#143 - Dealing with Burnout

We've heard so many bosses and creative entrepreneurs lately say that they are starting to feel the burnout—ourselves included. So we're talking about how we're dealing with burnout, how we push through burnout to do the work, and what we do to organize and prepare for busy times in business ahead of time.

This episode is sponsored by Freshbooks Cloud Accounting.

Get full show notes for this episode here

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Transcript

Unknown: 0:46

Hello, and welcome to being boss,

Emily Thompson: 0:48

a podcast for creative entrepreneurs. I'm Emily Thompson.

Unknown: 0:52

And I'm Kathleen Shannon.

Emily Thompson: 0:58

Today we're talking about dealing with burnout and maximizing productivity. As always, you can find all the tools, books and links we reference on the show notes at WWW dot being boss club.

Kathleen Shannon: 1:11

Alright, boss, it's never too early to start thinking about end of your financials. One of my favorite things about fresh books cloud accounting is that it keeps me organized year round so that tax time is always a breeze, I can pull a profit and loss report that tells me exactly how much money I made and how much money I spent. I can organize my expenses by category for my accountant. And I can see the bottom line of my business and whether or not I hit my goals for the year. It is never too late to begin to get organized with your money and fresh books. Cloud accounting was designed just for you. They have your creative mind in mind. It's intuitive, it's easy, and it's going to keep you organized. Try fresh books cloud accounting for free by going to fresh books.com slash being boss and enter being boss in the How did you hear about us section. So this week, I thought it would be fun to get really practical in how we deal with burnout, and how we maybe step away from our computers whenever what we do is so much online in front of a screen.

Emily Thompson: 2:20

Love this. And this is something that's been super top of mind for me lately, as I've been busting my ass hustling, some some business stuff out and working. I've worked more hours this summer than I've worked in a really, really long time. So I'm dealing with my own bit of potential burnout as well.

Kathleen Shannon: 2:41

So tell me a little bit about that. What have you done to get away from your screen whenever you are working more hours than ever. And again, if you haven't listened to last week's episode, we talked a little bit about 40 hour work weeks, and how energetically we just can't hang. So you probably have been working at least 40 hours a week. So what are you doing? Like how are you managing that?

Emily Thompson: 3:04

Sure. So the first thing I'm doing is doing it showing up and working as much as I need to work, which lately has been between 35 and 40 hours. And I've worked that pretty consistently for about a month and a half now. And that's pretty obscene for what my what my work life is generally like. But I've had some things that I've wanted to accomplish some deadlines I needed to meet and some things that I need to make and do. So it's all been very important for me. So going into it, I always go into really heavy times in business knowing exactly what I'm doing. So I'll go into it with these hardcore plans in place, I have deadlines for everything. These are all even internal deadlines. I'm not talking about client facing, I'm talking the person is holding the person who is holding me accountable is me, period. And I treat these deadlines just as as heavily as I treat a deadline that you would give me or that a client would give me or whatever it may be. So I've been going into this really heavy time of work knowing exactly what needs to be done, which makes working that hard, significantly easier. But I've also found myself working in ways that have been a little non traditional for how it is that I usually work. And that especially whenever I was doing just websites for clients and those sorts of things, it was very rare that I could step away from my computer and do things that were not screen oriented. But I found myself recently finding ways to sneak away from my computer, and really cute funny ways. And I get kind of tickled at myself because I know I'm just like, I'm tricking myself into doing work, not staring at my computer. So I've gotten really into doing lots of planning and implementing, and even on some levels and like email writing and things in a notebook. So either sitting in bed or at a table or whatever it may be not at a computer, but writing things in a notebook and then taking them to my computer later. So I can get a lot of the creative brainstorming and planning and things out without a screen in my face because I'm definitely finding now I'm seven and a half years into working solely online. I'm finding it really hard to sit in front of a computer for more than a couple hours a day, let alone 40 hours a week consistently. So I've been finding fun little ways to step away from my computer and do work not on a screen.

Kathleen Shannon: 5:29

Okay, so I think you and I share a love for a notebook. Yeah, like we've got notebooks upon notebooks upon notebooks. Right. And I always feel like I have this fear of being I oh no redundant with my work or with my planning by writing things in a notebook first. So I'm actually really curious to hear your creative process whenever it comes to planning and even email writing in a notebook, then are you writing it out word for word? Is it mostly just an outline, then are you taking it to your computer? Tell me what that looks like for you.

Emily Thompson: 6:07

Sure. So whenever I'm doing these, in a notebook, it's very outline based, if I were actually writing anything, there would be so many scribbles like I could not even deal with that for sure. But I do like to sit down with a notebook and outline things. And so whenever I'm doing my really big picture planning, I can't do it in my usual small notebook. So I keep, I think it's like five by eight, or five and a half by eight or something. But five star notebook. And I haven't used this same type of notebook for every notebook I've had since I started my web design business. And that's the notebook that I keep on my desk. And I just want to take notes. And like when I'm on phone calls, or if I need to jot down a short to do list or whatever it may be, that's the notebook I keep on hand. But whenever I'm doing some big picture planning and outlining, I have to have a full sized notebook. And I recently got this really awesome sort of like, folio style like leather bound thing with like a legal pad inside of it. For my birthday, and on the front of it, I got an anthropology guys. It's really adorable, his grand plans on the front of it, and I love it. And I've been using that very consistently lately for doing some of this big picture planning where I'll sit down. So for example, I've been working on relaunching rocker web design business, which has been a big course overhaul and marketing, planning and creation, all these things is very big picture thing. And so I'll sit down, and my notebook and I always have some sort of objective or goal. I'll write down rock web design business on the top of it, whatever my objective or goal is, and I'll just start writing things down. And it's funny, my big pages always end up with two columns. So I have like one big bulk column, and then this little side column, that I will jot things down. And I'll do things like outlining my sales emails, or what the topics will be for my sales videos, or, or how usually the sidebar is there for delegation. So as I'm planning things out, and the main part of the page, delegating things will go in the sidebar. So if I'm doing these things, then I'll need Cory to make sure that he's doing these things to support them. And having an all in one page like that allows me to then go to my computer and lay it all out and those finite to dues, but it helps me a lot to put pen to paper to do some of that large scale brainstorming around some of the bigger picture tasks and to dues that have to be completed to make something big, like a course launch go off. So that's for my big notebooks. And then I take it on my computer and make it into lots of little bitty tasks and delegate them across the board.

Kathleen Shannon: 8:50

And that's happening in Asana or a Google Doc, Asana, Asana,

Emily Thompson: 8:54

and some in Evernote. We're working on transferring everything to Google Docs to because keep losing things in Evernote, which is not fun guys at all. But Asana is really where the bulk of every of where everything lives, including all of those tasks. And I like breaking down my tasks into the smallest bite size little actionable to do. So that as I'm going through it, it looks like I have a lot of things to do, because I do have a lot of things to do. But it's easy for me to go through and check off things as I go. I know that I can sit down with 30 to dues and read today in a day and get through them in like an hour if I really get get my work and pants on and do what I'm supposed to do.

Kathleen Shannon: 9:40

So I found that some of my best big picture thinking happens whenever I am 30,000 feet in the air. I've always thought if I really need to get stuff done, I should just book a five hour flight, not even to specifically go somewhere but to that could be my CEO day, where I get in a plane, I get out my notebook, I have written some of my best marketing plans in a notebook, 30,000 feet in the air in a plane. And the way that I like to do it is drawing a calendar into my notebook. And I think that my brain just functions best in calendar view. So we all know, or at least you know that I keep a lot of my to do list or I kind of keep track of what I have to do in my Google Calendar. But even in Asana with my tasks and to do's I always have it in calendar view. And Emily, you always have yours in list view, which I think is very indicative of how we're doing this in our notebooks as well. So I like to sketch out a calendar and really see what's happening when and how It's almost like a, you know, this, this project or this email or this blog post will then fit into this webinar, which will then fit into the cart opening. And this is when it's for sale like it really just helps me organize my timeline, but then my tasks and to dues around that timeline. So I'm with you. And I even have a refer back to this marketing plan that I put in a notebook time and time again, and I have transferred it over into a Google Doc. So what I did is I downloaded a calendar template in Google, which you can find pretty easily. Like, if you're ever looking for a template in Google, you can find templates. So I found the calendar template and literally plugs everything into that template and then use that to link to then the email that I wrote, or the blog post that I wrote, or the webinar sales page that I wrote, and linking to those individual documents. And I'm still like, on the fence between now this turning into like an organization, podcast episode, but between putting everything in one long document or having a folder for one big launch, and then having like that master content outline, and then in that content, outline links to the sub documents that then house all the actual content.

Emily Thompson: 12:06

Oh, right. I think for me, it depends on the size of the project, for sure. I like having everything all in one place. But if you have too much in one place, it's way too overwhelming. So agreed, but depends on the project.

Kathleen Shannon: 12:17

Yeah, so maybe if it's like a mini launch, like a sales launch, and it's just taking place in a week, you put it all in one doc. But if you're doing like a web redesign, mobile doc got a few dogs, definitely multiple dogs,

Emily Thompson: 12:32

for sure. And so you know, laying all of this out, maybe it sounds overwhelming, maybe not. But for me, there's a lot of things happening at any given moment. And over the past couple weeks I've been it's been really hard for me to remain excited about all those mundane little tasks that I come in and just start marking off whether it's writing this email or loading this email or proofreading this email or whatever it may be over and over and over again, it's been really hard for me to say really excited about my job when all the birds are chirping outside. And I'm looking down the barrel of 252 lists for the next two weeks, or whatever it may be. So what I have found myself doing along with my notebooks, and being very mindful about stepping away from my computer, to do some of that planning, so that I'm not going cross eyed, by the end of the day is to is to also make fun tasks for myself. So as if I need more things to do in my life, it's been a lot of fun for me to inject some creativity and how it is that I produce things or even what it is that I produce. So one of the things that we're doing at the moment that I feel is a perfect example of this is for the New Orleans vacation that we have coming up. And we decided, hey, what if we were to create a Xen, because that would be awesome. Something that we can, we can create, we can design we can have tons of fun with and it will be in the swag bags, for the people who come on the vacation. And it allows us to really dive into some of those aspects of creation that we don't get to do much anymore. And also allows us to step away from our computer to have some fun creating those things. So this New Orleans game Kathleen is something that I'm so excited about right now.

Kathleen Shannon: 14:23

I know you know what I busted out my scanner. Like I

Unknown: 14:28

still had one

Kathleen Shannon: 14:29

I know right? So I can like print things off and rip them up and put them back together and then scan in the page and put that in the file. I feel like I'm in design school again. Love it.

Emily Thompson: 14:39

Love it. I know and one of my tasks has been creating a tarot spread for our Xen, which has been a ton of fun and I was able I took my notebook earlier I took it into into the dining room with my tarot cards and my my notebook that I keep all of my like my journal notebook, and I went through it and looking at some of my favorite Tarot spreads and just sort of gained some inspiration and created a tarot spread a being boss Tarot spread, which I'm so excited about to put in the Xen for the New Orleans folks. And that was I had so much fun doing that because it was something that required no computer whatsoever. I could walk away and do this fun thing that was purely done for creativity sake and for fun, and then I was able to come back in here, mock it up really quickly in Illustrator and send it over to you.

Kathleen Shannon: 15:31

Love it. I want to come back to the notebooks really quick though because I was watching your Instagram stories and one of the things that you did recently was clean out a year's worth of notebooks and I loved why You flip through some of your goals because I felt like every single one had come true.

Emily Thompson: 15:49

Pretty much it was a little bit mind blowing. So I did um I'm in the process of sort of cleaning out my life and you know this I've been purging everything lately, Kathleen's afraid I'm gonna probably purge her my child soon, I won't I swear it. But I have been going through and just getting rid of all kinds of things, both like in my business and like files on my computer, but also in my home as well. And one of the things that's been on my list is going through just some of the stuff that we have in the studio, the studio is, this is the room that I spend the most time in, but it's the room that the family spends the least time in. So what I found is, you know, all those weird boxes of things are like that bag of clothes or whatever, it all ends up in my studio space.

Kathleen Shannon: 16:33

That is bad. Mojo

Emily Thompson: 16:35

drives me nuts. So one of the things that I've been doing is going through and getting rid of a lot of those things. And just sort of putting them where they get that's also on my to do list and putting this into the into the world is I need closet organization. And my life is one thing My house is missing. And it's going to happen very soon, guys. So going through all of my things, one of the things that I have here was a box of all of those five star notebooks that I've been keeping at my desk for the past seven and a half years. And it was mind blowing going through all of them. Because I did I went through I flipped through every single one. And most of it was totally pointless stuff or things that I couldn't even really decipher or know what it was from because it just notes scribbled in the moment. But a whole lot of business planning and goals were set in those notebooks. And so things like writing a book, or things like making six figures or launching a course, or snagging that client or whatever it may be. So many goals were made around those sorts of things. And it was fascinating to go through them and see how I mean pretty much every single one of them were reached in some capacity or the other not always on the timeline that I wanted, but always reached nonetheless, it was amazing.

Kathleen Shannon: 17:56

What I really loved about watching you flip through all of your goals that you had written down is that I think that myself included, whenever I say this, I think it's easy to assume that opportunities and success and the things that we celebrate, just kind of fell on our laps. And granted, we do a lot of hard work to show up for opportunity whenever it does fall on our laps, right. But most of the time, it didn't just happen. There was a very intentional goal that was written down on paper, I went to book and from there, I even remember, you wrote down a book proposal, like I saw this. And I was like, wow, like you, you knew that that had to happen. And that that was part of reaching this goal. And I think that whenever people get to that part, I mean, even as we're writing a book, now, we've got a lot of friends, saying oh my gosh, I want to write a book to connect me with your agent, we connect them and then they never write the proposal. I'm not trying to call my friends out. But I think that they don't realize the amount of work and I you know, we don't realize the amount of work like I want a TV show and knowing that I probably need to write a proposal for that, for example, it's not just saying it or even writing it down, but knowing what the next steps are. So anyway, I just love that you wrote it down and kind of started to even anticipate what some of the steps are between the thing that you wanted, and where you were right then and what needs to happen in between in order to make those goals happen.

Emily Thompson: 19:27

Yeah, for sure. It was it was completely mind blowing, going through some of our stuff. Because these are all concepts that you and I are super familiar with now. I mean, we talk about them all the time. But seven years ago, it was just something that I was intuitively doing, I was sitting down and writing out the things that I wanted the goals that I had, and then writing out the steps to get there. And so it was really funny for me to go through them not only seeing the things that I had done, but remembering the mindset in which I did them, and how different it was from where I am now. However, it was also kind of the exact same I just wasn't as mindful of it as I am now. It was really fascinating. And I'm really excited to throw them in the trash can.

Kathleen Shannon: 20:09

I also is seven years in though I mean, we've been doing this for a while sometimes I forget to go back to the tried and true methods. So watching all of your dream come true because you have written them down and then obviously did the work to make it happen. reminded me like oh yeah, I need to be writing more things down and really practicing what I preach and I think that we really do for the most part, but I probably haven't been you know writing down some of those big dreams or big wants lately, just because I'm trying just implement everything that's come our way in the meantime, and but it really got me thinking and so one of the things I've been doing is I kind of fallen off the journaling wagon but I was so inspired when we talked to Katie Dale about on our podcast and she has her journaling book and I have a lot of friends that are avid journalers. Jessie Orteig, from silent pepper is always talking about journaling. Emily, I know that you're always writing things down. And so I decided to commit to I bought myself a new notebook. And as if I needed another one,

Emily Thompson: 21:20

that's how you get started.

Kathleen Shannon: 21:22

Now by giving myself the space to just write even one paragraph, it doesn't have to be morning pages where I write for, you know, 30 minutes, uncensored filling as many pages as possible. Sometimes it's literally a paragraph and sometimes my paragraphs are so boring. I'm boring myself as I'm writing. But then realize this is part of the process. Like I'm not so special that I don't have a boring day, you know, but I still need to go ahead and practice writing so that whenever I do have an exciting day that I really want to write about, I'm in the habit of writing. And I think that this applies to so many things in business, just getting in the habit of doing the thing. Yeah, there's

Emily Thompson: 22:04

so much to say about those menial little processes. I mean, no matter what they are, and they're not glamorous, they're definitely boring, but they're super important. And for me, going through my notebooks definitely prove that I went through my notebooks two at a time, when I was just trying to get away from my computer, like I was so done doing all the things I needed to go, I needed to go find something else productive to do. And so I decided, you know what, I'm gonna just go through that box notebooks because they've been sitting there staring at me and I went through them and I was so reenergized around all of the things that I was doing, because I was able to, to look back through them and see how far I've come. And what all I've done that, you know, going in and working a couple more hours wasn't really the worst thing in the world, because I was proving to myself by looking through those notebooks that my hard work does good things. And that makes doing the hard work a little more pleasurable.

Kathleen Shannon: 22:59

So I've been trying to deal with burnout lately, by going for more walks.

Emily Thompson: 23:06

Yes,

Kathleen Shannon: 23:07

I noticed on my phone, which has a pedometer in it, that I maybe at least with my phone, am only walking on average 2000 steps a day.

Emily Thompson: 23:19

That is when you work three feet away from your refrigerator.

Kathleen Shannon: 23:24

Like that is not okay. And granted, I do work out every morning. And there's a lot of probably steps that are happening without my phone on me. But for the most part, I would love to be walking 10,000 steps a day, I would love to be walking two to three miles at a time jog around my neighborhood, listening to a podcast or even just thinking. And so one thing I've noticed lately is that I have not felt I'm well inspired my may or may not be the right way to phrase it. Because I don't think you have to be inspired to do the work. But it certainly helps. And I haven't been feeling entirely inspired. And so I was thinking, what is what is the thing that gets me into the headspace to want to create content, ultimately, from podcasting, to blogging to even social media. And it's always been going for a walk. And it just really gets my brain in gear to want to create content. And for a couple of reasons. One, I'm moving my body, it's giving me the time and space to really think to I'm usually listening to a podcast. And that, you know, I'm not going to write exactly about what I'm listening to. But it gives me new things to think about, and new things to riff on. And it makes me realize, Oh, wait, I do have an opinion about these things. And I could share that. So walking has been tremendous. And so even just yesterday, I was telling my husband as a physical goal I want to get in 10,000 steps a day, but I just don't have the time for it. There's still a lot of work that I need to do in front of my computer to get it all done. And he suggested that I reframe it and think about it as I work. It's a time for me to do some personal development and to learn new things. I'm still on the fence. I mean, I do but I spend so much time already during my day working out like I will it really does carve into my day a little bit more. But it's something I want to do. Maybe I should write that down in my notebook.

Emily Thompson: 25:36

There you go. There's

Unknown: 25:40

loving create more content because of it.

Emily Thompson: 25:42

Wonderful. I know And for the past couple of weeks with it being hot outside, because I have a really hard time going for walks in the winter really, really hard time. I'm the opposite, that I can't do it that I had the idea of getting bundled up makes me want to gag. Wait,

Kathleen Shannon: 26:00

can you go for a walk in like 100 degree temperatures.

Emily Thompson: 26:04

Um, I can what we have been doing what we have been doing this summer is walking early in the morning. So the first thing we do when we get up is head out the door for a walk, and then also doing one just before we put the kids to bed. So when it's still relatively cool outside, and I found myself even though I'm in the busiest time of work, for me getting in those two walks is less difficult than it is when it's cold outside, and I have less work to do. But I've also I've definitely found that it has grounded me in ways that I would not have been able to do without it, especially with all the work that I've been doing. And all just like the energy I've had to put into the work that I'm doing. Those two walks a day have served me very, very well. So so I think I must push you Kathleen just a little bit.

Kathleen Shannon: 26:55

Well, and here's what I know to be true is that whenever I can go on a walk, I can literally start to outline, it's probably how you are in your journal, I can start to outline a blog post. Sometimes I'll even stop and put down bullet points in my phone just on my text, my little notebook app. Anyway, I'll just create notes, I'll get all sorts of ideas for things to write about. I'll create an editorial calendar for the entire month, and then I can come home and transfer it and knock out a blog post in one hour that may have taken me two hours previously. So it really does help me maximize my productivity to go on a walk and do the thing. I'm just so much more. I'm sharper, more sharp than the words coming out of my mouth right now. I've gone on a walk before we recorded this podcast,

Emily Thompson: 27:47

right and I see I think those moments of stillness for your brain give you the opportunity to see what it can do whenever you're not forcing it to do something that usually does things you didn't even think was capable of. I'm usually walking with my family and usually lilies talking about goodness knows what as we're walking down the road. So it's a little hard for me to usually find space to let my brain be creative. But I do know that just the body movement aspect does great things for my ability to focus once I get back. So I may have just started trying to work in alone walk in occasionally. That's three walks a day, guys, that may be too much.

Unknown: 28:32

Never.

Kathleen Shannon: 28:35

Okay, so another thing we've been doing lately to avoid burnout is saying no to all the things right. I feel like we've been on a no tirade,

Emily Thompson: 28:46

I will in good was funny. We started this year out doing two things, one not making money goals, which I'm beginning to feel kind of weird about, like seven months into it. Now,

Kathleen Shannon: 28:58

we didn't make money goals, I felt like we did

Emily Thompson: 29:01

no, we made some money projections based on things that we knew we would make. But in terms of like growing revenue, we did not make any money goals for the purpose of the second goal of ours for the year. The second like intention for the year was no new things. No more new things. Because Kathleen and I have been so open to every opportunity ever. We wanted to buckle down this year, write the book, hustle out some life, get things in order that are already in order and do nothing new. So that's pretty much meant we've said no to all kinds of opportunities. And now that we've said no to everything, because there have been a couple of partnerships and some speaking things and other things that we've definitely said yes to, but to be very picky about what it is that we do.

Kathleen Shannon: 29:53

And I think those are the opportunities that we were trying to leave open to be able to say yes to write things like speaking gigs, which we're so excited about. And I will say we started to cross the line of no new things. We started looking at hosting citywide meetups, we started looking at what it would be like to turn being bought into something that carries product. Like we're talking pins and stickers and notebooks and things like product, right. So we started to really go down those trails. I mean, we're talking website pages, were up and ready to click go

Emily Thompson: 30:33

right and then we thought you know what, this is against our intentions for the year. And we're not going to do them now. We'll do them soon for sure. But they're just other things that we need to Put our focus in. And I think that has been really powerful for us to be really clear on what's working, what's not working. I think that's probably fed into my purging lately. Meaning just get rid of all the things is this idea that we are ready for new things. 2018 is going to be so filled with new things, we're probably just, we won't even be able to handle it. But for the moment, we need to just nurture what is here and what is working, let go of everything that isn't so that whenever we are opening ourselves back up to all the opportunities, we'll have plenty of room to let really great ones in. So it's been fun going through life and through my inbox with that sort of mindset. And I think it's really helped with the amount of burnout, we could be feeling right now, if we had not went into this year, with the idea that we were going to do no new things like there would be products on our site right now. And we would be hosting meetups ourselves, which will do these sorts of things soon, but not in 2017.

Kathleen Shannon: 31:56

And what I've learned through this lesson of saying no to more things is dealing with the disappointment on the other side, there are a lot of people who have been disappointed whenever we've said no, but we've had to do it, too. And we talked about this on the last episode, but to protect our energy to protect our commitment to no new things. And so I think that if there's a lesson that comes out of all of that, for me, it's learning how to be okay with someone else being disappointed in me, because I'm not obligating myself to fulfilling their needs, whatever they are,

Emily Thompson: 32:33

right. And I've come to terms with that by being so much more aware of how happy I'm making the people that I am giving my energy to, because you know, as being bosses growing, and as any business grows, you are pulled in so many more directions, but your focus is more required in the directions that it needs to be in. And so the more you grow, the more you have to say no. So I feel like this has been an important practice for us moving forward, because I definitely see as 2018 rolls in and around that. That will be open to so many opportunities and and even though we'll be saying yes to more I imagine we'll be saying no to even more than we're saying no to now.

Kathleen Shannon: 33:17

Yeah. And it's funny, because I've been thinking about, you know, conversations around boundaries and how it's hard to not sound like an asshole when you're talking about boundaries. But if you feel like an asshole, you're probably doing it right, right. I don't mind

Emily Thompson: 33:33

feel like an asshole at all. I was talking the other day to someone where I was saying, you know, I have gotten very comfortable with just deleting emails in my inbox. Like, I don't need to reply to everything at all, I have no problem deleting things. And I feel like people probably think I'm an asshole because of it. But what I found is the people who actually know me and love me think I'm less of an asshole now than I would be if I were replying to everything. And their opinions matter much more to me than some random guy who's leaning in my inbox. Not that I don't super appreciate the love, I definitely read them, feel free to email me, but I'm probably not going to respond.

Kathleen Shannon: 34:11

Yeah, my child would prefer it if I'm not responding to every email, that's for sure.

Emily Thompson: 34:16

Right. So the thing that I found, has really helped me through not feeling burnt out is being very particular about making sure that I am maximizing my productivity when I'm actually here working. Because the more I'm able to do in that 567 hour block that I give myself to work on any given day, the more time I have to not work on any given day. So I've actually I have found, if possible, my productivity level is like through the roof guys. And this has been a multi year practice of getting in here staying focused, removing distractions, and just bust and shut out. And I found so much more pleasure in my life whenever I can run my business in that way. So we get asked all the time, you know, how do I manage my time? And how do I figure out what needs my focus or whatever it may be and we don't know the answers to focus for any individual person, look at your priorities, go after your goals, those sorts of things. But whenever it comes to time management, don't fucking play around, get in there and do the work. And I found that I found that doing that and cultivating that practice has put me in a place where whenever I am done with my 3540 Hour Workweek I am done And then I'm able to walk away and feel so good about everything that I've accomplished, that my weekends and my evenings are that much more pleasurable, usually after a nap, or maybe a cocktail, or maybe just veg out in front of the TV to decompress. But it makes it gives me so much more time to live my life whenever I am working like a boss.

Kathleen Shannon: 36:11

Okay, so I think that maximizing your productivity so that you can maximize your time away from work is incredible. That's so important. And for me, it really comes down to just knowing what my limits are. And my limits are constantly evolving and changing. And so there have been times lately where I've been working to the limits that I had maybe five years ago, which my capacity for, you know, I don't know, being able to work a 60 Hour Workweek was much different five years ago, pre baby pre, you know, two different full time jobs. And now, it's just quite a bit different. And so really knowing my limits has helped me know what to say yes to and know what to say no to. So I can really follow through all the way. So I have to know my limits by really testing my limits, and really getting to the end of my rope and knowing that I can climb back up that rope. So recently that's looked like saying notice some things, it's looked like asking for help on some things. It's looked like having really honest conversations and just saying, You know what, I just really can't do the thing. Thanks for thinking of me, I'm super flattered, I'm super humbled, but I just can't do it. So that's what it looked like. For me, it's just really knowing my limits and sticking to it.

Emily Thompson: 37:31

I love that. And that's really important. And I'll tell you another thing that's totally gotten me through this. For real. It's not booze,

Unknown: 37:40

smoking a joint is not joints,

Emily Thompson: 37:43

it is knowing that we have December off. So last year, we started something that I've been wanting to do for all seven years of my business. And that is taking off of December, we did it last year, it was the roaring success. I loved it a ton. And we plan on doing it again this year, and hopefully every year forever and ever. And I'll tell you that has been the one thing that has been on my mind the most lately is just knowing that if I can bust this shit out and continue to work and do the things, then very near on the horizon, I see it just out there is a whole month of me doing whatever I want to do with my time no matter what that is, it doesn't have to be work. It doesn't have to be creating a video, or making the Instagram or any of the things. It is just hanging out with my family and chilling and doing things. So that has been really huge for me and dealing with burnout of overcoming the feeling of burnout, because I think you can do things to keep from feeling it. But I think at some point, you're going to feel it and you just have to overcome it. And for me, I've been there lately, the thing that is making me push through and keeping me generally happy is knowing that I'm doing all of this so that I can have a month like December, where I don't have to do anything. That is what is getting me through.

Kathleen Shannon: 39:07

Oh, I like that. So my thing with overcoming burnout, along with December on the horizon is having scheduled vacations on the horizon. Yes, locking off days of just like no meetings, nothing today,

Emily Thompson: 39:23

I live for my no meeting days.

Kathleen Shannon: 39:26

And then the other thing that has honestly truly gotten me through it is having my support system. So I can really start to make up a bunch of stories around burnout and want to quit all the things and go get a day job. And then whenever I tell my team or my business partners that I'm feeling a little burnt out, they can really help me work through what's working and what's not working. Because sometimes it's just hard to see it for yourself. So if you have a business bestie or a spouse, or a partner, whether that's in work or life, I think tell them how you're feeling. If you don't have anybody in your life, hire someone, go talk to a therapist, and really let someone else take an objective view of what you've got on your plate. And they're going to help you see what's working and what's not working and what you could delegate or what you could get rid of altogether.

Emily Thompson: 40:19

For sure. I think that is one of the most powerful things that we have for sure is the ability to get on pre recording and be like, Alright, here's all the things that are happening. And being able to gain that perspective of someone who's in it but not in your shoes I think is really important. And has definitely helped me through it. For sure. And knowing that I don't know, knowing that I'm working towards something that's really exciting. One way or the other, you were talking earlier about writing down your goals. One of the things that that I've done for the rock, your web design business launch that I've been putting together and officially sort of starts with early bird today, which is very exciting, which by the way, I'm launching a course and today and yesterday, I had nothing to do, because I busted that shit out. So that launch is gonna be the easiest breezy thing on the planet. But one of the things I did as I started getting knee deep, and all of the tasks and to dues I needed to do to make this thing go off, was sit down with a note card, and write out some money goals for lunch. And then what I would give myself for each of those tiers if they were met, and I took it, and I propped it up on my computer. So that as I was working and busting out all of these menial tasks, I was reminded of why I'm working so hard. And you know, for some people, it's not things that you want, maybe you just put a picture of your kid on the side of your computer, or your dream house or go visit that Pinterest board. Occasionally. We're all doing these things to work for something. And for sure, my job is not the worst job in the world. But I think we all need to be reminded that these hard days are for good days in the very near future.

Kathleen Shannon: 42:07

I have a question about those money goals that you wrote down and what you would be giving yourself Were you following like a profit first model? Or was it more of like, I'm going to indulge like, I'm going to reward myself with this thing? That's just for me.

Emily Thompson: 42:20

Yes. So yeah, sure. So I'll share some of them. My minimum goal is I'm just going to get a massage, which I'll probably do anyway, regardless, maybe tomorrow. But starting really basic and going up from there. And all of these are so kind of boring things, but they're things I want for my house. So hiring someone else to paint my bathroom, or hiring someone else to paint my kitchen or giving myself $1,000 a month raise like if I meet my like my top goals. So those sorts of things is getting getting closet organization. Guys, this is really in my very top of my want list right now is just some closet organization, for sure. So really sort of boring things for most people, but for me are the things that I want the most. And I want someone else to do them for me, which is kind of key. I don't want to do that myself.

Kathleen Shannon: 43:12

Oh my gosh, I want to come back to space a little bit because I actually just hired Fox's babysitter to help me clean out our garage.

Emily Thompson: 43:21

Have I talked about this? No, you've told me about it. I think I love it. I'm glad

Kathleen Shannon: 43:26

you did. Okay, so I just paid her a couple 100 bucks to clean out my garage and she made decisions like a boss. She was just tossing things that she knew I didn't need she wasn't asking me too many questions and I kind of liked it like just get rid of the thing that I haven't seen. Donate it. Anyway, she found a 30 cans of paint.

Unknown: 43:50

Yeah,

Kathleen Shannon: 43:51

and whenever you're disposing a paint, you can't just throw it away like you have to take it down to the special place like the hazard toxic getting rid of stuff place. And so she took it down there and I mean I've been sitting in my house since we moved in over three years ago. So anyway, just cleared stuff out and uncovered a couple of bikes like bikes that I got for my birthday a few years ago that I just haven't ridden in a few years and since cleaning out my garage now it's all clean and organized and great. I've ridden my bike multiple times because now it's just accessible and easy to get to you we got Fox a little baby seat so that's another way we've been getting outside Moore's we've been going on bike rides at night. Anyway, I really forgot about the power decluttering of physical space has on you mentally It feels like such a relief and so you keep talking about closet organization but I get it I feel like more organized in your mind and you're already super organized in your mind and

Emily Thompson: 44:57

yes, I am super organized. So opening my closets and having things just sort of felt because there there is no organization like the one in my studio for example only has a shelf at the very top like there are no middle shelf there's not even a bar to hang things. So things are just piled in there and it's driving me mad mad

Unknown: 45:17

Yeah, your soul is going to seeing it we're like closet organized. So are you going to hire someone to do it?

Emily Thompson: 45:23

Um that closet I would love to hire someone just come to all of my closets because Louise calls us to the same way. But one of them has okay organization and there has none and so it's just all the things piled in there and it's ridiculous and then mine in David's is medium organized, it could definitely have significantly more I would love to just have someone come in and do it to all of them. But worst case scenario, we just do it ourselves, which we've done before in other places that we've lived. But I don't want to think about it.

Kathleen Shannon: 45:54

I don't want to hire but all done. You should hire check this out at the home edit on Instagram. They are in Nashville. And they are friends with. I want to say we who do we know that lives in Nashville? Becky Simpson does? No, it wasn't Becky. I wanted to say, oh, anyway, it's an Nevermind. I thought it was someone that we had on podcast. I remember who it was. Okay. Anyway, they are a friend of a friend the home edit, and they just did Rachel zoes closet. But it is like home organization porn. I just check them out on Instagram. You could hire them to do it for you. Or you could just watch their feed and get inspired. We should have them on the podcast.

Emily Thompson: 46:41

I agree this fast and organization. Guys, I'm definitely one of those people that spends time on Pinterest just scrolling through like pantry organization like that shit makes me so happy. Oh my god,

Kathleen Shannon: 46:56

I feel like I would get all these containers for organizing. And then just stuff would be sitting on top of the containers.

Emily Thompson: 47:03

Or not me Not me. I am definitely one of those. Sometimes I walk through my kitchen. And I'm so tickled by it. And but also annoyed by it because David and Lloyd are not as with it as I am in terms of putting things in the things. But I don't know I am I get tickled. Everyone,

Kathleen Shannon: 47:20

right, we can have them on the show to talk about like organization, one on one, a grade, it seems like it should be easy enough, but it's just not.

Emily Thompson: 47:29

I just need someone else to do it for I have other things I need to do.

Kathleen Shannon: 47:32

It's kind of like organizing our files. You know, we've gotten in tricky spots there where we get so organized from the get go and everything. So separated out that everything's all in a different place. Whenever really we needed it to all be together, I feel the same way with organizing my house.

Emily Thompson: 47:47

Yeah, I feel like there needs to be some sort of organic ness to organization like you need to start with some sort of basic organization and then just let it go and see what happens and then bring it back in. I don't know. It's it's a whole it's a whole thing. We should have someone on to talk about organization for sure. But to wrap up this episode, I do think that organization and just focus and staying on top of things and keeping your goals in mind. It's all how you deal with are we talking about? We're talking about burnout.

Unknown: 48:30

I'd organize my thoughts, putting some

Kathleen Shannon: 48:32

pen to paper, putting one foot in front of the other going for a walk,

Emily Thompson: 48:37

knowing what you want to going for walk Yes, going for walks, for sure. All of those things. Um, I don't know. Honestly, though, at the end of the day, the thing that makes me most happy about all the things that I do is just showing up recording and talking about all the bullshit that goes on in our life and work.

Kathleen Shannon: 48:56

I hear other people talk about how stressed out they are at their jobs. And I'm like, why your job is so fun. I would never be stressed if I had your job. And then you just realize that everybody's walking their own path. Everyone has their own set of stress that they're dealing with. And what it really means is that you care it means that you care about doing a good job, it doesn't mean that you're spoiled. It doesn't mean that you're privileged, it means that you just really care and I think that we really care and we have really big goals for ourselves. And so it's easy to want to do all the things at once get stressed out and burnout.

Emily Thompson: 49:32

Right? When really just go have a snack.

Unknown: 49:37

Love it might be what I do fix fix your blood sugar,

Emily Thompson: 49:40

right? That's a bigger body you eat well, eat well. Anyway, we got to wrap this up. This is getting rambling ridiculous. Sorry, not sorry, guys. There you go with Kathleen and I talking about dealing with burnout. If nothing else called the friend talking about stupid shit that'll make you feel better. We have gotten so much amazing feedback over the years from listeners about how our podcast has helped them start to grow and uplevel their businesses. So we want to celebrate you. Here's the boss we're celebrating this week. Hey, my name is Rachel Lange and I am being bought. I teach creative living at my website, making something arad.com and this week I'm celebrating coming to an epiphany that what I really want to do with my life is teaching encourage others to create a handmade wardrobe, just like mine. And I've actually set up my first webinar which I've never done before with my tiny email list of seven subscribers for this week. So I'm So excited to get started. Also I love your podcast Thank you so

Unknown: 50:50

much.

Kathleen Shannon: 50:52

If you're feeling boss and want to submit your own boss moment or win go to WWW dot being boss club slash I am being boss. This episode of being boss was brought to you by fresh books cloud accounting, thank you to fresh books for sponsoring us and you guys can try it for free by going to freshbooks comm slash being boss. Thank you so much to our team and sponsors who make being boss possible our sound engineer and web developer Corey winter. Our editorial director and content manager Caitlin brain, our community manager and social media director Sharon lukey. And are being countered David Austin, with support from braid creative and indicia biography,

Emily Thompson: 51:32

do the work. Be boss, and we'll see you next week.