Take the good out of the bad

I love to take advice from people. In fact, I probably ask too many people about a decision before I make it, a habit I'm trying to break just to make things go quicker. But I find that so many times I get a different idea or a different perspective than I originally thought of, which allows me to tweak my decision for the best. Great results are easier to come by when I crowd source my thought processes.

Sometimes however advice can be packaged in rude, mean, and sometimes just plain offensive ways. I'm not talking about your friend who can't seem to keep themselves from smirking when you try on new clothes. I'm talking about one of the talking heads on TV who you just can't stand because everything the say just pisses you off. Or perhaps a blogger who seems to come across a little...cocky. Or maybe a relative who just grinds your gears.

Whatever the situation, it's important to not lose sight of the message, to not throw out the baby with the bath water (I still cringe at this image). Just because the messenger annoys you, doesn't mean that the message is lost. That commentator on the news may sound like an idiot, but that doesn't change some of the facts that he presented. That blogger may sound full of himself, but it probably stems from some previous successes. That relative may get under your skin, but that doesn't mean that they're wrong.

Every once in a while I just listen to someone who I can't stand, just to gain some new information from the experience. It might be a new take on life, or perhaps a better understanding of the world, or maybe just a better understanding of how not to try to get a message across (If I have to force myself to listen, better believe a lot of people aren't going to go through the trouble). Whatever it is, I try to take something, anything of value from a conversation/interaction. Just because they are very rude, doesn't mean that they have absolutely nothing of value to say.

So the next time you have a conversation with someone you kind of hate, see if you can take some interesting fact from the conversation. Take the good out of the bad.

Twitter Feed is Live

Title says it all. I've started a twitter account, @LifeFreshOut. New posts will be pushed there, links to interesting stories, as well as little bits of whatever comes to mind during the day. You can also get updates via RSS or email by subscribing to my feed. Links to all the services are in the sidebar. Follow me and thanks for reading.

Ownership of things

William Morris. He was on to something.

 “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.”

-William Morris

This sums up my life right now. I'm in the process of moving to a new apartment, and packing is probably the most dismal part of everything. Actually moving boxes sucks, but it's over in a matter of hours. Unpacking is a lot of fun to me, since I get to decide what goes where and a change in scenery is usually fun. But packing...I hate packing.

So currently I have boxes and bags strewn around my apartment, half filled with various items as I decide on what I want to keep and what I want to get rid of. The basis of my decisions is strictly on the above quote.

It's amazing what people are able to accumulate when they aren't particular about what comes into their lives. I've been interested in keeping my spending low, so I've bought few items recently, but still things begin to enter into my life.

There are a number of movements out there to limit the amount of things people own. Voluntary programs to encourage reduced consumerism and mindfulness of the ownership of things.

100 things - People who decide they want to own 100 items or less. This includes everything, including clothing, toothbrushes, electronics, you get the picture. Leo at zenhabits wrote about his thoughts on the matter here.

Tiny Homes - People who decide they want to do an extreme downsize and buy homes starting at just under 100 sq ft. Very Tiny. One company, Tumbleweed Tiny House Company sells various designs here. 

While I'm interested in reading about some of these experiments, it's really not something I'm interested in doing myself.

I like my stuff. Having space to walk around is nice. Being surrounded by pieces of art and decoration that I've found to be beautiful is a great feeling after a long day at work. Having specialized tools in the kitchen for cooking a variety of meals is extremely useful.

But there's such a thing as too much, and I'm often on the lookout for ways of reducing how much stuff I own. I've moved every year for the past 7 years, so I'm used to keeping everything portable. (Here's a post I wrote about picking out furniture from IKEA that will last through various moves.)

So currently, I'm going through pretty much everything I own, and deciding if it's still relevant to my life, if I still find it useful for beautiful. 

How do you feel about stuff? Do you like being surrounded by mementos of life, or do you prefer to keep things simple and limit the amount of stuff you have?

Customer Service Experiences

I've recently had a few positive customer service experiences and I thought I'd share one of them to encourage everyone to take advantage of what we pay for when we buy products. It's in the best interest of these companies to take care of their customers, because then they write articles like this.

My experience at Bed Bath & Beyond

So many kitchen gadgets. Photo Credit: oahumom.com

For those of you who aren't familiar with the chain, Bed Bath & Beyond is one of those stores that pretty much sells anything your average person would need in the kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, and other areas of the home. Think pots and pans, laundry baskets, curtains, bedding, and the like. They lure me in to the kitchen section to peruse the shelves on a fairly regular basis. For a while it was my weak spot for shopping sprees. Now, I just go to see what might fit into my budget in the future.

One day in particular a few weeks ago, I was wandering the aisles willing myself not to buy anything when I came across a special cleaner for pans. Noting that some of my pans weren't quite as non-stick as they once were, and this cleaner was placed right next to the set of pans I use, I decided I was going to go ahead and spend the $12. I checked amazon.com before I bought to see the reviews (I do that for pretty much anything I decide to buy on the spot) and it seemed to have great results. I got home, took a look at the canister and noticed that it said it was not for use on non-stick cookware. Thinking that this was a warning for other cookware, since in the store the cleaner was placed right next to the set of pans I use, I ignored it. And proceeded to ruin my two pans.

Well that sucked. Old me would have tossed the pans, went out and bit the bullet and gotten new ones, and chalked that one up to the game. New me decided to go back to BB&B take some pictures of the display as evidence and then send an email to the BB&B stating my problem, advising them to change the display, and seeing what they could do about it making me a happy camper. I was prepared to do battle against 'big corporation'.

Within 24 hours, I received a response from the store manager asking to talk. I called him the next day and he offered to replace my pans immediately, saying he was sorry for my trouble. So I went to the store, had my pans swapped and they even offered to refund my money on the cleaner. I was in and out in under 7 minutes. Awesome experience. As a thank you I sent a letter to the level above the store managers to tell them how the store manager had helped me out.

If you ever feel like you aren't completely satisfied with what you buy, most good stores are willing to talk to you about it and come up with a solution. I make it a point to shop at these stores because I know I won't have a hassle if anything goes wrong. But please, don't take advantage of these policies like I've heard some people do, buying a new product to replace the old one and then sticking the old one in the box to return it. That's pretty grimey.

Have you had any positive or negative customer service experiences recently?

Getting your credit report, understanding it, and fixing any problems

Click here to learn about what credit reports are and why they are important.

Now that you know what a credit report is and why it's important, let's take a look at how to find out what your credit report says and what you can do to fix it.

First up: getting a free credit report. Everyone is allowed one copy of their credit report free from each of the three main bureaus each year. So that's a total of three free credit reports each year. Most people suggest utilizing this perk by checking your credit report once every 4 months, rotating between each of the bureaus. I often forget to check mine, but now that I’m writing about it, better believe I’m checking them right now.

The official place to go is www.annualcreditreport.com, which will link you to each of the bureaus, and will point out if you've already checked in with that particular bureau this year for your free report. I always forget which ones I've already checked, so this is helpful.

Additionally, you can get a copy of your report if you are denied a credit card or loan due to something a company rejecting you based on information from the report. Usually if you receive a rejection letter, it will include information on how to see the particular report they looked at.

Checking your credit report is critical as there can be any number of mistakes present that will prevent you from getting a loan. Even worse, these mistakes may not prevent you from getting a loan, and instead qualify you for crappy interest rates, and you'll never know that an incorrect entry is costing you thousands.

Credit reports are pretty easy to understand. They include some basic information, which includes your birth year, your current and previous addresses, and current and previous employers. This is useful information, but the real good stuff is the information regarding your credit history. This part of the report lists all of the issuers of credit, how much you owe them, recent balances, total balances, and a slew of other information. This is the information you want to ensure is correct. This is what most companies are going to look at to see if you are handling your credit responsibly.

If you find an error, you have to contact that particular bureau directly and ask them to fix anything. It might take a little while, but it's definitely worth it. Your credit score is based on this information, so make sure it's correct.

While you can get a free copy of your credit reports, it's not so easy to do the same with your credit score. Companies love to charge people to view this, and most will sign you up for a credit monitoring service, which may or may not be necessary. I'm still looking for the best website to get a trial subscription to view my score and then cancel the subscription before any fees are collected. I'll write about whatever I find when I try out a few of these places.

The say time heals all wounds, and it's pretty much the same for your credit report. Pretty much anything that you've done prior to 7 years ago will fall off of your report and become irrelevant. Bankruptcy remains on your report for 10 years, and severely limits your ability to acquire new credit, but even that too will eventually fall off. Those are long time limits, but the good news is that after 2 years, most problems have less of an effect on your credit score. So if you start paying bills on time, stop opening new credit cards, and start to manage debt responsibly, within 2 years you will be well on your way to becoming an upstanding credit citizen.

There is a lot of information about credit reports, specifically how much each part counts, i.e. paying on time, outstanding debt, and debt to credit limit ratios, so if you are curious take a look around online. If there are requests, maybe I’ll write a bit more about the specifics, but for right now this is pretty much the basic information.

Use your credit wisely.