updates

blog name change and other tomfoolery

Amanda B.2 Comments

Hey team—I wanted to publish a quick update to let you know my blog name has changed from “someone else’s life” to “burst of intention.” I’ve been searching for the right blog name for a couple of weeks, and “burst of intention” feels right, considering this is a blog intended to help us live purposeful, intentional lives.

I also now own the domain, which means burstofintention.com will bring you (and all your friends!) directly to this site. It’s probably the best $35 I’ve ever spent.

We’ll get back to our regularly scheduled programming on Saturday, when I’ll recap a massive declutter marathon I completed with my sister last weekend (with pictures to prove it). I’ll also give some tips on how to declutter without wanting to cry, throw up, or scream profanities while shaking your fist at the sky.

In the meantime, feel free to check out my Instagram account for travel inspiration and gratuitous pictures of my cockatiel, Jasper. He’s pretty cute.

jasper-the-cockatiel

finance · minimalism

opportunity cost: everything comes at a price

Amanda B.2 Comments

A few weeks ago, I spent an entire weekend cleaning.

From Saturday morning to Sunday night, I waged war against the dust bunnies in my bedroom—vacuuming, dusting, tidying, doing laundry, wiping counters, and aggressively scrubbing my toilet. By the end of my cleaning marathon, I was lying exhausted on freshly laundered sheets in my pristine bedroom, proud of the progress I had made. But when all was said and done, there was one thought nagging at the back of my mind: Was there something better I could have done with that time?

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declutter · minimalism

spiderpocalypse 2015: the journey begins

Amanda B.4 Comments

I started this blog because I feel like, up until fairly recently, I’ve been living a life similar to a lot of people out there—fine on the surface, but ultimately unfulfilling; sensible, safe, but boring. I’m following a path many have taken before me: Corporate desk job where I work 40 hours a week. Car loan. Living in a city geographically close to where I grew up.

My realization that I don’t have to live and die within this cookie-cutter template of a life has come in waves. I started learning about farfetched concepts like budgeting, financial independence, and not buying every shiny new thing screaming at me from a sale rack, and suddenly I was asking myself a lot of dangerous questions:

What if I didn’t have to work a standard 40-year career? What if I could purchase my next car in cash? What if I stopped buying stuff just because all the 15-second ads playing between YouTube videos told me I needed to?

This awakening began roughly two years ago, when I first stumbled upon the concept of minimalism.

I wish I could say that my journey to minimalism began gently, like falling into a downy bed of snowflakes knitted by singing angels, but that would be a lie.

Instead, my journey began with spiders, in a nightmarish event I have since dubbed Spiderpocalypse 2015.

Continue reading “spiderpocalypse 2015: the journey begins” →