Did you take the Love Language quiz the other day? We hope so! Today’s post will be quick, really to just get you straight to your work:

1. Define what you want your love relationships to look like. Write a separate definition for the top 3-5 relationships in your life. This definition cannot be a “what it looks like now” definition. We want you to write your ideal scenarios. Consider how you want to feel in the most perfect loving relationship with this person, including how you want to experience that based on your quiz results and your gut. Also consider your own output. Has anything you’ve learned lately altered how you will show your love to others? Remember, its a basic human need, so be sure to get clear on what you want this to look like from an inflow and outflow perspective.
2. Next, what are you willing to do about it? Spell out the behaviors that you are willing to commit to now in order to make this love happen on purpose.
3. Last, and most importantly in this category…. set the boundaries. What are you no longer willing to take? Even if, and especially if its family, you must consider when its time to stop allowing others to continually overstep your boundaries. If someone in your life is not loving you in the most beautiful way, stop giving them the authority. If they are doing anything but lifting you up, protecting you, and growing with you… its time to reconsider that relationship in your life. There’s a difference between “working at it” and continually setting yourself up for hurt or sadness.  Know what that means, and give yourself the gift of space to love elsewhere if this applies in your life. Holding your hand now….

We’ll wrap the series next time. In the meantime, if you found value in this journey, you will be served by our Heart & Sold series. That is a comprehensive mentoring series that brings your personal development to your business development.  This Building Your Legacy Series was fashioned out of the first 1/10 of the Heart & Sold curriculum, so you can imagine how extensive it is to feed your personal and professional growth.  Check it out if you desire….

Hugs, Love, and big cheers for you,

Aly & Andrea

As promised, we are circling back to the Faith category in our Building Your Legacy series today. If you are here for the first time, start by clicking here (it will make more sense that way).

If you have been riding along in the series, you already spent time a few days ago defining what role faith would play in your life. It was a highly personal reflection, and we hope that you did not let any one or society sway what you worked on.  Again, this is not about what anyone else thinks you should do/don’t do or think/don’t think. This is your legacy and no one else’s.

The other day, we shared how important faith was to us personally. Bigger than any definable “religion,” for us, its about relationship with God who has incredible plans for us. We happen to be Christians, but the point is again, this is not about a set of rules nor an attempt to conform to the box that someone else may/may not think we are supposed to fit into. Its about the understanding and ownership that we are uniquely built- all humanity is uniquely built for incredible things through Him.  And those incredible things will never come easy. There will always be challenges. But the greater the challenge, the greater shape we take. You’ll even see that your obstacles clearly shape you far more than your victories. But getting through those obstacles takes faith not just so we can get by, but so we can SEEK the lessons in each challenge and use that to further all we were meant to be. In the simplest of terms, that’s how we see Faith.

Your homework:  Take your work from the other day and build on that. You defined what role you want your faith to play in your life, so today you will define what you are willing to do to make that happen.  List or paragraph form, list out what you are willing to do on a daily, weekly, monthly, or annual basis to further faith in your life. The answers vary greatly from person to person here, so just be okay with your own. This is not a “good deed” list. It’s just the list that will feed you and help you grow in your faith.

Part two of your homework: Now, what are you no longer willing to do?  List that out, too.  No longer willing to listen to doubters? No longer willing to feel guilty? No longer willing to hear that negative self-talk because now you are clear that there really is someone/something bigger than us who has a greater plan than we can even imagine for ourselves! Write it out.

Next time, we’ll go back to the Love tunnel. We are almost done with the series! How ya feelin’?  Find us on Twitter or Facebook and let us know.

Hugs,

Aly & Andrea

The need to love and be loved is one of the 6 basic human needs we teach about in our Heart & Sold series. Because the need to love and be loved is so fundamental to humanity, it often explains the motivations behind our behaviors. We act in certain ways…. we do and don’t do things often for the payoff of either experiencing love or experiencing validation by giving love to others. 

Your work today is pretty straight forward. We are simply defining what we want our love life to look like. This definition, however, is not just what we want our romantic love to look like. Its really about how we want to express and receive all relationships in our life. This is important to you because in order for these relationships to work to their highest potential, you must first know you are speaking the same language. That is, are you expressing love in a way that your loved ones most desire? And are you being loved by the ones that matter in the WAY that matters to you?

For example, lets say you tend to express your love most often by giving lots of hugs and kisses because you may feel loved when others hug or kiss you. You go out of your way to hold hands with your spouse, or put your arm around your child even as you operate in busy daily routines because that makes you feel good. BUT, that annoys the kids, and your spouse would much rather hear about what a great job he/she is doing. They would rather hear verbal accolades, or perhaps receive little gifts, than a pat on the back or a hug. Suddenly, the love you are dishing out doesn’t feel so reciprocated because they aren’t hugging you back (and that’s what you really wanted– to be loved), and you can’t understand why they don’t respond in a more positive way when you go so far out of your way to show your love.
Its because you are speaking different languages. And just like in marketing, where your marketing message has to matter to the customer…. your love message ALSO has to matter to your loved ones. Your output has to be in a way that matters to them, and not necessarily in a way thats most fundamental to you.

Your homework today: From Gary Chapman’s famous The Five Languages of Love, go take the quiz to find out what your own love language is. This tool will serve you not only in your dating/marriage relationships, but with any one you love, and even in the workplace in the form of appreciation and behavior motivation. Understanding your own language always helps you seek the language of others for the ultimate effective communication and relationship building. Click below to get started…. and enjoy!

Next time, we are circling back to wrap the Faith component….

Love n Hugs!
Aly & Andrea

We are jumping into the last of the 7 Categories in the Building Your Legacy Series. Although we did not work these categories in in any particular order, we can tell you this is one of our favorites. This is not the time where you’ll hear us trying to be politically correct, either. You will not hear us trying to come up with the most universal word for God, or the most acceptable word for any particular belief. We, personally, operate in a style that is direct…. so if you want something “fluffier” or a little more woo-woo when we talk about your Faith category in your legacy, feel free to move to any expert or faith leader of your choosing for this component.

With that, our conversations are not going to be about a specific religion. We are not going to talk about a set of rules, and we will not ever tell you what you should or should not believe. We will talk about, however, the importance of a faithful relationship that is woven into your every day life. Personally, it is absolutely our faith that has played the most pivotal role in our ability to overcome incredible obstacles and yet achieve great joy and success. We never mince words about that, and we are in awe of the power and impact that faith has had in our own lives. So as you do your work here, if that serves you, please build on that. If not, we have some work lined up today to get you started.  This is your legacy you are building, not ours.

As an overview, your homework over the next few sessions will be to:

1. define what role your faith plays in your life
2. define what love looks like in your life
3. define what you are willing to do about both of those things to make it happen
4. define what you are no longer willing to do

For today, your homework is: Write in your notebook with as much detail as possible:

1. Faith is important to me because _____________.
2. My faith (not my specific religion) is about __________________.
3. My faith currently is/is not (circle one) as fulfilling as I need it to be on a daily basis.
4. If not, why?___________________.
5. If so, why?___________________.
6. What are the areas in my life in which my faith could serve me? If I work to get clear on what all of this looks like for me, how will it improve my life specifically?
7. Without faith, I have ___________________.
8. The role I want Faith to play in my life going forward is: ___________________….

Next time, we’ll make a stop in the Love Department before we circle back to complete our work in the Faith department. See you then!

Faithful Hugs,

Aly & Andrea

Since we just wrapped the money talk with your Career category, lets spend our time today talking about the Financial category of the Building Your Legacy Series.

Just like our conversation about your health, in your financial category, you must increase your muscle (revenue), decrease your fat (expenses), and increase your flexibility (willingness to be truthful about what must happen to meet your goals).  So today is the day that you truly look at your finances to assess where you are…so you can have a clear picture of where you want to be.

The disclosure here is that we are not CPAs or financial experts here. But we do know the value of knowing your numbers and the detriment of not knowing them.

Your only homework today is: know your numbers. This is your personal financial statement.  In your notebook, write down your income and assets, write down your current debt (including things like mortgage, college loans, all credit card loans-note the interest!, and so on). Here are some fantastic tools to help you. 

IF that homework task is challenging for you, or if the thought of being truthful about those numbers is daunting to you, your homework just changed. Skip the task above for now and go straight to Suze Orman’s Money Class. She also has tons of financial tools, resources, lessons specifically for women, insurance tools, and much more. If you are truly ready to make your finances a priority (that should be yet), Suze will help you get to what really matters in this category of your legacy via the simple truth. If you implement them, you truly will experience debt erasure and greater wealth. That is, your financial muscle will increase, your debt fat will decrease, and your treasure building flexibility will increase.  See you next time for the Faith & Love Category!

PS- If you are in a long term relationship, it is important that this work happens together. Financial secrets will be the death of your relationship if both parties don’t step up to the plate. Do NOT let someone else “handle it” out of a false message that they are taking care of you or simply because you are not willing to work in it. Know the facts, and be empowered by them together.

Hugs, Budgets, and Wealth to you,

Aly & Andrea