Monday, May 27, 2013

What the heck is B- School and why you need to sign up now!





Want to know what I am grateful for these days?
B- School.
What is B- School you might ask? B- School is Marie Forleo’s 8 week online program that helps you position and sell your services and products online.
Marie quotes on her website - “You deserve a business and life you love. We can help.” She is right, she can help. Why spend all your time and effort doing something you don’t love. Good question isn’t it.

For me, my passion is planning recipes and menu plans for people within the confines of food allergies. I know from bitter experience how difficult it can be to plan meals around multiple food allergies and if you are tired and not feeling well that just adds more stress to menu planning.

For years I thought about how I could possibly help others who were struggling with menu planning like I was. I took my time, yes 6 years to be exact, yet in that time I came up with tasty, healthy recipes that I thought other people would enjoy and might make their life a little easier when it came to cooking. 

I found a publisher and co published Finally... Food I Can Eat, a dietary guide and cookbook for people with food allergies, yet in the back of my mind I knew I wanted to do more. I wanted to have my own business that I could work at, at my own pace.

Because I also have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome my energy does not always support what my brain and body wants to do, so learning to deal with what I could do was huge for me. 
Yes, I am a type A personality and I often wonder why I have been saddled with this at times very difficult chronic illness. I had always wanted to go back to school, but the idea of sitting in a class room for hours at a time just wasn’t possible and with being on disability, there wasn’t a lot of extra cash lying around for school and learning.

I have been following Marie for the past two years. My hypnotherapist turned me on to Marie and Danielle Laporte, two of my favourite ladies. I get their newsletters and when I read about Marie’s B-School I thought this would be a great way to get my ideas out of my head and into a plan.

With being out of the work force for so long I often felt like I was living on a different planet. Sure, I knew how to use a computer and what facebook was, but that was pretty much the extent of my technical knowledge. I knew nothing of blogging, Opt- In boxes, or profit plans.

Marie makes you want to aspire to be who you want to be. She somehow makes it fairly simple to put together a plan that is doable for you. She inspired me to keep going and the B -School community was awesome and always there when I needed to share an idea, ask a silly question and even when I wanted to share a new recipe and get some feedback.

Whether you have been in business for years and are needing some updated resources to grow your business to the next level, or whether you are like me, just starting out and are flailing around like a chicken with its head cut off, oh, that isn’t a very nice image is it? Perhaps more like a woman who has just won the lottery and you just don’t know what to buy or which charity to donate your money to? You have all these ideas in your head and they spin around day and night and you are so busy spinning that nothing really gets done. Plus you have no idea how to go about getting these ideas into play. That was me. 

Marie did something wonderful and I will always be so very grateful for her generosity. She ran a contest with a chance to win a scholarship to B- School and to make a long story short, I won. Yes, little old me who has never won anything, well okay once I went to a move premiere and I won a boat cruise on the Ottawa River, big whoop!
This was amazing, I danced, I cried, I hyperventilated in my living room the day I read the email from the Forleo Team that I had won a scholarship to B- School! Get the Fuck out of town, was there a mistake? Did I really win? Yup, I did.

B- School has just ended, and yes I am going through withdrawals. I learned so much and cannot begin to tell you what it has meant to me to have learned from such a talented woman and her great team.

As I mentioned I was green when it came to business, websites, blogging, and really everything else that goes hand in hand with an online business. 

Hell yes, I learned a lot in B- School, but it’s what I learned about myself that surprised me, and this is where I owe Marie my deep gratitude.

I am 47 years old and have been on disability for 17 years. I can’t explain to you how it makes you feel when you feel that you are not contributing to society anymore because you cannot work. The day to day tasks that sometimes seem so overwhelming, that you just want to give up. You can’t imagine ever making a difference in the world again, let alone learning all the skills that you are behind in, and the worry that you may never bring home a pay cheque is hugely scary. Yet, one day during B- School I realized that even though I have been on disability for many years I have been making a difference, I have been contributing and I am able to do B- School at my own pace! 

Yes it took me 6 years to write and publish my cookbook, but I did it. Yes, I may not go to the office and receive a pay check, but I learned about being frugal and living on a very tight budget and can share these skills with others. I learned ways of dealing with a chronic illness that have made me stronger, yet compassionate with others. That because I was at home  I was able to adopt my sisters dog when he was in an accident and nurse him back to health, which in turn gave me such an understanding of unconditional love that I will never forget his love for me on days when I couldn’t even love myself. That sometimes I could look after my nephews when my sisters were so busy with work and just needed a break. That I had time to listen to friends who were stressed out over their kid’s mishaps, and the stress of building their careers. During this time I found out my passion was creating healthy, tasty recipes and sharing them with others whenever I had the energy. 

No, I may not be as young, energetic or brilliant as Marie, but I do, just like you do, have something to share with the world.

What I learned by doing B- School besides who my customer avatar is, how to blog and what is needed to have a great website, communication and marketing skills, is that we all have something to share in our own way and on our own timetable.  I learned that there is something to be said about having humility, compassion and acceptance for myself when I am too tired to do what I want. To celebrate and have gratitude on the days when I do have energy and can do the things I long to.

I am proud to say that I have 50 names on my list and I am building it day by day. Last month I didn’t even know what an Opt- In box was or how to go about building a list.
Maybe you have 10,000 people on your list and you know who your customer avatar is, but I bet there is still a tonne that you could learn at B- School.

So if you are thinking of enrolling in B- School, but are hesitating, don’t, just do it! You just never know what you may learn from Marie and team Forleo!

Thanks Marie, for B- School.



Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Hay House Free World Summit








I am so thrilled to be able to share this with you. 

Are you a fan of Hay House? 

I am and the Hay House World Summit is a free online event that will be taking place from June 1-10, 2013. It will attract over a million participants across the Globe and will include over 100 amazing speakers in the personal growth field.

Such talent as Louise Hay, Dr Wayne Dyer, Suze Orman,  Dr. Christiane Northrup, Dr. Deepak Chopra, Kris Carr, Gabrielle Bernstein, Lissa Rankin, Cheryl Richardson and the list goes on and on.

This is an amazing chance to experience teachers who can provide you with practical everyday information and techniques that you can put to use in your own life. Are you dealing with some major stress in your life, or wanting to make some positive changes? Tune in, listen and learn from the Masters

There is so much talent packed into these 10 days that you will for sure want to take advantage of the CD’s , DVD’s and other offerings and downloads that are being offered so that you can listen to all these amazing pod casts again and again.
 Take charge of your happiness and well-being- sign up for this amazing summit now,  www.WorldSummitJV.com




Hay House World Summit

Monday, May 13, 2013

Hay House Free Online Summit









I am so thrilled to be able to share this with you. 

Are you a fan of Hay House? I am and the Hay House World Summit is a free online event that will be taking place from June 1-10, 2013. It will attract over a million participants across the Globe and will include over 100 amazing speakers in the personal growth field.

Such talent as Louise Hay, Dr Wayne Dyer, Suze Orman,  Dr. Christiane Northrup, Dr. Deepak Chopra, Kris Carr, Gabrielle Bernstein, Lissa Rankin, Cheryl Richardson and the list goes on and on.

This is an amazing chance to experience teachers who can provide you with practical everyday information and techniques that you can put to use in your own life. 

Are you dealing with some major stress in your life, or wanting to make some positive changes? Tune in, listen and learn from the Masters.

There is so much talent packed into these 10 days that you will for sure want to take advantage of the CD’s , DVD’s and other offerings and downloads that are being offered so that you can listen to all these amazing podcasts gain and again.

 Take charge of your happiness and well-being- sign up for this amazing summit now,    www.WorldSummitJV.com

 






Sunday, May 12, 2013

4 Ways to cope with Fibromyalgia



What is Fibromyalgia?

The Mayo Clinic describes fibromyalgia as “ a disorder characterized by widespread musculoskeletal pain accompanied by fatigue, sleep, memory and mood issues. Researchers believe that fibromyalgia amplifies painful sensations by affecting the way your brain processes pain signals.”

Who gets Fibromyalgia?

Anyone can get fibromyalgia, but women are more likely to have fibromyalgia than men.
Many times fibromyalgia can show itself after a trauma or an accident.

How to be diagnosed?

There is no one test to diagnose fibromyalgia, but it is usually diagnosed by a Rheumatologist. If the individual has had overall body pain which has lasted for more than 3months and reacts to at least 11 of 18 tender points which are located all over the body, then fibromyalgia is indicated. 

Take your life back

Dealing with fibromyalgia can be challenging at times, but there are a few things you can do to help cope with your pain.

Proper nutrition- Nutrition is so important and reducing inflammation in the body is key. Testing for food allergies, sensitivities and candida is a good place to start. Eliminate gluten, dairy and sugar from your diet as they are acidic to the body. Keeping the body alkaline is a sure way to reduce inflammation in our bodies. Having 75% of your plate being green vegetables is a great rule of thumb to keep you more alkaline.
Meditation- Thirty minutes of meditation or mindfulness a day, has shown to reduce pain and anxiety for those with fibromyalgia.

Hypnosis- Hypnosis is a wonderful tool to learn about your past and you may have an underlying trauma or issue that is causing your fibromyalgia. The field of mind body medicine and epigenetics is showing us how our thoughts and beliefs can affect our health and well being.

Gentle Exercise- Walking, swimming, yoga or qigong are excellent ways of aligning our breath with gentle exercise which can help with pain management.

Shirley Plant is the author of Finally... Food I Can Eat, a dietary guide and cookbook for people with food allergies. Shirley also offers dietary consulting and menu planning via Delicious Alternatives
twitter @sherrecipes

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Thursday, May 9, 2013

Self Publishing with Balboa Press





I am a cookbook author and my passion is sharing recipes with others who are looking for healthy recipes within the confines of food allergies.
As someone who struggled with what to eat and how to make allergy free recipes for years, I wanted to make sure that anyone who was feeling deprived and thought there was nothing tasty to eat within their allergies, that they were wrong, there is! There are so many possibilities; one only needs to know where to look.
A few years ago I was lucky enough to find a publisher who saw the potential in my cookbook and wanted to co publish with me. It was a whole new learning experience for me. Writing the book was one thing, publishing is a whole new ball game folks.
Printing costs, design, editing, PR, and list goes on. But it was fun and it was like bringing my baby into the world, well into Canada. Fast forward to today and my cookbook, Finally... Food I Can Eat, is now available to anyone with a click of your mouse.
I decided to self publish with Balboa Press because I wanted to get my cookbook into the United States and finding a literary agent was proving difficult. Most agents I spoke to said I needed a following and a presence in the U.S. I thought the book came first, then the following. So when I realized that Hay House had a sister company called Balboa Press and this was a way to get my cookbook out there, I jumped on the Balboa bandwagon.
When I first called Balboa, I was greeted with a customer service representative. They explained to me the six different self publishing packages that they offered, which ranged in price from $999.00 to $7999.00. Now all I had to do was figure out which package suited me. I decided on the Empower Package which included such things as editing, E book formatting, book sellers return program, social media and a website just to name a few.
Once I decided on the package, I was then passed over to a check in coordinator who helped me organize all the information Balboa would need to proceed with my book. Since I had already published in Canada, this was pretty easy for her and me as I had all my info ready to go. Then my publishing services associate took over and from there my marketing associate. Everyone that I encountered at Balboa was helpful and nice to work with. If I had any questions I always called and I usually received a call back within 24 hours.
The only thing that I think could have been improved on was my website. I realize Balboa usually only designs a website just for your book, and I asked them to combine my dietary consulting with my book, so probably a little more involved than what they are accustomed to. But there again, they were happy to adapt to my needs.
I will be honest with you. My dream has always been to be a Hay House author. I have loved Louise Hay from the moment I first read “Heal Your Life”. I think I have all her audio CD’s and when people are asked what famous person would you like to have dinner with; my response would be Louise Hay.
So for any of you out there who want to bring your book to the world, I highly recommend Balboa Press.