Sometimes I Feel Like I am Sprinting in Quicksand

Hey Everyone. Have you ever had the experience where you have so much to do or have so much that you want to accomplish that you cannot make tangible progress on anything you are working on? This is where I am at right now and it sucks!

I have so many things that interest me that I am either currently pursuing or want to pursue: writing a book, publishing my own info products, offline consulting, creating membership sites, building 100s of autoblogs, being a professional singer in a foreign country, building a public speaking career, weight training to obtain the body of my dreams, dating/love life, time with friends, obtaining business credit, starting a travel company, outsourcing my business, obtaining my Tefl Certification, having an online store, modeling, writing more blog posts, starting a new risque’ blog, planning my next international trip, monetizing my blog and very specific HUGE monetary goals…

I think you get the picture. Right now, I literally feel as if I am sprinting in quicksand and the quicksand is pressing in on my chest and suffocating me! This feeling really sucks! Multitasking does not work!!! Combine all this with the fact that I suffer from S.O.S. (shiny object syndrome) and you can see why I’m feeling this way.

I know I need to prioritize and work on one project at a time, but that is easier said than done when I have the spector of making money to fuel my travel passion/obsession, eating and paying rent on an apartment in Austin that I’m never in. I’ve made the decision to hit a very large income target quickly and while my
current endeavors financially support me now, I’m ready to live a life that is truly “out of this world” and I want to do it now! Patience is not a strong suit, lol. There are shortcuts I could take in hitting my financial goal, but I’m choosing not to pursue them for personal reasons. Gotta do this on my own.

After talking to very insightful friends this weekend, I have narrowed my focus down to 3 things that I am passionate about and will get the most financial bang for my time invested quickly. I’m close to removing one of those items as I am still feeling that sinking quicksand feeling as I am typing this post.

Anyway, I just had to vent and get this off my chest. No pun intended, lol. I actually do feel a little better. Thanks for listening.

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PUBLIC SPEAKING CAREER IN MY FUTURE?

Just thought I would write a quick post to put a new idea/life plan for my life out into the Universe with the instruction for it to actually Manifest. Twice within the past 36 hours, 2 people whose opinions I think very highly of, both told me that I should make a career out of Public Speaking. Both of them mentioned that I should
speak to Women. I have heard this many times from other people in the past 2 years. It is actually a dream of mine to become a highly paid public/motivational speaker, but at the same time, the thought of it scares the hell out of me.

For years, I have proclaimed to anyone that would listen that I have a fear of public speaking. Through the major corporations I have been blessed enough to work for (Disney, Gateway, Activision), I have taken many high dollar public speaking trainings. I also had an entire semester of Public Speaking 101 while
I was a student at The University of Kansas. I think I managed to get a B- in that class. It has been my experience that when I had to do prepared, written speeches, I would be gripped with the most gut-wrenching, debilitating fear. When I got up to deliver my speeches, my body and voice would be trembling so badly that I could barely get the words out. I would start sweating and could not make eye contact with the audience. It has always been such a horrible experience for me. I now know that this reaction is not a fear of speaking, but it is actually my fear of being judged. I find myself worrying about my hair or my weight or my outfit and the possibility that the audience will think I am “ugly”. Crazy I know!!

On the very Psycho flip side though, there have been many occasions where I have been at seminars with several hundred/thousand people and an opportunity to take the mike or go on stage and speak impromptu to the crowd presented itself and I have rocked it! In fact, I very deliberately seat myself at the end of an aisle, at the front of the seminar room just so I can guarantee myself a chance to get up in front of the crowd and be heard and seen. What the hell is that about?? I love being the center of attention in those situations where I can speak off the cuff and not have to prepare a talk. How is it possible to have a very strong desire to speak in front of large groups of people, either in person or via some sort of digital media, while fearing it at the same time?? I know I have a gift and I am in some way destined to share it.

What do I do with this? How can I fulfill what I do believe is part of my destiny to become a motivational speaker and find my platform? Hmmmmmm… Perhaps since this revelation is now “out there”, something totally amazing will Manifest

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HOW I MAKE MONEY ONLINE – THE JOY OF MAKING MONEY WHILE I SLEEP!

Hello Everyone! Summer is finally here and you all know what that means…Sheila Brown aka The Onyxtraveler is traveling again. Whoo Hoo! My summer travel season officially started on May 15th, 2010 when I left my home in Austin, Texas and headed West to Los Angeles for a month of fun. Actually, my motivation for coming to LA was to clean out my storage unit I obtained to hold my remaining possessions. These are my collections that I said I would never get rid of. Well, guess what, after a year of not thinking about any of those items, it’s time to purge. I’ve spent the past 4 weeks selling a good portion of my collectibles and also giving away a huge portion. I’ve so enjoyed myself here in Sunny Southern California, that I’ve decided to spend another 6 weeks here and leave the first week of August to head to Glacier Park, Montana for a few weeks of fun. Actually, I’ve decided to travel for the next 12 months straight. I’ve used my time here in LA to plan out my travels thru May 2011!!

This leads me to the purpose of writing this post. The one question that people ask me all the time (and if they don’t ask, they definitely want to) is “How in the world do you make money to travel & have your fun life if you don’t have a job????” I am a very private person, so I NEVER EVER EVER answer this question directly until now. The truth is, I do internet marketing. I use MANY different strategies to make money online, but I will only reveal one in this post. One very successful strategy that I employ is the creation of blogs that run “automatically” in many different niches. I discovered this strategy and most importantly, discovered my teacher, Mike Johnson, in February of 2010. I loved the idea of basically having hundreds of ATM’s aka websites out there making me money 24/7 once I set them up correctly. Trust me when I tell you that there is no better feeling in the world than to make money while you sleep!! As I was psycho busy traveling for my then client, I was only able to set up a handful of blogs, but they are a VERY profitable handful (I’ve chosen my niches very well). I’ve since gotten back to my original goal of setting up a very large number of them every quarter. Think about it, if you have one site out there that is generating $10 – $100 a day (and this is VERY attainable), imagine if you multiplied that by 100 sites, 200 sites!! Crazy right!! Imagine what it would feel like to make $3,000 a month on autopilot? Mike is now up in the $30k – $40k per month range after doing this for 18 months. That is of course, not to say you will have the same results, because you have to actually do the WORK to actually make money. Novel concept, I know.

I am sharing this information with you because my brilliant teacher, Mike Johnson, has re-opened access to the course that I purchased back in February that taught me, step-by-step, this profitable strategy. The version that I learned was his Auto Blog Blueprint 1.0 course. He closed access to the course back in early April for 2 reasons: 1. he wants to limit access to the information to be able to work directly with his students and 2. he decided to release a 2.0 version with even more POWERFUL, money making AutoBlog strategies. After waiting with baited breath for 2 months, I was given early access to version 2.0 and OMG…IT IS KILLER!! So much so, that one of the main motivators for me suddenly deciding to stay put in LA for an additional 6 weeks is so that I can use this time to implement his new, super tactics and reach my goal of having xxx # of sites up and running and financing my 12 months of travel! Man, this version was worth the wait and then some!!

Since you all follow my travels and I do keep getting the question, I decided to become an affiliate for Mike’s course and share this information with you. He launched Auto Blog Blueprint 2.0 today and is limiting access to only 1,200 new people. This is not a scarcity tactic. He is serious and he will shut it down once he reaches that number. He added 400 members last night in a pre-launch event, so space is limited. Currently, the price for Auto Blog Blueprint 2.0 is $97.00, but because I am one of his early users, I have been given a $20.00 discount coupon for you to use, so the cost will only be $77.00. He launched at 6:00pm CST tonight and the coupon is limited to the first 300 that purchase and will not be valid if that number has been reached. As of June 29th, 2010, it will be $147.00. This content in invaluable no matter what price you get in at, but why wait?? BUY IT NOW!! If you ever wanted to know how to make money online, this is THE course to get. I have never promoted an Internet Marketing course because so many of them are pie-in-the-sky B.S. I am sharing this one with you because I do use it and am making money with it. This is one of the main platforms in which I am building out in my total Internet Marketing strategy.

If you are interested in purchasing this course, and if you are smart, YOU WILL DO IT NOW, then CLICK THIS LINK NOW to purchase & input COUPON CODE: 947DE9483F or CLICK ON THE PICTURE BELOW. As I mentioned, I am an affiliate for this product and by purchasing thru MY LINK, I will be compensated. Your time really is limited, so do not miss out!

I want to hear about your successes when you implement what you learn. Make sure you Facebook me and keep me posted on your progress. I’ll be sharing mine once I start hitting some major financial milestones with this strategy at the end of 90 days! Go out there and PROSPER everyone!! Stop WISHING you could have the life of your dreams and now, actually do something to ACHIEVE IT!! I HAVE!! XOXO

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Weight Gain and Travel!!

Hey Everyone! I hope all is well. My new life here in Austin is still awesome after living here for 9 months. 9 months! Wow, has it really been that long? With my short attention span, I never do anything for 9 months, especially stay in one place, LOL. I guess that is a true testament as to how damn cool this city is to live in and more importantly, how happy and content I am with my life here. For those of you that have never visited Austin, you should definitely put it on your list. In my next post, I’m going to write about all the great things there are to do here & why it fits my personality so much.

One of the downfalls with living in such a great city and having to build a new life from scratch is the fact that I have to be very social and being social = lots of eating and drinking with new friends. Austin is a city that has amazing and eclectic restaurants and food choices. I’ve spent the past 9 months indulging in my love for pizza, cheeseburgers, onion rings, Tex Mex, wine, cosmos and beer! I’ve
gotten in a lil exercise now and then, but really, not so much. As a result, I’ve allowed myself to gain back half of the 53lbs I released in 08. Yes, I am now up 22lbs! I actually like my new body. There were times where I felt I was a bit too skinny before and I am actually at a happy medium. Since I am 5′10″, I am blessed to be able to carry my weight proportionately. That being said, my hips, bootie and
tummy are bigger than I want them to be, so I am now incredibly focused on getting back down to a more manageable size. Not a stick, but definitely not too thick. I also want to be lean and muscular for the first time ever so I am incorporating in exercise which I did not do in 08.

One major hurdle that I have had to overcome in my quest for a new body is the fact that I am now officially a Road Warrior. I think of myself as a female George Clooney in ‘Up in the Air’ as I am on an airplane every Monday, jetting off to a new city to do work for my client and I do not come home until Thursday or Friday night. I spend a huge majority of my days driving hundreds of miles in my rental
car and the only food available is fast food. It had become my routine to go to McDonald’s for breakfast (sausage biscuit, hash brown & coffee), McDonald’s again for lunch (double cheese burger, large fries and large HiC orange drink) and some random fast food for dinner. Everyday of the freaking week!! I just got a nutrition chart from McDonald’s and the breakfast I was consuming was approx 600 calories, lunch was 1300 calories and lord knows what dinner was. I believe it takes 1800 calories to gain a pound, so at the rate I was going, I was gaining several pounds a week. These habits are the exact habits I allowed myself to follow prior to 2008 and it led to me getting to my all time highest weight of 215, size 16-18. Not good!! Since I have moved to Austin, I have gone from a size 10 to a size 12-14. I decided that this needed to stop now!

Two weeks ago, while driving across the state of New York on business, I prayed and meditated about my body and what I ultimately wanted my goal to be. One of the mistakes I made when I released 53lbs effortlessly in 5 months in 2008 was that my only goal was to get to 150lbs. Well, I reached that goal (152 actually), but then now what?? I managed to maintain the new weight for one year, even while traveling in Australia due to the fact that I was walking miles everyday exploring and I made the choice to not gain weight. In moving to Austin, I 100% gave myself permission to eat what I wanted to and to release myself from the “pressure” of monitoring my weight. This time, in my goal setting, it is not about hitting a certain number on the scales. I am now focused on dropping my body fat percentage, building muscle (I didn’t exercise in 08), majorly leaning out and working toward a much bigger lifelong personal goal that I won’t name here. It’s huge and daunting and I’m still nervous about it, but I’ll share if/when certain opportunities are created.

I’ve managed to put together what I am labeling as ‘The Road Warrior Diet’. I’ve taken all of my knowledge I have acquired from years of studying fitness mags & working with a doctor in 08 and created my own eating plan. I’ve made the decision to no longer make the choice to:
drink alcohol, (except for 1 glass of red wine once a week), eat fried foods, eat sugar or anything white (flour, bread), processed foods, sodas and unhealthy foods. Instead, I’m following the common sense plan of eating more vegetables, grilled chicken, turkey, minimal red meat, salads, drink lots of water, minimal bread (bread is my ultimate weakness), lots of fruit, breakfast daily, protein shakes, etc… While on the road, I have studied the nutrition charts of all of the fast food restaurants I frequent and I have been able to find very low calorie, healthy choices. At Taco Bell, their DriveThru Diet Fresco soft tacos have 150 calories. At McDonald’s, the choices will be the grilled chicken wrap, the Caesar salad with grilled chicken or their BLT salad with grilled chicken w/newmans low fat balsamic vinaigrette dressing. These 3 choices have 300 calories. Dinners on the road will consist of me finding full service grocery stores (whole foods, etc) and making healthy choices. If I am in a backwoods town (as I was in Wisconsin this week where I had to go to 3 stores to find non fried food!), I will go to KFC and order their grilled chicken and side salad – no biscuit- 450 calories. There are healthy choices while on the road, but is hard as hell to find them and I have to be extremely planful and diligent. I have found that eating the same foods everyday works for me as I am so picky, so it has been easy knowing what my limited choices are. I am targeting 3 main meals a day w/no more than 500 calories each and 2-3 small meals at no more than 200 calories. Small meals would be piece of fruit and 10 almonds or a protein shake.

I am elated to report that I started this new way of eating on Monday the 4th of April during my week long trip to Wisconsin. After one focused and determined week, I made healthy choices 98% of the time (I slipped twice and got cappuccinos & popcorn) and I released 2.5lbs!!! When I got home on Saturday, I went to the store and filled my fridge with healthy foods that I have been eating all weekend. I’ve also exercised 3 times this week. Working on amping that up to 6 days a week. P90x is a bad motha fuc*a ya’ll!!! I’ll be SheRa when I finish 90 days of that mess!!! Dayum!!

So anyway, I truly want to prove that there are no excuses when you put your mind to something and make a definitive decision. Being a road warrior is not an excuse to get fat. Living in a city with amazing restaurants is not an excuse to get fat. I’ll do a progress update every month. I would like to hit my 100% goal by the end of the summer.

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Montreal Canada – I love Canada!

Hello Everyone. I believe this is my first official post of the new year. Damn! Sorry ya’ll. Not much has been going on except for me working hard for my client. They send me out of town every week to a new city to do consulting projects, so the traveling has been a bit out of control. Combine that with the fact that I am still exploring and totally loving my new home city, Austin Texas, and it adds up to Sheila ignoring my blog.

I am truly blessed to have manifested a consulting client that pays me to travel & do really cool work for them. In the past 6 months, I have been sent to Los Angeles, Kansas City, Saint Louis, Phoenix, Baltimore, Boston, Atlanta, Savannah, New York, Vermont, Denver, Houston, Nashville & Wisconsin. In the midst of all of this business travel, I have had the opportunity to sneak in a few vacations. Ya’ll know how I roll! LOL I went home to Kansas City for my birthday, McAllen, Texas for Thanksgiving and Christmas, Dallas to chill, Park City, Utah for the Sundance Film Festival and I just returned from Montreal Canada. Montreal rocked and during my amazing time there, I was inspired to start blogging again. Please allow me to fill you in on this amazing city.

My client sent me to Burlington, Vermont last week to work and in looking at the map, I discovered that Montreal was very close to VT. I determined that if I worked my ass off to complete my consulting work, I could free up at least 24 hours to drive 1 1/2 hours to Montreal and explore the city. I finished up my work Thursday evening around 6pm and hit the road North. After a quick stop at customs for the obligatory “why are you going to Canada” questions, I was off. I arrived into Montreal around 8pm. Since I live in hotels Monday – Friday, I decided to book a hostel to stay in. I’m going to write a separate post about the joys of staying in hostels that I hope you all enjoy. After checking ratings on www.hostelworld.com…, I decided to book space in a 12 bed room for $20.00 a night at The Le Jazz Hostel Saint Denis in the Latin Quarter area of Montreal. As I knew absolutely nothing about Montreal, I chose this hostel based on previous ratings from other guests and also because staying in an area called The Latin Quarter had to have some flavor and energy right?

I definitely made the right choice in Hostels. I was in the heart of a very vibrant and happening part of town. Tons of restaurants, bars, people in the streets and partying. Upon getting checked in and entering my room, I met one of my roommates Mili. He was a mega cool Asian dude that had just moved to Montreal from Vancouver. As I was hungry as hell, I asked him if he wanted to join me for dinner and we headed off to find a great restaurant. We ended up at a Mexican restaurant called Three Amigos and got our grub on! Mili had never had a margarita before, so I suggested he get the Cadillac Margarita, which was their strongest one. He was a little dude and he was drunk as hell when he finished it. Hilarious! After dinner, we walked back to the hostel and I crashed.

Whenever I am faced with the dilemma of being of being in a totally cool city with a very limited amount of time to explore, I follow a strategy that has never failed me. I make my way to the main Tourism office and book one of those red double decker bus, hop-on-hop-off tours. This works so well because it allow you to sit on the bus and let the tour guide tell you all about the city and sights while you take notes of the 3-4 things you want to go back and revisit. As it was the winter season, they did not have the hop-on-hop-off tours, so I booked a 3 hour bus tour that drove us all over the city with an amazing guide. During this tour, I learned some of the most fascinating facts about this city regarding its history, culture and lay of the land and completely fell in love with Montreal even though it was 20
freaking degrees and ya’ll know Mama does not do cold weather!!! LOL

Highlights: Montreal is a city in the Providence of Quebec. Because of the cold weather, Montreal has an underground city that runs for 33 kilometers. It is a series of tunnels mainly under the downtown that contains over 1,100 shops and restaurants. It connects buildings and also houses its subway system. It allows people to maneuver around when the temperature is below zero degrees. It was amazing! I also got to explore Old Town Montreal which is comprised of buildings built at the turn of the century. It is a popular, lively area for tourism with shops, restaurants and outdoor venues all along the water. We also hit Chinatown, the Latin Quarter, Notre Dame, the Olympic village and buildings, the Botanical gardens, museums, parks, etc… Montreal is definitely a summer city with MAJOR festivals occurring every week. It is a city that is built on tourism and truly loves tourists to visit. I felt incredibly welcome from every person I encountered. Montreal is a French speaking city and unlike snobby Paris, a huge majority of the citizens are also English speakers. Most of the signage was in both French and English. I loved hearing the beautiful French language being spoken, while being able maneuver around because they spoke English as well.

If Montreal is not on your list of cities to visit, please do yourself a favor and put it on there!! I am seriously toying with the idea of traveling around Quebec this summer as it is a part of Canada that I want to learn more about and fully experience as a result of being in Montreal. In my 28 hours there, I was able to walk over 5 miles exploring the city both above ground and underground, tour the entire city by bus, have awesome meals, meet incredibly warm people, go to a Blues club, stay in a great hostel and discover a new favorite city. Thanks Montreal. I cannot wait to return!

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