Donna Freedman - Surviving and Thriving

How to lose weight.

December 30, 2015December 29, 2015 by Donna Freedman

“Lose weight” and/or “eat better” will appear on many a New Year’s resolution list — just as they did last year, and will again next year. Such plans often gang agley for a number of reasons.

We aren’t really invested in them. We miss our old comfort foods. We don’t know how to adjust the rest of our lives to support a new way of being in the world.

That’s why I’m giving away a Kindle copy of Victoria Hay’s “30 Pounds, 4 Months: How to Eat Well and Lose Weight – Painlessly.”

Her approach is fairly simple: Dieting isn’t something you do. It’s something you are.

“You change your way of looking at food, work light exercise – nothing extreme! – into your daily habits, and learn to eat better food, not necessarily less food,” says Hay, a former journalist and professor and current owner of The Copyeditor’s Desk writing and publishing service.

Desperately seeking solstice.

December 21, 2015December 21, 2015 by Donna Freedman

Seasonal affective disorder has hit hard this year. Despite the aptly named S.A.D. light I’ve been eyebrow-deep in doldrums.

Having battled depression and anxiety in the past I can say the past weeks feel both familiar and different.

The glumness is just as I recall it: a cement straitjacket that impedes my ability to move, let alone achieve much. What’s new, and worrisome, is that I’m having a devil of a time talking myself down from it.

In years past I got through the season – heck, through my life – thanks to the sheer number of Things That Must Be Done. Should those things not have gotten done I would have been letting someone down: my child, my then-husband, my employer, my friends.

Or I’d do what I privately think of as a Full Pollyanna and create my own personal glad game. Just look at what I’ve got going for me: a daughter I love, health (mostly), family, friends, a job I love (mostly), a roof over my head, plenty to eat, etc. etc.

Generally that worked, either because it made me realize how lucky I was or because it embarrassed me off the self-pity path. Hasn’t worked lately, even though I can add astounding midlife love to the plus side of the ledger.

In fact, it’s made me feel worse. To be clear: I’m fully aware of how blessed I am. It’s just that sometimes none of those blessings can get through the fog. As Sinclair Lewis put it, “It has not yet been recorded that any human being has gained a very large or permanent contentment from meditation upon the fact that he is better off than others.”

The perils of holiday driving.

December 17, 2015 by Donna Freedman

Finishing your holiday buying in person? Get ready for warfare on wheels – and not just as regards scoping for prime parking spots.

Combat shopping can be murder on your ride. Whether you leave it in a garage, on the street or in a mall parking lot, you’re at risk of being tagged by a clueless driver and/or having your purchases stolen before you can even get them home to be wrapped.

While some consumers prefer to shop entirely online nearly six in 10 will do at least some brick-and-mortar visits, according to the National Retail Federation. Excited, distracted or stressed-out shoppers may dent your fender or scrape some paint on the way into or out of a parking space.

The honest ones will leave contact information on your windshield. The others just keep driving, which is not only bad manners but could also be a hit and run, legally speaking. Most states don’t define this as taking place on roads or highways, and many include parking-lot incidents in the hit-and-run definition.

One of my recent NerdWallet articles can help.

12 ways to spend less on stocking stuffers.

January 23, 2016December 14, 2015 by Donna Freedman

Just got a press release from a company suggesting “fun and affordable” stocking stuffers. What got my attention was how it defines “affordable”: items under $50.

Um…no. I don’t spend $50 altogether on the stuffers for five stockings. In fact, I generally don’t spend anything at all (more on that in a minute).

On what non-frugal planet is “under $50” considered a low price for a small item? And when did stocking stuffers graduate from candy canes and stickers to things like $50 iTunes cards, Sharper Image six-port USB charging hubs ($29.98) and $30 bottles of perfume?

Little things mean a lot, but they shouldn’t have to cost a lot. Thus I refuse to pay a lot. Here are some ways to save.

Up for grabs: Alaska art jewelry.

December 11, 2015 by Donna Freedman

This week’s giveaway achieves two of my favorite goals: supporting the local economy and helping readers finish up their holiday shopping.

I only wish that my meh-photography did justice to the two pendants up for grabs this week. They’re quite striking and hand cut- and hammered by my friend Linda B.

She started by cutting two disks of aluminum: one a deep maroon and the other a vibrant violet. Onto each she riveted a five-armed, gear-like circle that makes the pendants look, at first glance, like sheriffs’ badges or combat medals.

The colors below seem richer, possibly because you’re seeing them in concentrated glimpses. The overlays give a suggestion of motion that I like to think of as, “Hey — get your life in gear and start moving!”

Know anyone who needs an accessory with a built-in kick in the pants? Or maybe you need it yourself.

The temporary potentate.

December 9, 2015 by Donna Freedman

This morning I indulged my inner frugal sybarite with a hot, hot soak. Unlike the man in the song below, I don’t limit baths to the end of a tiring day. Sometimes a good dunk is the right solution for mid-morning writer’s block or midday slump.

I pop an already-cold Diet Coke into the freezer for 15 minutes to create little fizzy icebergs or fix myself a glass of iced tea. Then I lower myself into water that’s as hot as I can stand.

Steam floats in the air, my toes crinkle and the cold drink provides a shivery shock, the perfect foil to the boil of the tub. As soon as the water cools even a little I hit the hot-water tap again.

Most of the time I rush from the shower to the day’s chores, or stumble from the shower to the bed. Tub ablutions are relatively rare, which makes them more luxurious.

They’re great attitude adjustments, too, as Flanders and Swann can attest:

I don’t sing in the tub, but I do talk. Yes, really.

Some questions, some answers.

December 1, 2015 by Donna Freedman

A while back I put up a post called “Ask me (almost) anything,” in which I said I’d answer reader questions. Not all of them, mind you, but some of them.

I meant it, too. But you’ll notice I never said how soon I’d do it.

Now, three months later, I’m taking on three queries for starters. They’re fairly softball-ish questions, but I’m pretty tuckered out right now as I wind down the contracting gig.

Two million and counting.

July 20, 2017November 29, 2015 by Donna Freedman

When I started Surviving and Thriving back in 2010 my life was very, very different. I’d recently gotten a university degree (at age 52 – better late than really late) and was making a living as a full-time writer for MSN Money plus an every-other-week staff writer at Get Rich Slowly. I freelanced for other publications as well, and traveled a lot.

Now I live in Anchorage, Alaska with the love of my life and am back to freelancing full-time because MSN Money fired all its writers on the same day back in autumn 2013.

Earlier this year I started an online course called Write A Blog People Will Read* and also hung out my shingle as a writing coach.

Tired? You bet.

Grateful? Indescribably so.

What’s your biggest money fear?

November 19, 2015 by Donna Freedman

A whole lot of U.S. residents are scared of outliving their money. According to the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, 57 percent of clients called it their biggest money fear.

That doesn’t surprise me. Although nearly 8 in 10 full-time workers have some money for retirement, 28 percent of them report that the total value of household savings and investments is less than $1,000 (not including primary residence and defined benefit plans).

Certainly I’ve had my own share of bag-lady dreams, so this topic really resonated when I researched it for a NerdWallet article called “7 steps to deal with our No. 1 money fear.”

Funding a retirement plan can seem daunting, but it’s not something you can put off. Even if your future is decades away, your new best friend compound interest is here right now.

The best cold weather perfume.

November 17, 2015 by Donna Freedman

We’re in a subzero cold snap that should last at least a few more days. The temperature was eight below when I got up and managed to make it only four degrees above the zero-mark before shivering its way back down the thermometer.

But I don’t care (much), because the house smells so good.

After DF had his lunch he filled the five-quart West Bend slow cooker with the contents of the boiling bag, some vegetable cooking water from the freezer and the water left from last night’s boiled potatoes.

(That last included little bits of spud because I got distracted and let them boil perhaps a bit too long.)

This time around the boiling bag contained carrot tops, apple cores, the tough ends of romaine leaves, onion skins, potato peelings and a handful of very small, very green tomatoes from the greenhouse project. Although all of the bigger tomatoes and some of the smaller ones eventually turned red after we brought them indoors, the little ones were stubbornly bright-green and beginning to soften. Thus we sacrificed them to the soup and are already dreaming of next spring.