Podcast

Episode 371: How To Stop Putting Off Non-Urgent Tasks

Often in business, we have important yet non-urgent tasks – they feel new and unfamiliar to us and they don’t have a set deadline. These tasks are easy to put off for later while we focus on other things that are more urgent.

I share why perfectionists normally struggle with this – as well as how to get non-urgent tasks done in your business –  in this episode.

If you want to honour the deadlines you set for yourself (even when no one else is watching), this episode was made for you. Tune in today.

Find the full episode transcript and show notes at samlaurabrown.com/episode371.

In This Episode You’ll Learn:

  • Why it’s normal to put off new or scary tasks that don’t have a deadline
  • The reason perfectionists work well with external deadlines
  • Focusing on not disappointing clients vs surprising and delighting them
  • Questions to help you become a more successful entrepreneur
  • What to do if you’re scared of wasting effort on a non-urgent task

Listen To The Episode

Listen to the episode on the player above, click here to download the episode and take it with you or listen anywhere you normally listen to podcasts – just find Episode 371 of The Perfectionism Project Podcast!

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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Introduction

Hi, and welcome to another episode of The Perfectionism Project. A podcast full of perfectionism advice for entrepreneurs. My name is Sam Laura Brown, I help entrepreneurs release their perfectionism handbrake, so they can get out of their own way and build a fulfilling and profitable business. I’m the founder of the perfectionist getting shit done group coaching program, which is otherwise known as PGSD. And for even more perfectionism advice to help you with your business, you can follow me on Instagram @perfectionismproject.

Sam Laura Brown

So often what will come up in business is that we will have tasks that are uncharted territory, so to speak. They are new to us, they’re unfamiliar, we need to do things we haven’t done before, we need to put ourselves out there in a way we haven’t done before. And a lot of times, these tasks won’t have any external deadline, they might have an external deadline, but it’s quite far away, or they won’t have one at all. So this might be work for a particular client, if you have a service based business. This might be something like creating a new iteration of your product, or new product altogether. This might be things like hiring team members. There are so many different things that come up in business that fit this category of uncharted territory with no set deadline. And what I want to talk to you about in this episode, is how you want to operate as a business owner and having you thinking about that, about who you want to be when it comes to those tasks. Because these are the tasks that are so easy to put off week after week, after week, because our brain tells us, it doesn’t matter. I don’t need to get it done today, there are other things that are more important. I don’t even know how to do this anyway. I don’t even know if it’s going to pay off that I do this. So I’m going to focus on these other more urgent things. Whether it is you know, something for a client or a customer, or whether it is social media content, I’m just going to focus on this stuff that has to get done, and then I’ll get to that later. So if you have had any tasks like that recently, just gonna be chatting to you about something that came up on a PGSD coaching call as it relates to this, because it’ll be really helpful, to just have you thinking about going from being someone who…my guess is if you relate to what I talk about this podcast, you’re someone who doesn’t like disappointing others or letting others down, you might have some of those people pleasing tendencies, you might be scared of judgment. And you tend to be able to work well to external deadlines, you probably burn out a bit and don’t have the best experience. But you get the work done, you do it to a high level. And you find it easier to work when there’s an external deadline, whether there is a client/customer, whether there is someone else on your team, there’s just someone else who knows about the task, you’ve committed to a certain time frame for it. And you have the self image, you have the identity already that you’re someone who gets it done if you said you would to someone else. But when it comes to your relationship with yourself, it’s a little bit different. Right now, that relationship with yourself is, well, if there’s a deadline, I do it, but if it’s only for me, or if I’m the one who said the deadline and no one else even knows about it, then it’s okay if I adjust it. And obviously something I talk about a lot on this podcast, when it comes to power planning and planning properly as a perfectionist, is making little tweaks to your calendar and this concept of workability, that we want to be able to keep our plans workable to adjust them to have flexibility, it helps us stay out of that all or nothing mindset. And it really allows us to be growth minded, to adjust, to adapt, and you know, all those things that are very important when it comes to entrepreneurship. And at the same time, we want to be a little bit onto ourselves, when we are telling ourselves that if we’re the only one involved then it doesn’t matter, i.e. that whether or not is important as other people, or that it’s not really affecting things. And so the PGSD-er is quick, they’re already saying like “So why is it important to you that you get things done for your client by the deadline you told them that you would?” And she was saying that it’s important to her because she wants to maintain integrity, like it’s important that they trust her. It’s just important to her that, that is what she does. She does what she said she would. And so when we looked at that and uncovered that, we were discussing how when it comes to this question of like, “Okay, I don’t want to disappoint others.” Great, cool, okay. Also, what does it look like to actually surprise and delight the people that you’re serving? And we can tend to think of it like, “Well, I don’t want to disappoint them. So I’ll get it done by the deadline” and all those things. But actually, what is it like to over deliver? And what impact is it having on our business and our relationship with ourselves, when we’re not the business owner who over delivers. By the way, when I say over deliver, I want to be clear about this. This means that whatever result you help them create, you’re helping them in a, ideally like a shorter timeframe, it’s easier for them, they’re getting a better result. Over delivery doesn’t mean that, say for example, if you are a coach, or you’re real estate agent, or whatever, if you’re someone that has clients that you are available 24/7. And that’s over delivering, a lot of time that’s not actually over delivering, because it’s not in their best interest that you’re available 24/7. It depends, but a lot of times that, that actually is taking away from the service rather than adding to it. But it’s really about getting them the result in a quicker, better way for them. And so instead of thinking about like, “How can I not disappoint them?” Which is the question we tend to operate with, what if it’s about surprising and delighting them. And also being about being the the business owner, the entrepreneur, the person who is proactive, who gets shit done early, who is able to set deadlines for themselves and honor it, even when no one else is watching, even when no one else is involved, and just recognizing the flow and effects and the impact that, that has, when we are able to switch out of “Okay, I just want to not disappoint anyone to what would it look like, to really be operating at the highest level, not in this pressuring, stressful, I need to do a perfect way.” But just asking yourself this question and also thinking about some of the experiences you’ve had, as a client or a customer. So I shared on that call a recent experience that I’ve had, while hiring a financial planner at the moment, Steve and I, and we found someone who really like we had a call with him, it was great. And then it was left out, “Okay, we just need to get you the engagement letter” basically, like, “Yeah, we want to work with you, we’re gonna get you the engagement letter and then you’ll be on boarded as a client,” like, cool, great, that’s perfect. There was no deadline given by Steve or I about the engagement letter, there was no deadline suggested by the financial planner, it was just, “we will get you the engagement letter as next steps.” So I was expecting that would be within that week, like, it’s just going to be a templated like insert name here. And that will be that. So very quick to get that and that like this is still getting us as a client. So typically, most businesses when they’re in that stage, like that’s when they’re putting their best foot forward. And so it got to the point that there was a couple of mentions further along about it in different emails, but not really. And there was no promise of when this would be received by us. And it got to the point that yesterday I sent an email, this was three weeks after our meeting, and I said, “Hey, I just want to check in because we haven’t received the engagement letter and could you please let me know when to expect this or like what to expect going forward, because we had expected that we would receive it by now.” And then they replied pretty much straightaway with the engagement letter. And it’s just an example of like, there was no deadline. And for them, it wasn’t uncharted territory. It’s sending out an engagement letter, they hopefully have a template for that, because it’s something that’s repeatable. They can automate that so to speak.

But it was something that…there was no deadline or pressure from us as a client. But it also sets a certain tone, that it makes me question, “Okay, what’s it going to be like working with them going forward?” That if it’s taken this long to do something that’s very simple. And that should be like, there should be a process in place for this, you would think that what are our other communications going to be like? Are we going to get a response? Are things going to be left vague all the time, with no real deadlines? And they’ll get it to us when they get it to us. Because that’s not how I want to treat my finances. That’s not how I want someone else to treat our finances or to treat us. And so even though otherwise, the experience was great that, that thing alone, then ’cause things into question, even though there’s been no broken promise. And so I bring that example up just to have you thinking about, even if you’re not letting someone down, and like that financial planner would have in his mind, a window of like, well, this is what is acceptable to get them a letter and beyond a certain number of weeks. It seems like in this case beyond a certain number of weeks. That’s when it’s the deadline is like their internal deadline. So I need to get done by then, but in the interim it’s not super important that we just need to be thinking about like, for all of us, we have those expectations for ourselves and like unwritten rules about this is a reasonable timeframe. This is unreasonable in those circumstances where there’s no set deadline. Sometimes we don’t even have that, if it’s a vague thing that we’ve never done before, especially when no one else is involved. We’re like, well, I have, you know I can do it whenever I have all the time. But just knowing that it does impact the self image and identity you have as a business owner, like how seriously you take yourself not in this, like, professional buttoned up kind of way. But if you are someone who feels like your business is a hobby, that your business isn’t legitimate, you maybe have some impostor syndrome, just i.e. self doubt, doubtful thoughts about do I belong here? Am I good enough to do this? That part of that if you are someone who, right now, you’re not being proactive, you’re not getting things done. And you’re kind of creating that experience that I’ve had with the financial planner, like, without meaning to and not to beat yourself up if you are, but if you’re kind of like, well, you know, there’s no set deadline. So I’ll just get it done when I think is reasonable to get done. And I’ll focus on the more urgent stuff first, or like, the things that needs to be happening on a routine basis. But instead to think about, like, Who do you want to be? And what could it create for yourself, and your business? To be the kind of person who, even when there is no set deadline, that you are someone who creates a deadline, and you honor it, you honor it without burning out, without sacrificing clean rest, but you honor it. And it just removes so much mental drama, and overwhelm and guilt, because we all know how it feels when you have a task that’s hanging over you. It impacts everything you do, it impacts every conversation, every task you do, even if it doesn’t feel like that consciously, that it’s there in your subconscious and you’re feeling guilt and you’re feeling basically just like you’re not actually cut-out to do what you’re doing. Because you’re not…you know, you’re not doing it at the highest level. So I want you to be thinking about the kind of experience it creates. And so the PGSD-er I was coaching, that she helps travel clients, booked their holidays, and organize that and all of that kind of thing. And that she needed to create a certain document, a landing page, and that there was no set deadline for it. And she knew like the vague deadline was well, it would need to be done by the end of the year. But they’ve said that “Whenever we get it is great, and so I’ve just found myself pushing it off again, and again, and again, because it’s this new thing that I haven’t really had to do before. And so I’ve just, you know, not really sure about how to do it. And so my brain says “we’ll do it later,” which of course it does. Our brains are wired to conserve energy to not expend mental calories on things we don’t need to, so of course our brain is like, “Okay, well, cool, I can do this later.” But I was saying to her like, “with your business, rather than being the person who never disappoints a client or lets them down, i.e. who doesn’t turn in work by the due date” What if even when your client came to you, and they said, “Okay, this, you know, we want this done, but it doesn’t need to be done for quite a while. We know you’re a busy person, you’ve got other stuff going on.” If you turn around, and you said, “I appreciate you saying that. But also, I’m gonna get this done by the end of next week,” maybe it’s like months earlier than they need it. “But I’m going to be getting this done by this point in time. And this is what you can expect from me, here’s when you’re going to receive it, here’s you know what else you need…” whatever, just making stuff up. But if you can say to them, basically like this thing, you thought you wouldn’t get that a long time, or you weren’t even sure when you get it, here’s when you’re gonna get it. And like I’m going to honor that..and then you show them that you’re going to honor it, by honoring it. Or if you can’t, if something comes up, you get in communication as soon as you’re aware of that. And that’s something that is so important as a company, one of the values that we have is being your word and part of that, like being an integrity, isn’t just about you stick to your deadlines, you stick to your commitments, no matter what, come rain, hail or shine, that it’s also a big part of it is getting into communication. Once you realize that you won’t and be able to get something done that you said you would, or honor a commitment that you had, you know, committed to or whatever it is, either in your business or in your personal life. That rather than for example, in a situation where…and not everyone in PGSD has a client based business, but say you are in a situation where you do have one, that it’s not like on the day, you said, you would get it to them that you email them and say, “Hey, sorry, it’s not going to be today, it’s going to be next Friday,” or whatever, that if you knew a week prior to that, that it wasn’t going to get done, the best way to build trust, that even though we think like, “Oh, I don’t want to let them know until I like I’m certain I can’t get it done. And maybe I’ll get it done at the last minute” or whatever, to just reach out ahead of time…It just build so much trust. And if you’ve had this experience, on the other end, when someone has reached out before the deadline, and said, “Hey, here’s what’s going on…” you don’t even have to explain what’s going on. But “Hey, I won’t be able to get it done by this point in time, here’s actually when I will be able to get it done. It’s really important to me that I honor the you know what I said I would do and that if it’s no longer workable, that I make it workable, and commit to that and so here is the revised deadline.” To say that ahead of time, instead of once the day actually comes, it just makes all the difference, it’s like if say you’re meeting a friend for lunch, and they’re going to be late, if they message you half an hour before the lunch versus 10 minutes after you’re meant to meet up and you’re already sitting in the restaurant, there’s a big difference between those things. And they already knew half an hour before most likely, depending where it is, that they were going to be late. And so it’s like, “Okay, I’m gonna get in communication, as soon as I know,” rather than once the time has already passed, and try to make amends for it after the fact or apologize to just say, “Hey, like, I can already tell I’m going to be late.” And if this isn’t helping you…if you are someone who isn’t on time to things, I’ve done an episode a while ago about being addicted to chaos. And I talked about this in that episode of like if you’re consistently late to things. But if that is something that you are currently doing, that this can be a really great way to just really change and nurture your relationship with yourself that instead of being someone who messages after the time has passed, when you should have already been there that you message before and give them a heads up before. So that’s just a little side note. And I will link up to that episode about being addicted to chaos, because so many people said that was very uncomfortable for them to listen to, but helpful, which is the main feedback I get about this podcast. And it’s confronting and helpful at the same time. So I’m happy with that feedback. I’m happy with having a podcast, it’s like that. 

But with this, just be thinking about like, “Who do I want to be as an entrepreneur?” And this is where power planning really comes in. And planning properly, that you are so much better able to really understand, you know, that deadline that you can commit to without burning out, and without sacrificing clean rest, and different things like that, like what is that deadline, you can see clearly what you’ve got going on. And really, rather than pulling a number or date out of thin air, you can actually calculate that a lot more accurately. But you can also through the power planning process, particularly little tweaks, which is keeping a calendar workable, and updating it as you go, you can notice if you are putting tasks off, and you can then, because you have that awareness, you can then start to look at what are the thoughts that are having you put that task of and solving for those, rather than just trying to motivate yourself more, or to set yourself some kind of deadline is a form of motivation in terms of like trying to have maybe someone else keep you accountable, or that kind of thing. Self accountability is so powerful and anyone can develop it. And power planning is really such a great tool to develop that self accountability and it’s okay to have external deadlines. And we’re all going to have external deadlines in our business to some degree, ones that are self created that we communicate to our customers and clients or whatever. And ones that are communicated to us by someone else. But there are going to be so many times that we are in this realm of things, as I said, where there’s unchartered territory, there’s something you need to do that is new to you and has no set deadline and who do you want to be in that situation? So, to share a few examples for myself where I’ve really been in this and I’m in this a lot of them, like we can’t…and…this is like where we live, in uncharted territory with no real set deadlines, particularly for the biggest needle movers a lot At times, some of the needle movers are doing the things you’re already doing, and just continuing to show up and do them. But uncharted territory with no set deadline, there’s a reason that makes it onto our calendar, it’s because usually most often, it’s something that is going to move us forward. So for me, for example, that has looked like hiring. So at the moment, I am in the process of hiring a marketing manager or full time position for the business. And that is uncharted territory. I haven’t had that kind of role before in my business. I have, even though I have team members, like contractors who work for me that it requires like employment contracts and thinking about, like all different things without like, what leave to offer and whatever. And also like onboarding, and communicating to them different things. And like, it’s just so easy to put that kind of thing up. And there is no set deadline, like that’s something that I’ve decided for myself that I want to do. And also hiring when I initially first hired other people to coach inside PGSD alongside me that, that was something…so when did I do that? 2021 I think at the beginning of 2021, that I was like, “No, I’m just gonna, like delay that, delay that delay that,” because it meant that I needed to basically coach these coaches on the PGSD principles and philosophies and the things that come up and the way that we handle them and all those different things. And it was just this, like, I didn’t even…like googling how to hire a coach to coach in your program, like not much comes up, pretty much nothing comes up. And so it’s really uncharted territory. And like, I haven’t done this before. And it’s really hard to access information about how anyone else does it unless it’s like, knowing people personally and asking them. And at the time, I didn’t really know anyone personally who done that. So I was just making it up as I went along. But it was one of those things, there was no real set deadline. Like for me, I knew I wanted to do that before I gave birth to my daughter, Lydia. But what I found myself doing was like, “Okay, well, I’ll do that, like, you know, a few months before my due date.” And what I realized is that I needed to actually begin doing it. So I had her in the middle of the year, I actually needed this to start doing it in January, so that I had time to like onboard the coaches and to train them and then to have them lead calls and me to provide feedback and all those different things. And so it’s such an example of like, it took so much courage, I really had, like the vulnerability hangover, so to speak after that experience, because it really took a lot of courage to decide I was going to do it, to create a process for doing it, to execute the process for doing it. And to create my own deadlines for that, that I didn’t have to like, it didn’t have to be…there were so many other options as well that I could have done it. It wasn’t the only option. But I decided that I was going to do it. And I did it. And I built up so much self trust with myself through doing that, that it means now, in my business, when there are things like that, that I need to do, that I’m able to better set my own deadlines. And even when there are things I have, like even this week, in my calendar, related to uncharted territory, no deadline tasks, it can sometimes our brain can tell us, “it’s irresponsible to prioritize that over something that’s urgent.” And a lot of times, it’ll be like social media content that needs to go out or whatever, that it’s like, “oh, no, I need to do that and I can do this once. I’ll do these, you know, the uncharted territory task once everything else is done” or maybe you have urgent client work that needs to get done. And then there’s client work with no deadline, that like just recognizing that there will be things in your calendar that might have the external deadlines or internal deadlines. And it’s great to honor those as well. But ideally, I’d say probably at least every week, you will want to have something in your calendar that is uncharted territory with no set deadline, and you’re the one creating that deadline for yourself. So that you are able to really build and live into the identity, that you’re able to stick to your own deadlines, that you’re proactive, that you keep things moving. Part of the way you do that is you keep things simple. You don’t overthink or overcomplicate and you recognize, and this has been something that’s been huge for me, I’d say this year is recognizing, but particularly last couple of months, that a lot of times the irresponsible thing to do is be more focused on the social media content calendar, than these unchartered territory, like bigger needle movers that aren’t urgent, and they’re very important, but they’re not urgent. And there’s also this thought about like, they can come up with this, well, I don’t even know if it’s going to work, I don’t even know if it’s going to make a difference. I don’t even know if it’s going to, you know, be worth going the extra mile in this task. And so I’ll just like kind of get it done in the last minute. And I’ll just do what I can do at the last minute. And that’ll be good enough. And when this came up on the call today, what I was coaching on as well was like, “we want to be in this mentality of, you know, if it was easy and uncomplicated, what would it look like?”

But at the same time, we have to just be mindful of like when we’re in this perfectionist mindset, our perfectionism handbrake is on, that we see effort as a sign of inadequacy. And we see it as if we’re putting in a full effort, and we don’t get the result we want immediately, right away, that means we’re not good enough. So it can feel really vulnerable to put in a full effort, particularly with these unchartered territory, non-urgent tasks. And what we want to be thinking about is, how we want to operate and the relationship that we want to have with ourselves. And that it is worth putting in a full effort, even if we don’t know if it’s going to work. And if we’re in the mentality, so say, for example with the, the landing page for the travel clients, that when we were looking at if this was easy, and simple, and you know, what are the other ways to do this? What would that look like? And we explored that, one of the things that came up was like, “Well, again, also, it would be better to do it in a simple way, rather than the way I had planned because I don’t even know…I’ve never done this kind of thing before, I don’t even know if it’s gonna pay off to put this extra time in, and this extra effort in,” and so an important distinction that needs to be made here is that when we’re doing things in the simple and easy and uncomplicated way, that is putting in a full effort, for us to do it in the complicated way is us actually getting in our own way and us having that perfectionism handbrake on. There’s nothing wrong if that’s happening, of course, your brain is going to want to do that, like there’s no problem. But at the same time, we just want to be aware of when we’re in this mentality of, and this can come up when it comes to, you know, there’s a non-urgent, uncharted territory task, that we’re thinking that “Okay, well, I’m not going to put a full effort into it. Like, that doesn’t seem like the smart thing to do, because it might not pay off and I don’t wanna waste the effort” to instead think about, as I said, Who do you want to be? How do you want to operate? What relationship do you want to have with yourself? And why is it worth putting in a full effort? which doesn’t mean overworking, over scheduling, burning yourself into the ground. It means doing it the simple, easy, uncomplicated way, like, what are the benefits of giving it a full effort? Because if we think, and I shared an example, with social media, if we think like, “well, I don’t want to do it, unless full effort, unless I know It’ll pay off.” So say, for example with Instagram, and just to share a social media platform could be anything, TikTok, YouTube, whatever, it could be messaging people, whatever you do to market your business. If you think like, “well, this is…this might not work, I might not even get clients or customers. So I’m just going to do a…you know, do it, the bare minimum, and then basically I’ll half ass it. And then if it seems to be working, then that’s a smart thing to do is to put a full effort into that and lean in.” But what happens is, say, for example, with Instagram, that if you like, “Okay, I will show up more on Instagram, when I have more followers, when I have an engaged audience, like right now, I’m not getting many likes or comments. No one’s really watching my stories. So I will just keep showing up. Because I know it’s important to create social media content, but I won’t give it a full effort ’cause that just, you know, feels like a bit of a waste of effort.” So then what happens is because you’re not giving it a full effort, it doesn’t actually work. And maybe as well, part of that is you’re not doing it consistently. So you can’t even tell if it’s working or it’s not working. And then that further perpetuates that story of like, “Well, look at this is not really working, no one’s engaging with this. So I’m not going to put a full effort into it, because why bother when I’m talking to a brick wall,” and then you show up that way, and you get more, and more, and more of that experience. And so what you want to do instead is look at who do I want to be? again, Who do I want to be? How do I want to operate? And why is it worth giving a full effort, regardless of the outcome? Knowing that full effort is doing it in a simple, easy, uncomplicated way that requires courage. How will that benefit me? What impact will that have on my relationship with myself? When I’m able to show up like that and go all in like that. What are the dividends that’s going to pay for me, in my business, and my personal life? Even if I don’t get engagement or sales or whatever, that like, “How is that going to benefit me?” and really answering that, because a lot of times, we just think, “Well, there’s no benefit unless I immediately get whatever result we think we need.” And a lot of times that result isn’t even connected to the growth of the business, the result might be engagement. And that’s not even related necessarily to sales. But we think “No, I just, I want to be liked as a result I want and I want to get lots of instant gratification and like that kind of buzz from having people, you know, double tapping or commenting or whatever. And then I get to feel good about myself. And then if I feel good about myself, then I’ll be motivated to post more.” So be mindful of that when you have these uncharted territory, non-urgent tasks or projects that come up, and they will come up, they will be happening, if you have a business, they’re gonna be going on that it’s so powerful to look at, even if this doesn’t work right away. Or this year, like “Why is it worth showing up fully and how can I show up fully, while taking care of myself, while taking care of my business?” Not this all nothing like showing up fully, which means overworking, which means needing to be available to everyone, every second of the day, like all these different things. But like, “Really what does it look like to give a full effort here? And why would I want to do that for myself?” and answering that, and really seeing how it does impact your relationship with yourself, it impacts every area of your business, it impacts your relationships with your clients and your customers, even if you’re meeting all the deadlines that you have with them, and you’re quote unquote, doing what you said you would do that there’s just a different energy. When you are the business owner, the entrepreneur who can put unchartered territory tasks and projects in your calendar, you can honor that, yes, you keep it workable, but it gets done. And you do it ahead of time, it doesn’t mean it’s magically “this so important, I’m wrapped up on this.” That doesn’t mean getting things done ahead of time, being proactive, putting in a full effort, doesn’t entitle you to it working instantly. And that’s something I’ve learned on multiple occasions now this year. But thoughts of like, “If I get it done early, this will work, like this should just, you know fall into place.” And particularly with the PGSD launches, I shared this for the launch that we did in April that, that was really the first time for me, getting pretty much everything done ahead of time for the launch. And I was in…without realizing it in this very entitled way of thinking of like “I got everything done early, so everyone should just sign up,” and I…just recognizing that was entitlement. And then more recently, it has been “Well, I’ve done so much super thinking around this and being so intentional with this, so everyone should just sign up.” It’s like the same thinking but with different flavor. But it still creates a feeling of entitlement, which then has us not showing up fully and not being compelling and different things like that. There’s many ways that entitlement, and for a lot of people, they can not want to look at that, because we have such a negative association with the word entitlement as a society. And we don’t want to think that we’re someone who’s entitled, because those people are bad people and we’re not one of them. But just looking at, like, not having just being on to yourself, about not being entitled, that if you are doing things proactively, if you’re giving a full effort, if you’re getting it done early, and operating at the highest level, at your highest level, at the moment, as a business owner, that doesn’t mean that everything you touch is going to turn to gold. It means that you’re going to be for sure, learning and growing and evolving at a different pace to what you ever have before in a really positive way. But it doesn’t entitle you to instant success, and to everything working without obstacles or challenges. So I just want to get clear on that. This is really, ultimately, end of day about your relationship with yourself, the experience that you want to have with yourself as a business owner and entrepreneur and also as a creator. Regardless of what kind of business you have. You are creating something, even if that’s building a team, you’re creating something and like day to day, how do you want to feel? Do you want to be someone who feels stressed, feels overwhelmed, feels guilty about the tasks that you know you need to do, but there’s no set deadline so you can keep pushing them off, or do you want to be someone who feels proud that you are willing to do things that you never done before and to set deadlines for that, and to honor that deadline, even when it’s challenging, and yes, keep it workable. But you still get it done within that relative timeframe. And you’re able to do it in a simple, courageous way. Like, that’s who I want to be. That’s what I’m working towards. I’m a lot closer towards that than I had been before. I still have work to do there. But I just want to invite you into that possibility and identity, because as I shared at the top, I think a lot of times you think about, I don’t want to disappoint anyone.

And we never ask ourselves a question of like, what would it look like to really honor myself, to really honor my customers and clients, to not just not disappoint them, but to surprise and delight, and the same thing with ourselves like we so deserve that. And at some point, it comes down to just creating a new standard for yourself that you will no longer tolerate that kind of treatment from yourself, that you will no longer tolerate pain, the last priority. Being someone that breaks their own promises, or has their promises broken, so often does nothing about it. Because if you think about your relationship with yourself, like, it’s you, that’s breaking the promise to yourself, but it’s also you who’s on the receiving end of that, who’s been promised things. And a lot of times, we…if we’ve been in that cycle, that we stopped promising ourselves things, that we stopped setting deadlines. This is why power planning is so effective when it comes to reconstructing and rehabilitating yourself, trust that you are able to actually start creating promises with yourself again, but doing it in a way that really supports you and learning how to, and developing the skill set around honoring that, rather than just trying to turn a blind eye and be like, “Okay, well, you know, I won’t make any promises, no expectations, no disappointment.” If you look at relationships with other people, that if someone never promises you anything, that isn’t what creates trust, like that doesn’t…isn’t effective in creating trust. If someone’s like, “I never want to let anyone else down,” So I’m just never gonna…to, you know, tell you any, like, when I’ll be somewhere or anything like that, because I don’t wanna…to disappoint you. You know, like “Okay, cool, I trust you because you never commit anything to me.” That’s not how trust is built. It’s there being a commitment and honoring that and getting communication when something needs to change when that plan is not workable and making a new one. Like that’s how it’s built. And so you need to have a tool like power planning, where you’re able to…rehabilitate that. And to make promises to yourself, that you can actually keep to make those promises in a way that actually works for your perfectionist mindset, not against it. And just a tool to have to evaluate that, to further strengthen your relationship with yourself. As much as I’ve talked about improvements to your relationship with yourself, just recognizing you do have a lot of things about your relationship with yourself that are working. It’s not a one off thing, that it’s either complete shit or amazing. But if that…if this episode did speak to you that, you feel that “okay, yeah, I’m not disappointing anyone, but I could be really showing up in a different way and that would impact my day to day experience in a positive way.” Then, I’m glad I’m glad it’s been helpful. I’m glad it has resonated. And if you don’t yet know about power planning and how to do that, then I want to invite you to go and watch my planning series videos that I have that will share about power planning and how to get started with it. So you go to samlaurabrown.com/planningseries, I’m just trying to think of what it is off top my head. I think it’s slash plan. But it’ll be in the show notes, to go and have a sign up for that. And you get instant access to the videos. And they will help you get started with this journey. So yeah, and if you’re already doing that I won’t invite you into PGSD when the doors open next, you can sign up for the waitlist at samlaurabrown.com/pgsd hope this episode has been helpful, and I will talk to you in the next episode.

If you enjoy this podcast, I invite you to sign up to receive a short daily perfectionist power up from me. These are little notes and reminders sent to you via email that will help you plan properly as a perfectionist and get you out of your own way. So you can go to samlaurabrown.com/power to sign up today and you’ll start receiving motivating perfectionist power ups this week.


Author: Sam Brown