Good morning from Milano. What’s on my mind this morning is taking care of business. That’s because I’m taking advantage of this time that I have in Italy, trying to get my ducks in a row for all things related to sorting out my pension. Having worked as an employee, a freelancer, and as a business owner both here in the United States, it’s quite complex.

I’ve simply put it in my mind that I’m going to figure it out and I’m sitting here thinking about what a major pain in the ass it is to sort through this stuff. Much like sorting through your personal finances, taking care of your will or even following up on a series of doctor’s appointments you know you need to take care of, these all fall into the same category. things we put off and love to complain about.

It’s funny because I heard myself say to my friend Eric on the phone last night I’m on a roll and I’m going to stick with it till I get to the bottom of it. These things are all about getting over the hump of getting started. In fact, it’s satisfying to take that first step and most often you fall into this idea of Oh, I’ve got this. And every step of the way, you gain more momentum and you gain appetite for getting things taken care of.  In fact, I’ve been urging several of my friends to take care of the paperwork related to their personal assets and their living will and those sorts of things. I always say to them just think of it as a mortgage. You know when we’re motivated by a property that we’ve fallen in love with somehow we magically just get it done. You get out that checklist, and one by one you knock things off the list.

For many years, I had my Italian citizenship but I didn’t have the passport.Every time I went to get my passport, I got shut down by the sheer amount of bureaucracy I had to face in order to tackle the paperwork. Then, the pandemic got thrown in there and I’d start and stop until one day I just decided that’s it. I’m going to put on my blinders and move forward until I get to the bottom of it.  I will tell you the day I got that Italian passport was a major victory.

One of the reasons I’m telling this story is because I was with my friend Angela yesterday and she told me that when she retired and finally got around to taking care of her pension matters, she learned that had she worked just four more months the check she gets in the mail would have had a different number on it.

I don’t know who needs to hear this today, but we’re at the end of January now, and January and February are really great months to take care of business. We all have those annoying bureaucratic things that we put off. Calling the credit card company, refinancing our debt, taking care of our estates, our living wills, doctor’s appointments, whatever it is. I simply want to say that it feels so good to get started. And I promise you, you’ll be supported and rewarded by the energetic momentum that comes with taking that first step. So, stop complaining and remember those types of should – those things that are in the back of your mind that you know you need to do,  that you really want to do – act as a drag on your energy system. By getting started, I promise that  you will be supported with momentum, because energetic momentum is the reward you get when you take that first step. So just get started.

I suspect there are lots of people that needed to hear this today, and I hope perhaps I’ve inspired you to get started. Until next time, from my heart to yours