Write This Down with Maddy Birdcage

You’re Not Lazy — You’re Unclear

• Maddy Birdcage • Episode 2

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 31:43

Send a text

Burnout, procrastination, and perfectionism aren’t flaws. They’re symptoms of misalignment. Here’s how to fix the root, not punish the symptoms.

To work with us, book your client assessment call at https://www.birdcageangeladvisors.com/hire-an-angel/

Maddy Birdcage:

Welcome to Write this Down with Maddy Birdcage. I'm Maddy, founder of Birdcage Marketing, birdcage School, birdcage Studios and Birdcage Ocean Voyages. I'm a psychology-informed marketer, serial entrepreneur, and my life's purpose is to make your delusional goals a reality. If you want more than just a business that looks good from the outside, I'm going inside my own brands to share practical, proven strategies that transformed my business from near bankruptcy to building a multi-million dollar company just 12 months later. Let me give you the weekly aha moments to break free from outdated business and life rules so you can prove them all wrong and, trust me, you'll want to write this down.

Maddy Birdcage:

Hey friends, Maddy Birdcage here and welcome back to another episode of Write this Down.

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, whether you are tuning in via your favorite podcast app or you are watching me here on YouTube with the weather and the location as a paid actor, today we are diving deep into something that has been misunderstood for too long, and that is laziness. Did I trigger you with that word?

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, today's episode is personal, because this is something that I have struggled with myself and, based on how many of you voted on this topic on my Instagram stories, I know it's something that you relate to as well Burnout, procrastination, perfectionism and the uncomfortable suspicion that, hey, maybe I'm just lazy. But recent studies reveal that this isn't just you and me that are struggling with this. In fact, 88% of working adults admit that they procrastinate at least one hour every single day and I have a feeling it might actually be higher for some of us and 77% of us have experienced burnout, which has negatively impacted our careers, which is crazy. Clearly there is an epidemic here, but here's the truth you are not lazy. You never were, no matter what your mother or your teacher may have said. You're actually just misaligned. You're unclear and you're unfocused, and, as an entrepreneur or an empowered career person, I know you want this to stop because it's frustrating and that is why you're here. But the challenge is that, in order to get clear, it's a very personal thing. You can't simply copy and paste someone else's clarity. Clarity is something deeply personal that you actually need to figure out yourself and, spoiler alert I've accidentally figured out a system that works for every single person that I've ever worked with on this to figure out the unique clarity signature, but we'll cover more on that later.

Maddy Birdcage:

So, as I mentioned in last week's episode, if you haven't listened to it, make sure you go back and you do, but this past year I hit a really hard wall. I'd built a seemingly successful business, the money was great, my life looked amazing on the outside, but I was still struggling daily with procrastination, with burnout. I would get exhausted, I would still get stuck and, very unlike me, I was actually starting to get trapped by perfectionism, which isn't something I really had dealt with in the past. But every task I had to complete it felt like climbing Mount Everest, and sometimes I just could never get myself to do things that I know I had to. But maybe you can relate.

Maddy Birdcage:

Are you hitting the snooze on your alarm seven times? Is your to-do list growing and growing, and yet the motivation doesn't? And so then you feel overwhelmed and you just give up on everything. Or maybe, like me, you find yourself avoiding tasks you know are crucial. Or maybe you're endlessly polishing things, but then they never get to that perfect state, and then, inevitably, you label yourself as lazy or not disciplined, which isn't helpful. So here's the uncomfortable truth You're punishing your symptoms instead of addressing the root cause of this lack of motivation.

Maddy Birdcage:

Because those feelings the burnout, the procrastination, the perfectionism they're actually, they're all signals. They're your brain and your body screaming that just something is not right. They're not the actual problem that you need to fight to solve. What I've discovered was that when actions and your true desires they're not lining up, it's because you lack clarity in where you're headed, and that is why your mind and your brain and your body resist. It pulls the handbrake. It's like driving around in a new city without a GPS. You don't know where you're meant to be driving, and so every road feels wrong and you're questioning it. And because your brain thinks it's wrong, it's actually trying to protect you from continuing down that wrong path and that resistance that looks and feels a lot like laziness, and then we start to spiral. But here is the good news Alignment can be fixed. You just need your own signature clarity.

Maddy Birdcage:

So today, due to popular demand, I am breaking down exactly what this feeling is, how it masquerades as laziness, burnout, perfectionism and how, crucially, how to find clarity, how to realign yourself and how to regain that effortless momentum when things just feel easy. So to get there, I'm going to share some insights from some of my favorite psychological studies, because understanding how my brain even works, that has transformed my habits and my behavior. So not only that, I'm also going to explain how these insights have guided my own life and helped countless other brands and marketers overcome this misalignment trap as well. As you might be aware, not only do I have my Bachelor in Media and my Master's in Communication Management, but I've also studied Consumer Psychology and Business Psychology both at uni, and it's just what I like to do in my spare time. That is my hobby. I don't read naughty fiction books, I read psychology books to unwind. And this obsession, this nerdy obsession. This is great news for you, because there have been some very interesting insights that have spoken to me, and I wanna share these with you. These insights have both taught me new things, but they've also reaffirmed ideas I already had about how to create a happy, productive workplace or nurturing high performers in my business and, as a founder, how to get the most out of myself. So I'd love to share these with you today, so you can break free from this very unhelpful feeling of laziness and that label that you put on yourself and instead start hitting the goals that are actually very much within reach. They're really not that far away from where you are now.

Maddy Birdcage:

Let's first quickly nerd out together. You know I love my psychology and, as I mentioned earlier, understanding how our brain works. I find that is the fastest way to change habits and behaviors, because it creates this awareness and if we understand what we're working with the operating system, it's a lot easier to change it. So, first up, there is this fantastic 2019 study by Eckhart and colleagues about procrastination, which, spoiler alert isn't just laziness or poor time management. This research that they did actually shows that procrastination is wait for it an emotional regulation strategy strategy. So, in other words, when you are avoiding a task, it's probably because doing that task triggers stress or anxiety for you, which you may have noticed. But this is just your brain trying to protect you by delaying something uncomfortable, and this is something that I really get the most. I'm wondering if you can relate to this. So, for example, if I have to do a task that is either something I haven't done before or it's out of my comfort zone, I tend to procrastinate on it, and it's not until I have a really hard deadline that I will actually get my butt into gear and do it. But for me and I'm pretty much guaranteeing that it's the same for you often if there is a task that stands between you and a result you deeply want. That is when you will procrastinate the most. It's because this is a protection strategy for the brain.

Maddy Birdcage:

It may feel easy to answer emails or play around in Canva on a new social media design or doing something that feels like you're getting a dopamine hit, like you're being productive. But what about putting that proposal together for the dream client who's reached out? Well, my brain will completely stall on it, because what I've realized is it's asking questions like what if I do put my best foot forward and it still doesn't work out? I'm going to be disappointed. Then I might even talk myself into being a failure and then use that as proof that maybe my dreams just aren't meant for me. So it might just be easier not to even do that proposal in the first place. And even if I do do it I know it wasn't to the best of my ability and that's why it didn't work out.

Maddy Birdcage:

But it gets even more sneaky. What if you do get that job and then you have to step up into a new level? That, my friends, is actually a fear of success, and that is where perfectionism comes into play. Now I also came across a groundbreaking 2019 meta-analysis by Curran and Hill. Now they discovered that perfectionism has actually increased over recent decades, which that doesn't surprise me, if I'm honest. Now, this study, it contributes it, largely because of society pressures that have increased unrealistic standards and, yes, the good old comparison trap that we see on social media. Now let me explain why this is affecting you. Because every day we're flooded with these ideas that people start this business and then the next day they go viral and then the rest is history and it's just been a straight line up.

Maddy Birdcage:

So when it doesn't happen instantly for you, you take that as a sign that maybe, just maybe, you're not good enough, you're not making it happen quickly enough. But that is not the case. The reality of business, of chasing any sort of dream, is that it is a goddamn rollercoaster. The overnight success stories that you see, they're probably 10 years in the making, or maybe, yes, maybe someone just got lucky. It does happen. But I promise you, after being on the inside of many of these brands and seeing the real detail, the numbers, the state of the founder's mind, easy come, easy go. And, if I'm honest, if I could choose whether to build my business foundations based on an overnight viral fluke where it came easy and quickly or on years of hard lessons learned. I would always choose the second, because when you have solid foundations, that's how you make the success last. Trust me, I have never learned anything from my successes, from things that just worked. Every lesson that I've ever learned has come from my failures, and damn, there's a lot of them. So how does this fit into my idea of clarity and how does clarity fix this?

Maddy Birdcage:

The reason that you are procrastinating or chasing perfectionism, it's actually your brain protecting you from danger. That is what I have figured out. We still operate off our cave membranes, right when it was safer to stick with what you could predict the hunting areas you could predict, the people you could predict rather than explore something new, a new tribe, a new forest, where you couldn't anticipate the dangers that lie ahead. You couldn't be prepared for it, which means now, today, where we're not hunting lions, your brain will make you stick in a situation that you hate. You might be getting no customers, your marketing might suck, everything is a struggle, your relationships aren't serving you, and yet your brain will keep you where you are and invent any excuses to stop you from taking action on the thing that will create a different outcome, because you can predict this shitty situation and you can deal with it. So what I'm saying is that chasing perfectionism, procrastinating these are fear reactions simply related to uncertainty, and you're specifically dealing with two key fears here fear of failure and fear of success. So let's quickly unpack these fears, because they're likely running your life without you even realizing it. In fact, I guarantee that they are running your life.

Maddy Birdcage:

Fear of failure it often shows up as procrastination. Think about it. When a task represents something significant, like pitching a dream client or launching a new product, or posting that social media video or launching a podcast, you delay that social media video or launching a podcast. You delay it Not because you're lazy, but because there is risk involved. What if you put everything into this pitch and it doesn't work out? What if you put everything into this product launch and it doesn't work out?

Maddy Birdcage:

Your brain worries that the disappointment, or worse, the embarrassment of being seen to try and fail it might confirm your worst fears about yourself that you are not good enough, not capable enough or not worthy enough of what you want. Procrastination is just your brain's attempt to avoid facing that emotional pain. On the other hand, though, we have an even sneakier fear, which is the fear of success, and that seems really really strange. But success can feel as scary as failure, and in my world it actually is. Because what if you do land that big client or your product sells out overnight? Suddenly you have to step up to this whole new level new responsibilities, new expectations, perhaps even new criticism. This is where perfectionism creeps in here as a way to control the outcomes. And try and well, try and control the outcomes and prevent unexpected changes. It convinces you that nothing is ever ready or good enough. So you just keep polishing it infinitely, protecting yourself from having to actually face the realities of success. Crazy, right.

Maddy Birdcage:

So what is the solution? It's clarity, because when you have absolute clarity about who you are, what you truly want and exactly where you're going, these fears begin to dissolve, they don't seem as important because you're focused on where you want to go. Clarity becomes your mental gps. It's guiding you confidently through this uncertainty period. It allows you to take on more risk. It tells your brain hey, I know exactly where I'm headed. Plan for for this, I'm safe, let's move forward, and things like mental rehearsal and using meditation that will help you get there even faster.

Maddy Birdcage:

So, in order for you to identify where you might be sitting in all of this because this might be the first time you've heard about this I've put together some questions that will give you that guaranteed aha moment. I promise you in every episode, to understand if you have a fear of failure or, even sneakier, a fear of success. And I'm going to be honest the first time I was introduced to this idea of a fear of success, it was back in 2018, and I thought it was rubbish. How can I be afraid that I'm going to be successful? That is all that I want right. Fast forward seven years and it is still something that I'm constantly working on this fear of success and the procrastination and the perfectionism that comes with it, and I'm breaking it down piece by piece at every new level. Okay, so let's first dive into a fear of failure which you may already realize is operating somewhere. You procrastinate because, deep down, you're afraid that taking action could lead to rejection, criticism or failure.

Maddy Birdcage:

Your tasks seem overwhelming because they represent risk. Your clarity fix is to get clear on why the outcome matters to you, so that you can build a plan that makes failure a learning step and not a dead end. I actually don't believe in any such thing as failure. So what I want to ask yourself honestly, if you're feeling this, what specific failure are you most afraid of right now? How would your perspective change if you knew failure was actually impossible and only feedback and growth existed? I want you to reframe what failure actually means. It's not failing, it is simply learning. Once you start thinking like that, you will take more risks. You will do the things that scare you, because failure is not an option with where you're headed right. That's why we need to get clear.

Maddy Birdcage:

Birdcage School didn't start as just another course and, in fact, it will never be that. It started because of demand from you. You saw the work we were doing with our agency clients, what they were achieving, and demanded that we make an on-demand school that teaches you everything we know about psychology-informed strategy, marketing funnels and content creation. And you were so convincing. How could I say no Today? Birdcage School offers support at every stage of your business, whether you haven't even launched yet, you've just started out or you've been working for decades on growing your brand. I promise massive breakthroughs and aha moments in every single one of our programs and as a special gift to you. For any program worth over a thousand us dollars, you'll get get 10% off using the code podcast10. If you're in Australia, visit birdcageschoolcomau, or for everywhere else, birdcageschoolcom. Now back to the episode.

Maddy Birdcage:

Okay, let's look at the fear of success. So are you the type of person that obsessively refines and polishes everything because, subconsciously, you might be afraid of what success might demand of you? You might worry that success will disrupt your comfort zone or force you to face criticism at a higher level or lose friends. Your clarity fix here is to define exactly what success looks like and to reassure yourself that you are actually capable of handling it step by step, and your life really doesn't have to change unless you want it to. So ask yourself honestly what scares me most about achieving the success I say that I want. And if I achieve the success, what am I worried that I might actually lose?

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, when you're clear on your goals, when you are aware of your fears and you're actively managing them through deliberate, aligned action and even journaling and meditation and some of the other tools that I always talk about, your failure and success, they are seen as opportunities, not threats. This is when tasks flow naturally, because clarity overrides fear-based responses and this resistance that you're feeling right now that's blocking you from taking that next step. It just goes away Because remember fear and misalignment they are not permanent states. They're just signs that clarity is missing. And the moment you name and understand your fears which is what we've already done you've already taken the first powerful step towards clarity. And simply by listening to this episode, your subconscious is already ticking over Okay, so how do we actually find clarity and how do we build it?

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, it is kind of a brick wall, because first what we need to do is find clarity about what you personally want first. First, before you can start towards clarity in your business and clarity in your marketing. Now, when we consult with our clients through our angel consulting services or when they come through our online programs, a lot of people are actually shocked and alarmed to find that the first step we take is personal exploration around what they actually want out of life. Yes, our consulting clients come to us for marketing help, but what I found is that if you're trying to market a business that you're not sure will even create the life that you want, you're not going to do the work. And, more importantly, because we strongly believe that marketing should be created from inside your brand, with a founder having a strong personal brand presence. You need to figure out your personal clarity, because people buy from people, so you need to be a clear person, to clearly sell your business.

Maddy Birdcage:

Only then do we work on the marketing strategy, the messaging clarity and all the actions that we have to take how to use social media. This is how we get our clients and our students to achieve results that they never thought possible, with less effort, in less time than ever. And it's why a lot of other programs and consulting and coaches they just don't get there because they skip this very important step that nobody else knows about. They skip this very important step that nobody else knows about Because when our clients and our students, when they're clear, they are confident, they're in control and they're building a business that's aligned with the life that they want. So then your content and your marketing it just it comes pouring out. You almost can't help yourself from posting because it's like it's just you that needs to come out. And if your marketing isn't currently just flowing out of you and feeling easy, like word vomit, almost, that is a massive sign that you need to go back and do these initial steps, because 99% of you haven't.

Maddy Birdcage:

So let's first talk about life clarity. Now, in our favorite self-membership which is just 31 bucks a month and you even get a free trial period, because I think this is so important that every single person does it takes you through the following steps, and this is what you need to do in order to get clear on your personal life goals. First, we look at your life core values. Now these are three to five pillars that help you filter any and all of your decisions. One of my life pillars the first one is actually ease. So if I'm making a decision on which way to go with anything in my life, I ask myself is this easy or does this choice create ease in my life? And if it doesn't, I need to rethink it. But if it does, I make the decision and I don't think about it again.

Maddy Birdcage:

It's like turning left into that street. If you knew you had to turn left into that street, you would turn left into that street and not give a second thought. But if you are driving around aimlessly, you turn left. You're constantly oh, should I have turned right? Should I have gone back the other way? That's a lot of energy to be spending on second guessing yourself, and that is slowing you down.

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, once you have a filter to push all of your goals in your life through, we need to create my version of a vision board. Now don't get me wrong yes, photos are a part of it, but it's almost like the last step. The first part is working through all of the categories in your life career, home, leisure, travel, family, etc. And choosing 12-month goals, maybe just one for each of these categories. So once we have our goal, we need to figure out what am I wanting out of this goal? What do I want to feel out of this goal? Why do I want this goal in the first place? Then we need to list out the version of me, the favorite self version of me, that has this what are the things that they do daily, weekly, monthly, as a one-off and, finally, what does she believe about herself, about the world, based on that goal? So let me give a tangible example.

Maddy Birdcage:

For a really long time, my goal was to grow to 100K TikTok followers, and I'm happy to say I am almost there. When I set that goal first, I had to gain clarity around. Why do I even want this goal in the first place? Do I want it? Because it's just a number and I think I should have that amount of followers for simply bannatory metrics. If that was the case, I would have scrapped that goal and gone with something else, because so many of you are trying to hit goals that you don't even want. It's not aligned, it's someone else's goal, and this is exactly why clarity can't be copied. You need to find your own signature clarity for yourself, based on your life values, your life goals. Do you see how everything is starting to work in together, why we do the life goals first? So for me, I want the 100k followers because I want my ideas to feel heard. It's part of my growth pillar. I want to feel like I have influence amongst people that I want to help. I want a sense of a movement behind me that it's not just this journey that I'm on, but it's a whole group of us that are doing it together and we're changing the world together through our businesses. Now I had to get clear on what this version of myself does in order to be living in that goal.

Maddy Birdcage:

She has a content plan that she sticks to. She works with an editor. She works with a marketing strategist. She has a system that helps her show up, even if life gets busy or she gets sick, or her kids get sick, or she goes away or she just doesn't feel like showing up on social media. She responds to comments and messages and she shows up for her followers. They are the things that 100k TikTok follower Maddie that's what she does. Then I had to believe that I have a valuable voice. What is it that 100k Maddie believes? That she has a valuable voice, that people are being helped by the content she creates, that it's safe for her to be seen by millions of people.

Maddy Birdcage:

Do you see how this goes beyond just writing down 100k followers and putting a photo on a vision board? Because once all that's done, across all of your life categories, you now have a complete, clear to-do list of what your day, your week, your month should look like and you literally can create a schedule for yourself directly working towards those goals, not just taking random action, losing motivation and then calling yourself lazy and spiraling into a pit of despair. This, this is the power of clarity, my friends, I really hope this is hitting home for you. If it is, make sure you DM me on Instagram. This is how you hack your brain to change your life. So, in terms of some action steps, I have some questions that I'd like you to answer. Make sure, if you are not in a place to write these down right now, you come back to this episode and you do this when you do have some time and space. So what I would love for you to do either use your notes app on your phone in an ideal world, you write this down with a pen and paper in your journal and I want you to ask these questions of yourself honestly what in your life feels off or heavy right now? What do you hate doing? And if you dropped external expectations, what would you genuinely pursue? Not what your mom wants, not what your teachers want, not what your husband or your wife wants. And then, what is one clear step I can take towards reaching those goals today, even if it's just small, even if it's just signing up to the free trial of the favorite self membership and trying a few things on for size, reading through a few of the teachings, are you feeling vulnerable right now? That is totally understandable, because alignment can actually feel very confronting, because it's a different way of thinking, but it is incredibly empowering and will change your life.

Maddy Birdcage:

What comes to mind is Jess, a student who's in our full library program from Align Studios. So she deeply struggled with burnout, procrastination in her web design business and she actually joined the full library thinking, okay, this is what's going to fix my web design business. It's going to finally get me through, take me to the next level, right business. It's going to finally get me through, take me to the next level, right. And yet, after just a few weeks of doing the last strategy in the full library and then doing the marketing strategy piece, she had this huge realization that this business isn't what she wants at all. Imagine how confronting that would feel. Imagine how that would kind of make you feel sick to your stomach that this business that you've been building, it's not what you want.

Maddy Birdcage:

So what did she do? Instead of just pretending everything's fine, she took radical responsibility and a huge step forward and she started a new business, a coaching business. She put her web design business to the side. This was a business she's been working on for years. It just wasn't working. And then she wrote a new marketing strategy following our formula. From that strategy, she took the advice that we give in the action, which is the second part of the full library, and she posted content to a new Instagram account with zero followers and after just 12 posts, she signed $25,000 worth of clients in 10 days.

Maddy Birdcage:

That is how quickly and easily it happened for her, and that is how quickly and easily it can happen for you If you are clear on what you want, if you are honest with what you want and if you're brave enough to put aside the misaligned actions you've been taking, the misaligned business you've potentially been building, and be honest with yourself and show up the way that you want. It's a terrifying act and I've had to do it myself, actually recently. But when she realized that burnout and this feeling was actually misalignment, not laziness, not something she was doing wrong, she could finally build the coaching business of her dreams. More importantly, her life felt energized and powerful again. She showed up to our group call as a brand new bitch. It was incredible and that's when she told me all of this and I just it brought tears to my eyes because I have been there and I know how brave she had to be in order to be honest with herself and take this step. But it just goes to show how quickly and this is why I'm saying you're not far from your goals because if you're aligned and clear, you can actually get there really, really quickly.

Maddy Birdcage:

Now I'm not saying you need to shut down your current business. What I'm saying is that there are different ways of doing things. We don't have to do things the way that old fashioned business or the right way of doing things, and actually, through this podcast, this is how I want to empower you guys that you can create a business and a life that is different to what everyone thinks you should be doing, as long as it is aligned with what you want to do and I believe this is the next wave of business. It's aligned business owners taking aligned action, making the world better by making ourselves happy. So now it's your turn.

Maddy Birdcage:

By listening to this episode, you have already taken steps forward towards alignment and clarity, and maybe there is a niggling thing in the back of your mind that's like how I've been doing things. Maybe that's not how I want to do things. So if you're ready to find personal clarity, I would say the first step is the favorite self-mindset membership to take those first few steps forward into personal clarity. And if you're ready to fully realign your entire business strategy and your mindset and your actions. The full library is the program I would recommend, with proven strategies, psychology-backed tools, clarity and confident action. It just becomes your second nature and it gets you to where you want to go very quickly.

Maddy Birdcage:

Now, if time is of the essence and you want your hand held to reach your goals even faster, that is what our angel consulting services will do for you. We get there by working one-on-one with our senior strategists to hold your hand through this entire, sometimes scary process. So feel free to book a call with us and we can explain that whole process to you and let you know if we think it's right. Remember, clarity isn't optional. It's not a nice to have, it is essential. So thank you so much for joining me today.

Maddy Birdcage:

Until next time, stay clear, stay aligned and please remember you are not lazy. You are simply ready for something better. And just a quick note if you love this episode, I would really, really appreciate if you could leave a review on this new podcast. It helps us grow, it helps us reach more people like you and I, and together we can create a world of people that love what they're doing. They are happy when they go to work, they're happy when they come home and that happiness and that joy and that fulfillment just ripples out to everyone else. Because that is what I believe the future of business should become Just being fucking happy. See you guys.