“Despite the distance, we appreciate the times when distance is measured in inches to comfort us during the time when distance is measured in miles.”

Meet Haley. She is the epitome of a working full-time military spouse bad ass. Seriously—I don’t know how this woman stays as organized, positive, and motivated as she does. She’s #goals. Haley works in software sales and travels the United States on a daily/weekly basis for client meetings and tutorials. When I say she travels the country on a daily basis, I truly mean it. Sometimes I can text Haley and ask her if she would like to grab dinner and she will reply, “I’m in Boston for the day and won’t get back to Wilmington until 8.” Just casually jet setting to Boston for the day!

As we all know, the Marine Corps takes our Marines away from us quite often. So with both of their schedules requiring a lot of travel, that naturally leads to times when their travel occurs at opposite times. It’s not often that the Marine is left at home alone to hold the fort down while the spouse is out working! In order to combat that, they have made a promise to one another to always prioritize their marriage, whether they are together or apart. Haley says it takes some balancing, but they have worked to make it work for their lifestyle.

Throughout the two years that I have known Haley, she has served as an inspiration in so many ways. Every single day of hers presents a new schedule and a new challenge, but even with all of that coming at her on a daily basis, she still finds time to cultivate relationships with her husband, her friends (near and far), and her family (mostly far) as well. She introduced me to a couple products that ended up changing my life. First, is the Simplified Planner by Emily Ley. If you don’t already have one, go buy one now. It has seriously changed my life…I know—how in the world can a planner change your life. Well, of course it depends on how you use and keep up with it. I have adopted Haley’s color coding system to help me visually see my responsibilities for the upcoming day. It might seem old school, but something about writing down “Coffee with Haley 8:30 Starbucks” makes it so much more real to me than typing it into my phone. It even has a meal planning section for each day!!

The other tool she uses to keep up with her personal and work goals is called “Powersheets.” It was invented by Lara Casey and used to keep you on track for setting and obtaining goals. For example, if you have a goal to read 12 books in a year, this resource will help you stay on track with one book per month until you have achieved your goal at the end of the year. This is a tool, of course, and as Lara Casey puts it, just because you own a rake, it doesn’t mean the leaves are going to put themselves in a pile. It is a tool you have to actively use in order to achieve your goals, but the resource lays it out so simply (and beautifully) it is easy to stay on track!

Part of Haley’s interview that stuck out to me was the part where she thanked all military spouses. She eloquently put it: “Even though you may not hear this every day, thank you for everything you do to help our military members focus on the most important aspects of their jobs, to keep themselves safe and come home to you quickly.” And she is so right—we keep everything going stateside so that our military member doesn’t have to worry about us and can focus on whatever mission (training or combat) is in from of him/her at the time.