Jenny Blake, FREE TIME: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business

2022-12-26 · 30:19 · Jenny Blake · Podcast Audio

[0:02]Hi, I'm Zivi Owens, the creator and host of the award-winning podcast that you're listening to right now.

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[0:58]Jenny Blake is the author of Free Time, Loose the Busy Work Love Your Business.

[1:03]Jenny is an author and podcaster who loves helping people move from friction to flow through smarter systems,

[1:08]powered by delightfully tiny teams.

[1:10]We talked today about her award-winning third book, Free Time.

[1:14]She's also the author of Pivot, the only move that matters is your next one,

[1:17]that won the Axiom Award for Best Business Book in the careers category upon its release in 2016.

[1:23]She hosts two podcasts with over a million downloads combined,

[1:26]Free Time with Jenny Blake for heart-based business owners,

[1:29]and Pivot with Jenny Blake for navigating change.

[1:31]Welcome, Jenny. Thank you so much for coming on mom's turn-ho time to read books,

[1:35]to discuss free time, Loose the Busy Work Love Your Business.

[1:39]Yay, thank you so much for having me.

[1:41]Thrilled to be here.

[1:43]It is like you wrote this book for me.

[1:45]You were like, wait, you want free time? What's that? That's what you want.

[1:50]No, this is so wonderful. It's like the ultimate guide book for entrepreneurs,

[1:55]and it's just amazing. It's like so helpful in every way.

[2:00]And you know, anyway, I was just blown away by the utility of it.

[2:04]I went and listened to your podcast. I'm like totally a fan, so thank you.

[2:08]Oh, thank you so much. That means the world to me.

[2:11]And yeah, that's really what I feel like that's why we go into business for ourselves.

[2:16]I mean, of course, sometimes there's a broader mission and purpose behind it,

[2:20]and also so that we have autonomy over our time.

[2:23]And I really see free time more as a verb and a skill.

[2:26]It's a muscle we build and something we can get better at.

[2:29]And so that's the spirit of this book is like, how do we all get better and better at

[2:33]freeing our time so we can do more of our best work?

[2:37]I love it. You had so many great concepts and principles and things that now help me think about my

[2:45]life differently. Let's see. One thing was even just recognizing that business stress is a

[2:51]systems problem. This was just in your introduction. But it's like, oh, well, that's interesting.

[2:55]Like the stress that you feel is not necessarily because you're a stressed out person. It's

[2:59]could something fundamentally is not particularly right with the environment you've created.

[3:03]So I was like really good to know, business or not.

[3:06]Yeah. That's it. My motto for years was stress is a systems problem.

[3:11]And by the time we got to the book, I didn't want to offend anybody because there are

[3:15]bigger things going on in the world that sometimes it's not an individual systems problem.

[3:20]It's a broader systems in society. But I think when it comes specifically to business,

[3:25]and even running a household, oftentimes stress is a systems problem.

[3:30]Like if my husband and I are fighting because the house is too messy,

[3:33]there's a system that we can solve for. And like, what are the best things I did was

[3:38]hire a cleaning service once a week automatically, where I don't have to think about when we

[3:42]need a cleaner, they just come once a week. And something that simple is a system that enabled me

[3:47]to stop fighting with my husband. That was being too messy. It's like, so I think sometimes solving

[3:54]for that household stuff is as important as the business because adulting is annoying sometimes.

[4:01]A lot of stuff. A lot of friction at a home and at work. And a lot of business books are written

[4:07]by men. And I find that they don't always include that perspective of what's happening at home,

[4:12]because in a lot of cases, someone's taken care of it for them. Interesting. I like that.

[4:17]I also love this heart-based business. And now, we're not companies these days,

[4:23]they're not just the bottom line focused, but it's so much more than that. And what it really

[4:29]means to be invested fully, sort of emotionally, not just financially.

[4:34]Yeah, I see a heart-based business and it's specifically a heart-based business owner as somebody

[4:40]who wants what's in the highest good for all involved, for themselves, for their team members,

[4:45]for their clients, for their community, for their family. And sometimes I find in the business press,

[4:51]it's kind of this growth at all costs, or creating a turn and burn culture. Or the business owner

[4:56]has all kinds of free time, but then the team members are stressed and overwhelmed and overworked

[5:01]and underpaid. And so the heart-based business is one that might make decisions in the short term

[5:07]that let's say impact revenue, but for the sake of something bigger. And so sometimes,

[5:14]yeah, sometimes it means sacrificing money or growth, but oftentimes it doesn't. And that's

[5:19]another one of my missions in this book. And in general is to break the pattern of linear thinking.

[5:25]Well, if I want more free time, then I'll earn less. That's not necessarily true. It might be the case

[5:31]that the more you engineer for free time, maybe you'll earn four times as more because as much

[5:37]because your systems are smarter and you free your time and you start doing even more strategic

[5:42]work and creative work and creative thinking. So there's no, there's no linear correlation

[5:48]necessarily that if, yeah, if we work less, we're going to earn less. And that's just to have it.

[5:53]But I've been trying to break myself and encourage others as well.

[5:57]Speaking of this free time and how it makes you more productive,

[6:00]I'm now forgetting what it's called. It's not personal time off, but what did you call it?

[6:04]When you're a founder of time?

[6:05]Foundry time, right. So when you're taking time off for you and you feel like put it in your calendar,

[6:11]free up, founder of time. Tell me about that. And how often are we supposed to be doing this and

[6:16]blah, blah, blah. This is, it's into a bigger idea of even just intentional calendar design.

[6:23]It's so easy to get caught in what I've lately been thinking of it as the rip tide of reactive

[6:29]work where I actually felt like that the other day. I felt like I'm in a rip tide and it's pulling

[6:34]me under like just reacting to everybody else. And sometimes our calendar can be the same way.

[6:39]We react to what everyone else around us needs and then we're left with the scraps.

[6:43]Researchers call it time confetti where your calendar is just a mismatch of shards of time and you

[6:50]can't quite get anything meaningful done. So free up, founder time is for starters putting a

[6:56]block. Maybe it's one hour to start or two hours, but it recurs every week. And that's your time.

[7:02]And specifically, it's your time to work on your business or on your career on the really high

[7:08]level of it. What do you want? Where are you going? What do you want to say now to just every week

[7:14]carving out that time to recalibrate and really strategize about what's most important?

[7:20]And so I do recommend setting it to recur every week so that it's on there. But you could

[7:25]be even more aggressive with calendar design, especially heading into a new year. I look at the

[7:31]year ahead and I will block off from now mid December to mid January. I have a do not schedule

[7:37]block and that recurs annually. So not only am I going to take this mid December off, but every year

[7:43]my calendar is already blocked from now into infinity. And so things like that where you can be

[7:48]more aggressive up front about creating do not schedule blocks, then you're kind of corralling

[7:54]your calls and meetings to a shorter window. Maybe just you only have calls Tuesday, Wednesday,

[8:00]Thursday. Maybe you only meet with team members on Thursdays. Maybe you only meet with clients

[8:05]on Tuesdays. And I know what sounds radical and it might sound impossible, but there's more

[8:10]than you might think that's doable within these kind of type parameters. And then you can always

[8:14]make one off exceptions as needed. I love that. Yeah. I don't know. I try to do that sometimes.

[8:21]You know, for a while, it's like I'm only going to do podcasts on Tuesdays and Thursdays,

[8:25]but then like never works. Like I make, I block time out in county. I'm like, I'm only going to use

[8:30]the county. I'm like, but now I change these six podcasts. Anyway, I love it. I love it. It's just

[8:36]it's just hard. Yeah. Right. It gets hard if you you suddenly have some kind of speaking,

[8:42]engagement or something that's going to pull you away on that day. And I've had that happen to

[8:47]where I hope to show I do interviews on Wednesdays. But if I get invited to a keynote on a Wednesday,

[8:52]now I have five calls to move or four. It's tricky. Let alone taking a week off where you're

[8:59]shuffling all kinds of things around. Why do I like this again? Oh, wait. Now I have to

[9:03]you know, where I have to do it. Right. But it's fine. But I love the notion, the whole theory

[9:08]behind it. And I love how you look analytically to add the detail work. Like, are you focusing your

[9:13]energy even on the right things? Do you like, are you and you're in the whole podcast? I was

[9:18]doing about like the low hanging watermelon and all that. Like, right. Yeah. Like, just are you

[9:24]are the things you're doing things that someone else should be doing. Like the tedious things or

[9:29]the ones that just take up so much time or, you know, basically evaluating each thing as you do it

[9:35]because the little things add up to become really big things. Yeah. And even observing,

[9:40]let's say over the next two weeks, I recommend having a piece of paper at your desk. It could

[9:45]be a notes app on your phone. But even if I would ask you right now what kind of work drains you

[9:50]the most? What energizes you the most? You might have a few off the cuff answers. But it's the new ones

[9:56]that comes when we observe for a few weeks with intention.

[10:00]that all of a sudden you're in the midst of your day

[10:02]and you go, ah, this is something I could delegate

[10:04]or this is something that drains me.

[10:06]This is something I don't like to do.

[10:08]Because sometimes people tell me,

[10:10]well, yeah, I'd love to free up my time,

[10:11]but I don't know who I would delegate it to

[10:14]or delegating as its own morass of energy and effort

[10:18]and I don't feel like doing that.

[10:21]But there is a category,

[10:23]let's call it the low hanging watermelon of this arena,

[10:25]which would be the stuff that you're not even good at

[10:27]and you hate doing it.

[10:29]That's the most ripe for delegation

[10:31]and you will be absolutely thrilled

[10:33]if you could figure out a way to get it off your plate.

[10:35]And it is possible,

[10:36]but you don't even need to know how yet.

[10:38]Just observe what you would delegate if you could,

[10:41]large and small over the next few weeks.

[10:44]It's a funny, I hired someone,

[10:46]her name's Chelsea a while ago, maybe two years ago

[10:48]and she's like, I love spreadsheets, I love them.

[10:51]I live in spreadsheets, I get so excited about spreadsheets

[10:55]and I was like, that is the thing I liked the least.

[10:57]So what a great team we are.

[11:00]And it's proven true in everything she's done.

[11:03]When you have somebody who really enjoyed,

[11:04]like you think that if you don't like it,

[11:06]no one will like it.

[11:07]But it's true.

[11:07]So that's not all true.

[11:10]So you just love that people get excited by that stuff.

[11:13]That's how I feel about my email inbox.

[11:15]Like I dread it so much and I have so much guilt

[11:17]associated with my email that I cannot imagine anybody

[11:21]wanting to work in my email inbox.

[11:23]You know what, then when I find the person that says,

[11:25]no, I love helping.

[11:26]I love, you know, managing email, it's such a dream.

[11:30]And they're out there, it's true, they're out there.

[11:34]So what else, when you give all this amazing advice

[11:38]to entrepreneurs, to people running businesses,

[11:41]there is this hope, even like this very optimistic,

[11:44]beautiful, free time.

[11:46]It's like, this is literally like,

[11:47]I want to like put this at the end of the tunnel of like

[11:51]every day, like this glowing beacon

[11:54]with the little gold flecks that you sunshine

[11:57]and have this and all of that.

[11:59]Tell me about the joys of running businesses

[12:01]and like why it's so great.

[12:02]And then like the combination of some of the easiest things

[12:07]to implement, but like what makes it worth it?

[12:10]Like what makes it worth it for you?

[12:13]For me, it's just questioning any narrative

[12:17]that anything that involves the word should,

[12:19]but there are a lot of best practices in the business world

[12:22]of how we should work, how we should build our business,

[12:25]even the idea that we work Monday through Friday nine to five.

[12:30]And it's just so ingrained in us, but who does that serve?

[12:35]Like it has never been what's best for me personally

[12:38]for my energy, for my health, for my family

[12:40]that I work from Monday through Friday nine to six,

[12:44]you know, these factory hours.

[12:46]So for starters, if you're someone who has time autonomy,

[12:50]being willing to question that

[12:52]and lately the last few weeks in a row,

[12:54]I've just told my friends, it's a Monday and I go,

[12:57]it's, I'm declaring it, it's still Sunday.

[12:59]It's Sunday again, because I need another Sunday,

[13:01]I can just not ready for the week.

[13:03]And even what you were saying is maybe about rescheduling

[13:06]a bunch of stuff.

[13:08]I find that by having really tight calendar parameters

[13:12]at least by default, then when you do want to take

[13:15]a spontaneous trip, you have room to reschedule it.

[13:19]You actually have room to move those calls and meetings

[13:21]into another week because you have some margin

[13:24]and you have some spaciousness.

[13:26]And I noticed myself, like when I was growing up,

[13:30]I was always going to all kinds of activities after school.

[13:32]My calendar, even though I didn't have an app at that time,

[13:36]my day was jam packed from like seven to seven

[13:40]of school and activities.

[13:42]So it was really hard for me as an adult

[13:44]and even as a business owner when I was no longer an employee

[13:47]to break that pattern.

[13:49]And that's what to me free time is about,

[13:51]is like breaking our own patterns, our own inner time blueprint

[13:55]of how we think we need to work,

[13:57]in favor of something that's more life-giving.

[14:00]And I genuinely believe that everybody finishes.

[14:04]If we would work, but one of the central inquiries

[14:07]of the book and of my life and business

[14:09]is how can we earn twice as much in half the time

[14:12]with ease and joy while serving the highest good?

[14:15]And so it doesn't have to be literally

[14:18]earned twice as much in half the time,

[14:19]but what if we held that as an inquiry,

[14:22]what would that look like?

[14:23]And so for me, I don't do calls after three.

[14:26]I go take my dog out for a walk

[14:28]and I spend family time and I go to bed really early.

[14:33]And so it's then we have more flexibility

[14:36]to create a life that actually works

[14:39]where it's not just these crash and burn burnout cycles,

[14:44]which is so common and I've been through so many

[14:47]burnout cycles in my own career.

[14:49]So that's kind of the vision here.

[14:51]Is it like to each his or her own,

[14:54]it's not for me to say what you should do,

[14:57]but to just drop the prescription of what we feel like,

[15:01]even on social media.

[15:03]I called sailing the sea of shiny sheds.

[15:05]Like there's so many shiny sheds that we can impose

[15:09]on ourselves when we look across the fence

[15:12]to see what other people are doing.

[15:14]And I encourage everybody to just a really question,

[15:17]is this energizing me genuinely to my core

[15:20]or is it something I can drop all together?

[15:23]Just saying.

[15:24]I'm totally gonna do with the,

[15:26]is the straining or energizing me?

[15:27]Yeah.

[15:28]Testing earlier.

[15:30]Yes.

[15:31]And for your team as well.

[15:32]So if you work with team members,

[15:34]I once spent an hour just having that conversation,

[15:37]that one question of the work you're doing with me,

[15:40]what do you find most energizing

[15:41]and what's most draining?

[15:43]And then I would just ask,

[15:43]what else, what else, what else?

[15:45]And we spent an hour just unpacking.

[15:47]And I always tell them, you can't offend me.

[15:50]You won't offend me.

[15:51]If whatever you tells me that's draining,

[15:53]I don't take that personally.

[15:54]I just, and I might not be able to take it off your plate

[15:57]tomorrow, but together we could solve for it.

[16:00]We could figure out if there's a way to streamline it,

[16:03]delegate it even to someone else,

[16:04]stop doing it all together.

[16:05]There's always a way,

[16:07]because I don't want anyone on my team to be doing work

[16:09]that they find draining,

[16:10]because they're probably not gonna do a great job at it.

[16:12]If it's not things that they enjoy.

[16:14]Yep, no, you're absolutely right.

[16:16]I love this golden hour.

[16:18]Like what's your most energetic window in the day

[16:21]and then like how should you spend it?

[16:22]That's such a smart way to think about time and productivity.

[16:26]I mean, I know a lot of authors talk about this

[16:27]because they feel most productive and creative,

[16:30]particularly novelist, I found,

[16:32]when they first wake up in the morning.

[16:34]Like get up and just go right in it

[16:35]when you're sort of in a dream state or whatever.

[16:38]And I'm like, that's not necessarily when I would buy it now.

[16:40]I'm writing a novel.

[16:41]I tried it once, I knocked over a class and I was like,

[16:44]oh my gosh, no, not for mine.

[16:45]I know.

[16:46]I almost let the house on fire

[16:47]when I was up to early ones.

[16:49]Yes, I would hear pile of hook, yeah.

[16:51]I heard and everything.

[16:52]So tell me, yeah, just tell me about that.

[16:54]Should everybody just go through and think like,

[16:56]what, like when is my most,

[16:58]when I'm in the zone type of timing

[17:00]and like what should I be doing at that time of day?

[17:03]I mean, it's so simple, but so smart.

[17:05]So golden hour is when that's the period.

[17:08]Just before sunrise or just before around sunset

[17:12]when people are like bathing golden light

[17:14]and photographers shoot at that time often.

[17:17]And it's to our own circadian rhythms.

[17:20]Exactly as you said, Zippy, it's like,

[17:22]when are you most energetic?

[17:24]And McKinsey research shows that executives are five times

[17:28]more productive when they're in a flow state than when they're not.

[17:31]That's kind of to me stating the obvious.

[17:33]Like we all know when we're at our creative

[17:36]and energetic best, we can get 10 times

[17:38]as much done as when we're in the lull in the afternoon

[17:41]when one of my clients said to me,

[17:42]I don't even know my own name.

[17:45]And so the idea is not letting anyone else have that time.

[17:50]So don't allocate it to email or meetings or calls carve it out.

[17:54]And that's a good place for those founder time blocks,

[17:57]which is when you're at your best

[17:58]so that you can just, you can get all your work done

[18:01]for the day practically if it's in that window

[18:04]instead of getting drained by emails and calls

[18:07]and then somehow you're left with the scraps

[18:10]for your own energy.

[18:11]And it's just not, I find it almost impossible.

[18:14]You do create a work too.

[18:15]It's almost impossible to do creative things

[18:18]once you're zapped for the day.

[18:20]Sure. Even when is your best window?

[18:22]When do you feel the most energized?

[18:24]My worst window for sure.

[18:26]I was like, you, I used to stop.

[18:29]I say used to because I'm still kind of clinging onto it

[18:31]by one dangling little thread,

[18:33]but I wouldn't schedule anything after three

[18:36]until again around six when I would do like a book event

[18:38]or whatever.

[18:39]So I could pick up my kids at school and be with them

[18:41]and just like do busy work or whatever.

[18:43]Nothing I had to interact with somebody else or whatever.

[18:46]I think it's wanted to go for ice cream.

[18:47]I could just go for ice cream or whatever.

[18:50]So I think I've been doing that for so long

[18:52]that now occasionally I'm like, oh gosh,

[18:54]I really do need this meeting.

[18:55]So I'm just gonna make time for like this one day.

[18:58]But even when I sit at like four and I try,

[19:02]it's just my worst time.

[19:03]It's my worst time.

[19:05]And then sometimes I'm like,

[19:07]is this how most people feel all the time?

[19:10]Right.

[19:10]Because then they would never get anything done.

[19:13]And I'm like, maybe that's why people look at me

[19:14]and they're like, how are you so productive?

[19:15]And I'm like, I don't usually feel like this.

[19:18]Usually I'm like, I'm going so fast because you're so right.

[19:21]I also had a friend point out that as a,

[19:25]so when you're self employed,

[19:27]your time is a premium and you want to have as few

[19:30]or as little meetings on the calendar as possible.

[19:33]In most cases, I guess unless you're

[19:34]a super extrovert and you just love me to be with people.

[19:37]But then for people who work in companies,

[19:40]they have to be at work all day.

[19:42]So sometimes when like those of us on the outside

[19:45]consultants are working with companies,

[19:47]they'll suggest let's have a weekly sync

[19:49]leading up to the event.

[19:51]And that's no skin off their back

[19:52]because they have to fill their time anyway.

[19:54]They're gonna be in meetings anyway.

[19:55]So they're more apt to suggest meetings and calls

[19:59]whereas those of us.

[20:00]Where we work for ourselves

[20:02]The goal is the opposite, you know, the incentive is the opposite as few meetings as possible

[20:07]So even just noticing that has helped has helped me set more boundaries and parameters for even client work

[20:14]Like if I do a speaking engagement, it comes with one pre-event strategy session or if I'm gonna do a free event

[20:20]There's no

[20:22]Call in advance. I'll come on to the event half an hour early for and that same time. It's the same way. Yes. Yeah

[20:28]But I'm not gonna do something

[20:34]Like I can handle it whatever it is. Yeah, I think it's amazing when podcasters require a pre-call and I

[20:41]Get why they do that, but I'm thinking how on earth that means you're doing double the amount of work

[20:47]Yeah, there's no way. No, no, no

[20:49]Yeah, I love also your always be listening chapter

[20:54]Systematize listening to your community by building listening moments into all that you do regularly review the feedback to help determine product improvements and what to build next

[21:03]Very smart. Yeah, that's it with your team and and with the consumers of whatever you're doing. I like how how is this going?

[21:10]What do you think and all of this is about?

[21:13]Again coming back to systems like what can you build once that you don't even have to think about again?

[21:19]But it builds in a listening mechanism. So a very straightforward example both of us probably have newsletters in the news

[21:28]letter

[21:28]Once someone new signs up the second one can say here's a quick survey. I'd love to hear what's on your mind

[21:33]What's interesting to you or what's the biggest challenge that I can be most helpful with and it or in your case of you

[21:39]I know you just want to the magazine like

[21:41]what types of books are you most

[21:44]Interested and what types of author events would you be most interested in and so that survey then continues to work for you

[21:51]Every single time a new person joins and they fill it out and then you have all this data that you can turn to

[21:56]Maybe you don't need you could review it regularly

[21:58]But just when you are in a planning session for the next quarter of the next year. It's already there. It's already captured

[22:05]Yeah, you right. Maybe I should do a survey

[22:08]We're going through our strategy for Zivi Mag content for 2023

[22:14]But then I was like, maybe we should just do a poll like you

[22:17]Right and do a poll as a one-off and then and then build it in to a welcome series and

[22:23]Welcome series. Yeah, and like, you know, you can incentivize

[22:28]But I don't even think you need to I think people are generally happy to fill things out

[22:31]But it could even say like you know every quarter would give away a book or a sign book or a

[22:37]Sign copies of something. Yeah, that's the way to when I first started my newsletter

[22:42]Like a couple years ago with this is like 10 iterations of the newsletter

[22:45]The newsletter is like the bane of magazines, but I know

[22:48]Never ending right never ending always changing never like doing what I wanted to do

[22:55]I hear you but I used to in the beginning say that I would give personalized book recommendations

[23:01]If you feel that if you if you signed up for the newsletter, which actually

[23:05]Gave me the most amazing feedback ever and I should probably go back to doing this because I really was doing personalized book recommendations for everybody

[23:13]And I asked them all these questions like what of what are some books you've read lately

[23:17]What are you in the mood for what do you not like but it I learned so much about reading habits from those answers

[23:23]Which I still have somewhere I should really dig them out and that in fact

[23:26]That's why I started offering a lot more thrillers

[23:29]I started covering a lot more thrillers on my podcast because I don't read three thrillers myself

[23:33]But like everybody wanted to read thrillers and said that would see

[23:36]And I was like okay, so now I include thrillers, you know

[23:40]I could even see you having people fill that out

[23:43]Let's say when they joined the newsletter and then you randomly pick one and you could even do a little podcast spot

[23:49]Where you at the end of a show or as an interstitial like an in between a sode

[23:54]Where you pick one and so people know if they fill it out

[23:57]They have a chance of getting that your book wrecks even if it's not always a one-to-one ratio

[24:03]I think that is so cool

[24:05]Maybe I'll do something with them. Yeah, I don't let it to the to the list

[24:09]I know

[24:11]I'm gonna get up where I can even find my list is where I am today. I know I hear you

[24:15]Anyway, what do you do when you get like totally stressed? Like I know you talked about this one of having these like

[24:21]I want to burn my whole company down moment. Yes

[24:23]What are your coping non-work related coping mechanisms like what's your most embarrassing?

[24:29]Oh, I must be embarrassed. I don't know or just like you're

[24:32]You know the most just like what do you do?

[24:35]I'm just hit these moments and I'm I actually had one kind of got a cold yesterday

[24:40]Where I just call it being glued to the couch. I can't move. I can't even look at my laptop

[24:46]I can't do anything

[24:48]I can barely even communicate to my team that I'm gonna be offline today or this week

[24:52]It's like when those hit they hit so hard for me and I just need to give myself permission to

[24:58]To take the break

[24:59]Mm-hmm the break often lasts like what I need is often three times longer than what my mind tells me

[25:05]I should do, you know, like my mind will go okay, but you're gonna get back at it tomorrow, right?

[25:09]But then my body's maybe still saying

[25:12]Absolutely not anymore time and I've just noticed that's kind of how I am

[25:16]I mean some people are really able to

[25:19]Work so diligently so consistently like I know none of us are machines

[25:24]But they're almost able to work like a machine

[25:27]And they don't even need as much sleep and I've just never been that way. I really go through ebbs and flows

[25:31]So when I also call it the furry rest monster

[25:35]Like I picture it as that blue fluffy monster from

[25:38]Monsters ink and I just imagine that the furry rest monster comes out of the couch and like glues me to it

[25:45]I'm telling you I'm in one of those weeks right now

[25:47]And I just have to let it happen

[25:49]And I've tried over time to drop the guilds around it and trust that if I rest enough

[25:56]I'll get back at it

[25:57]Nothing is urgent and nothing is gonna catch fire. I mean it's just so rare in my business

[26:02]That something so catastrophic is gonna happen if I don't open my laptop or check the email for a day

[26:08]Even a week probably nothing would fall apart and this is where having at least a tiny team

[26:14]And some systems is helpful because it's nice knowing that

[26:17]There is some buffer for days like that and I can delegate things to my team

[26:22]But um, so we try to catch the really important things

[26:24]But I just also remind myself like nothing nothing is so urgent in my business

[26:30]That anyone's really gonna care

[26:33]How about use if you I'm curious what your strategies are

[26:36]Oh, when I get stressed. I just know I cry. I know I cry. I eat. I don't know

[26:42]But the thing is even when I'm my most annoyed or my most overwhelmed

[26:46]What I want to do is read so yeah, it's like I

[26:50]So then I just go right back to what I do. I mean, I love what I do

[26:53]It's just sometimes it gets too much. It's it's just overwhelming and so

[26:57]But I don't know. I don't mind being overwhelmed. I guess a lot of the time

[27:00]But yeah, sometimes it gets that breaking point where it's too much

[27:04]Right, and it's not it's not that the reading itself is too much

[27:07]But there's all the kind of infrastructure around it and the

[27:11]Deathines and projects and pings from team members and yeah, I just can so relate to that

[27:16]Or if like anyone else gets upset for any reason

[27:19]Yeah, and I'm like then I

[27:21]Yeah, it looks emotional. Yeah, the emotional. That's whole or roller coaster completely

[27:26]Yeah, so what's your advice on finding free time

[27:31]Not just for people running businesses, but the average totally stressed busy person

[27:37]How can everybody listening find a little free time for them

[27:41]To remember who they are. What's the secret? Well, I love love what you appended to the question to remember who they are that's beautiful

[27:49]The

[27:51]Agile development quote each time you repeat a task take one step toward automating it

[27:56]I love that. I kind of live by that

[27:58]Another way to think about it is what small steps can you take today that will free your time far into the future

[28:04]So for anybody listening or watching just hold that as an inquiry

[28:08]What small steps could I take today?

[28:10]Because if you can just step back on your life a little bit

[28:13]And an example I give often is putting a household product on subscription like paper towels

[28:18]If you just put in a lot of subscription at the cadence when you last ordered and

[28:22]Okay, now they're gonna arrive every four months

[28:24]You never have to think of it again

[28:26]It's not like we got more efficient at ordering paper towels

[28:29]It's that you never have to think about it again

[28:31]Unless you're gonna like move out of your house for six months

[28:34]So things like that just looking for little things you can do

[28:38]The example I mentioned and the way that the way to discover

[28:42]These opportunities is by noticing what frustrates you

[28:46]Where is their friction at home

[28:48]With your errands anywhere that there's friction in the end of your annoyed or frustrated

[28:54]That's the perfect place to look is like, okay, I just found this frustration area

[28:59]I'm sick of dealing with this or I'm sick of repeating myself

[29:01]I'm tired of the how annoying this thing is to do

[29:06]That's where we're all so resourceful and creative

[29:08]If you just take a couple minutes

[29:10]Think how can I design a better process here and

[29:13]Gear into you will find some breakthroughs

[29:15]In areas large and small and the small ones add up

[29:18]So oh my gosh, I say start there

[29:21]I'm taking this so to heart you have no idea

[29:24]Thank you

[29:25]Really, thank you so honestly

[29:27]Thank you for your mug

[29:29]Thank you for the help

[29:30]Anyway, I really got so much out of it

[29:33]So I'm so grateful for coming on the podcast

[29:35]Well, that means the world

[29:36]Thank you, Debbie

[29:37]Thank you for having me

[29:38]And I'm just so grateful that we cost paths this year

[29:42]IRL

[29:42]And now for the show

[29:44]So yes

[29:45]You do

[29:45]Yeah

[29:46]Thank you

[29:47]Okay

[29:47]All right, bye Jenny

[29:48]Bye

[29:49]Thanks everyone for listening

[29:50]Thanks

[29:52]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books

[29:55]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at zibi Owens

[29:58]And at Moms Don't Have Time to Read

[30:00]Books, also sign up for my newsletter at zibbowens.com

[30:03]and sign up for my virtual book club

[30:05]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.

[30:07]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound

[30:10]for the Sound Editing,

[30:11]and thank you to Morning Moon Productions

[30:13]for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.