Mrs. Flexcents is quite an artist. She carved the pumpkins and made the ghost. She and her co-workers helped to get this great set up. How appropriate, I think this is how most people feel about student loans.

Hi Everyone,

This is a new series I started last month that gives me the opportunity to share more of myself with you. This will allow us to learn more from each other and grow together.

I have been writing in my journal more frequently to better appreciate all the developments in my life, either good or bad.

I plan to take my daily journal entries and reflect upon them weekly. These reflections will be released at the end of each month in a single post to make them easy to digest.

At this time, these posts will likely include my fitness progress, blog developments, career, things I have learned, and all the good people in my life.

2nd year wedding anniversary

Our 2nd year wedding anniversary was on the 1st. While it would have been great to sleep in with Mrs. Flexcents, I worked until noon to make the rest of my week more manageable rather than trying to squeeze all my patients in 4 days.

One thing I am forbidden to do for my wife is to get her flowers. The last time I did, she told me never to waste money on flowers again. That was many years ago. I also discovered early on that she is not a fan of jewelry.

I learned that she prefers more practical gifts or handmade cards. Together we have enjoyed years of using our creative minds to exchange handmade items. This year was no different, she wrote me a heartfelt letter while I gave her a collage of my custom cartoons that gave her a laugh.

My New Routine

October 4th, I stumbled upon a life-changing podcast episode. It was the most powerful content on the habit that I have consumed to date. I recommend a close listen for actionable tips. Seriously, sit down in a quiet room, grab a pen and paper and you will be perfectly equipped to begin shaping your life to your design.

One of the habits that I have been trying to break repeatedly is going to bed around 1:00 AM – 4:00 AM. I have implemented the power of intentional habits to get me to sleep before 11:00 PM throughout most of this week. I think the last time I slept at 10:30 PM was probably when I was a toddler, so this was a gigantic win for me.

I was successful in sticking with this routine this week, and it has allowed me to wake up at 5:00 AM each day more refreshed and ready to attack the day.

Family

Every Fall, my family gathers to commemorate the passing of my grandparents. Usually, after praying, we catch up with everyone and enjoy delicious food. Being more mindful this year, I noticed that these gatherings have slowly been shrinking. This is because many family members have started families of their own and have moved further away.

I immediately felt that I have cheated myself from enjoying potential memories from prior celebrations. I mainly thought about the years when I was in PT school. If I could go back in time, I would tell myself to take a moment to put down my textbook and enjoy my family.

I am glad I now know what is most valuable to me. Better late than never!

I am very much looking forward to our gathering for Thanksgiving which has a much larger turnout and is 10x more fun!

Habit checkup

Meditating each night is something I now look forward to and I can see how this change will lead to myself sleeping better, waking up with more energy and achieving my goals. I have reserved the weekend to explore old habits of staying up to get work done. Why? I have been pulling so 50+ hours of work a week, there is really no other time to get things done!

Overall, sleeping earlier and waking up at 5:00 AM has made me feel even more energetic and feel the power of habit run through my veins.

Career Burnout

More recently, I have been feeling like I have less time to dedicate to my side projects and hobbies. Even the amount of time I spend exercising and blogging has dwindled these last couple weeks. This is because my responsibilities at my full-time job are increasing.

Before burnout hits, I have requested to reduce hours at my second job. Not living paycheck to paycheck and carrying no interest accruing debt allows me this flexibility. As roughly 80% of Americans carry debt, I feel like not having debt is like having a superpower. One of the best things that helped me manage my finances is tracking my wealth, asset allocation, cash flow, and budget through the free web and mobile app Personal Capital. I just shared this with my brothers and sisters who are all loving it. I would highly recommend it to those who are managing their own or their family’s finances.

For Patients In Poverty

One night, I sat down and was thinking of ways where I could better help my patients. I eventually decided a gofundme page would be the best way to do this. I quickly wrote out my story on the purpose of this fund. I wrote a much lengthier purpose statement, but here’s a quick excerpt of my goals:

1) I am building a free rental inventory for my patients to temporarily use until their insurance funds their equipment (a process that can take a couple weeks to a couple months). During this time, patients may fall and injure themselves placing them back in the hospital! During this time, my patient who had a stroke could lose 2 important weeks that he will never get back in his narrow window of recovery.

2) If insurance doesn’t pull through within a reasonable time, I plan on donating items to my patients on a case by case basis.

I believe timely intervention is key to reducing further medical costs for both individuals and the system as a whole.

If you wish to support this fund, please visit: Patients in poverty

Blog Developments

I did a lot of great things for my blog this month. One of which was a publication of an interview from mindebt.com where I gave a little more background on my story. I’ll link the article to that interview here.

I spent some time reflecting on my greatest accomplishments next to earning my doctorate in physical therapy – which was paying for it. I paid off over $100K within 2 years with a starting salary of $60K. I detailed almost my entire educational journey from debt accumulation to debt demolition. To date, no piece of writing has better summed up the last decade of my life. Check it out here if you dare. Warning: It is long!

I’m working on other articles but mainly have been tied up with front-end aesthetics and trying to get the blog to look the way I want it to. I really should start focusing more on my content creation because my list of ideas is growing quickly outpacing development.

Side Hustles

Cutting down hours at my second job will allow me to pursue my side hustles.

I finally sold the Finding Nemo Jumper I found on the curb a few months ago, I can’t believe I held this for nearly 2 months for this buyer. I have to say, I thought she was stringing me along for a moment. In the end, this item cost me a minimal amount of time and effort while turning over $75.00

Mrs. Flexcents also sold a few more items from her Etsy shop!