I’m Minimizing! (Again)

[long story short, if you want to receive daily tips for a nomadic life from me, sign up HERE]

Even though you can’t tell, I have been hard at work in the background of these sites I run… or sorta run.  I think I got a bit overwhelmed and confused as to my direction as we made this transition from tiny house to tiny mobile (like really mobile) house.  Over this time I have had a lot of great ideas.  It seems I have to repeatedly learn that just because an idea is really great doesn’t mean it needs to be THE priority in my world.  Sometimes it is really important to just say no.

All those sort of commitments are emotional baggage.

The truth is that work has never been the priority in my life.  My family is what matters.  Helping others is what matters.  Having fun is what matters, together! So I have cut some threads loose.

Some of you know I had another website called PlanningTiny (.com) where I tried to give fact based reasons why you may make once choice over another.  It proved too much to upkeep two blogs though, so it was ill managed.  I was able to grab my work over there and add it to this site (PlanningTiny tab up top). Then I minimized that obligation and deleted that site.  (I actually had bigger plans to make a tiny house configuration on there and a lot of cool stuff that would have [hopefully] helped a lot of people) So, if anyone wants a decent domain name I suppose it is up for grabs next month 😉

Then there were other pressures

Like being on every social media platform.  Really BEING there.  All the time.  Who has time for that!?

I have internet access sporadically.  I have a one year old and a three year old.  And I also have a dog who likes walks and stuff.  That just isn’t realistic for me.  So I am learning that to help the most people I have to pick.  I am not a video person, watching or making so YouTube is not likely going to be my cup of tea.  I have been baffled by Instagram but with all this travel I finally get it.  At least I get how it applies to us!  We (James and I) use a joint Instagram account to document our days.  We keep our families up to date with where we are in an instant and what we’re doing and we use it a lot to make new friends in various locations!  It’s been very handy on a personal level. (and I plan to make a family book out of the pictures eventually, so it’s nice to have them all in one place.

I still run a tiny house group on Facebook for ‘group think’ called Tiny House People and a different one for family travel called Family vagaBonding. All those other half-hearted attempts to ‘be present’ on Youtube, twitter, linkedin, etc. are out though.  They had the exact opposite effect.  By being present ‘everywhere’ I pretty much became non-existent everywhere.

There is also that pressure to make money.

So you can do things like feed your kids… I sell Plans for my house.  I sell ecourses on how to build a tiny house and why you may make one decision instead of another.  There are ads on this site (feel free to ignore them).  Those all put food on our table.  I spend a lot of time answering questions in there and in email for those users (the people who pay me money always get answers the fastest! ;-)).  As much as I like giving away as much info as I can it is really hard and really time consuming to keep up with all the ways to give out free info!

So, my new [old] direction

I’ve cleared it all out.  I am still ALWAYS here for questions.  Comments, contacts, emails always get answered from me but I am simplifying how I spend my days.  I now own only two domains, Minimotives.com and Learningthelongway.com.  You probably like one or the other and occasionally both.  Either way, this is my blog on both of them because both of them are about my life.  I don’t want to dilute the tiny house information with travel information.  The travel information is still building (we’re only 2.5 months in!) but is separate from the tiny house stuff too.

This go round I am doing something that I hope less time consuming and more fun and sending out daily tips and inspiration on how we have been able to make our lives work like this.  I am doing it as much for me as I am for others. It will make me think. It gives me a reason to reach out to those more knowledgeable than us.  And it seems like a good way to keep info free flowing to help others reach a more enjoyable life.  I promise it won’t all be relevant to you but every tip I send out will be something that has helped us!  Sometimes tremendously!

The Best Part

Since it is email format, I can do it all from my phone!  You sign up and get the emailed tips.  Easier for you and easier for me, which leaves more time for exploring and family bonding for all!  Also, if you have a great tip you would like to share with others you can submit and I will share it with everyone while crediting you and link to your site (if applicable!).

If you are interested in being in the loop on these tips you can sign up HERE.  (*note emails will officially kick off in three weeks but I have enough of the infrastructure set up to open it up to those interested) 

Short story, I am a lot more here and a lot less ‘there’, I hope you are too! 😀