumers. Appointments may be more practical in some instances than others. You have to tailor-make how you manage access to your particular situation if you are to eliminate distractions. Having said that it is important to note that some people do not mind spending the whole day at the office entertaining friends, visitors, and casual acquaintances dropping into the office whenever they feel like it. Do not be that kind of person. It sets the wrong kind of example to junior staff and can harm one’s productivity because these people take up time that you do not have and besides you want to cultivate a professional environment.

The demands of the day are enough to fill the eight working hours available unless if you tend to stay back and play catch up. How do you stay competitive in the market if there is no separation between work and play? Anybody serious about success and achieving effective results will put boundaries that are clear so that there is no confusion. Entrepreneurs are more susceptible to this especially when the workplace is easily accessible. The fact that you are your own boss even puts more responsibility on you to maintain self-discipline and self – management. I have written a whole book called, “Achieve More through Self – Leadership. In it I walk you through the practicalities of how you can get better results through managing self.

Appointments are an important way of not only managing time but managing life. They help you become more structured and productive. Some people seem not to be able to honour their appointments. I once attended a job interview that was supposed to start at 10:30am. By 11:30am there had been no communication about what was happening or when the supposed job interview was going to take place. I decided at the point that this company was probably not good enough for me to join because if you don’t respect people’s time you probably do not respect them.

You may be saying appointments are just not for me yet you never rock up at the doctor, dentist, lawyer or hairstylist without an appointment. Why is that the case? Because you simply won’t see the dentist without an appointment. They have given you conditions acceptable to them. We tell the world around us how to treat us by what we allow.

Some people are always available when you want to see them. If you are always free to see people at short notice, you are probably not that organized. The one who owns a diary will manage the one who doesn’t own one. Why? Because the one without the diary is always available, even though he is very likely to forget important meetings, dates and engagements because of a lack of organization. I used to have a boss who kept a diary and whatever you promised to do in the line of work, he would write down, including the day and time you said he would have it by. You would of-course forget because you didn’t record it like he did and when the time to deliver comes, guess who would be found wanting. It was then that I decided that I do not commit to an action that I am not willing to write down because, what’s written gets done!

You may be saying, “what if my business feeds off the “walk-ins? The fact that your business relies on walk – in customers should not be an excuse for disorder. Sometimes those who drop in unannounced may indeed be potential customers, suppliers, cold-calling salespeople, and even worthwhile business contacts. There is nothing wrong if the call is beneficial to you and your business but I believe there must be a structure and way of doing things that follows certain pre-set principles. I remember seeing a poster in an office that said “if you don’t have anything to do please don’t do it here”. It’s humorous yes, but true. Appointments help to structure your day and helps you allocate time to what’s important. This means you can focus on your most important asset: the paying customer. There is nothing as bad as walking into a place wanting to do business and staff are inattentive because there is just a demand on their time. I am more understanding if the personnel are not busy entertaining social visits at work.

In conclusion, you know your business situation better than any of us. All we can do is make recommendations that will enable efficiency that leads to growth. Some of you may actually need a personal assistant who will put order in your office and focus on the things you are not willing to do that will enable to focus on the highly value things you ought to do such as running a business.

Do you think successful people are just plain lucky?

Successful people did not become successful because they were lucky.

They did not achieve success by accident. Being at the right place at the right time, meeting relevant people, reading the appropriate book, did not come about accidentally or by luck.

Luck is brought about by Labour Under Correct Knowledge.

Successful people prepared themselves. Instead of giving up on anything they started and wanted to achieve they got stronger by learning more.

Success is a methodical, orderly and deliberate process of deciding what you want to do with your life, what are the steps that you need to undertake to get you there, and lastly what you will do once you get there.

One of the most important aspects, if not the most important aspect to success, is the ability to visualise your successful outcome and stay focused on it until you achieve it.

“Imagination is more important than knowledge, knowledge is limited.” – Albert Einstein

Successful people understood the potential power behind knowledge, yet they also understood that, for them to close the gap between where they are and where they wanted to be, they would have to piece together the enigma that is most often referred to as “life”.

They had to build a picture, a vision, of success in their mind, and then go about taking action on creating that envisioned life.

In much the same way, you have to be serious about your present and future, you need to have the knowledge that is required so you, too, may close the gap: you need to be and remain determined to devote yourself to taking massive action to build your business of succeeding in life.

You, too, will need to see the end, your dream and destiny that you desire in your mind’s eye. It is up to you to take the necessary and relevant action to make it all happen. It’s just like going to the doctor with a particular health problem.

The doctor may prescribe a medication for you to take four times a day, yet he cannot be there with you to ensure that you are taking the medication.

It comes back to deciding to be responsible for your life.

Have you noticed how it all stems from that one attitude? Being responsible for your own life.

Your success, your being responsible 100% for you to live your dream life starts here.

When you accept 100% responsibility for yourself and your current life situation, you will have the power to move towards those things you truly desire in life: which is success in all areas of your life.

This life-changing article is about possibilities and opportunities, knowledge and tools. It will help expose your unique course in life.

It will inspire, support and motivate you to excel, to do what successful people do, to have all that successful people have, and to become a shining example of a successful person.

Here, you’re not being told what you couldn’t do, instead you are being told to shoot for the stars. And above all, you are being shown how to shoot for those stars.

“A person is what he thinks about all day long.” – Emerson

Interesting thought, wouldn’t you think? So much so, it’s worth repeating: “A person is what he thinks about all day long.”

Success and happiness cannot happen if you possess the same old thoughts and beliefs.

If you do not change your mind, if you do not get rid of the unsupportive thoughts and beliefs, you will inevitably remain stuck in your old ways. Not much, if anything, will change.

Let’s give you a quick overview on how change comes about:

Your BEHAVIOUR, how you act (or perhaps do not act), controls your success or failure. Your ability to attain high levels of success is dependent upon your actions and behaviours. Your results are the outcome of your behaviour. Now let’s consider where your behaviours come from and what controls them?

Your FEELINGS command your behaviour. Every action that you take is first filtered through your feelings that reside in your subconscious mind. How you feel about something determines what you do and how well you do it. So where do your feelings come from?

Your ATTITUDES create and influence your feelings. Your attitude is your perspective from which you view life. Whatever attitude you have about anything will affect how you feel, which, in turn, affects how you act. Where do your attitudes come from?

Your BELIEFS create, control and influence your attitudes. What you believe about anything will determine your attitude about it, which will create your feelings, and then which will direct your behaviour and action. Belief patterns are so powerful that two people who are in the same situation could perceive things completely differently. It only requires us to believe what we see and how we see it. We all have thousands of beliefs – big and small. And where do your beliefs come from?

Your THOUGHTS create, control and influence your beliefs. Your thoughts are real and are immensely powerful. Everything you accept from the outside world and everything you feed yourself from within is a product of your thoughts. Everything starts as a thought.

So, it goes without saying you need to learn to control your thoughts. And when you do, you will automatically control your beliefs, your attitudes, your feelings and, consequently, your behaviour and actions.

The big secret to success:

Learn to control your thoughts and you will influence your behaviours and actions. It’s all a mind-set. That’s what we’ve been saying all along.

Success is predictable and is not achieved by accident.

Have the mind-set of the successful people and you will achieve success. Believe and it is yours!

“There is a great future in front of you, you can leave your past behind.” – Joel Osteen

Science of success experts have concluded that the brain is a goal-setting organism.

That is fantastic news for us: for whatever goal we give to our subconscious mind, it will work for us day and night, 24/7, to achieve it for us; to make it a reality.

The principal breakthrough that scientists made was that we do not need to waste our precious time and effort trying to change old thoughts and behaviours: we just simply create new ones.

And the other discovery they made was that we can continue to create new thoughts, new memories, new behaviours, new skills, and learn new things for as long as we are alive on this earth.

Now, with the new discoveries in recent years, it has been scientifically proven that our capacity to achieve and succeed literally has no limits.

Our brain has the capacity to continually learn during our entire lifetime.

Our brain can form new thoughts, can have new memories, and can learn new things by the millions, no matter what your age is. By the millions.

That’s how many new things we can learn, that’s how many new skills we can learn, that’s how many new thoughts we can have, that’s how many new behaviours we can adopt.

This is encouraging because there is no limit on your capacity to achieve new things.

No limits whatsoever for the human brain to learn, memorise, develop, achieve and perform at higher levels than ever imagined. It makes no difference what your age is: you are capable of learning anything new that you want to learn.

That adds to what we spoke of earlier: no more excuses.

“The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.” – Malcolm X

Your brain has the capacity to achieve way beyond what was ever thought possible. So now is the time to break out of your limited thinking and start dreaming big and imagining unlimited possibilities.

Becoming successful is not impossible.

It is a choice you make through a decision. Every day, step-by-step, you may climb the mountain of success if you’ve decided to do so, if you’re committed to accomplish what the others think impossible.

Design your future now.

Prepare to receive what you desire.

Thanks to the phenomenal advances made in cognitive science and the development of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), personal change, personal transformation, has come a very long way.

In fact, personal growth is no longer a mystery.

NLP has brought to light that change, transformation and growth can be fast, reliable, and even fun. It has shown us that we do not need to spend thousands of hours slaving away to increase our creative-thinking abilities.

By practicing a few simple exercises and applications, you can start your creative juices flowing, and you may even amaze yourself at the quality and quantity of good ideas that you can come up with to expedite your success.

It can allow you to achieve something you seek within days and months as opposed to years and decades. That’s the power of the progress science has made on how the brain works, and also how you can have your mind to be your best ally in achieving anything you want.

Learn to live as you like by no longer living as you dislike.

Are you ready to get on the road to success and fulfilment?

Bear in mind, much like everything else in life, success requires practice and massive, consistent action.

“Success doesn’t mean the absence of failures; it means the attainment of ultimate objectives. It means winning the war, not every battle.” – Edwin C Bliss

Do you feel as if you’ve outgrown your circle of friends? Perhaps you do not feel safe or understood any longer. There may be fewer and fewer things you can share with people in your habitual circle, and it leaves you feeling lonely or isolated. If so, you are not alone. Welcome to one of the core dynamics of continuous growth!

As we continue to evolve, many of us struggle with a sense of not quite fitting in with our traditional community or tribe: we may have expanded or changed beyond the borders of tribal norms, and no longer find the same sense of belonging there. Other members may have tightened the tribal rules to foster a sense of security. As a result, we may feel a sense of disconnection or alienation.

In truth, each one of us belongs to many tribes simultaneously: there is your original tribe – the family you were born into – and then there are all the communities of choice you have joined: your work tribe, your social circles, your faith-based community, your neighborhood, and more. These communities are not static; they are in continuous flux because they consist of individuals who are in continuous states of change. When there is a lot of change happening in either the individual or the community, a sense of dissonance results.

How are we to deal with this? First, it is important to recognize that tribal allegiances were historically forged for survival. They were adapted over the course of centuries to ensure the safety and survival of the group. Survival required that individuation be sacrificed for the trade-off of security.

In modern society, the tables are flipped. Whether we enjoy it or not, change is essential for survival at every level of being. The pace of change is driven by technological advances and happens with increasing rapidity: sociologists estimate that more change has taken place in society over the course of the past 100 years, than in the totality of the previous 6,000 years. Individual adaptation now is a requirement for survival, and the pace of individual change does not always match the pace at which our various tribal communities evolve. The resulting dissonance can cause intense friction and pain.

Dissonance also results from confusion between the concepts of ‘connection’ and ‘community.’ We tend to equate one with the other, when they really relate to different qualities. Connection relates to connectivity: the objective physical technology or media that enables us to build community, but which does not represent the quality of that community. Connectivity simply offers the opportunity to connect with others through internet, texting, phone calls, or any other social networking options.

Community is the result of building relationship through meaningful interaction over time. There is no shortcut; it is a process that develops when bonds of trust and intimacy are nurtured and honored.

And here lies a caveat: When we confuse connectivity with community, we depersonalize the sacred nature of true community and start relating to people as objects. Instead of developing intimacy over time, we collect friends on social network sites or try to buy people’s allegiance. Yet friending is simply an act of connecting; it does not create intimacy.

In fact, social experiments indicate that technologically dominated connectivity results in alienation and social collapse over time. In a groundbreaking social experiment conducted by Josh Harris, one of the founders of social networking on the internet, he found that the more people’s private lives were exposed by 24/7 technology, the more their sense of intimacy and relationship deteriorated until the community collapsed in violence and self-destructive behavior.

It is time to revisit our concepts of community so we can create tribes that offer a true sense of intimacy and belonging.

In his 1987 book, The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace, psychologist M. Scott Peck described several core characteristics of true community. Beyond the obvious components of inclusivity, commitment and participatory consensus, Peck pointed out the quality of embracing diversity through realism. When each member contributes their unique viewpoint from a place of humility and goodwill, the community benefits from a broader perspective in which to better grasp the full context of a situation. In other words, mutual tolerance helps members to embrace one another’s different viewpoints as an integral part of the whole, instead of imposing a forced compliance to groupthink or cohesion.

In an environment like this, members experience and express compassion and respect for one another. They allow others to share their vulnerability, to learn and grow, and to express who they truly are. When conflict arises, they learn to resolve it with wisdom and grace. Members listen to and respect each others’ gifts, accept each others’ limitations, celebrate their differences, and commit to find solutions together rather than to fight against each other. Indeed, the true spirit of community is the spirit of peace, love, wisdom and power. The source of this spirit may be seen as an outgrowth of the collective self or as the manifestation of a Higher Will.

Does this description of community sound spiritual to you? It is indeed, because Spirit is the common denominator among all of us, regardless of how separate we feel from others.

As human beings, we often experience a socio-economic sense of separation from others because of different opinions, beliefs, expectations, language, culture, or interests, since each one of us expresses these in a way uniquely different from anyone else. And still, we continue to differentiate! In this ongoing process, we continue to evolve or devolve in response to life. A community that felt like a good fit last year may no longer work today; the places where we felt embraced, now may suffocate us. Over the course of a lifetime, we can expect to outgrow and change allegiances to many of the tribal communities we once belonged to.

And yet, when we transcend the layers of physical appearance, mental beliefs and socio-economic conditioning, we find in the presence of Spirit a common denominator in everyone around us. Perhaps it is time to expand our tribal definitions to embrace a spiritual community that includes all of mankind as children of God.

Mother Teresa admonished her nuns to see Jesus in every leper they encountered, to find His presence as they looked into the eyes of the homeless. When we can look past the issues that divide us to find omnipresent Divinity in each other, we will uncover the foundations of true community.

Spiritual community transcends all socio-economic borders, beliefs and backgrounds. It is inclusive because it operates on voluntary self-responsibility and mutual compassion, and its doors are open to everyone.

Building this type of community takes time: time to listen, to hear, to respond and to participate. Take a few moments to read the description of spiritual community again. Then, make time in your life to foster that type of connection with people who matter to you. You are one of the architects of community in your life, and you can participate in building a tribe where you belong.

What would happen to you if your home life was more organized than it is right now? Can work-life balance be achieved? What are the tools at our disposal? Could scheduling appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize?

What is the challenge we face? I sometimes find that time spent at home can be the busiest time, especially in the times we live in. Imagine someone working from home, home-schooling children, and sometimes even doing a side hustle. Imagine also the full-time home-based entrepreneur. How do they manage to do all they need to do in a day?. We are living in a time when many entrepreneurs and even company employees have adopted work- at – home culture. This comes with its challenges as the lines become blurred between home and work. These blurred lines and constraints on the limited resource called time result in over-worked, under-rested, burnt-out individuals. Whilst good time management has been encouraged and indeed, embraced in the workplace, I believe more needs to be done in changing the mindset for the elusive work-life balance to be achieved.

What are the tools at our disposal? To manage time effectively at home, there are many interventions one can employ including setting goals for the day, prioritizing wisely, setting a time limit for every task, organizing oneself, and instituting the discipline of appointments. Yes, an appointment at home! We can spend time pontificating on the pros and cons of each intervention, however, I believe we need to focus on appointments and see how this can powerfully change the course of one’s day regardless of whether it’s a workday or weekend. Life is busy as it is without any intrusions. The question is how do you handle the one who announces that they are at the gate. These can be friends, neighbors, a salesman of some product you do not even need. I am not promoting regimentation here but rather a culture of filling your day with what’s important. Everything that we succeed at is because we carefully plan and execute it. I am a firm believer that you cannot manage time if you do not manage yourself thus I implore you to incorporate planning and appointments into your repertoire. I am not talking about something I do not do. I have to achieve many things in a day therefore I set appointments with my work, others, and myself.

Could scheduling appointments and keeping them on the home front help us save time and prioritize? Whereas we have established that it is a normal business practice to set appointments and keep them, we need to abandon the liberal open-door policy of allowing all and sundry to have access to us as and when they please on the home front. Please understand where I am coming from. We each have greatness within us but for us to achieve it we need to culture great habits. Employing the use of appointments at home and seeing only those people you had agreed to see removes non-essential encounters especially during the most productive hours. I know this will vary with culture, geographical region, or even level of affluence, whether you live in a low density or high-density residential area, but doesn’t negate the need to be organized and effective. Controlling access determines how organized you are and how well you will work and rest when the time for scheduled rest comes.

What do we need to do differently? We need to be disciplined and diligent, learn to say no, now is not a good time, let’s make an appointment for next week. What are the benefits of this approach? You are not always fire-fighting to meet deadlines, You are not always tired because you have not taken time out to rest. You have set aside enough time to spend with your loved ones or a loved one. If you are a busy person, I am sure you appreciate what I am saying. Whether it’s time to work uninterrupted, family time, or “me-time”, it takes some kind of order to enjoy it.

I am not saying that those that come unannounced are bad people. No, not at all, they probably are people you enjoy spending time with. Nevertheless, there must be prior communication so that you can attend to your visitor(s) when it is convenient for both you and them. It can be quite disrupting and a whole day can just pass by without achieving anything that you had planned to do.

As we grow older we begin to appreciate that rest and recovery need to be scheduled. The fact that I am relaxing doesn’t mean that I don’t have anything to do. One therefore cannot assume that just because you are at home you are available. Maybe you have scheduled that time to rest. That is important. You need to make an appointment with yourself, spouses need to also set aside time for each other. Parents need to schedule a time to spend with their children. When you have some sort of order in your life you determine who sees you and who you see. It also means that your relationships will be healthy and that makes you a happier person.

In conclusion, I believe that the work-life balance can be achieved. There are many tools at our disposal just like it is in the workplace.I believe we could do more and be happier if we are disciplined enough to make only the commitments we can keep.I am certain that setting appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize.