On the road again...

So tomorrow I'm going to L.A. for a conference filled with health coaches. These are my people. I went to the same conference back in May and had the most amazing 3 days and met a bunch of like-minded people. This conference couldn't have come at a better time because I've been really lacking creative motivation with everything in my life. I kind of feel stuck. Like, I know there are things I want to be creating and developing for Raw Generation, but I feel scattered. Part of it is because I am in the thick of our other seasonal business so my days are split between juice and Christmas trees.

I've also been completely unmotivated to cook which makes for a really dull blog about cooking. Sorry! I guess it should be expected that after a solid 14 months of cooking and writing I temporarily ran out of things to cook and write about....

Lately, my regimen of eating healthy consists of juicing at least once a day, eggs for lunch w/ chopped up veggies, and whatever I feel like picking on for dinner (last night I had air-popped pop corn with butter). I've been eating like a bird.

Hopefully this conference gives me the much needed creative motivation. Otherwise, I'm going to have to rename the blog to 'Plenty of Things to Do & NO THYME'.

Featured on the Institute for Integrative Nutrition's blog!

This was super exciting news to wake up to yesterday morning. I wasn't fully prepared to handle the amount of emails and comments I got in regards to this so I spent most of the day replying back to people about Raw Generation- not a bad start to this week!

Here's the blog post featuring me and Raw Generation.

Health Coach Starts a Family Juicing Business
Posted on September 8, 2012 by Dorry Tolson Original Source 

At Integrative Nutrition, we are honored to play a role in helping you discover your passion for healthy living. Each student takes a different path after graduation, and today we are shining our spotlight on 2012 graduate Jessica Geier.  

Jessica’s interest in health and nutrition began when her grandmother was diagnosed with cancer. She channeled her nurturing spirit by preparing nutritious, healing meals to help her grandmother through treatment. Jessica has since paired her education from the Health Coach Training Program with her father’s entrepreneurial background, and together they created a fulfilling new business in Neptune, New Jersey!  

What were you doing prior to enrolling at Integrative Nutrition? 

I finished my graduate degree in 2007 and immediately jumped into a job as an architectural intern. I knew right away that this work wasn’t fulfilling, but I stuck it out as long as I could. After nine months, I quit my internship and tried out a couple of other jobs. It was exciting at first, but after the learning curve wore off, I was right back where I was before: feeling like I wasn't doing what I was meant to do in life.
After those jobs, I started working with my father. He is an entrepreneur and at the time, he had a few small businesses that I was helped him systematize. I started to get that same feeling again, and realized it was time to find a fulfilling career.  

What led you to explore the Health Coach Training Program? 

Just after I started working with my father, his mother – my grandmother – was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She moved in with my dad and I took over the role of cooking. I started researching everything I could find to learn about feeding her nourishing meals that would keep her strong to get through chemo.  

This is where my understanding of food and health began to change. After she passed away, I realized that I needed to change the way I was taking care of myself, or more accurately, not taking care of myself, so that I could prevent disease in my future. I was scared because cancer runs on both sides of my family.  

How did your life change after enrolling? 

Shortly after I enrolled in the program, I knew I was in the right place. I met people who were on the same page with me, people who believed the same things that I did. As I learned new information each week, I became more confident that I was doing the right thing. I was doing something that I felt proud of, something that would change my life and the lives of those around me.  

For the first time I was incorporating what I love – cooking and food, with something I believe in – nutrition and healthy living. I knew I could create a career in Health Coaching that would allow me to do what I love every single day.  

What are you doing now? 

Around the time I enrolled at IIN, my father and I were talking about what business we wanted to develop. We were exploring a few options, but the one that I was drawn to was a fresh pressed juicing company. At that time I was sharing with him everything I was learning about the benefits of food on our overall health, and he was starting to get on board. It didn't take much to convince him that juicing was the way to go. Thus, Raw Generation Juices was born!  

It’s wonderful that you had the courage to start your own business! Did you ever experience any doubt, and if so, how did you work through it?  

I was confident about the growing market for fresh pressed juices, especially with my newfound network within the Integrative Nutrition community. I knew that my role as head of marketing would be something I could really dig my teeth into and enjoy. 

What makes Raw Generation unique? 

Before we started our company, my father was an on again, off again juicer. After a while, he became discouraged with the time it took and the mess it made. He had looked for a company that sold leafy green juices, but there were none in our area! This was one of our motivations to start Raw Generation.  

Tell us more about the products you offer. 

Raw Generation sells leafy green vegetable juice blends. We started focusing on the dark green leafy vegetables (kale, collards, spinach, Swiss chard, & wheatgrass) because of the immense health benefits they offer. We currently offer a few signature blends, and we will be expanding our line while keeping all of our juice blends at least 50% leafy green vegetables, including organic wheatgrass juice.  

What do you love about your work? 

I love that I can get up every morning and honestly say that I am spreading health and happiness in the world. I am also helping myself become healthier on a daily basis. I had heard that when you are doing something you love, it doesn't feel like work. I believe that now. 

It's been a busy week!

But so worth it! I am happy to say that in the past 7 days I finished and launched my eBook (which you can find here), past my final exam for my Holistic Health Coach Certification, and Raw Generation is officially open for business! Go check out our website!

I have to admit, when I'm productive, I'm productive. If only every week was like the past.... I'd rule the world!!! Haha, kidding. 

I also managed to get everything done without ANY anxiety, without getting sick, without giving up my mostly healthy eating habits, and without over exhausting myself. I am thoroughly beat though and need some R&R in my bed with some tea and a book. 

PS... I know I haven't been posting anything lately about cooking and whatnot, but to be honest I haven't been cooking or even preparing much. I've been drinking a lot of juice and eating a lot of eggs. I'll get back into it one of these days. Cooler weather is coming which means I'll be getting into some great comforting soups and such.

How is everyone else's week going?

Making Changes

So sorry for the minor interruption in my posting last week. I had a lot going on in my head that I had to work out. First of all, I was seriously considering moving in with my sister. She's moving back to NYC and needs a roommate. I had to make a decision rather quickly because if I wasn't going to move in she had to find a roommate. I thought about it at first and was like 'am I really going to uproot my life almost on a whim?' and then I was like 'this would be a great opportunity to advance my career and help build Raw Generation.'

This was the struggle I had in my head for 5 days. I have been very comfortable here in my awesome (very spacious) apartment 6 blocks from the beach close to all of my friends and most of my family. I have spent the past few years slowly making changes so that I was less stressed out, more calm, and healthier. On the other hand, I have always wanted to live in NYC. It would definitely be fun, but very different from what I am used to.

In the business coaching program I am doing, they talk about getting out of your comfort zone so you can grow. I am realizing that maybe I am too comfortable and I need to stretch myself. So I was like 'I can just sell my car, find someone to sublet my room, put all of my stuff in storage, continue working, and move in 5 weeks!' (That sounds like a Jess type of agenda) Well, I went up to the city Friday to look at the apartment. It's such a beautiful place, however, it's small. I stood in it by myself for a solid half an hour trying to figure out if just the bare minimum of what I needed to survive and work from home would fit. Not happening. And then I looked at the "kitchen" and asked 'where the hell am I going to cook?' Not happening. And then I asked myself if I could get by without cooking as much as I do.

This was the point where I had to checkin with myself to see if this was actually right for me right now. I have been working on this blog for almost a year now. My goal in writing to all of you is to share my experiences and the things I have learned about living a healthier life. Food and cooking have been my main topics (although more recently I have broadened my scope to other aspects of living a healthy life). And more recently, I have been "cooking" and testing for Raw Generation. Can I really live somewhere that is going to be physically impossible for me to have the space to cook and prepare?

As much as I would love to tell you that I am spontaneously moving to NYC in a few weeks, I had to stick with my more logical roots, be honest with myself, and listen to my gut.

ME: 'I would love to be in the city to explore and meet new people and live with my sister.'
GUT: 'This is not right for me right now.'
ME: 'I can do all of this. Work and get all of my ducks in a row in a few weeks.'
GUT: 'I need to plan this out so that in the next year I can make a move into something that is going to fit the lifestyle I have created and want to maintain.'

So there you have it. I am going to stay where I am and set myself up so that in the next year I can move into the city if that's what I still want to do. Everything has been changing so fast lately. I have a hard time keeping up with myself.

So there is a 2nd reason for my mild absence last week. I finished my first e-book. It was a 2 day writing marathon to get it to the point where it was 99% complete. I am getting it reviewed by a few people right now for some constructive criticism, and then I am going to get it posted up here on my blog as well as Amazon. I have no idea how this process works with Amazon so if any of you have any idea shoot me an email at jessicageier@gmail.com. I'm sure it's not that difficult, but any advice would be much appreciated. This is my next step... to get it selling. I'll be writing a post dedicated to explaining it when I am ready.

So, last week was hectic but super productive. I feel good about my decision and am glad that I was able to weigh the pros and cons and listen to my gut feeling. As much as I love being spontaneous, moving to the city on a whim is just not the type of thing I think I should do right now.

The moral of this story: listen to your gut!

Raw Generation Juices Coming Soon!

I swear....we are really going to be able to show something for
all this work!

We (my father and I) have made quite a bit of progress over the past 3 weeks. For a while I was overwhelmed  because there were a million things to do, but now we are at a point where things are really starting to come together.  First huge accomplishment...we decided on the name Raw Generation (which I think I told you about), second...we decided on a logo after about 18 different variations. Ta-daaaaah~

I know this wasn't even one of the original 9 that I asked your opinions on. We had settled on one of them, but then had some issues with how to apply it to our marketing materials so we went back to the drawing board (Photoshop) and it morphed into this! Hope you all like it as much as we do!

Third...on to the website. I have a love hate relationship with creating websites. A few years ago I decided I wanted to learn HTML/CSS so I could make my own websites. I bought one of those Dummies books (300+ pages) and started from scratch. The basic stuff worked when I did it, but as the code became more complicated I realized that I am not a natural nor do I have the patience/time to study PHP, Appache, JavaScript, & MySQL to figure out what the F was going on. So I Google'd "webesite creator" and found Wix.com. 

Wix.com worked (except on Apple computers) and it was right up my alley because it is drag and drop much like I am used to with Photoshop. Then I got into blogging, which Wix didn't have at the time. 

Enter WordPress. I HATE WORDPRESS! I spent literally the entire summer last year trying to build a blog/website in WordPress and after 60+ days of fudging around I had a glitchy site that looked nothing like I wanted it to. So I gave up and started this blog on Blogger. It has most of the functionality that I was looking for and I could customize it enough to be happy with the way it looks. If you know me you know that I am almost OCD about the way things look- my house, my websites, my graphics, the food I take photos of...aesthetics are ridiculously important to me. 

When it came time to start the Raw Generation website I needed something more powerful that included eCommerce. I did some looking around and found Shopify.com which was the only website creator I found that had a shopping cart, blog, and looked super easy to customize. It's also set up like a smart phone with apps you can download and they almost seamlessly integrate with your website. You don't have to fudge around with complicated code (like with WordPress) unless you want to. 

I think I literally started on this Wednesday of this week (2 days ago) and I already have more than half it done!!! Here's a sneak peak:

I am amazed at how easy it is to work in Shopify.com! WordPress should take some notes; they could really learn a thing or two from Shopify.

Have a great weekend!

Revisiting my goals

Lately I have been focusing on eliminating as much from my to-do list as I possibly can. I ask myself:

• Will this bring me closer to my goals?
• Do I really want to work on this?
• Do I really need to work on this?
• Will this improve my life?

I decided a few weeks ago that I was not going to pursue a business that I had thought up. At the time of it's inception I thought it was something that could really take off. But after getting curbed for a few months, I realized that it was not something I was in love with and it would just be a distraction for me right now. 

I put quite a bit of pressure on myself for not launching right away, but in hindsight I think that when delays like that happen, they are for the best. I would have spent countless hours building something that I ultimately would have lost passion for, and would have distracted me from the things that I love doing. This is the first time in my life where I can honestly say that waiting actually paid off. 

I figured I should make it a habit to re-evaluate my goals every once and a while because I tend to have extreme enthusiasm for projects at first, and then once I am knee deep they tend to become burdensome. So I am taking a second look (6 weeks later) at the goals I set out to conquer at the beginning of this year.

Dec. 30, 2011: 

I am on to bigger and better things. My specific goals for 2012 are:

• finish my book (I just finalized scope)

• figure out which publishing route I am going to take

• grow my readership to 10,000 reads per day (I am at 1900+ this month)

• create and sell and app for android/iPhone (details TBD)

• work towards seeing 40 health counseling clients per month (starting in March)

• vacation at least once (Rincon, PR is calling my name)

• start saving $ to buy land/design & build a house (not ready yet, but want to have $$ by the time I am)

My thoughts after settling into February....

• I am putting the writing a book thing on the back burner for a while. I realized that #1 I am still in school and I need to focus on that right now, #2 everything that I wanted to put into a book I can put in my blog, #3 I thought I finalized my scope, however, I keep changing my mind so I am going to wait until someone approaches me or I am absolutely sure of what I want the focus to be.
• My readership is growing by leaps and bounds. It is amazing that the littlest things can catapult you so much farther than you ever expected. There's that 80/20 rule again! You will get 80% of the results from 20% of the work...so true!
• I still have creating and selling an app for the android/iPhone market in my radar. It isn't #1 right now, but it is something I think will pay off.
• Right now I have a trip to visit friends in Los Angeles coming up (never been!) and I am planning a trip to Paris and the south of France with my sister over the summer. Two blonde American girls in France- look out! Ha! I am so looking forward to eating and drinking, taking photographs and writing for a few weeks in France. Ahhhh! That is my calling!
• As far as saving money is concerned, I am incapable right now. However, I am working on finding more freelance graphic design work so I can start bringing in the big bucks! I'm also promoting my health coaching business...if your life/health is a mess and you need some help digging yourself out don't hesitate to contact me. I've been there before. I am an expert on getting yourself out of shitty situations/feelings/health concerns.

So there... I have made some progress on a few of my goals. That's good for only 6 weeks into the new year. I plan on doing this every month or so, so I'll keep you posted. Also! Still working on the juicing business! I know that wasn't in the plan for 2012. That's because I wasn't sure if we were going to pursue it until after the New Year. Still working on branding, but will be sure to keep you updated on the progress. 

What keeps you motivated? or helps you get it back?

Working From Home

So for the next month I am going to be mainly working from home (score!). This means mornings filled with rolling out of bed and onto my computer, utter disdain for the way that I look, and poorly planned meals for myself (fail).

I know this to be true because I have worked from home before and this is what happens. So...my goal for the next few weeks is to:

1. Go food shopping at least every Sunday and do not put it off when produce runs low
2. Shower every day (most people don't need to remind themselves of this but I find it necessary)
3. Make 1 smoothie a day
4. Cook at least 1 meal every day
5. Workout for at least 1 hour 5 days a week

Wish me luck! I will be reporting on all of my dark-green-leafy-veggie-findings so don't you worry...

Thyme to not make superficial GOALS

I hate it when people say they are going to lose weight for their new year's resolution. That's so vague. How are you going to go about losing weight? What are the specific steps that you are going to take to lose weight? How much weight do you want to lose? What are your benchmark goals? How will you eat? What types of workouts will you do? (Can't you tell I'm a Type A personality? haha)

See what I mean? I used to be one of those people with lofty vauge aspirations and no follow through. I think the reason I never followed through was because I never had a plan. I never laid out the specifics of how I was to accomplish what I wanted to accomplish (usually to lose weight).

Well I'm over trying to lose weight mainly because I know that if I keep eating the way I am with moderate workouts I will keep losing.

I am on to bigger and better things. My specific goals for 2012 are:

• finish my book (I just finalized scope)
• figure out which publishing route I am going to take
• grow my readership to 10,000 reads per day (I am at 1900+ this month)
• create and sell and app for android/iPhone (details TBD)
• work towards seeing 40 health counseling clients per month (starting in March)
• vacation at least once (Rincon, PR is calling my name)
• start saving $ to buy land/design & build a house (not ready yet, but want to have $$ by the time I am)

Something funny happened last night that made me re-evaluate what I am doing. I REALIZED I GOT TOO COMFORTABLE. For the past 2 years I have been working on my own an with my father. The money wasn't great, but the flexibility made up for it. I don't need flexibility right now...I need money! I realized that I am too comfortable and I will never grow (professionally) if I keep on this track. I am not exactly sure of what I will do, but I know that I need to make some changes. I am in my money making prime right now because I have no kids and no real responsibilities other than dragging myself out of bed to get to work. Yeah I have some socked away, but there are things I want to do (build a house, be able to have flexibility when I eventually have children, travel more) that require a lot of money. 

2012 is about to be blasted with my Type-A-Agenda! 

Reflecting on the Last Year

I used to get hung up on 'not getting enough done'. I would beat myself up mentally which never resulted in better results, just more negative feelings. I started to look at things differently when I put myself through the Midwest Center for Stress & Anxiety. It was  a 15 week program which I started in October of 2010 and ended in January of this year (2011). One of the things that this program teaches is how to change your thinking, which will ultimately change the way that you feel. And it works. I was a walking billboard for chronic anxiety, self-doubt, anger, and worrying. But now I'm perfect! Haha just kidding!!!

One of the things I did to help me get over the 'not getting enough done' way of thinking was to write down what I actually accomplished. I sat down and thought about everything that I had done over the previous year. And you know what? When I actually took a few minutes to think about it (and write it down in black and white) I was proud of myself. I had done quite a bit. I did this exercise every week for a few months to try to build the habit.

Well, recently I have fallen back in that trap. It happens when I have a lot on my plate and am feeling scattered. My health coach (yes I have a health coach; one of the perks of going to school to get certified as one) worked it out with me so that my goal is to focus on one or two big things I have to do every week and put everything else out of my field of view so I do not overwhelm myself. In addition to that, I thought I would make a list of all of the things that I have accomplished this year. Here I go:

• started a blog
• enrolled in school to become a holistic health coach (and passed the 1st test)
• improved my diet by leaps and bounds
• lost weight (approx 10 lbs)
• reconnected with 5 old friends that I had fallen out of touch with
• came up with 2 different business ideas that I will be pursuing after Christmas
• learned 2 new computer programs (it would have been 3 if WordPress wasn't such a pain in my ass)
• made a raw cake
• took 2 vacations
• made a lot of progress in the LOVE department

I think that is pretty good for one year. I urge you to do the same. Sit down with yourself and make a list of all of your accomplishments over the last week, month, or year. It's shocking right?

What is an accomplishment you've made over the past year?

Mid-day Revalations

I can honestly say that I just had an a-haaa! moment (followed by a DUH! moment). I was stressing in my head over all of the things that I signed myself up to do and all of the things that are required of me over the next few months. And just like that, I said to myself, "Self, you are always going to be busy. There are always going to be too many things to do and not enough time. But it doesn't matter, because as long as you have mostly productive days and strive to move forward with your goals, you will be doing a great job."

Talk about improvement! A year ago I would have worked myself into a panic attack at 6:30 AM. Thank goodness that I do not have anxiety anymore! Other things I learned today:

• how to get yourself kicked off of Twitter in 1 business day
• I love working from home...I get so much more done.
• the active time (meaning the time you actually have to be doing something) for baking bread is about 10 minutes, give or take, unless you want to get fancy. Why don't more people make their own delicious bread?
• I hate working out. Lucky for me I trade my website skills for my 5STAR's workout skills.
• S-H-I-T I have to weigh-in tomorrow and I just thought about all of the damage I did during my non-stop-birthday-blowout-weekend and my insufficient workouts since.
• I actually do like chicken (it came from the farm, not a factory so I feel better about eating it). Especially when the Boyfriend cooks it for me! We have a new chef in town!!! 
• Maybe all of the chicken I ate this week will turn into muscle to counteract all of the fat that I probably gained back. 
• My taste buds are changing and I am starting to not notice the vegetables in my smoothies as much.

Looks good doesn't it? haha

Trust me this was amazing compared to what I thought it was going to taste like. Today's green smoothie was:

• 1/2 pineapple
• 1 green apple
• green grapes
• 1/2 cucumber
• spinach, large handful 
• kale, handful
• water

You might get another post from me later when my bread is done and I turn it into a deliciously simple meal. I'm sorry but I wish I could give you food through the computer. Hey Google or Mark Zuckerberg....maybe you could start working on that.

Do What You Love & Love What You Do

I have struggled with this since I took the job in Atlanta right after graduation that I knew I didn't want. I took it because it was a great salary right out of grad school, and the thought of moving to a new city was exciting. While I loved my weekends out on the town, I dreaded the week days that were filled with anxiety, boredom, and doing stupid S-H-I-T-T-Y work that I didn't care about.

Next up was a stint designing clothing. At first it was interesting because I was learning a lot. But once that learning curve was over I quickly grew tired of the work. I wasn't in love with it.

After that I started working with my father on a few of his small businesses. While I enjoy the work (a lot of graphic design, websites, and organizing), the flexible schedule, and getting to see him every day, after about a year and a half I was loosing enthusiasm for what I was doing.

I am now 29 and I just recently I had a heart to heart with myself about what it is that I love doing. I love to cook. I could do it all day every day. I love organizing things- a closet, a filing cabinet, my garage- it doesn't matter. I love designing- graphic design, interior design. I love making things- hair clips, things out of concrete, paintings. I love learning new things- I have had a new found love (some would call it an obsession) with eating healthy to prevent cancer and other chronic illnesses.

I realized that I need to focus on what I love doing. I am not good at being unhappy. I have always heard that if you do what you love then the rest will fall into place. I have previously taken jobs because of the money, and it backfired. Until recently I never really thought about how I could incorporate what I love doing into a career.

I suggest everyone think about it. You may find that you really do love what you do- if so congratulations! You may realize that you are not really doing something that you love, but may not be able to make a career change right away. That's OK. At least it will give you something to look forward to and be excited about. Ultimately you can change your career, I have done it 3 times already. Yeah I took a huge pay cut, but what I am doing now does not seem like work. I get to learn new things every day, cook and tell people about it, and make positive changes in my life. The money will come. (I never turn down donations if you are feeling generous today ;) And at the end of the day, I would much rather be a little bit poorer and doing something that I love than richer with miserable days.

Think about it...you spend at least 8 hours a day at work, with your crappy coworkers, doing work that you probably don't care about. That is 1/3 of your life.

It is sad when you see people who really love what they do pass away at an early age. I know it is old news that Steve Jobs died, but I thought it appropriate to include something he said because it's right in line with what I am writing about.

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do," he told the Stanford grads in 2005.

"If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on."

Food for thought!