Julie Morgenstern, TIME TO PARENT
[0:09]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens, and you're listening to the Webby-nominated podcast Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
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[0:59]I'm here today with Julie Morgan Stern.
[1:01]Julie is an internationally recognized organizational consultant who has written six books, including two New York Times bestsellers, organizing from the inside out, and time management from the inside out.
[1:12]Her latest book is Time to Parents, organizing your life to bring out the best in your child and you.
[1:17]Julie has written Columns for Red Book, Oh, the Oprah Magazine, and many other publications, and has appeared on countless TV and radio outlets.
[1:25]I feel like I want to go try to count them for.
[1:27]She hosts workshops, coaching clinics, and speaks around the world to help people find real solutions to their time management issues, which of course we all need.
[1:34]She also writes two blogs on Julie Morgan Stern.com, called The Balance Parent, and organizing you.
[1:39]So welcome to Julie.
[1:40]So thanks Julie.
[1:41]Thanks for coming on momstone.
[1:42]I have time to read books.
[1:43]It's so nice to be here with ZIBY.
[1:45]I have a million things I want to ask you.
[1:47]I'm like totally transforming my life based on the system that you presented in this book.
[1:52]I thought it was so helpful.
[1:53]So can you start by just telling listeners what Time to Parent is about and what made you write this book now?
[1:59]Yeah.
[2:00]So Time to Parent is basically a manual.
[2:02]I think it's the manual that's been missing from society for generations of how a parent can think about how to organize their time to cover everything that really needs to be done.
[2:14]We all want to be there for our kids, but not lose ourselves in the process.
[2:19]We want to spend time in our relationships, but also have time for ourselves.
[2:23]And Parenting is the biggest, most challenging, most noble job in the world.
[2:30]And there's never been a manual of how to manage your time.
[2:34]And when my daughter was born, I was looking for manual.
[2:37]I was like, where's the manual?
[2:38]Why are they not handing out time management brochures with every baby that's born in the maternity ward?
[2:44]In the offices, like the waiting rooms of pediatrician's offices.
[2:48]And as a professional organizer in a time management coach, which is my profession,
[2:53]I've been doing it for 30 years.
[2:56]It's remarkable because I'm only 28.
[2:58]I don't know.
[2:59]I was thinking of myself.
[3:00]Yeah.
[3:01]How was she doing this?
[3:02]No way.
[3:03]So it keeps me young.
[3:04]And I never really targeted parents.
[3:07]It was organizing in time management.
[3:09]But as it turns out, 80% of my clients male and female are parents because they struggle with the time being time-stretched and trying to choose between priorities.
[3:22]So I just thought someone's got to write this book.
[3:25]I had to wait till my daughter was out of the house to do it.
[3:27]I never could have written this book while I was actively parenting.
[3:32]All you're doing is, like, head down, making the best choices of praying that God, you're doing it right while you're in it.
[3:38]And when I was, when she, you know, flung the flu than us,
[3:43]I started the process of thinking about this and reflecting on all these years with clients and the patterns and did research, which we can talk about.
[3:52]Should I talk a little bit about that?
[3:53]Talk about it, sure.
[3:54]And also, you started when your daughter was a baby.
[3:58]You were having trouble getting out of the house.
[4:00]Tell that story.
[4:01]Yeah, so I mean, I was not always an organized person.
[4:04]It's really important for everybody to know that.
[4:06]And FYI, Julie, was late getting here today.
[4:09]Last, do you think that her time management skills are that good?
[4:12]Eight minutes late, everyone.
[4:15]Blame it on traffic.
[4:16]It was actually poor planning.
[4:18]No one is perfect.
[4:19]No one is perfect.
[4:20]No one is perfect.
[4:22]And even when you get organized, I think the most important thing is getting organized does not mean your life is going to run perfectly smoothly.
[4:29]It just means that you have the tools to get back on track every time life throws you a curveball when traffic goes bad or you're, you know, not you're being a perfectionist about something and it takes too long.
[4:41]So how did I get started here?
[4:43]So I was notoriously disorganized growing up.
[4:47]I was a theater person, very right brain creative person.
[4:50]Every paper was late.
[4:52]I lost a gazillion things.
[4:54]And when my daughter was born, she was like three weeks old and she woke up from a nap.
[4:59]And I thought, ah, this is the perfect opportunity to take her for her first walk.
[5:03]And I sent my husband for the car.
[5:05]And I went to get the baby.
[5:07]And then right before I picked her up, I was like, wait a minute, you can't just take babies out like you need stuff.
[5:11]What do I need?
[5:12]And where's the diaper bag?
[5:14]And where's the stuff?
[5:15]And every time I thought of something I needed, I had to go find it.
[5:19]And every time I thought I was ready, I thought of something else.
[5:23]And two and a half hours passed.
[5:26]My husband waiting in the car outside the whole time as it was his, you know, standard way.
[5:33]Like I was always leaving him like that.
[5:35]And by the time I was ready, I had to type her bag over stuff with like half the house.
[5:41]Maybe it was going to be prepared for that one.
[5:43]Yeah, whatever she did it.
[5:45]And I went to get her and she had fallen back asleep.
[5:50]And my heart just broke.
[5:52]And I just looked at this innocent child in her crib sleeping.
[5:58]And I thought, this child is never going to see the light of day if I don't get my act together.
[6:03]I'll never get her to school on time.
[6:05]I won't fill up the forms on time.
[6:07]And I just was determined to get organized.
[6:10]And I started with the diaper bag.
[6:11]And I told my husband forget like I blew it, come on in, park the car.
[6:15]And I, with this fit of determination, I like dumped this bulging diaper bag on the floor.
[6:22]And I grouped similar items.
[6:24]I was just like put all the sweaters.
[6:26]I had brought like multiple sweaters, all the changes of clothes, the things to entertainer with.
[6:32]And I just grouped things.
[6:34]And then I pared down.
[6:35]I was like, she does not need three different sweater weights for a walk.
[6:39]Like a 20 minute walk by the river.
[6:41]Like one medium weight sweater will do.
[6:43]She doesn't need six changes of clothes.
[6:45]So I just pared down each pile.
[6:47]And then I gave each category its own divide section.
[6:52]And the divided bag like, oh, this is where her sweater will be.
[6:55]This is where her change of clothes.
[6:57]This is where the entertaining stuff.
[6:58]And then I wrote a little inventory of everything that belonged in the bag on a piece of paper.
[7:05]And I put that in its own little pockets.
[7:07]Because I thought I never want to go through this thinking process again.
[7:11]I figured it out.
[7:13]I'm documenting this.
[7:15]And then every time I came home, I would just like restock the bag and we were always ready to go.
[7:20]And I felt very victorious.
[7:23]I felt very, oh my god, I organized something.
[7:27]And I felt ready.
[7:29]And I felt never again is my child going to miss an opportunity because I'm not ready.
[7:35]And I really think that's what being organized is all about, especially for a parent.
[7:39]And that's what's so great is that you figured it out and then decided to share it with everybody.
[7:44]You could have just kept that little nugget to yourself.
[7:46]But you've decided to dedicate your career to basically helping other people have those victorious moments as well.
[7:52]Which is awesome.
[7:53]I did because I had craved organization for years.
[7:57]I was always, oh, I wish I was organized.
[7:59]But I was always like, I didn't know how to do it.
[8:02]I couldn't figure it out for myself.
[8:04]I was a little scared of being organized because I thought I would become less creative and spontaneous.
[8:09]As much as I craved it.
[8:11]And so, yeah, it was a few years later.
[8:14]It was when I got divorced three years after that.
[8:17]I got divorced.
[8:18]And I was waiting in the car.
[8:20]He was like, I'm out.
[8:21]Yeah.
[8:22]I mean, it was just as simple as my favorite.
[8:25]If you would have that diaper bag ready or something.
[8:27]Oh man, I would still be married.
[8:28]And I don't think I would want to be.
[8:30]So, all right.
[8:32]No, that was just not the right marriage.
[8:34]It was definitely not the right marriage.
[8:36]But yeah, I feel like I, because I was so disorganized and I craved it and couldn't find my way.
[8:44]Once I figured it out, I'm really good at walking people across the bridge, at meeting them where they are.
[8:51]And my entire approach to organizing, I call it from the inside out that I think every system
[8:59]has to be custom designed to the person who's using it.
[9:02]No two people think alike and it has to sort of be organic to the way you think
[9:07]and what your goals are, what your needs are, or what your family's needs are.
[9:11]You can do it as a unit.
[9:12]Yeah.
[9:13]So.
[9:14]I love how you took organization and time management and made it something that a parent could follow.
[9:20]And that was something concrete.
[9:23]And now I'm being vague about it.
[9:25]But here, let me read this quote you said.
[9:26]The responsibilities of parenthood can feel simultaneously ambiguous and infinite,
[9:31]where it is hard to see the edges in order to manage the job with confidence.
[9:35]Lack of clarity often leads to time clutter with too many precious hours focused on low value activities,
[9:41]like worrying about whether you're spending your time well.
[9:44]Organizing the job and approaching it systematically will allow you to take control and make confident time choices while being fully present in each thing you do,
[9:51]which is amazing.
[9:52]And then you also see later how what you've seen in many organizations is that failure can come from when people don't have clearly defined roles.
[10:00]Yes.
[10:01]And when they don't have clear roles and responsibilities, things fall through the cracks.
[10:04]So you took these two things basically and developed this part self system, which is genius.
[10:11]So do you want to quickly run through those parts and self or do you not want to give
[10:14]it away?
[10:15]Yeah.
[10:16]No, you won't have to give it away.
[10:17]Yeah.
[10:18]You want to share it?
[10:19]Sure.
[10:20]You should do it in your own words.
[10:21]And my own words.
[10:22]Okay.
[10:23]So part is division of time and energy you spend with the kids.
[10:26]So with your own.
[10:27]With your own.
[10:28]With your own.
[10:29]To be in person.
[10:30]Let's take it up one notch.
[10:31]I'm going to help Zibi.
[10:32]We're going to do this together.
[10:33]Okay.
[10:34]Okay.
[10:35]So the most important thing is what I did is I defined the edges of the job.
[10:39]What is it that it has to juggle their time between?
[10:42]It's not eight thousand things.
[10:44]That's what it feels like.
[10:45]It's primary buckets.
[10:46]Yeah.
[10:47]It's really, and it's not two things that you have to juggle.
[10:50]It's basically first, divide the job in two.
[10:53]You have part of it is raising a human and then being a human because, and parents
[10:58]miss that.
[10:59]Yes.
[11:00]We all miss that.
[11:01]We think, oh, we just sacrifice ourselves and everything's for our kids.
[11:03]But that's not sustainable.
[11:06]It's not a good role model for your kids.
[11:08]You can't be a good parent if you are not taking care of yourself at all as we know
[11:13]intellectually.
[11:14]So first you divide the job into two parts and then each of those has four components.
[11:20]And now Zibi, you're on.
[11:23]So what's the raising a human?
[11:25]There's four activities that we have.
[11:28]Four activities to raise a human is for providing, so that's everything related to making
[11:35]sure kids have shelter, food, all of those basic needs met.
[11:39]Yeah.
[11:40]A is for arranging, which I feel like is my life logistics and forms and making sure everything
[11:46]is ready and that your kid doesn't forget special snack and special snack day like my
[11:51]kid just did and all those things are is for relating the time you actually have like
[11:55]quality one on one time where you're like, looking at your kid in the eye, you're on
[11:59]the carpet, you're not on your phone, you're like, paying attention to your child.
[12:03]And T is teaching.
[12:04]So being a mentor, role modeling, and also actually teaching kids how to do things in
[12:09]the world.
[12:10]Yeah.
[12:11]So that's four or on behalf of the kids.
[12:13]Right.
[12:14]And they spell an acronym and they spell part.
[12:16]Part.
[12:17]As in doing your part, for another person, provide a range, relate, teach for activities.
[12:24]Okay.
[12:25]And there's the taking care of yourself part, aspect, which makes you better at doing
[12:30]all the other things, which obviously, and I've said, I've heard these things.
[12:34]Well, okay.
[12:35]So itself, which is S is for sleep, which is so important to everything, including
[12:41]just cognitive functioning and everything else.
[12:43]Exactly.
[12:44]But easy to toss aside is important, which I often do.
[12:47]E is for exercise, also like the first thing off my list usually, which is really bad.
[12:51]When you spell out in great detail, all the reasons why, in a compelling way, not like
[12:55]in a, I've read this before way, L is for love, which includes your relationships with
[13:01]your spouse and your loved ones and friends and the important of being together and connecting
[13:06]with other people, not just your kids.
[13:09]And F is for fun, which I thought was such a great thing to include.
[13:12]So pursuing your own hobbies and your own things that you enjoy doing in life, because
[13:16]you can't be just a one-dimensional parent, and like you said in the book, like if you were
[13:19]a writer before, you liked to knit before, pick those hobbies back up.
[13:23]You're still, that's still who you are, like don't let those go.
[13:26]Yes.
[13:27]And then taking it all together, you can allocate your time on all those different endeavors.
[13:31]Right.
[13:32]And then the interactions of those things.
[13:33]So in the book, and I'm going to let you talk in the book, you have things like if you're
[13:37]a parent that specializes in just the providing and just the arranging, you know, maybe
[13:42]you need to work on the relating a little bit more and like maybe for you, like you have
[13:46]to tell yourself to get down on the floor for 10 minutes a day or things like that.
[13:50]So, and you have a quiz.
[13:52]So I don't know.
[13:53]For someone like Taipei, like myself, having it in a grid, spelled out is super helpful.
[13:58]So tell me how you came up at this and thank you for the system.
[14:00]Good.
[14:01]So how do I go?
[14:02]It's so funny.
[14:04]How I came up with it.
[14:05]So I was originally going to write the book just about how to, about quality time.
[14:11]Quality time with your kids, how to deliver it, how to make time for it, how to make space
[14:16]for it.
[14:17]Because over the years, clients who would hire us or come to speeches or workshops for
[14:23]getting organized or managing their time had the universal goal.
[14:27]The reason they wanted to get organized was so they had more space for quality time with
[14:32]their kids and quality time for themselves.
[14:35]If I was only more organized, I could really be present with my kids.
[14:39]If I was only more organized, I'd have time for myself or to go for a walk with a friend.
[14:44]So those were the illusives.
[14:46]And I knew from research the time and attention is the single greatest gift that we can
[14:55]give anybody, including ourselves, that you can give to kids.
[14:59]We all wanted this kid like you just want to be somebody give you undivided time and attention.
[15:03]It's the greatest gift.
[15:04]It makes you feel valued and valuable.
[15:06]And you said you doesn't even have to be that much time.
[15:09]No, that was a really big impact.
[15:11]Exactly.
[15:12]I think that was the greatest discovery I made.
[15:13]And I did the research for the book.
[15:15]I was like, I know parents want that.
[15:17]But how much time and attention do kids really need?
[15:20]Because how can I give parents a guide on how to divide their time?
[15:23]If I don't know the answer that, I'm not a parenting expert.
[15:26]I'm an organizing expert.
[15:27]So I had to go to the experts.
[15:29]How much time and attention do kids need?
[15:31]The whole quality versus quantity debate.
[15:34]And I thought if we know the answer to that, we can organize around that.
[15:38]And here's what I found out.
[15:39]And I was shocked.
[15:41]I did not know this.
[15:42]I did not know this when I was raising my daughter.
[15:44]So kids thrive on short bursts.
[15:48]And when I say short bursts, I'm talking five to 15 or 20 minutes tops at a time.
[15:55]Short bursts of truly undivided attention, eyeball to eyeball, delivered consistently.
[16:02]Rather than big blocks of time, delivered occasionally.
[16:07]And the reason for that is the kids have short attention spans.
[16:11]And many experts say to calculate about a minute for each age of life.
[16:15]And if you stop and think about that, it really makes sense.
[16:19]Like a one-year-old has a one-minute attention span before their eyes drift to the next shiny object.
[16:26]Or five-year-old, if you're going to have a one-on-one deep conversation with a five-year-old,
[16:31]it's probably not going to last more than five minutes.
[16:33]But I'm not sure.
[16:33]I have a 42-minute attention span these days.
[16:36]42?
[16:37]You do.
[16:38]Oh, yeah.
[16:38]Well, I think there's a certain thing after maybe
[16:41]like 15.
[16:42]15, 15, 15.
[16:43]That's right.
[16:44]I'm like, I can't focus on anything that long anymore, except for a book, is I from a book.
[16:48]Aaron, but it's sort of the key to both nurturing your kids is just think in terms of
[16:54]at each transition point in your kid's day.
[16:56]At each reconnection point, there's like pivot points in a kid's day.
[17:00]It's when they first wake up, when they go off to school, when you get home, it together
[17:04]at the end of the day, dinner and bedtime.
[17:07]If at the beginning of each re-connection point or transition, you spend the first five
[17:14]or seven or three or 10 minutes giving your kid undivided attention, then you can do the
[17:21]logistics.
[17:22]You can do the together.
[17:23]But a part-time, you can check.
[17:24]Did you do your homework?
[17:25]I'm going to do dinner.
[17:27]All of that.
[17:28]It's about doing it at those transitions and doing it first.
[17:32]And then you can do together but a part-time.
[17:35]And I think it's incredibly liberating to know that it's just short bursts.
[17:40]We can all put our phones down for 10 minutes, literally got to put your phone down.
[17:44]It doesn't count if you're half in your phone and listening to your kid's story.
[17:49]Your kid knows.
[17:50]Yeah.
[17:51]An adult knows.
[17:52]Yeah.
[17:53]So it's just short bursts that, and you can do the same thing for self-care, by the way.
[17:56]Ten minutes of sleep?
[17:57]No.
[17:58]Other than sleep, sleep, we really, really, really, I mean you have to be asleep ninja
[18:03]as a parent.
[18:04]You have to, it's the first, as you said, zippy to go.
[18:07]And we just overestimate our ability to function on very little sleep, on not exercising
[18:13]and lack of self-care.
[18:14]We just overestimate ourselves.
[18:17]And then we end up short-tempered, slow in our thinking process where not as creative,
[18:23]even in dealing with our kids.
[18:24]So you have to get, trying to get a full night's sleep.
[18:27]But when you don't, because as a parent, you always often have interrupted sleep or
[18:32]short or sleep, learn to take rest in 10 minutes or 20 minute doses.
[18:38]Don't just go all day, become like a master of just sitting still for 10 minutes, physically
[18:45]and drinking a cup of tea and eating your sandwich is a form of rest that actually can
[18:50]restore you when you did not get enough sleep at night.
[18:54]So don't just always operate, it's like 10 minutes, 20 minute rest periods, 20 minutes
[19:00]or less of exercise, learn to nurture your love relationship and short bursts and fun.
[19:06]You talked about knitting if you were a knitter or you were an actor, you're not going
[19:12]to get to be in the theater every night or you're not going to be able to knit for hours
[19:15]on end, but you could do 20 minutes a day, you can.
[19:19]So now I know all these different buckets.
[19:21]How do I then figure out how to spend the time?
[19:25]Let's say arranging, which takes me, not because I want to, not because I'm particularly
[19:31]good at it, but it just, the demand of it is such a big time suck.
[19:35]What do you do then?
[19:36]Like what, like I want to be on the floor relating more, but I have to take care of the
[19:40]other stuff first.
[19:41]I want to work at every day, but I have to do some of these other things, like so, what
[19:46]do I do with that?
[19:48]So a range that quadrant is without exception, the single biggest sort of time trap for
[19:54]parents, particularly moms.
[19:57]I mean, it still falls mostly as much as,
[20:00]And today's men and husbands participate way more in childcare and house work, it's still
[20:06]the main emotional labor and mental labor and physical labor is mostly the woman's.
[20:13]So the very first thing is I think you have to rethink the entire approach and your sense
[20:20]of ownership around the range.
[20:23]And I challenge everybody to stop thinking of it.
[20:27]It's not your job.
[20:28]Those logistics are not yours.
[20:30]They are the family's logistics.
[20:33]I see your like, I'm divorced.
[20:36]Okay.
[20:37]I'm remarried, but I just not like, I'm not going to drag my husband into this.
[20:41]He's the stepdad.
[20:42]Like I'm just not, you know, yes, I see what you're saying you can offload it onto other
[20:46]people and your family.
[20:47]And share it.
[20:48]It's not offload.
[20:49]Okay, okay, fine, share it.
[20:50]It's not offload.
[20:51]I mean, honestly, recently I started asking my babysitters to do a lot more of the logistics
[20:55]stuff and like helping me with forms because I am just like, if my babysitter could
[20:59]help me with the form, then I could be on the ground for this time and it's well, she
[21:02]does the form.
[21:03]So yes, she's a great to meet one area.
[21:08]There is so much.
[21:09]It's a much bigger job than anybody ever realizes.
[21:12]It's so time demanding, mentally demanding.
[21:14]There's so many different skills involved, organizational skills, complicated to organize
[21:19]for a family, way more complicated than organizing for an individual.
[21:23]And you need to really, it's kind of PhD level organizing, you have to create incredibly
[21:28]simple systems that anybody can follow.
[21:32]A teenager who you hire for just a day can understand how to stack the dishwasher and
[21:37]how to do the laundry and where things go.
[21:39]It has to be like kindergarten simple and that way it's much easier to share and delegate.
[21:45]So you really have to streamline it, but it is the one thing that is the most delegatable
[21:50]of everything.
[21:51]You're irreplaceable in that those short bursts of undivided attention.
[21:57]Your kid wants you to look at them like they are the sun and the moon and the stars and
[22:03]be interested in whatever story or dumb book or dumb game they want to play that you want
[22:08]to, you're not interested in, but they want you, they want to share it with you.
[22:13]That is the part you're not replaceable on.
[22:16]You can have other people who do that.
[22:17]It's not like you're the only one.
[22:19]But a range of logistics, honestly, they're just mechanical tasks.
[22:25]It's shopping, it's figuring out the food, it's putting the food together, it's cleaning
[22:30]up the dishes, it's picking up the clutter, it's putting things back in their homes,
[22:36]it's anybody, those are mechanical tasks, those are shareable.
[22:40]And studies say that kids who are responsible for chores growing up have the most successful
[22:46]careers in life.
[22:47]So it's not a bird into your kids, which we feel.
[22:51]I mean, why do we not do it?
[22:54]I was a single parent.
[22:55]I felt so guilty about that, that I was not going to push my kid and in my limit and a
[23:02]working single parent.
[23:04]I didn't want to take what little time I had with my daughter and get into battles about
[23:09]cleaning up or doing chores.
[23:11]So I just did it.
[23:14]They want to participate.
[23:15]Your kid would rather share that work and have a job and have more time with you than
[23:21]have a perfectly organized house and perfectly orchestrated gorgeous meals and a perfectly
[23:29]running life that you are too busy or ranging to spend time with them.
[23:34]They much rather have a plain sandwich than a fancy sandwich.
[23:38]If that would mean they get five minutes with you.
[23:41]It's a mindset shift.
[23:42]And your other key takeaway I thought in the book was the way in which you invest energy
[23:48]in each of the buckets.
[23:50]So the mad, no, mad, man, Max.
[23:54]So you can spend, figure out first before you do a task, how could you, the best possible
[23:59]way ever, which is like the goal, which is a magical goal.
[24:03]This is like, and you said like for a birthday party, this is like when you're handbaking
[24:06]the cake and a shape and decorating it to look like a Cinderella shoe or I don't know
[24:11]something exactly.
[24:12]And then it actually slips off and then inside are all the little prizes for all the
[24:17]kids in the party.
[24:19]And then the minimum you could do on a birthday party, which is like call the place and
[24:23]have them run the whole thing for you or moderate, which is somewhere in the middle.
[24:27]And then at least you think about the boundaries and then arrive.
[24:30]And so is the advice to do the moderate amount?
[24:32]No, your advice is like depends on the situation.
[24:35]Sometimes you want to do the max and sometimes you don't need to.
[24:38]Yeah, I think it's our perfectionist, perfectionist mindset is there's only two ways
[24:43]to do anything, exceptionally well or it's such a disaster you're embarrassed and it's
[24:50]like why bother?
[24:52]And that black and white thinking is paralyzing, first of all, which leads to a lot of procrastination
[24:58]or like, oh my God, if I can't do this right and I don't have time, so I keep putting
[25:02]it off, that puts a lot of time pressure on you.
[25:05]And it also leads you to spend more time on certain things that then steals your ability
[25:13]to do the others.
[25:14]Now, I've defined the only eight things, total that you have to divide your time between
[25:20]as a parent.
[25:21]You have to make time for each and contain the time.
[25:25]You can't let any one of those eight quadrants or any two of them monopolize your time
[25:31]at the expense of the rest.
[25:33]So and we gravitate toward what we're good at and away from what we're not so confident.
[25:37]So this roadmap kind of allows you to go, oh, there's eight things.
[25:41]How am I doing?
[25:42]Oh, I'm spending too much time here.
[25:43]I have to contain that.
[25:44]I have not been over to relate for a while.
[25:46]I got to go make time for it.
[25:48]I'm spending too much time teaching, not enough time relating.
[25:51]I have not done anything for fun.
[25:53]I'm not spending time at all with my significant other, even like 20 minutes at the end
[25:59]of the day to say, hey, how was your day?
[26:01]So it just isn't awareness thing.
[26:04]And to make sure you contain the time, you have to watch your perfectionist tendencies
[26:09]because perfectionism will keep you in one quadrant like 10 times longer than you need
[26:14]to because you're trying to do that thing perfectly.
[26:18]So Max Modman is like it changes you from black and white thinking to shades of gray.
[26:24]And the skill is being able to define three levels for a task.
[26:30]And it's hard at first, you're like, what's the max?
[26:33]Well, I could tell you what the max is.
[26:35]What's the min?
[26:36]It's probably doing nothing, but that's not actually what min is.
[26:40]Min is like, it's a clever way to get the job done.
[26:43]And then moderate somewhere in between.
[26:45]And by identifying those so concretely, it gives you choices.
[26:51]It gives you options.
[26:52]And as a parent, every day expands and contracts and like you had plans for the day and
[26:59]then a kid gets upset about something and you lose half an hour to it tantrum or, you
[27:04]know, work calls or, you know, things go wrong.
[27:08]So Max Modman allows you, it's like an accordion to right-size tasks for the moment, for
[27:14]the situation, for everything else going on.
[27:17]And nothing gets neglected.
[27:18]It's like, it just keeps you very fluid and agile and gives you options, which is so
[27:25]liberating.
[27:26]It is.
[27:27]I love that.
[27:28]It's really helpful for me.
[27:29]Yeah.
[27:30]Like, it was one of the most, you know, that there's a choice.
[27:34]Some things don't have to be perfect.
[27:36]I mean, I feel like, as a mom before, I've come to realize this because I can't do
[27:40]everything perfectly.
[27:41]I just can't.
[27:42]I'm always messing up.
[27:43]But I love just having it like, okay, I'm choosing this one.
[27:47]And those sometimes min and mod is actually smarter.
[27:51]Even if you had all the time in the world, like, yeah, I don't need to do that.
[27:55]Max.
[27:56]No one's even paying attention to it other than me.
[27:58]It is not worth that time under any circumstances.
[28:02]And that it's actively taking time away from something else, which is also the context.
[28:07]Everything is like, you know, I'm seeing this as like a, like it's like a bar graph,
[28:12]like in the holidays, and like all the different colors for your different things.
[28:15]So the more I spend on this, the smaller I'm going to have for something else.
[28:19]That's exactly right.
[28:20]And I think that's what the framework really helps with, which is it gives you the perspective
[28:26]of, this is the full playing board.
[28:28]There's nothing in your peripheral vision that you're missing, but you're also not getting
[28:32]like going down a rabbit hole and thinking the whole job is this, right?
[28:37]And so it gives you that flexibility and agility and give in a system without giving
[28:42]anything up.
[28:43]You don't have to give anything up.
[28:45]And now you're developing the system for teenagers as well.
[28:48]you have something coming with your teenage daughter or you have that book is out.
[28:51]The book is out.
[28:52]Oh, yeah.
[28:53]I wrote a book with my, sorry.
[28:54]I should have known that.
[28:55]That's all right.
[28:56]No.
[28:57]I wrote a book with my daughter when she was in high school, the organizing from the inside
[29:02]out for teens.
[29:04]And it's a great book.
[29:05]She co-authored it and it's about how to organize four teens space and time at home,
[29:13]at school and your locker, all of that.
[29:16]And it's a wonderful book.
[29:17]I think it's very helpful in two ways.
[29:20]One, the teenage years are really the time when we as humans really need organizing systems.
[29:27]Those skills become extra important, both developmentally what's going on in the brain.
[29:31]That's kind of when you're supposed to be developing those skills and also your life gets
[29:35]more complicated.
[29:36]You're not just in one classroom all day, you're in blah, blah, blah, blah.
[29:40]But it's also the hardest time for a parent to be able to guide their kids because teenagers
[29:44]are like, I can do this to myself.
[29:46]Give me a loan.
[29:47]It's like that's the years when kids are fighting to have some identity of their own and
[29:53]sort of blend, unfortunately, with their kids, their friends.
[29:58]So the book is really helpful.
[30:00]Your kids can read it themselves.
[30:02]Parents can read it and sort of,
[30:04]there's a whole section on how to actually support your kids
[30:07]and getting organized and be more of their coach
[30:10]than their teacher or their doer.
[30:14]And I have a little section in there
[30:17]that organizing with your kid if it's done
[30:20]with no judgment is one of the best ways
[30:24]to get to know your kid in the world.
[30:27]But you have to go in with no judgment
[30:29]to do it from the inside out.
[30:31]And I kind of coach you to be the coach
[30:33]and ask your kid what is this?
[30:35]And how would you group these things?
[30:37]And you learn how their brains work
[30:39]and what's important to them.
[30:41]So it can be one of the greatest ways
[30:43]to get to know your kid.
[30:43]And you sort of can be a wonderful experience.
[30:45]But it can't be, you feeling bad
[30:49]that you don't know how to teach your kid
[30:50]to get organized.
[30:51]Cause that really ruins your ability to be present.
[30:55]Cause you just feel guilty.
[30:57]And it can't be organizing your way.
[31:00]You have to like help them organize the way they think
[31:03]and sort of shape.
[31:03]It's really wonderful.
[31:05]I'm definitely getting that next.
[31:06]I have twins who are about to be 12.
[31:08]So I'm perfect time.
[31:09]Yeah, perfect time.
[31:11]So, yeah.
[31:12]Well, Julie, thank you for coming on mom's own time
[31:14]to read books.
[31:15]This has been so life-changing, really.
[31:17]I'm like staying in touch with you
[31:19]and letting you know.
[31:20]I want you to.
[31:21]I want you to.
[31:22]And I think that the thing about the book
[31:24]is to keep in mind that for moms who don't have time
[31:26]to read, you actually don't have to read the book
[31:28]cover to cover.
[31:29]It's designed, you can read the first two parts,
[31:31]which is the principles in under an hour,
[31:34]probably under 45 minutes.
[31:36]And then the rest of the book,
[31:37]you just, it's organized around the quadrant.
[31:39]So each chapter, if you feel I'm spending too much time
[31:42]in a range, go into that chapter
[31:44]and then you go pull tips.
[31:46]And the tips are either general.
[31:49]They're a general conceptual.
[31:50]And then it's also age by age.
[31:52]How do I apply this?
[31:53]What can I ask a 12-year-old to do around the house?
[31:56]It's reasonable.
[31:57]And so everything is sort of both age by age.
[31:59]And then, and just, you don't have to do it all.
[32:02]Max Mudd meant on the book too.
[32:04]Mm-hmm.
[32:05]That's awesome.
[32:07]Love it.
[32:08]All right, thanks so much.
[32:09]You might pleasure.
[32:10]Mm-hmm.
[32:12]Thanks again to my sponsor, Mermaid PillowCo.
[32:16]Mermaid PillowCo.com slash zibi,
[32:20]and her code zibi for 10% off.
[32:22]Thanks so much.
[32:23]Check out those really awesome giftable pillows and blankets.
[32:26]Thanks for listening to Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[32:28]You can follow me on Instagram at Moms Don't Have Time
[32:31]to Read Books and at zibi Owens and my new podcast,
[32:35]at Kids Do Have Time to Read.
[32:37]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Texture Sound
[32:39]for the Sound Editing.
[32:41]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[32:42]for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.
[32:45]Thanks for listening.
[32:46]You can always email me at zibiatzibiowens.com.