You may be one of the millions of workers who are currently redefining their careers. Being “in-between jobs” can be a powerful season to reassess your personal goals and values. Here are some things to consider when you’re in this season.

How can you keep up productive habits in between jobs?

Approach this season with intentionality

Consider what you’d hope to invest your time into while you’re not employed. Want to exercise more? Planning to travel? Aiming to do specific house projects? Hoping to invest in a creative endeavor?

Be intentional to map out your desires. It’s easy to let time get away from you when you lack the structure of being employed.

Now might be an ideal time to make a list of goals to accomplish that you’ve been unable to achieve while you were working. However, if you’re already extremely goal-oriented, you may not want to pursue goals right now. You’re likely going to spend most of your life working to accomplish workplace goals, so choosing to rest right now may help you overcome burnout and find the reprieve you need before you start your next job.

Let the world know what you have to offer

Letting people know that you’re looking for a specific type of job is probably the most important thing you can do while you’re in between jobs.

Meeting for coffee with a well-connected friend who isn’t hiring is likely a better use of your time than applying for a job where you don’t know anyone. The best job leads often haven’t been posted publicly yet. They could also be jobs that are custom-created for your unique skills. Personal referrals are 4x more likely to get the job.

However, if no one knows you’re looking, they can’t pass exceptional opportunities to you. Publicize that you’re looking on LinkedIn and social media. Bring it up in conversations with your loved ones. Email trusted people your resume. Boldness during this season may set you up with a job that becomes a source of great joy for years to come.

Time off from work isn’t the same as a vacation

When you embark on a vacation, it has a specific end date, and you know how you’re funding the trip. When you’re off from work, you’re facing financial insecurity and time may feel ambiguous, which can dampen the feelings of ease you’d normally feel during a vacation.

Additionally, you need to exert energy while in-between jobs to figure out what your next job will be. Hunting for your next job may be more exhausting than you initially expect. This is normal.

Maintain a schedule

Oh, joy! While you’re in between jobs you don’t have to wake up to report to a boss. You can enjoy sleeping, eating, exercising, and doing chores on whatever timetable you desire! However, while there’s great freedom in redefining your schedule, it’s important to at least create a schedule. Without some structure, you may feel rudderless.

Explore a temporary “fun” job

Consider the ways that your career path has drained you. Do you regularly have to make complex decisions? Are you constantly surrounded by people? Is your job physically taxing? Does it require constant creativity?

You may find emotional refreshment in trying a job that requires completely different skills. If you’re tired of sitting at a desk all day, try waiting tables. If you’re sick of dealing with people, consider walking dogs. If your body needs to recover from a grueling physical job, consider working at a desk as a virtual administrator. If you want to get out of town, explore teaching English abroad.

Trying a new job doesn’t mean making a permanent life change. It’s just a way to supplement your income and explore what makes you happiest in the workplace.

Watch your finances carefully

It goes without saying that when you’ve lost your main income source, you need to budget carefully. Being unemployed can be very emotionally taxing and you may be tempted to self-soothe your big emotions with retail therapy. Also, some people really underestimate how long they’ll be in-between jobs, making budgeting hard.

This is a critical time to carefully manage your money. Know exactly how much your life costs you and figure out exactly how long you have until you’re going to run out of funds. Consider temporarily cutting unnecessary expenses.

Get creative to consider where you can find supplementary income during this time. You’re in a vulnerable spot when you’re unemployed, so make sure you protect yourself from financial insecurity as much as you can.

Maximize your benefits

Right now, government assistance to support people is unprecedented because of COVID-19. If you were laid off, seek out every dollar the government’s willing to give you.

Additionally, maximize any severance benefits you may have. Feel empowered to reach out to your former employer’s HR team to get clarity on anything that you’re unclear on. For example, they may be offering free career coaching to former employees. This resource could prove to be incredibly helpful as you navigate the job hunt.

Figure out a way to maintain health care coverage. This is so important. Even the healthiest person is just one bad day away from incurring crippling medical debt. You may choose health insurance during this season that’s lower quality than your employer offered, but please make sure you establish some sort of medical safety net during this time.

This is a challenging season, but also a very special one!

There will likely be a day when you’re exhausted in a future job and you look back on this time with rose-colored glasses. While feelings of anxiety and dread are natural when you’re in between jobs, try to also find feelings of rest, hopefulness, and optimism. This too shall pass, and then one day you may actually miss it.

Which of these productive habits are you going to do while you’re job hunting?

The good news is it’s easier than ever to gain insights into personal fertility markers, even if you’re not trying to get pregnant, empowering you to make more informed family planning decisions.

Fertility Overview

Let’s start with a general overview of fertility.

While men generate new sperm throughout their life, women are born with all their eggs. Each month, your body summons a cohort of eggs into your follicles, 10-20 eggs is normal. It only takes one egg to get pregnant, so your body will choose the best egg and the rest will die before you ovulate. Over time, egg reserves decline, and the remaining eggs become more fragile.

So, the average woman should have a fairly easy time getting pregnant until she’s 35. After that, pregnancy rates decrease and miscarriage rates increase. 40 is generally considered a critical milestone – at this point, a woman’s chances of getting pregnant is down to 5% each month.

Your unique age will be the most powerful number to reference when you’re assessing your fertility, and if you’re 35+ it may be time to take your fertility more seriously.

At-home fertility testing

It’s easier than ever to understand your unique fertility thanks to at-home tests like Modern Fertility, Everlywell, and LetsGetChecked.

Tests typically cost about $150. When your kit arrives, you’ll prick your finger and mail back a blood sample. Within 2-5 days, you’ll receive your results.

Modern Fertility is exclusively designed to test fertility and has fantastic online resources. They also have a partnership with Quest Diagnostics, so you can get professional help drawing your blood if you want it.

Everlywell and LetsGetChecked offer fertility testing in addition to many other at-home tests.

Testing at your doctor’s office

While affordable at-home fertility tests are being used more frequently, they all have one major limitation: the results aren’t interpreted and explained by a doctor.

Doctors can also run tests that look at your body’s anatomy (which at-home tests cannot offer). For example, they can use an ultrasound to manually count your follicles, which can help diagnose premature ovarian failure. They can also use an ultrasound to observe if you have uterine fibroids. They may perform a HSG test to ensure there’s no blockages in your fallopian tubes.

Reproductive endocrinologists can perform these tests and insurance will often cover these costs. If you’re charged out of pocket, expect to pay $250-$1,000.

What does a low AMH mean?

Let’s take a moment to explore AMH, one of the most popular fertility metrics. You want your AMH to be over 1 ng/mL. If it’s below 1 ng/mL, it indicates declining egg quantity. There’s no test that assesses your egg quality, so age serves as the best quality indicator.

As you recall, each cycle the average women summons 10-20 eggs from her reserve into her follicles, but only one will be released during ovulation. If you’re attempting egg freezing or IVF, your doctor will use hormones to attempt to retrieve all the eggs summoned that month, not just the ovulated one. Generally, doctors recommend retrieving 10-15 eggs per desired live birth.

If your AMH is low, your body may be summoning fewer eggs each month, perhaps 5 instead of 10. So, if you are attempting egg freezing or IVF, a low AMH may mean that you won’t retrieve as many eggs as you’d like in one month’s cycle and may require multiple cycles of stimulation.

However, if you are attempting to get pregnant naturally, you only need one good egg, not 10. So, even if your AMH declined and fewer eggs are being summoned, you still may have wonderful luck conceiving naturally.

Low AMH indicates that you may need more aggressive fertility treatment and/or that you may be nearing the end of your reproductive years, so you may decide to get serious about natural conception. Low AMH does not mean that you are inherently infertile.

As you can see, this is confusing, and this is only one of the factors a fertility test measures. While at-home fertility tests are easy and can give you interesting data, you may panic and make ill-informed decisions if you don’t understand that data’s context. Working directly with a doctor ensures that you’ll access expert advice when interpreting your results.

Making sense of your fertility results

While it’s often extremely empowering to learn about your fertility, the results may reveal information that feels stressful or scary.

Perhaps your results may cause you to expedite your family planning. This will likely be painful to discover. First, take time to process and grieve before rushing into next steps.

Why did you test your fertility? Are you actively trying to have kids right now? Or were you testing because you’re just generally curious?

If you’re actively trying for kids

If you’re under 35 and have been trying to conceive for 1 year or you’re over 35 and you’ve been trying to conceive for six months without any success, it’s time to talk to a reproductive endocrinologist. Your test results may offer clues revealing why you haven’t been able to have the baby you desire.

If you’re testing for general curiosity

If you’re younger than 35, it’s likely that your test won’t raise any red flags. However, fertility issues are common for young women too, so your results could cause concern.

There are ample options for you and testing can help guide your decisions. If you’re not ready to have kids, but hope to one day, here are options you can explore in the meantime:

• Freeze your eggs (if you haven’t found your family planning partner)
• Freeze embryos (if you know who you want to form your family with)
• Undergo treatments to reverse anatomical barriers (ex. remove large fibroids)
• Begin researching alternate family-planning options
  • Adoption
  • Fostering
  • Using donor eggs/donor sperm/donor embryos/surrogate carriers
• Begin saving for your family planning goals

Unfortunately, getting insights into your own fertility will not be voluntarily offered to you during general doctor appointments, you must seek this information out.

You need to be your own advocate when it comes to your health and family planning goals. Fertility testing isn’t necessary for every woman, but every woman should have the right to testing if she wants it. Allow your results to empower and guide you as you course your future.

When you consider bringing more self-care into your life, there’s value in looking at your long-term goals as well. Out of love for yourself, what decisions can you make today that will allow future you to thrive?

For some women, one of the best ways to show love to their future selves is by preserving their fertility. This is why egg freezing is so powerful. Women’s bodies can typically carry a baby well into their 40’s or 50’s, but by their late 30’s or early 40’s their egg reserve begins to quickly decline.

Our culture has changed dramatically in recent decades, and women are now opting to not enter into motherhood until a later age. While this is great news for many women’s careers, finances, and relationships, it also means that by the time a woman finally feels prepared to become a mother, she may face an uphill battle with her fertility.

What exactly is egg freezing?

Egg freezing empowers a woman to serve as her own egg donor for her future self. She embarks on the first half of the in-vitro fertilization (IVF) process to retrieve as many eggs as she can in one month’s cycle. The eggs are flash-frozen and placed in storage for future use. While a woman will get older, her eggs will stay the same age indefinitely.

What are normal outcomes?

First, let’s explore the range total of eggs you could access in a single freeze cycle. Without any fertility decline, the average woman will likely retrieve 10-20 eggs per cycle.

Every month, your ovaries pull a cohort of eggs out of reserve and then release the best one during ovulation while the other eggs die off. But, during your egg freezing cycle, your doctor will prescribe hormones to tell your body to grow all the eggs that month rather than just one, and then your doctor will retrieve your eggs before you ovulate.

So, will one cycle of egg freezing be enough for you? It depends.

How many children do you want? How old are you? How much are you able to invest in this process? A quick rule of thumb for a woman in her 30’s is to target 10-15 eggs for one live birth, but talk to your doctor, every woman is unique.

This calculator can help make sense of the nuances involved with attempting to answer these questions.

How much will this cost?

On average, women will spend $15,000 per egg freezing cycle. They will also pay $500 annually for storage fees, as well as fertilization and implantation costs when they’re ready to use the eggs.

However, many employers are beginning to provide benefits to help cover these expenses. Explore your benefits to see if they can help with costs.

How confident are you that you will need these eggs because you won’t begin family building until after your late 30’s? If you feel confident that you’re on that timeline, freezing your eggs now for later use will most likely provide a lot of cost savings later when you move forward with trying to have kids at an older age.

Additionally, there are clinics emerging like CNY Fertility which offer significantly more affordable options and support traveling women who don’t live in the cities where the clinics are located.

When’s the ideal time to do this?

In theory, there may be wisdom in freezing your eggs at a very young age; the younger a woman is, the more eggs she will typically retrieve, and the higher their quality.

However, the reality is that the majority of women don’t come back to use their frozen eggs. If a woman freezes her eggs in her early 20’s, she has a very large window of time to meet a potential partner and have children naturally without any fertility complications. Also, at a younger age, she’s likely starting out her career and may lack disposable income for this investment.

Conversely, a woman’s fertility typically begins to decline at 35 and falls rapidly around the age of 40. So, if she’s 37+, she may freeze fewer eggs and need to do several cycles to achieve her goal. Again, this may not be the most financially ideal moment to freeze eggs.

There may be a sweet spot for a woman in her early-to-mid 30’s. At this age, she’s likely to still have a good egg freezing outcome, she’s likely to have more disposable income than a woman in her 20’s, and because she likely hasn’t yet met her partner by the time she’s reached her 30’s, it’s more likely that she’ll actually need these eggs in the next 5-15 years.

Are there any downsides?

It’s well known that IVF is a demanding and costly process for a woman to go through, and egg freezing mirrors the IVF protocol.

It’s an expensive procedure. The majority of women don’t return to use their eggs. And, it’s not an insurance policy.  The reality is that each individual egg may have only a 7% chance of resulting in a live birth. So, freezing eggs offers a tangible reason to have hope, but no guarantees.

So, is this self-care?

I’m going to peel back the curtain a bit as an author and reveal that I personally froze 14 eggs when I was 33. I found a doctor who I trusted deeply and who was much more affordable than the national average.

For me, someone who was entering my mid-30’s, who knew I really wanted kids, and who had access to the resources to make this possible, this was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I have an extreme calm about my decision, it was the right self-care I needed to give myself.

Only you can determine if egg freezing is right for you. Regardless, remember that when you approach the topic of self-care, you are allowed to make decisions beyond just was immediately brings you comfort. Consider how you can show love to your future self and then take action; this is self-care at its finest.

When we’re in our twenties, we often don’t understand the limitations of their own fertility and therefore cannot make an educated decision about when, if, and how we want to build our family.

Here’s a short overview of what every woman should know in her twenties about fertility:

Crucial timeframes

Typically, a woman’s fertility remains steady from the time she begins her period until 35. As she enters her late 30’s, she’ll remain fertile, but a marked decline has begun. By 40, a woman’s chance of getting pregnant each month is only 5%.

Men also experience a fertility decline, but it’s much slower. While it’s very uncommon for a woman to get pregnant naturally after the age of 45, it’s quite common to hear stories of men fathering children well into their 60’s.

Every woman deserves fertility diagnostics

If you’re interested in having biological children, simple fertility tests can be very helpful. ‘

For the best testing, visit a fertility clinic. Diagnostic blood tests measure your hormone levels and a fertility doctor can use an ultrasound to assess if anatomical issues may impact your fertility.

Simply by looking, a doctor gets a general sense of how many eggs you’ll be able to produce in an IVF cycle by counting the follicles on each ovary. These tests cost about $300, but many insurance companies will cover diagnostic testing.

You can also order an at-home test like Modern Fertility for $159. These tests look only at your hormone levels and don’t include the doctor’s interpretation that you can get in a clinic.

Hormone tests have their limits. While they can give you an idea of your egg quantity, there’s no test that can measure egg quality. And ultimately, egg quality matters a lot more than quantity.

Additionally, your doctor may do more in-depth tests to see if you have any anatomical barriers to pregnancy. Also, a semen analysis can test for male-factor infertility.

Egg freezing: a single woman’s choice

In 2012, the experimental label on elective egg freezing was removed, bringing this technology to the masses. Women can carry a baby in their 40’s and 50’s, but by their early 40’s they lack high quality eggs. So, if a woman freezes her eggs while they are still high quality (typically in her 30’s), she can use them at a later date when she’s ready.

Egg freezing is not an insurance policy. Eggs cannot be tested for quality, so there’s no guarantee that they’ll result in a live birth. If an egg is fertilized with sperm to become an embryo, that embryo can be tested for chromosomal abnormalities.

So, freezing embryos is an ideal option for a woman who wants more certainty about the future. However, embryos require sperm, so if a woman doesn’t yet know who she desires to be her child’s father, freezing eggs allows her freedom to make that decision in the future.

When should couples seek help?

In a heterosexual couple, if the woman is under 35 and has been trying to get pregnant for a year without success, they may be ready to get medical help. If a woman is over 35, they should try for 6 months and then seek help. If a woman is over 40, there may be value in getting help immediately from a fertility doctor.

What does intervention look like?

A fertility doctor offers a wide array of treatments, but the most common interventions are intrauterine insemination (IUI) or in vitro fertilization (IVF).

IUIs are simple and affordable, but only have a 10-20% success rate, so people aim to try 3-6 IUIs. A woman’s cycle is monitored and she takes a low round of hormones. Then, when she ovulates, sperm in a catheter is placed directly in her cervix. IUI is a non-invasive and intentional process which helps sperm overcome the distance it needs to travel to create an embryo.

IVF is a much more involved process, but also has a much higher success rate. The first half of IVF is identical to egg freezing. A woman takes a large amount of injectable hormones to grow as many eggs as possible. She’s closely monitored, going into her clinic every few days for several weeks.

Eventually, her doctor determines that she’s ready for egg retrieval, a minor surgery. If she’s freezing her eggs, the process stops here until she’s ready to use them.

After her eggs are retrieved, they’re fertilized with sperm to create embryos. After 5-7 days of growth, there will be a clear understanding of how many embryos have advanced and the doctor may run a test called PGT-A to see which embryos are chromosomally normal. At every step along the way, there will be loss; not every egg will become a chromosomally normal embryo.

After all that, the patient(s) will have a very clear understanding of how many healthy embryos they have. Next, a woman will take more medications and the embryo is transferred into her uterus. Then, everyone waits two weeks to see if she’s pregnant.

IVF success varies on a woman’s age, but if a PGT-A normal embryo is transferred, she has a 60-70% live birth rate regardless of age. Three PGT-A normal embryos have a cumulative 95% chance of pregnancy.

If a woman is older and wants more than one child, the doctor may recommend “embryo banking.” She may be successful having her first child, but then 1-2 years later when she’s ready for a second child, her fertility may have declined. If she freezes multiple healthy embryos through IVF before attempting pregnancy, she can use her younger embryos at a later date.

Options always remain

People who aspire to be parents may reach finite limitations to have biological children, but there are many beautiful non-traditional options. Loving relationships forged in families don’t require genetic ties.

Donor eggs and sperm can help in certain cases and are great resource for LGBTQ couples. Donor embryos may be another wonderful resource if a woman desires to carry a baby, but can’t use her own embryos. Surrogacy is another beautiful option for woman who cannot carry a baby or for gay couples.

Adoption is another powerful way to form a family. Children can be adopted via domestic infant adoption, international adoption, or through the foster system.

Financial support

None of this is cheap and unfortunately financial limitations are a barrier for many. However, some support is available.

1. Check your insurance. Most insurance will at least cover diagnostic testing. However, some plans offer amazing full coverage. Check out this list to see if your employer provides this. HR teams often may not realize that there’s a desire for this coverage, so have a conversation with HR if you feel comfortable.
2. Get a temp job. Starbucks is famous for its amazing insurance for part-time workers. Employees who work 20 weekly hours can access remarkable fertility coverage after three months of employment.
3. Shop doctors. Fertility prices vary wildly, but some clinics are positioning themselves to price-conscious patients. It may actually be cheaper to travel for care. CNY Fertility has a low-cost and travel-friendly model with locations in New York, Georgia, Colorado and Quebec.
4. Fundraise. Your community loves you and wants to support you. It can feel awkward to ask for funds on a site like GoFundMe, but you may be blown away by the ways your loved ones rally to help.

If you’re able to harness even a small sense of optimism right now, that’s worth celebrating! Perhaps, just maybe, you feel hopeful enough to set some goals for 2021. If you feel that there’s hope on the horizon, it can serve as a powerful source of inspiration and motivation.

While we love seeing ambitious big vision goals be established for the new year, we wanted to actually encourage an alternate type of intentional goal-setting; set your ambitions for the next ten years!

Bill Gates is famously quoted for saying:

Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.

Let’s dive in deeper to explore the wisdom of this quote.

The proof is in your own life

While Gates’ quote may sound like sage advice, it’s worth taking a moment to see if it actually resonates as true for you. When you consider how much you’ve been able to accomplish in one year’s time does it underwhelm you?

Alternatively, if you look back on the past ten years of your life does it become apparent how much has transpired? Walk even further down memory lane to twenty years ago. Consider your life’s differences between 2001 versus 2011.

If you need more evidence of the power of a ten-year window, look at society as a whole. Reflect on the ways technology advances every ten years.

Consider how gradual fashion changes every year result in a completely different fashion signature on society every decade.

Think about the measurable changes in music, politics, film and communication over a ten-year span.

Once you realize how dramatically anything can change in ten years, a world of possibilities opens up for what change may be possible in your own life over the next decade.

Give your one-year goals some grace

The paradox of personal growth is that you may not feel like much changes at all while you’re growing. In one year’s time, you may perceive no forward advancement in your career, in your relationships, in your health, in your finances or anywhere else. Frustratingly, you may feel like the exact same person you were just 365 days ago.

Gates’ quote helps normalize these all-too-common feelings of impatience and frustration. Maybe one year just isn’t long enough to recognize the personal growth that’s underway.

Set your “North Star” for your next decade

First, map out the past ten years of your life, giving extra care to notice the biggest shifts. Perhaps you see very tangible professional growth from this past decade. Note the more subtle changes that built upon themselves to result in a major professional growth shift.

Think about how to continue adding these subtle advancements into your life. They will build upon themselves like compounding interest.

Next, let’s look forward.

As you see how the mundane moments can add up to eventually lead you into a dramatically different situation, be proactive to consider where you hope to end up in ten years from now.

It’s okay to avoid being overly specific; there’s no way that you’ll exactly foresee your lifestyle in 2031 today. However, what are the major touchstones or elements of what you aim to cultivate in ten year’s time?

Write in a journal and/or craft a vision board to document these desires.

Now, with this ten-year “North Star” in mind, consider what you’d hope to manifest in the next seven years? Narrow it down to the next five years? What about the next three years? As you break up your major goals into smaller segments, this can help you be more pragmatic about what would be the ideal benchmarks to set for the next 365 days.

It’s okay to give yourself grace when you set your pace. You don’t have to magically make everything in your life pull together in the next twelve months; this is an arbitrary deadline that’s often not realistic.

Schedule a calendar invite right now to revisit your ten-year “North Star” in one year’s time to see if you’re still on the path you desire to be on. Simply keep moving forward with intentionality; sometimes it’s best to play the long-game when it comes to pursuing your dreams.

However, like any skill, listening to your intuition is possible with focus and mental exercises. Here are a few ways to increase your intuition today.

1. Take your intuition for a test drive

Hit the road and let your “nose lead you”. Turn off your GPS, proactively enjoy seeing new places you may have never driven by. Give yourself permission to simply see where you end up.

Does a café or roadside attraction catch your eye? Pull over and see if your intuition has something to show you. While you’re on your intuition-led road trip, be intentional to strike up conversation more than you typically would. Perhaps there’s a person completely outside of your normal path that you need to meet.

I know, I know… For those of you who are directionally challenged, this idea may be giving you hives. It’s okay, you still have your phone with Google Maps to help you get back home. You can always get back on track if you’ve veered off your path too much.

However, allowing your internal compass the chance to guide you is a great faith exercise to increase your intuition.

2. Draw a daily tarot card

Tarot cards are incredibly misunderstood. For those who are skeptical of psychics and psychic tools, tarot cards may seem completely frivolous. However, I would encourage you to look at them from an alternate perspective.

Tarot cards originated in Italy in the 1430s and were originally used to simply play card games. They are very similar to a standard modern deck of playing cards. They contain images that were likely very straightforward to the local Italian community, much like how we all quickly understand exactly what a certain emoji or meme signifies.

Over time, the cultural meaning of the images has been lost, and now we can pontificate to try to find that lost meaning.

Draw a tarot card and take some time to try to figure out what this mysterious image may mean in your life. You can reference a tarot guidebook for the “standard” interpretation, but feel free to simply let your intuition fill in the mystery for you on its own. It really doesn’t matter if you’re right or not. By taking time to simply just listen to your intuition while looking at a tarot card, you’re strengthening your ability to hear your intuition in any situation.

3. Induce self-hypnosis by doing repetitive movement

Remember when you were a kid and you would get caught up in making the same odd sound or movement over and over again? This universal behavior that children display seems to serve a purpose; it’s calming and allows the child to venture into an internal place.

Children are inducing self-hypnosis through repetition. As we age, we become embarrassed by this nonsensical behavior and we override any desire we may have to enter this mental state.

Allow your “silly” self the chance to emerge. Certain group fitness classes will allow you to move and make sounds in a playful way. Getting caught up moving and singing to live music can also bring you into this state. Seek out this euphoria and be intentional to feel what you’re experiencing in this altered hypnotic state.

When you become friends with this side of your brain, it may start to offer insights that aren’t always obvious.

4. Embrace the MacGyver Method

Remember the show MacGyver?

In every episode, Agnus MacGyver found himself in a seemingly inescapable situation, but at the last moment, he would find a brilliant solution using his handy swiss army knife, duct tape, paper clips, or a slew of many other ordinary items. The demand to constantly be clever fell quite heavily on the show’s creator Lee Zlotoff as he was writing scripts. Zlotoff developed a system he dubbed the “MacGyver Method” to help him find his eureka writing moments.

When facing writers block, Zlotoff would go for a long drive or hop in the shower. Seemingly, without fail, it was then that he would come up with a brilliant plot line. Over time, he realized that when he distracted his conscious mind with a menial task like driving, he allowed his subconscious mind the opportunity to get to work to find solutions.

Zlotoff explains that “studies show your subconscious [mind] is between 500,000 to 200 million times more powerful than your conscious [mind].”

Your subconscious brain is also very creative, it’s not bothered with logic or rationale.

So, pose a question to your subconscious mind and then get out of the way to let it find a solution to your problem. Distract yourself with a puzzle, yoga, a drawing or something else menial and simple that will require your conscious mind’s attention. Then, check back in with your subconscious mind to see if it found a creative insight that wasn’t initially obvious.

This is a simple formula to allow your intuition the chance to come out and make itself known. Your “aha” moments are just around the corner.

Fast forward to today, and you likely have a bookshelf full of books that you may have started, but never got beyond the first chapter. In our fast-paced smartphone world, human’s attention span is, in fact, declining. And the demands of adulthood may mean that the last thing we think we have time for is to read a book.

However, thanks to technology, there are innovative ways to increase the total number of books consumed, redefining the way we read. Here are some tips to help you rewrite your relationship with books.

Listen to audiobooks

Reading a book is an active task; you cannot do anything else while you are reading. However, listening to an audiobook is more passive, so audiobooks allow you to multitask while you take in the book. You can drive, cook, clean or exercise while an audiobook keeps you company. Some people are visual learners, while others may be auditory learners. If you are more of an auditory learner, you may be delighted to discover that listening to audiobooks makes a major difference for improving your information retention.

One great way to access audiobooks is to become a member of Audible. For a $15 monthly subscription fee, you’ll be able to download a new audio book every month, and there are over 500,000 books!

However, who doesn’t love free access to books?! Did you know that you can likely check out audiobooks from your local library? The Libby App has a modern interface and mirrors Audible’s functionality. You may have to wait while a library hold is placed on your desired audiobook, and after a few weeks, it will be “returned” to the library. So, be sure to begin listening to your book as soon as you are notified that it has arrived on your phone.

One other pro-tip – consider listening to your audiobooks on 1.5x speed. The rapid narration pace can be divisive, some people love it and others hate it. However, if you adjust to faster narration speeds, you’ll finish your books faster and have more time to get onto the next.

Read eBooks on your phone

If you have seen The Social Dilemma, you know that our hopeless addiction to social media apps on our smartphones is doing significant damage to society. Many people are trying to intentionally find ways to reduce or eliminate the time they spend on social media.

Let’s be realistic though – sometimes, you are sitting in a waiting room, and you just want to look to your phone for a little entertainment and distraction. Consider deleting your social media apps and instead fill that screentime reading eBooks.

Libby, the app we love for free audiobooks, can also open up a world of access to free eBooks. You can also download the Kindle app for your phone and read downloaded eBooks on-the-go.

Make it social

Lastly, a great way to ensure that you read more is to have social accountability set up. Goodreads allows you to track the books you want to read, are currently reading, and have completed. You can write reviews of the books you’ve completed and be informed by fellow readers’ reviews before starting a new book.

Sync Goodreads up with your contact list to see what books your friends are reading. You can also set up a reading challenge to complete a certain number of books in a specific time frame and if you are competitive, you may discover that your friends’ reading challenge success is enough to motivate you to complete the books you’ve begun.

And of course, we can’t forget the good ole fashioned book club! In a world where people are feeling increased social isolation, a book club offers something truly special. Acting as a modern-day thought salon, book club conversations can spark meaningful dialogue and deepen relationships. They provide a network of friends who you know you’ll get to connect with on a regular cadence. Book clubs also offer accountability to ensure you complete the books you began.

In a world of quick moving TikTok videos and countless short tweets, perhaps an eloquently written book savored slowly with a group of dear friends can offer far more than any social media app ever could.

In order for fast fashion companies to respond very quickly to trend changes, they must often produce items in grueling conditions. This often unfortunately means that human suffering and toxic environmental impacts were the price these companies paid to give you cheap options on the rack. At its worst, the fast fashion industry can be built upon slave labor. (If you want to learn more about this, check out the documentary The True Cost.)

However, there are so many other options available for filling your closet. Sustainable alternatives abound and they also can be quite affordable. Here are some tips to build a curated ethical closet:

Buy used

A simple and wallet-friendly way to build an ethical closet is to buy used clothing. Even if the brand has compromised ethics, your purchase dollars go to the reseller, not the original producer.

Double your ethical impact buying from a thrift store with a social purpose like Goodwill, The Salvation Army or a local charity-run thrift store. You can also buy from more fashion-forward resellers like Buffalo Exchange, Plato’s Closet or Crossroads for more on-trend options. Alternatively, you can buy directly from individuals on eBay, Poshmark or Offer Up.

In addition to reducing sweatshop labor, buying used also has a positive impact on the environment; your purchase prevents used items from reaching landfills and reduces packaging waste.

Buy “Made in America”

When you purchase “Made in America” items, you can rest assured that a minimum level of care was considered for the product’s manufacturing. Employees were paid at least minimum wage and not forced to work overtime unless properly compensated for their time. Companies manufacturing in America must also comply with environmental regulations set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Additionally, when you purchase “Made in America,” your dollars will stay within the country; keeping your funds within the USA, helps grow local economies and protect American jobs.

RELATED: 7 Ethical Beauty Brands Worth Adding To Your Cart.

Choose B Corps

B Corps “are businesses that meet the highest standards of verified social and environmental performance, public transparency and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose.” Think of the B Corp label like the Free Trade or Certified Organic labels seen on food packaging.

There are over 3,500 B Corps and the B Corp Directory features over 100 fashion-specific brands that have been independently verified for their ethical business models. (Pro-tip: the B Corp Directory can help you find recommended brands for purchases beyond your closet as well. Why not build a more ethical pantry, home and office while you’re at it?)

Check brands’ websites for a supply chain disclosure

In recent years, many brands have received bad press for problematic supply chains and sweatshop labor. With increasing attention being paid to manufacturing, brand are likely to proudly publish their policies on their websites if they’re engaging in ethical manufacturing.

Certainly, there are ample smaller name brands to seek out in boutiques and online stores. However, even when shopping major department stores, there are globally-recognized brands operating with a heart. A few great ones we love are Patagonia, Eileen Fisher, Adidas, Brooks, Rebecca Minkoff, and Levi’s.

A few more resources we love

Before you purchase your next item of clothing, you can check a out a brand’s practices with these tools:

• Done Good: This is a web browser extension. Done Good’s browser notifications alert if you’re about to make an online purchase from an ethically compromised brand. The app then recommends an alternative vendor and provides a coupon code to incentivize you buy from the better business. You can also explore Done Good’s website to find verified businesses to support.
• Good On You: This mobile app is great to reference when shopping at a brick-and-mortar store. Quickly input the brand’s name to see how they check out for production practices. Good On You also runs a fascinating blog that regularly takes deeper dives into specific popular brands and their strengths/weaknesses as ethical vendors.
• Dressember’s Ethical Fashion Directory: Dressember is a fashion-oriented non-profit organization working to eliminate slavery. This directory is frequently updated with recommended brands and also features discount codes for buyers.

Stick with the brands you trust

You may feel overwhelmed with all this information. Set aside some time to research to find your “go-to” apparel brands. While it takes time up-front to do this research, the good news is that there are ample companies that can fill your closet. Once you’ve figured out the brands you’d like to wear regularly, keep coming back for more!