clarity on social media marketing for small business shows a clear windshield with a dream catcher

Clarity is Imperative For Sustained Success

 

The Law of Entropy. My chemistry professor used to joke entropy was to blame for his messy office.

It’s bound to happen, our persistently organized systems will break down…

Despite our best efforts to build better and better systems, there will always be room for improvement because our systems will eventually encounter a chip, glitch, or setback.

This universal pattern explains why as we try harder and harder sometimes it feels like we find more moments of failure, more than when we didn’t even try at all.  Perhaps we can even give it the term the law of effort: mo’ money, mo ’problems in a sense. It’s why we entrepreneurs are always reminding each to keep hustling and to take one more risk.

You may consider to yourself: what does it take to make sure as we attain new heights of success on our journey? How can we ever continue when we feel the blows of betrayals, letdowns, and disappointments?

One key practice is making sure we are crystal clear about what moves us forward and why we choose to move forward.

It is imperative we keep crystal clear about what moves us forward and why we choose to move forward. @ZingaHart 

Stepping back to unfog our vision’s lens every once in awhile is as relieving as cleaning your car’s windshield. The tension of life’s muck provides a subtle added negative stressor from the strain of trying to see as far ahead as we know we can. So we take a moment to wipe it away, and then we see what we know we have the potential to see. A brighter vision of the road ahead of us.

How do you wipe the subtle stressors that slowly attach to your success goals over time? Do you meditate? Journal? Or perhaps simply unplug? Comment below or share with me on social media somewhere 🙂 

For me, my current long-term project is developing workshops to help small business owners gain social media clarity. Writing this for me takes a lot of concentration and energy, and having a clear strategy helps take the stress of thinking away. When I don’t feel like I know what to do next, I know to defer to my past notes for inspiration, and motivation. No matter what, if you are fighting through a mental fog at any point on your success path: slow down, reflect, and clarify. The next step will open up when your insight can relax on your vision again.

If you are building a social media strategy as a part of your success plan, you should sign up for the 10-day social media clarity challenge.

Go from chaos to clear in just 15 minutes a day – delivered straight to your inbox.

Sign up here for free or sign up below. This is nothing fancy, just simple action emails to keep you moving forward. Do this for your personal brand or your business. Challenge starts May 1st. 

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One More Move: Sustain Your Momentum

Agendas, fundraisers, programs, networking and this is just the volunteer work?!?! As a passionate creator that presides over a startup non-profit, #LimitlessAmbition, 2 businesses, a higher ed profession, and a beautiful growing-so-fast family surfing the wave that is seeking success could easily crash, but when we do what we love…love finds a way. As entrepreneurs,  we often find ourselves swimming deep in a variety of projects, responsibilities, deadlines, and commitments that could easily have us feeling burned out, overwhelmed or just swamped. Our ambition won’t let us give up and the people we serve rely on us to be leaders, mentors, and overall figures of what our purpose stands for. So how can we ensure we sustain ourselves while completing complex projects and timelines?
Here a three key factors to take into account:
  1. Honesty is a winning policy: Before you embark on any ambitious journey, you need to honestly assess the progress you and your team can capably commit to weekly. If you are already in your journey and are starting to feel buried, share that with your team as well. Voicing frustrations, delays, and setbacks with everyone allows for many minds (including your own) to create a solution. Journal, set up a meeting or group chat to discuss a strategy for success that works for everyone!
  2. Create and celebrate easy wins in your project, early and often: *Secret Alert* I have a little happy dance EVERY TIME I release a post by the end of Monday. I started it in an effort to share what I learned helps individuals craft their own success, so they can contribute to and grow a thriving community! Although it takes some time to complete, it is still a small step towards ensuring that someone will be inspired to boldly take any small step towards building their own success journey.

celebrate victory zinga hart

  1. Harness the power of your tribe! Being held accountable to our goals boosts our sense of commitment. There is something special about someone else knowing about what you want to do and then checking in on you to make sure you completed it! Schedule lunch dates, send a FB msg or text, connect in a Group chat, etc. etc. Find an accountability partner/group and share your goals and progress with them. Need someone to hold you accountable?
What goals are you sustaining in March? Share them in the comments below.

Rest Works Wonders For Your Leadership

I run social media for our graduate students on Facebook. From asking our students about their content needs I’ve discovered missing a balance between work, family, school, and other human activities can make them feel over-stressed, overworked, and under-satisfied. While, finding balance goes beyond one remedy or another, there are proactive activitiesthat take us towards our core center of being.

One activity is to balance is our active mind. We’re constantly learning, applying knowledge, and making decisions that can draw away our energy from our core being. While our purpose can fuel our passion, it requires us to expend energy, which can only be balanced out with the other end of the spectrum: rest.

Sleep quote

How do you measure a good rest?

Now, you may say, Zinga that’s a bit fluffy. It’s not serious enough to help me achieve success. Or…I’ll rest when I’m dead.

I get it. We feel like more stuff gets done when we’re awake. It’s like a leaders version of FOMO.  Yet, if you are feeling low and groggy from a lack of rest, you may find more mistakes are made, relationships take a toll, and your zest for creativity and innovation is dulled. While we make be able to function when we are sleep deprived, we lose focus more often, which takes away our attention from essential tasks.

Finding rest keeps us focused and when we align our focus with our vision we move towards success.

What’s one way you fit rest into your routine?

As a higher ed professional, non-profit leader, entrepreneur, coach and mom, how I stay calm and rested seems like a mystery to some of my friends and colleagues. Sometimes, I’ve wondered what has sustained me for so long? Especially since at the height of my activities, I was also pursuing my master’s degree full-time. Were there days and nights when I was tired? Yes, but for the majority of the time, I was at ease.

Why?

My reliable secret: Taking a daily nap on my lunch breaks in my car. It would range from 5-20 minutes depending on my lunch activities. To wake up I set a really, loud and obnoxious rooster alarm.

It did take some practice to nap well. I did it by starting off with just napping for a minute or two and getting used to getting up and going back to work as soon as the alarm went off. Then the build up to 20 minutes, which took about a week and a half to get used to doing. Now, I nap like a pro.

For me, the obnoxious rooster alarm is a necessity.

If you can wake up to ringing fairy whispers, go for it.

So that’s one more move towards your success. Take some rest.

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Building Your Authentic Self-Definition

Building your self-definition plays a crucial role in how you lead yourself towards success. The challenge arises when you must sift through the input of others and find the wisdom nuggets you identify with, and with which others can mostly tolerate.

Trust, there is a lot of input.

We can’t help it, we want to see you take action, and so you are offered information to inspire your next moves. In addition, businesses want to envision you your ideal reality and offer you a solution to buy. While this can be useful when needs arise, it can also fill your mental chatter with clutter that distances you from the voice of your Self. 

self
self/
noun
  1. a person’s essential being that distinguishes them from others, especially considered as the object of introspection or reflexive action.
    “our alienation from our true selves”

This can make communicating with your authentic self feel like the Tower of Babel when the discord first struck.  Chaos and confusion as you try to build and yet somehow manage to stagnate or destroy simultaneously.

Yet, you need to  envision something and you need feedback to ensure your definition can withstand the test of time.

How can you balance between external inputs and internal controls?

There are many ways, but a reliable method can be borrowed from the business world. Small businesses and enterprises alike benefit from what is called a SWOT analysis. This assessment lists the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that a certain enterprise, team, product, or brand faces. It helps sort a wealth of information so you can turn it into actionable feedback.

if-you-change-the-way-you-look-at-things_wayne-dyer-quote-5

To incorporate this practice into your own success path  take these simple steps.

  1. Choose a personal goal you are pursuing.
  2. On your own, list what you consider to be your personal strengths that might help you achieve this goal and weaknesses that may inhibit you from achieving this goal.
  3. Next, consider any opportunities you could take of advantage of to reach these goals or any competition that might be in the way. Write these down as well.
  4. Then go around and ask people you trust or your closest circle of acquaintances and ask them the give you the observations from points one and two. What do they think your strengths and weaknesses are? What do they think of your goals and what challenges you might find along the way or what gaps they might hope you fill.
  5. Finally align the feedback notes you got for yourself and from your circle and see if where they align and where they don’t. Are your strengths viewed by your circle the same?
  6. Go over the feedback and use it to determine what you want others to know and how you can get there.

The personal SWOT assessment is a decision making tool to help you unlock possibilities for yourself as you develop her brand.

Click to download the Personal Definition SWOT Assessment

Let’s connect!

 

Daydream to Boost Your Most Passionate Career Path

96% of adults daydream. If you are one of those adults, ask yourself: are you using this seemingly random activity to the fullest potential?

Like most successful activities, daydreaming to your favor will take practice, purpose, and persistence and, in this case, we’re going to focus on your career. How can you use daydreams to ensure you are reaching your career path’s most passionate potential? There are simple techniques to do so, but first a short overview of current thoughts around daydreams. 

What are daydreams?

Daydreams were discovered when scientists notice neural network activity while participants were not participating in anything at all. This came to the formation of the phrase “stimulus-independent thought,” which are thoughts created sans interaction or engagement with the environment outside of our minds. In this sense, daydreams may seem as if they are out of your control, and they can easily be, but the truth is our mind is a muscle and we work with it as we would most functioning muscles in our body.

So how can we use daydreams to create our best career path?

We must actively practice day dream by engaging in personal discovery sessions. This type of daydreaming is called positive-constructive daydreaming, which is the active reflection on our feelings, thoughts, imaginations, and other personal facets of our life in an open manner. This activity means letting go of any urge to stop yourself from thinking a thought or dreaming a dream. Studies found  this type of thinking led to an overall sense of well-being and furthermore it opens you up the possibilities of where you can apply your value.[source]

envision your career success

How can you use this on your career path?

 The answer is there are many ways to do it and you mustn’t stop at one! Experiment and continuously reflect on your career path throughout the time that you desire to earn a living for yourself. Two simple ways to incorporate this technique into your life is by:

Take a career quiz

Taking personality quizzes, like this one, or this one, and imagining yourself in the ideal roles that they describe for you. When it comes to career construction, my old mentor, Dr. Mark Savickas, told me they’re only about half right. Yet, this is a safe and simple activity to envision a future you.

Put yourself into the position and research it. Note what excites you and what doesn’t as you explore what the role has to offer.

The closest personality test for your work preference is the Holland Code, a model developed by John Holland and used by the military. My Holland Code was IEAS, most Holland Codes are the first 3 letters, which meant my career preference would be book restorer. NO!!! Don’t let online or even legitimate quizzes decide your career path,  in order to find your authentic value you must dream deeper into who you are.

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Career Path Dream Land

Asking yourself probing questions and then answering them until you reach a point of profound clarity is a thing. This is what is needed to really unearth the answers of who you are and where you are meant to bring value to the world.

A safe way to do this is what I call a mini-self-retreat. Find a way to get time alone and comfortable: send the roommate or partner out, find a baby or pet sitter, or go to a hotel.

Relinquish yourself from responsibility save for your Self.

Then have a nice thoughtful internal discussion about what you want. Stay with the discussion and record your answers for later use, listen to yourself with openness and innocence, as if within you there is a great warm source of your very own personal all-knowing. It can seem different at first, but this is just a surface level way to find your authentic value from within.

Will daydreaming get you a job? No. Constructive daydreaming and self-discovery will set you on a path to a career you are confident carrying as a part of your life’s legacy. If that’s something you think is worth having, let me know!

Comment and we’ll connect 🙂

No affiliate links in this post.

5 Small Steps to Create and Use A Personal Strategic Plan

Anyone who knows me, knows I love planning. While, I do a lot of business and marketing planning for others, my true passion for planning stemmed from personal development planning. It all sparked from a meeting with Sheila Palmer, Assistant to Donna Karen of DKNY, she shared with me a book called the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens after a brief conversation on the beach of Coney Island. When I read that book, the life of discipline, value, and achievement opened up to me for the first time.

From that year (2004) and on, I began a tradition of sitting down every year and creating a personal strategy for the next. This personal strategy helped me get three degrees, start 2 businesses, and accomplish many other complicated goals over my lifetime. Now as I grow into an adult millennial, this tool is helping me manage the many balls in my life with my chill and confident attitude towards getting things done.

First a few notes

  • A personal strategy is your strategy. Only you can define the desires that swell within you.
  • Your strategy will get better with each pass. You have to stick with it.
  • Your strategy can, will, and should change. Although, your values, goals, and beliefs will be closer to a constant, how you reach these ends will need to be adjusted as the year unfolds.
  • Your higher-order mission, vision, and values should remain constant, but be refined over time.

No strategy should be set in stone; it should only serve you for as long as it helps you reach your goals.

So, here are 5 small ways to create and use a personal strategy for 2016 today

  1. Start with your wildest vision for your life then scale it back to achieve for the year. Be a firm believer that whatever goal you set can be accomplished, then do yourself a favor and give yourself a generous timeline to get there. No city is built in a day, but it is built eventually. 2_zkbkpa
  2. Write 3-5 goals to achieve over the year. Try to build off the work you’ve done last year. If you are starting from scratch, make one goal something you can achieve right away to boost your efficacy in achieving annual goals.
  3. Schedule a time to review your goals for at least 5 minutes a day. I know an hour once a week may seem like more, but the odds of missing one week, then the next, then the next, are too high of a risk for your best you in 2016. Instead, find some way to incorporate your visions and goals in a high-frequency place throughout your day. Build it into your passwords, set up a vision board, or make it a part of your alarm clock. There are tons of ways to make your goals presence known.
  4. Pick one goal per day. Yes, you are a leader and have so much more to offer the world, but if you are having trouble genuinely sticking with the goals most important to you then you have to stick with tactics that work. Focusing on one goal per day will not overwhelm your schedule. 5778ca76b341bfa7e1fcaaca85770d4c
  5. Share what you are doing with an accountability partner. Find someone in your life that you admire for achieving their goals. Meet with them and share your goals and work towards meeting with them regularly. Do a SWOT assessment, share tips and tricks, and other successes with them. Sharing your goals makes you more accountable to yourself and others, which will build your persistence.

Simple steps, but a great start to mapping out your best 2016. Let’s get rid of resolutions and map out the business plan for your careers!

What’s wildest dream are you working on? 

Relish Every Achievement. Celebrate Your Success As an Entrepreneur or In Your Career Path To Victory. Be authentic by remembering the small parts.

Relish Every Achievement in 5 Easy Moves

One of my clients is a visionary. Her passion for setting bold goals and creating constant possibilities to current situations is thrilling.When we meet, I find sometimes she feels discouraged by all her organization has not achieved, and quickly overlooking all the small victories she did accomplish. She isn’t the first person I’ve known to do this, and at times, I’ve been guilty of getting discouraged about where I am not instead of remembering and celebrating how far I’ve made it. 

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So for our next move forward, we’re going to take a look back on how far we’ve made it.

Here are five ways you can relish your achievements today.

  1. Think of 3 ways you have grown in the past five years. Remember yourself from five years ago. You probably made mistakes, struggled to achieve something, or achieved something that made you proud. Consider this growth. If five years is not enough then think over the ten past ten years. You graduated, got that job, started a blog or business. Take a historical scan of your past and thank yourself for taking those successful steps.
  2. Check off parts of your vision board that you have lived. I had on my vision board to be bold and hang with the best. This year I’ve met more CEOs, executive directors, and other business leaders than ever. What is on your vision board that you find is a quality you are currently exhibiting? The point of a vision board is to help us define our desired reality. When you begin to live those desires you have acted in successful alignment with your vision, so take the time to celebrate. Don’t have a vision board? Make one.62953990
  3. Go through your social media and celebrate your successes. Visit your Facebook page, LinkedIn account, or other social media channel and look for a time where you posted something you were happy about or found to be a particular achievement. Tell yourself good job again and remember that you have been successful in the past and are on the right track. Can’t find anything? Then think of a moment where you shared good advice that someone liked. There, you made an impact, which is a successful action.
  4. Remember something small you did successfully and do it again. If you are having a hard time remembering an significant successes then think every smaller and consider the daily achievements we make. Did you remember to take the garbage out on time? Or call your mother after you set the goal 3-weeks ago? These little acts are acts of success and worthy content to from when your memory banks feel fuzzy.
  5. Share your goal/purpose/mission. Celebrate. Taking ownership of our success means being able to be held accountable. When you share what you want to do with another you have taken a victorious step towards being more accountable, while improving your path to your long-term achievement. It’s a win-win move that you can use anytime.

Celebrating our successes over time is just as important as learning and growing from our failures. Both success and failure keep us humble and motivated on our personal or entrepreneurial success path.

How do you find time to celebrate your success? Comment below or Connect with me on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn 

 

 

person starting at the cosmos wondering how the will manage their time and achieve complex project objectives

OMM: 5 Ways to Squeeze in Good Work

@ZingaHart

Life is complex. Work, school, family, career (which is separate from work), brand, relationships, and, oh yeah, our passions. As complex humans we tend to want to achieve complex goals (e.g. goals made up of many tasks). For instance, I have a friend Tia who works in education, serves on a nonprofit in her free time, is starting a business, and still manages to rise as a brand leader on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. This along with the other dimensions of being a superb daughter, reliable sister, active community leader, and woman growing into her own creates a week that ebbs and flows, and sometimes feels like an intense juggling act. Finding balance as she leads as a nonprofit board member (her first time around btw) means is fitting in one more complex role into her life. How could she possibly squeeze in everything and still maintain her brand of composed and in control?

It’s taken me years to refine a time management system that ensures I am meeting the goals that matter while living the life I want. Although, I am still adapting and trying new systems, there are a few key principles that matter consistently.

1. Commit to something

A nonprofit that strives to grow a powerfully empowering networking of women means that you have face a lot of goals to chew through before the vision is fully realized. Meetings, deadlines, worksheets, and email correspondences can quickly come before you and it can feel comforting to ignore it and hide. Yet, part of you made the decision to be a part of the mission in the first place, which means there is a reason behind you decision. Within that reason is your motivation.

Write down the why behind your commitment. This is the something that you can turn to when you are forgetting the motives you had.

2. Set goals

Writing down or otherwise documenting your goals gives your brain something simple and concrete to solve. Your mind is a powerfully calculating tool and you are the command master. Set small SMART commands and your brain will do the work for you.

goal achievement

3. Put it in Your Face

How do you make sure the things you really want to get done actually get done? You have to constantly remind yourself until you have it finished. To keep your tasks at the top of your mind, find a place you look at often and place those goals there. For me its my homepage, a small notebook I keep in my purse, and a calendar on my desk.

4. Measure It

Review your history and cross off what you successfully completed. You’d be amazed. Once I stumbled on a five-year goals list I made for myself in high school and I had completed about 80% of the tasks even though I left it at my dad’s house when I moved away to college. When you celebrate your small successes you rejuvenate your mind, body and spirit to continue doing more.

goal achievement

5. Talk about it regularly

It can take a while, but even the most stubborn of individualist must admit humans cannot exist alone on an island for long. We need others to grow us, to support us, and to hold us accountable. Set goals and share them with others and then return and share your achievements and failures. Communicating is the first step to bringing the ideas inside our heads into reality.

How do you manage to squeeze your passion into your daily activities? Let’s chat. 

friends connecting by a campsite like one would find in northeast ohio especially if you were on a retreat and wanted to connect with your leadership team

One More Move: Connect

friends connecting by a campsite like one would find in northeast ohio especially if you were on a retreat and wanted to connect with your leadership team

Image source

I had lunch with a colleague yesterday and the weather was delicious. When in Northeast Ohio one must bask in the sun’s rays for winter is always a whisper away. My colleague was a woman I’ve been meaning to have lunch with since last year. It took twelve months for our schedules to align so we could breath and meet for lunch’s sake. She was a mentor to the Executive Director of the non-profit I am helping to grow, and when she spoke in one of my graduate classes I could tell she was a kindred spirit.

Tweet: Persistence pays. Follow up on the people you mean to meet. You meant to meet them for a reason. @ZingaHartTweet: Persistence pays. Follow up on the people you mean to meet. You meant to meet them for a reason. @ZingaHart

Meeting for leisure can be rare in a world where agenda’s are pressing and calendar days stream past us. Yet, leisure is the glue that sticks business together. It is where we find the human in all the services, activities, and products we offer. It keeps us orbiting around where our purpose belongs. It is imperative that all personalities find ways to connect. My lunch was a bonus because she was an acquaintance so we had much to discover about each other. When we met, I got to remind myself of why I got into higher education, the renaissance career path I have taken over the past decade, and the complex life history that makes me who I am. She got to speak about her path as well and the art of leadership today. We didn’t focus on the mission, yet we refueled for the long haul.

zinga hart paulo freire only through communication can human life hold meaning

Here are three simple ways to connect this week:

  • Remember that person you’ve been meaning to call? Send an email or Facebook message. Sometimes it takes a build up to get to the call stage.
  • Respond to someone’s comment on LinkedIn. If they reply back keep the conversation going.
  • Schedule 1 lunch meeting with a person you would like to know more. Schedule it for 2-3 weeks out so you don’t feel rushed into the challenge.

Connecting with people is the cornerstone of building trust. Therefore human connection is the cornerstone of our economy. Authentic leaders will find time and space to facilitate human connection and allow for it to grow in organic ways. How do you take steps to grow your connection with others? I would love tips – as an INTP it is a worthy challenge for me.

Dealing with negativity using wellness techniques either personal wellness or wellness in the workplace including mental, physical, and spiritual wellness

Use Wellness to Overcome Negative Ruts

 Facebook is introducing a dislike button.  Although they are not quite ready to roll it out, yet it is imperative that you and your team are able to face negativity in a way that yields positive outcomes.  You are going to have to face negative situations, behaviors, and emotions in your life and your business. When you practice ways to embrace negativity you will strengthen your ability to innovate and improve over time. Managing negativity means making proactive prevention a priority under your leadership. Mental, physical, and spiritual wellness are components necessary for maintaining positivity within your enterprise’s well-being. Here are some ways to consider how you can strengthen your systems and embrace negativity for good.

Mental Wellness

Our thoughts craft our reality and consistent negative thoughts can generate a reality that saps away our motivation, inspiration, and overall energy. Beyond our own input, the brain has a bias towards negative stimuli. We notice when something is wrong more strongly and more often than we notice positive attributes. Think of a silky smooth face, save for a small pimple on the right chin line.Our pimple gets more attention because it deviates from our preferred norm. Since our mind can easily dwell in negativity it is important to strengthen our mental toughness. Having a strong mindset and a belief in your ability to create positive outcomes will form a habit that will propel you beyond negativity and towards success.

Here’s a great YouTube clip where you can feel the integrity of positive thinking:

Physical Wellness

Of course. your mind can only take flight with your body. Physical wellness plays an important role in our ability to function at our prime capacity. It is your source of energy, which is the fuel you use to maintain a positive attitude all day. Consider this, when you are tired, loaded on junk food, and at an inert state due to bare minimum movement, your are bound to be cranky, groggy, and unfocused. Diet, exercise, and rest are key players in your physical wellness, but the main leader is your relationship with your body. Find ways to celebrate and respect your body for all it has produced in your life. A great way to tap into that relationship is through Tai Chi, which forces us to slow down and feel how we move.Then make sure to regularly fit in those superfoods in and to move a bit.

I attend to my fitness. I go to the gym every day and try to maintain my physical fitness; without that, it it tough to take challenges on the chess board.

Spiritual Wellness

Spiritual wellness is a tricky category, but one may call this emotional wellness or even wellness for the soul. Whatever it is; it is the positive emotions we elicit from certain actions we take. From putting on a favorite dance playlist or volunteering for your good cause to even taking some time to garden in the year. We as humans need to fulfill our desires and ignoring or downplaying them will build a subtle, yet powerful force of negative living. For yourself, take some time to ask and question if you are doing the activities that align with your values and vision. For your team, allow for people to spend time talking about their hobbies or create social activities around activities directly tied to the bottom line. This will boost morale and perhaps ignite creativity within your organization.

Here’s a quick exercise to boost wellness at work:

  • Hold a walking meeting on ways to improve wellness around the office
  • Create a “Free Fruit Friday” and bring in healthy fruits for people
  • Place an anonymous suggestion box for employees to freely share their thoughts and opinions
  • Craft out time for office groups to meet on a subject tied to their interests

There is a ton of ways to improve  wellness in your life and ventures. Wellness prevents negativity from paralyzing your flow. Take time today to boost the positives around you, and when Facebook rolls out its dislike button, you will be fully prepared.


Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”