Myo Life

#29 Too Busy to Start Your Myo Biz? This 3-Step Time Audit Is Your Fix

• Carmen Ball • Episode 29

Share episode

Let's Connect! Text me here or email me myotrainingacademy@gmail.com

In this episode of the Myo Life podcast, Carmen shares her signature 3-step time audit process to help you stop bleeding hours and start building your myofunctional therapy business with clarity and focus. If you’ve ever felt “too busy” to work on your dream, this episode will show you it’s not about having more time — it’s about having better priorities.

"Is It Time To Ditch Hygiene?" is a self assessment workbook to help you get honest about where you are, see what's actually possible in a career you’ll love and to help you decide what comes next!

Speaker 1:

Hey, I'm Carmen and welcome to Mayo Life. That's short for my Outrageous Life, which is exactly the kind of life I get to live since I found the courage to ditch dental hygiene and build a life I'm bonkers about as a myofunctional therapist and entrepreneur. Here you will find all the things myo business and how to build a life that you, too, are bonkers about. I'm very happy you're here. Shall we dive in Well, hello, friend, and welcome back to the MyoLife podcast. I'm Carmen, the Director of Bravery at the Myofunctional Therapy Training Academy, and I'm so glad you're here. We have a great topic, but also just a heads up. We also have some landscaping going on, so nothing like hitting record on a podcast that you have to do right now and then find out that your lawn team is getting to work. So if you hear it, my apologies. So back to that topic today.

Speaker 1:

If you have got a dream of starting your myofunctional therapy business or maybe you've already gotten started and then you're just dreaming about when it's going to be profitable or you're going to be making some money, or maybe you're dreaming about a life that doesn't involve, you know, dental hygiene snore, snore, wink, wink but your calendar might be saying like ha ha, yeah, nice, try. Then. This one is for you, because today we're going to be blowing up that lie. You are not too busy, you just need a better system, and I've got one for you a simple three-step time audit that's going to show you exactly where your hours are leaking from and how to fix it quickly. So three steps. Step one track it. So the first thing that you need to know is some data, okay, so I want you to track everything you do for three to five days. Okay, and you can do this easily on your Google Calendar. Basically, you take a time diary, everything you know. You can do 15 minute increments there and so just track it all and you're going to keep track of everything.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so, time spent at your job taking care of your dental hygiene patients um, all the way to your doom, scroll your TikTok spirals, even driving to target for just that one thing that you need. Okay, so use whatever tool works for you Notebook, iphone notes, even a time tracking app. The goal here, my friend, is total honesty, no judgment. You're just trying to get clarity. Okay, it's not about guilt.

Speaker 1:

Most of us think and you can't see me, but I'm doing think in air quotes. Most of us think we don't have time, but in reality, we're just not aware of how we're spending it. So the spoiler alert here is that you're probably just bleeding hours. You, you didn't even know that you had. Okay, and this is very real for most of my students.

Speaker 1:

When we do time audits, when they are complaining about how they don't have time to get stuff done, they're just spending it, um, in silly ways. So step number one is to track it. Okay, so once you have that data, then step two is going to be, uh, that you're going to score it. So you're going to take your log or you're going to look at your Google calendar and you're going to score each activity. Okay, red, yellow or green. Now you can turn these colors in your Google Calendar, which is super easy. Or, if you're old school like me, you can just get out a pen and paper and write these activities down and get out the markers. Okay, red. So this is your straight up time waster. So this is your doom scrolling your TV, your Netflix binges, anything that is just wasting time. I don't have to tell you about this, you know it. Okay, now yellow is going to be your necessary but neutral thing. So this is obviously your job. Your hygiene shifts, your chores Like this is lifing, okay Groceries, laundry, um, church activities 4-H all of those things that require your time, uh, tommy's tea ball, jujitsu, all of that kind of stuff. And then green is going to be your business building goals. So if you're just dreaming about starting your business, then this is going to be like doing your Ditch Hygiene Academy trainings.

Speaker 1:

If you're already kind of in business and you're just trying to get, you know, some wind in your sails, maybe that's writing your Instagram content, uh, booking consults, those free assessments, doing exams, delivering therapy all of that is a big deal. So what you need to be asking yourself is is this activity fueling my dream or draining my energy? So one of my students realized that she was losing hours every week just by rerunning errands because she wasn't organized or because she didn't make a list or she didn't meal plan correctly, okay, so she had to stop at the grocery store. So once she fixed that, she gained back a bunch of hours. And then you know, was was booking clients and had more time to work. So it works, okay.

Speaker 1:

And then step number three is you're going to shift it. So here comes the good part, time doesn't magically appear. You make it. No time fairy is coming your way. There's not a magic lamp with a genie. We all have the same 24 hours and really what sets the successful people, the doers, apart from just really the dreamers and the not doers, is really how you use your time.

Speaker 1:

So step three is really important, and this is where the action is, and that step is to shift it. So you're going to cut it out or delegate the reds, okay. Those things that somebody else can do, okay. You're going to, or or just get rid of them, okay, and there's many, many red tasks that you're doing that you don't need. Okay. You're going to simplify the yellows and you are going to ruthlessly protect the greens, and so that might mean turning off Netflix an hour earlier so you can work on your business, or you can do your Ditch Hygiene Academy lesson.

Speaker 1:

This might mean knowing what your enough is, so that you can cut back one day of hygiene to have a sacred business day. And so, for those of you who don't know what your enough is, your enough is basically the bottom line on, not your dream life, not the money that you, that you need to live your dream life. But really, the money that you need to, uh, keep beanie weenies on the table and keep the lights on, okay. So, for example, if you're enough requires requires you only to work 15 hours a month instead of, uh, 60 hours a month, then there's room to to get some white space so that that could be sacred business building time. Okay. And then other things that you might not have thought of that, let me tell you, are absolute life changers. Is like let Instacart handle your groceries so that you can handle your dreams, okay. Or hiring a housekeeper so that you can work on your business.

Speaker 1:

I know when I made these investments in my own life at first I just felt like who the hell am I to have a housekeeper? Or who am I to have somebody, you know, a personal shopper that brings stuff to me? But since somebody else can't do my business, it is hard for me to hire somebody to come into my business. I remember, um, my business manager once, my, my growth manager, was trying to write a podcast uh, not a podcast, a blog for me. And you, you guys, bless her heart. I love her, but it it took me more time to clean up all the stuff that she all the terms she was using, that wasn't in industry standard, that kind of stuff. So we did that one time and after she spent more time than correcting that blog, she emailed me back and said this is best served for you to do it. I'm going to do something else, okay.

Speaker 1:

So if you, if that's kind of the your sentiment, which it probably will be, because nobody that you can hire is going to write your content or your emails or make your lead magnets, they're not going to, they're not you Okay. They don't have your knowledge, and so it makes sense. If you need to work on business stuff like let somebody else bring your groceries Okay. Let somebody come in and clean a couple hours a week. Let somebody come in and watch your babies for a couple hours a week, okay. Or let them babysit your babies and you go somewhere so you can work, okay. That's, that's the big thing. So, in my opinion, you only need at least a minimum of three focused hours a week to build momentum. Now, if you could get five to 10, that is fantastic, but I have some students who are just starting out and all we can find is you know three to five hours and that's okay, as long as you keep moving forward. That's going to be really important.

Speaker 1:

The other thing that's really important is to remember that you don't need more time, you need better priorities, and this is a biggie. And, of course, I teach you how to set priorities and, and all of that stuff, make sure you're working on the right things. But, in a nutshell, if the things you're working on don't earn you money, then they are probably passive income or passive action, and you really need to be taking massive action. So you, you might just be working on the wrong thing, and that's one of the things that I do in any of my courses is I teach you how to set your essential priorities and and we don't necessarily plan them for a year we break it our yearly goals down into quarterly, monthly, weekly and daily, so that you know that you're doing the right thing. Okay, all right. So let's get ready to land this plane.

Speaker 1:

This was a quick and easy one. It's really important, my friend, that you learn how to track where your time really goes and then, um, then score it. Okay, score what serves you versus what drains you, and then shift your schedule so that your business finally gets the attention that it deserves. So if you're feeling motivated at this moment, here's what I want you to do Start your time audit, do it, do it for you know, three to five days, three to seven days, whatever, and then send it to me.

Speaker 1:

I want to hear about your biggest aha moments. Where are you wasting time? Most of you are wasting it on social media, which is a stupid waste of time. You're comparing, collecting recipes, looking at stretching videos, all of that stuff and it's keeping you from building whatever that dream life is. So I can't wait to hear. So you can get in touch with me by sending me fan mail message, by using the link at the top of the episode description. So wherever you're watching this, right at the top, there's going to be a link that says let's connect. Text me, do that, okay. Make sure I have your um, your name, your information, so that I can reach back out to you, because I read all of these and I love being in touch with you. So let me hear what's going on for you. I will help keep you accountable to getting your three steps in. So I'm going to hold you accountable to track it, score it and shift it.

Speaker 1:

One last thing, my friend, if this episode helped you out, hit subscribe rate. Share, uh with I would say with a fellow myofunctional therapist, but really this could be shared with any business owner. Um with I would say with a fellow myofunctional therapist, but really this could be shared with any business owner. Um that's having trouble with their time. It is one of the best ways that I can reach and support others who are just trying to figure this business thing out. So if you subscribe and you decide that I'm not your gal, then you can just leave me. You can unsubscribe. I'll cry, but you can still do it. Um, until next time, my friend, go build a life you are absolutely bonkers about. I'm going to be back real soon with some more myofunctional business goodness.