Work and Play with Nancy Ray

A few years ago, I came up with a core purpose statement for my work and this podcast, and that is: Practical tools for an integrated life. That is what I'm after. I want my teachings, my content, everything that I give to you or anyone who's listening to be very practica, and I want them to be implemented into an integrated life. But first you have to answer the question: What is an integrated life? What does that even mean? Well, the word integrate means to combine one thing with another so that they become a whole. Another definition of integrated is with various parts or aspects linked or coordinated. Living an integrated life means combining your faith life, your home life, and your work life so that they become linked or coordinated, complimenting each other beautifully and ultimately providing the train tracks for a healthy soul and a fulfilling life. And I'm gonna challenge you today, in your faith and your home and in your work—to live an integrated life. Resources from this episode: An Integrated Life Course The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!) The Work & Play Patreon

From gift guides to Instagram Ads, to those Amazon kids toy magazines, to Black Friday deals—everyone right now is telling us that we should be buying more, that we should have more, that we should be dressing in cuter clothes and decorating more perfectly. And today, I just want to be a voice that says: You don't. You don't! You don't have to buy all of those things. You don't have to do more. The good stuff, the really good stuff of this holiday season, is found in the quiet, grateful moments. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/174. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!) The Work & Play Patreon The Contentment Challenge Episode 172 - My Christmas Gameplan Song of the Stars, by Sally Lloyd Jones An Angel Story, by Max Lucado Episode 033 - Our Favorite Thanksgiving Tradition Golden Coil Planners The Giving Manger Episode 171 - Let Your Yes Be Yes Every Moment Holy, by Douglas Kaine McKelvey An Integrated Life Course My Christmas "Be Merry" Playlist

God created the world in six days, and on the seventh day He completely rested and enjoyed his work. He created this cadence for all of us to work six days and to rest one, and then repeat. We have a hard time doing this, don't we? I do. It's hard. It's not surprising why of all the 10 Commandments, this one was the longest with the most emphasis in the Bible. He designed us to do life this way. And when we do, life is refreshing and when we don't, it's exhausting. So today, I am gonna share with you simply how we practice the Sabbath and hopefully give you some practical things that you can do, too. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/173. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!) The Work & Play Patreon An Integrated Life The Gospel of Mark: Sabbath sermon

It is that time of the year where we are starting to think all about the holidays. And in my opinion, you can't start planning too early for Christmas. So, today I am telling you all about my Christmas gameplan, which is simply the planning that goes in to making Christmas a wonderful, peaceful time of year—because let's face it, it can be very stressful and very hectic if you don't thoughtfully plan ahead. So I'm just gonna share with you my approach and my strategy, and hopefully it will encourage you and bless you to plan a little more ahead and also enjoy your holidays a little bit more. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/172. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!) An Integrated Life Welcome Home, by MyQuillyn Smith The Work & Play Patreon Christmas Budget Spreadsheet Affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!

"Priorities are what we do, everything else is just talk." I love that phrase. My husband works for an organization called C12, and they say that all the time, and it just re-centers you and re-grounds you on the fact that what we do matters. It's not what we say, it's what we do. I had a hard time coming up with the title of this episode and I landed on "Let Your Yes Be Yes," because that's the biblical truth I just kept coming back to, but I also thought about naming it "Saying vs. Doing" or "Teaching vs. Modeling." The heart of what I want to talk about today is simply the idea that we can say a lot and we can have a lot of great ideas, but really our lives come down to what we do. My encouragement to you today is simply to let your yes be yes. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/171. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!) The Work & Play Patreon An Integrated Life Em for Marvelous blog post about leisure The Maid, by Nita Prose Affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!

Someone once told me that we are most like God when we are creating. He is after all the creator of everything, and we are after all made in his image. Today's episode has me feeling, I don't know, a bit weepy, inspired, ultimately, grateful. Fair warning: might cry by the end of this. I don't know, we'll see. But this content today was inspired by a children's book that left me in tears and the simple truth that I've been kind of mulling over that we were created to create. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/170. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist The Work & Play Patreon Called to Create, by Jordan Raynor Steal Like an Artist, by Austin Kleon Redeeming Your Time, by Jordan Raynor The Creator in You, by Jordan Raynor Art For Kids Hub Affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!

Today I'm talking with my dear friend Nicole Jacobsmeyer, who is a fellow mama of four. She is an author and a kindred spirit. Fun little backstory— she and I met when we went to Great Wolf Lodge and she had three kids and I had three kids and we experienced it together and then connected on Instagram, then connected on Marco Polo, and we have stayed in touch and has been so sweet to find out how connected we are and like-minded we are in so many areas of our lives! Nicole loves Jesus and she has a passion for helping women walk in victory, joy, and faith in the face of trials, sorrow and suffering. Her story is unbelievable. Her first book, Take Back Your Joy, just came out and if you open the first two pages of the book, you'll read my endorsement, which is so much fun! I hope you enjoy our heartfelt conversation today. Resources from this episode: Take Back your Joy, by Nicole Jacobsmeyer Nancy Ray Book Club Affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!

Have you ever heard of having theme days? It's this idea that you choose different themes to focus on for different days and it helps you batch things or just simply not switch back and forth mentally between tasks so much. I have found them very helpful and I wanted to share a few different ways to approach creating your own theme days throughout your week, or even breaking them down into theme hours, to maximize productivity and enjoyment—AKA maximizing your work and your play. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/168. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Weekly Checklist The Work & Play Patreon Episode 73: Design Your Rhythm of Work, The Next Right Thing Podcast

Today, I had the absolute privilege of talking to my friend Graham Cochrane. He is the author of How To Get Paid For What You Know, and we talk all about his book! I've read the whole thing cover to cover and it's so good. If I could describe it in any way, it would be practical and helpful. You know, sometimes you read business books and you think, "Oh, that's great, but that doesn't really apply to me." It's not that way with his book. He really makes you feel like you can do this—it's awesome. So, yeah, he's an author. He's also a business coach to over 3,000 premium customers worldwide. He founded the recording revolution, a seven figure online music business in 2009, and now, he hosts over 80,000 monthly followers on his podcast, YouTube, and blog, talking about business mindset, productivity, psychology. He's a believer; he's a brother; he's a friend. I just really have so much respect for Graham. I'm so grateful for him. And even though he's been featured in things like Business Insider and Yahoo and Huffington post and CNBC, he's so humble and he's so real. And I'm so grateful for his voice in this industry. I know you're going to enjoy our conversation today and I can't wait for you to listen in! For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/167. Resources from this episode: How to Get Paid For What You Know, by Graham Cochrane Nancy Ray Book Club 158 - Raising Daughters with Shay Cochrane, Part I 159 - Raising Daughters with Shay Cochrane, Part II Graham's website The Graham Cochrane Show The Go-Giver, by Bob Burg and John David Mann Start, by Jon Acuff Invitation To Solitude And Silence by Ruth Haley Barton Vuori Sunday Performance Joggers Graham's Free Class Some affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!

Listen, this episode is so good. I say that because I get to sit down and talk with three of my good friends, women who I adore and admire, who run businesses, who are moms. They are so special to me, and you get to hear the inside scoop about their lives and their businesses, but all throughout the conversations, we're going to be talking about this thing called The Blueprint Model. And I first want to tell you what that is before you listen in, because otherwise you're going to be really confused. So The Blueprint Model is a course that was created by Shanna—who is one of the ladies you're going to be hearing from today—and it's all about the numbers behind your business. But more than that, it's about creating a business that suits your life. Now, Shanna is a numbers girl, and she helps people. She helps a lot of creatives get the hang of their money, like the money side of business. And she is teaching a free class in two days and I want you to mark this down in your calendar because it's going to be so good. It's on Thursday, the 18th, I believe at 1pm—you can find out all the details at nancyray.com/blueprint, but the name of the class is The Art of Six Figures: Join me live where I'll teach you exactly how to define what is enough in your business and how to align your business goals with your big dreams and life values. Okay. That is Shanna's class, not my class. She's gonna be teaching it, but it's so good. I'm going to be there. It's so good. Okay. So the blueprint model, which she's going to be explaining in that class is something that I have taken a small group of women through already once this year. I coached them through it and we did The Blueprint Model together and we learned so much and applied it to all of our very different businesses. And guess what? The doors are opening to The Blueprint Model again in just a few days. And it's only going to be open until August 25th and after that, the doors are going to close. So I just encourage you to check it out. If you think that these conversations resonate with you, just go check it out, go to nancyray.com/blueprint to see if it's a good fit for you. And if it's not, that is totally great! I know you're still going to get a lot of value from these conversations today because they just get you thinking about what's important versus vanity metrics and the things that we *think* are important. So I know you're going to enjoy it. Make sure you had to nancyray.com/blueprint to register for Shanna's free class or in a few days, it'll turn into the page where you can learn all about The Blueprint Model. Now, two more quick things, before we jump into these conversations, you might be wondering, okay, why is Nancy talking about this other girl's course so much? I wonder if she's an affiliate. The answer is yes, I am an affiliate because I'm invested in this course. So, whoever signs up for the course through nancyray.com/blueprint I'm actually going to be group coaching you through the course, and I'll be talking with you the entire time as we go through it together. I love the accountability and I love this course. So I am a proud affiliate of The Blueprint Model. Second thing is, I wish I could give these wonderful long intros to of these ladies, but I'm going to just keep it short and sweet and let you know that I trust these ladies. I love them. I love their businesses and I'm so grateful. So you're going to hear from Shanna first, she created The Blueprint Model, and I think your mind is just going to be blown with her wisdom. I'm also gonna leave a link in the show notes to my last episode with Shanna, which is referenced several times in this episode. And then you're going to hear from my friend, Kayse, she runs an online business that really equips women and moms. And she's going to tell you all about her business. It's awesome. It's Anchored Women. Then the third lady I'll be interviewing today is Kait. And she is just a kindred spirit; I love Kait. She creates the Curious Year Calendar, which my kids are total fans of. We have one hanging in our kitchen and we look at it every day. So I just love these ladies. I love the work that they do, and I'm thrilled for you to hear from each of them today. For the full show notes, head to nancyray.com/podcast/166. Resources from this episode: The Work & Play Patreon Shanna's Free Workshop Episode 146 - Life & Work Without Social Media With Shanna Skidmore Anchored Women website Free Class: Quiet the Running To-Do List in Your Head! A Little Something Goods website The Curious Year Calendar (USE CODE: WORKANDPLAY) Affiliate links have been used in this post! I do receive a commission when you choose to purchase through these links, and that helps me keep this podcast up and running—I truly appreciate when you choose to use them!