
I thought I’d record a ‘day in the life’ episode to share a behind the scenes about what a work day looks like for me. This episode has two parts – I recorded the first while I was driving into work and chatted through the meetings I have scheduled, what I hope to get done, what the structure of my day looks like etc. And then I recorded the second part while I was driving home from work so I could share what actually happened (including a big mistake I made and how I recovered from it).
This episode was recorded a couple of weeks before our most recent launch of PGSD. It’s a chatty episode for sure and one that’s going to remind you that we’re all just figuring this out as you go. And I don’t know about you, but most of the time I don’t need more information – I just need a reminder that I’m on the right path and if I keep showing up things will work out. So if you need some of that in your life, definitely tune into this episode ASAP.
Find the full episode transcript and show notes at samlaurabrown.com/episode423.
In This Episode You’ll Learn:
- What a realistic day in my life looks like
- How I recover from mistakes and avoid a shame spiral
- How I do self-coaching so I actually self-coach on the most important things
Featured In The Episode:
- Join the waitlist for Perfectionists Getting Shit Done (PGSD) – samlaurabrown.com/pgsd
- Take the perfectionism quiz: samlaurabrown.com/quiz
- Sign up for daily Perfectionist Power-Ups – samlaurabrown.com/power
- Follow me on Instagram @perfectionismproject
Announcement: PGSD is open for enrollment for one week only
My 12-month group coaching program Perfectionists Getting Shit Done (aka PGSD) will teach you how to plan properly as a perfectionist and get out of your own way. If you struggle to consistently market your business and put yourself out there, PGSD is for you! The doors to PGSD will open on 10 December 2023 for one week only. To find out more about the program and be the first to know when the doors open, join the waitlist today: samlaurabrown.com/pgsd.
Listen To The Episode
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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
If you’re anything like me, sometimes you just need a reminder that everyone else is figuring shit out as they go, and isn’t having a perfectly productive day, and is trying to figure out where to put their time, and all of that. So if that is helpful for you, then this episode is definitely one worth tuning into all the way to the end, it’s me sharing a realistic Day in the Life. I’m really still working on developing how to do this kind of episode in the podcast format. But I love hearing people share what their day actually looks like, I’m really getting specific with things. And I don’t know, it feels boring to record it and share little nuances and stuff like that.
But as a listener, I love it. And so, in case you love that kind of thing, and you also just love feeling like someone else is on this journey with you, especially if you don’t yet have a team, you don’t have many friends who have businesses, this episode is going to really just comfort you, I think, because it’s me sharing what actually happens in a day. And that I’m not perfect. I mean, on this podcast the whole time, I’m sorry that I’ve never tried to pretend that I’m perfect. And I’ve got it all figured out. But in this episode, specifically, there are two parts.
So the first part is me recording, just a little update on what I have planned for the day ahead. So this was recorded towards the end of August. So what happened before our PGSD launch that just recently wrapped up. But I recorded what I had planned for the day, what’s coming up what I was thinking about and just like what my intentions were and a few different concepts and things around self coaching, how to make sure you go beyond surface levels of coaching, like helpful things like that as well within this, but sharing what my day was planned to be.
And then I recorded a part two on the drive home, sharing what actually happened, the big mistake that I’ve made as well, which is a bit embarrassing, but anyway, was all good. But I share about that, and how things actually played out in my day. And yeah, it’s just it’s a chatty one, like these episodes often are. And it’s going to be really helpful for you. And it’s also packed with lots of helpful practical advice as well. So I do want to mention before we get into it, that we have just wrapped up our cohort enrollment for PGSD for October so PGSD stands for perfectionist getting shit done.
And I just wanted to take a minute to welcome our new PGS us who joined us, Christina, Olivia, Ariel, Carol, Holly, Carolyn, Andrea, Lisa and Patina. Welcome to PGSD. If you are wanting to join us for our next cohort, which is in January that we start but we enroll in December, or if you’re wanting to find out more about what the program is and how to work with me that you can go to samlaurabrown.com/pgsd So let’s just get straight into the episode. It’s going to be part one recorded on my day in, day in, drive in part two, recorded on my drive home. And yeah, I hope you enjoy it.
I am on my way into my co working space, and thought that I would record a bit of a day in a life style episode while I’m at it. So this morning I’m driving in it is 8:10am. While I’m driving in, I will share a bit about what I’m going to get up to today, what my plans are what I’m thinking about. And then on the drive home, I am actually doing a workout with a couple of my friends this afternoon. So on the way there, I’m going to just record a bit of a like what happened, kind of update, and just give you a bit of a picture of a day in my life.
I think that these episodes are just here to share some specifics of things that might be helpful or interesting to you. And also just hopefully, hearing someone else who’s in the thick of building a business as well, is calming and reassuring and can really help paint a picture of what it’s actually like, for other people, when we tend to imagine that everyone else is having this amazing experience all day every day. So I’m driving in, as I said, I’ve just dropped Lydia at her daycare, and spent time with everyone this morning. And I’m feeling today just not very energetic. And sleep was okay last night. It definitely wasn’t great, but it was okay. Given that I have six month old twins as well as Lydia.
And I’m just feeling I don’t know, who’s not super into today yet. But this morning, like what’s on the schedule today. This morning, I have a PGSD coaching call at nine. And I am really looking forward to that. Because, A. I always love coaching in PGSD. But also, it is so energizing to me. And I have so many ideas that come from it for podcast episodes and things to create to help you. So I know that after that call, no matter what state I’m in now I will be in a better state.
And even like during pregnancy, with Lydia and with the twins when I was feeling very unwell if I had a coaching call, even if I was in bed, like 15 minutes beforehand, feeling so ill getting on a call, just like I kept that commitment, because it really was so energizing for me. And so, yeah, so good. Like, that’s I love coaching. So anyway, I have a PGSD coaching call that’s from nine till 10. And for that call, I’m not planning to do really any, like a guided topic or thing today, I did that on my last call, I talked about how to take like a really nebulous, vague project and actually break it down into something really specific and tangible so that your brain doesn’t want to keep putting it off.
So we did that last time. But today, I just want to do some open coaching. And just check in with everyone who’s asked what they need coaching on and just see where the call takes us. And I love that because everyone has a very similar mindset, and has the same style of goal, a growth goal and is doing power planning and has a business that no matter what we coached on, it’s going to be relevant for everyone. So it just feels good knowing that it’s going to be helpful for everyone who’s there and who listens on the private podcast to the replay, to have that.
And then the other thing that I have, at the moment, just thinking about my calendar is a call with Daisy. So Daisy is the head of client success for PGSD. And we have a call to talk about how to really create such an incredible experience inside PGSD. Obviously, like hopefully it would go without saying it’s already a program we believe in and that gets incredible results for people. If you don’t know what PGSD is, perfection is getting shit done. It is my group coaching program. And we get perfectionist entrepreneurs out of their own way and help them be more productive, do the things they said they would do and do it in a way that feels good to them.
So we already have a great program, but we are always in conversation about how to make it even better how to make sure even more of our clients get results and quicker, better, faster results. So we have a meeting today from 12 o’clock to one and then I will need to leave around three o’clock just before three o’clock to go to my friend’s place for our workout in her garage. So I’m looking forward to that and then after that, I will pick up Lydia on the way home and then hang out with everyone tonight. And I actually have a call with Aditi, who’s one of the PGSD coaches, but I am her client at the moment as well to talk about human design and the podcast. So I have a call with her at 8pm.
And then in terms of the other things that I’m doing today, I am working from the co working space, as I said, and my friend Jen works from there. So we will probably chat for a little bit at some point. And just like it’s always so energizing to chat to her. We’re always thinking about the same things. Even if we haven’t talked to each other in weeks, we are, like always scarily similar in our thoughts and the topics we’re thinking about. And it’s just really lovely always to chat to her. So probably talk to her at some point. And then in terms of the rest of the day, so I haven’t actually done my power planning for today.
And well, that’s not fully true. I have I did it for the week, and I had my clean rest mapped out and everything all in there, except for today was really like a lot of buffer time. And I haven’t said what I want to do in that buffer time yet. And so I can even feel this week, like when I started the week that I didn’t do my power hour in the full way that I normally would and I did end up with instead of deciding what I was going to do, and then keeping that workable through the week, I just was in this mentality of like, I don’t know what to do this week. So that was interesting, too, that I didn’t really coach myself on that just kept rolling with it.
And sometimes you just have those weeks where you’re like, I know, I’m not really like doing this stuff that supports me fully. And I can see that. And I don’t want to look at why. So I don’t know, that’s kind of where I’ve been at this week, we’ve been finishing getting the Planning series and all the content for the next PGSD launch, the September launch, getting that all together. So I was doing the final podcast episodes for that yesterday, I had a really great day, actually, I work from home. I shouldn’t say actually like that, because that that’s a self image thing and daying that, it’s somehow surprising to me that I had a great day.
What I mean is, I had a great day when I hadn’t really planned out what I was doing. And I really let myself kind of go with the flow. And this is what I’m wanting to do with my power planning even more, is really have a lot of spaciousness. And like, just because you’re working from a calendar doesn’t mean that you can’t plan in like a two hour chunk of time to just like do whatever you want in the middle of a workday. And to just like, go down a rabbit hole, like yes, I was looking at podcast stuff. So it’s not like everything you put in has to be this like to do item so to speak, I find when I am doing super thinking, and that kind of thing. And just following my curiosity, then it often leads to a great place. And so I am wanting to calendar more of that in.
So yesterday, I was in the thought of I need to or want to record some podcasts episodes like the one for next week, which I think is 414. And then the OpenCart episodes need to be recorded or organized or like decided what they are. So those are the episodes that will go out when enrollment for PGSD is open. And I just like wasn’t feeling it in the morning. And so I went to a local cafe, and I got brunch, my plan was doing myself quoting from there, but my laptop was dead. And my earphones had 5% I was like, Okay, this is just a sign to just sit for a minute in like with my own company and not kind of distract myself with anything else.
So went there. And then when I got home, I was just thinking about the podcast and really like big picture. What I want to do contemplating like, what a new format could look like and how many episodes I want to do per week and things like that, I did actually end up recording a little episode with an update about that, and my thought process. So I won’t share that here. But at some point, once that is decided, I will put together an episode going through that decision because I think it’s so powerful to see someone else’s decision making process so that you don’t just look at the decisions I’ve made and think that’s the right way that you can really, this is what I at least tried to do is understand the thought process behind someone else’s decisions.
Because that decision they made they might have made for reasons that don’t make sense for your business or for your personal life. And so we need to just kind of do a little digging and see what’s underneath. So anyway, I recorded something about that. But I was thinking about that and just kind of let myself go where I wanted to go in terms of like, I want to watch some videos on YouTube about this and just kind of let myself be and I could feel yesterday morning as in this mindset of like, I need to be doing things. Like I just need to let myself be for a minute and trust that the doing will come. And reflecting on with the podcast, I can definitely say I need to sit down at 9am and record and I can do that.
And it can be a great episode. But my favorite ones, and if I’m thinking about the experience I really want to have a lot of those episodes would more so be I and, like really feeling prompted and compelled to pick up my microphone, which I pretty quickly was yesterday. But I ended up recording quite a few different things. And yeah, it was a really like flowy day and I ended up doing all the things that I had wanted to do anyway. And just kind of because my power planning at the beginning of the day looked a bit different to that. As I went, I just kept updating it and ended up doing as I always would like the little tweaks with my checkmarks so that by the end of the day, I could see where my time went. And yeah, so for my weekly review, I can look at that and reflect on that.
So then, coming into today, so I had been thinking like, Okay, well, by the end of today, I need to have those episodes done. But they’re kind of already done. And so it’s just funny how sometimes my brain, just like I don’t have enough time. And then when I just trust that I do have enough time, I get it all done. And then I’m like, Okay, well now what I do with this time, and I know that I have a habit of wanting to fill my time with busy work of just keeping myself busy, because it feels more uncomfortable to just really have that spaciousness, and to have spaciousness without overthinking or overworking things like to just have spaciousness and let done be done. That’s what I’m really thinking about a lot and working on at the moment.
So today, in terms of what I want to accomplish, what I’m going to do is, so first up, as soon as I get there this morning, it’s really going to be about my PGSD coaching call that I’m doing. So that’s top priority. And then after that I’m going to do because I didn’t even do my weekly review yet for for last week. So just sharing that as well. It’s Thursday, I plan to do that on Tuesday, I didn’t so I’m doing on Thursday, it’s still better to do it today than not at all. So I’m doing that weekly review. And I’m gonna do my power planning for the rest of today. And for tomorrow, as much as my brain wants to just be like, let’s just jump in and work in whatever that I know. Doing my power planning is going to be the most helpful thing.
So I’m going to do that this morning. And then plan out next week probably even plan out the week after. Renae and I have a bit of a like high level planning day. In a couple of weeks, we’re doing two days in a meeting room together with a whiteboard and all of that jazz to plan out our 2024 marketing. And like the dates for the PGSD launches, and all of those details. And this is really exciting to me, actually, because it’s the first time that I’m really doing that with someone else. Last year I did it. And it was with a different context because I was pregnant with the twins.
And I didn’t do my yearly planning the end of the year, because I need to do that beforehand, because I was going to be having the twins. They came in February, so I kind of reshuffle things but I went to the coast for a night. And it’s just really nice to just get out of your usual habitat, and environment and do some planning and big picture stuff. And so a lot of that actually was when I decided about hiring a marketing manager. And then I went on to hire Renae. So this year doing this planning, I get to do it with Renae and have someone to bounce ideas off instead of just being in the echo chamber of my mind.
So I’m really looking forward to that. And for us to just have this space it is during the planning series. We’ll be going out that week. But we will already have prepped everything like everything will be done for the launch, so that we have just the time to really be in that and they’ll be open cart the week after. So we focused on the launch. And that way we planned it at this time so that we could plan out the rest of quarter four. And then next year as well, it really just make sure we’re thinking about things with a long term view. And not just short term. So that is exciting to what I need to do related to that.
And why I mentioned it is because I want to do some preparation for that. And that’s why I think about the podcast yesterday as well like what I’m wanting to pitch to Renae, in the sense of the podcast, and what that’s going to look like, because that is going to be our main marketing channel, it really always has been, but I have really not giving it as much attention as I could. And yeah, it’s still being the main one, but really having it be the forefront and being intentional about that. And putting our energy into that, our brains into that. So thinking about that. So next week, I’m going to do some planning around that.
And the other thing I want to do next week, is to do the like a bit of an operations check in I, you might have heard me mentioned this on other episodes. But I have taken back on the operations of the business, like the back end admin, that kind of thing overseeing that, because Daisy moved into client success. And I was looking at hiring someone for the operations role and didn’t find the person I was looking for, for the way that I was seeing that role. And so decided to take it back in have a look at everything, which I haven’t done for few years, I’ve had for the last, I think since 2019, someone helping with that.
So it really feels like not a great use of my time to be doing the operations. So I need to have a look at solutions for that and really get clear on what bits I need to do in terms of like high level strategic thinking about operations, and really clarifying what that operations role will be offered to be an executive assistant, like what’s needed, and then being able to hire that person and getting ready for that. So I want to have, like a good chunk of time. And this is where I can get a bit in my own way, is that I like to have a big chunk of time and like this kind of spaciousness to just be in one kind of task. Rather than jump around from like this, to this to this to this service.
My ideal day workwise is I’m doing something I do like recording podcast episodes or thinking about PGSD or even the operation stuff like but whatever it is, having time to go deep, and not just like 30 minutes on this thing, then 30 minutes on this completely other different thing. So I’ve been wanting to have a big chunk of time, but then it’s this mentality of like, well, I just need to get on top of these other things, to be able to have that chunk of time. And then I’m never because I’m vague about what on top of the things mean, then I’m not actually able to get on top because I don’t know what that looks like.
And I just kind of end up in this cycle of not being on feeling on top of things, even though I am and then therefore not giving myself the time to do certain kinds of needle movers and then not feeling on top of that. And it’s just a whole thing. So I know I need to normalize for myself, and create an identity around like I am on top of things. And that is really important. I believe in business, because there’s always more to do. There is always something else to be working on. And we have to define for ourselves. So I’ve done that in a lot of ways, with things. And my planning definitely helped with that. But there still is work for me to do on that front.
So that is something I’m going to be looking at today when I’m doing my Power Hour and planning out. I’d say today, and in the next two weeks. And really, if there is anything vague, like I want to like figuring out, for example, what podcast episodes I need to record and getting them in my calendar and knowing that I don’t need to like, as much as my brain wants to have a full day to look at this thing or whatever. I don’t need that you can get a lot done in a focused hour or even two hours. So yeah, it’s just been aware of that mentality.
And once I do my Power Hour, and I’m reviewing it for the workability to just look at that piece again and just make sure I’m not in that mentality of being on top of things and whatever like wanting to be on top and then pretending I’m not on top of things. And also doing probably my self coaching before I do that well that’ll kind of blend with the weekly review. So that’s my plan for today. I will update you on what I end up deciding to do and how the day goes and even just talking this out. I feel more energized than before and I think that today will be a productive day.
And I will do what I need to do. And it’s just making sure that instead of believing my brain when I know for sure, it will tell me to just jump into things or like we do our project management in Asana, to go and look in Asana and see if anyone in the teams messaged me about anything. And then if the equivalent of checking email, we don’t email each other, we just comment in the relevance Asana task, or slack or there’s something urgent, but almost all the communications in Asana. So it’s the equivalent of checking emails, and it’s very easy to check that and then go down a rabbit hole of things. And so I really do my best to have my Asana check in with the team be at the end of the day.
And then if there’s anything that that’s needed, I do it the following day. And we try to work far ahead enough that there’s not really ever anything urgent that needs to be done that day, we have deadlines for things and like I’m aware of when things are due for me on certain days. So I will put that in my power planning. Lately, I feel like so we had an Asana with our due dates that like and part of our company values has been your word. So when you commit to it being a due date, and you give that task a thumbs up, and like we make sure the due dates clear with the time that that is the due date, and you can get in communication about it with whoever else is involved.
If you need to change that it’s not set in stone. But it’s not a hope or a wish. It’s like I’ve thought things through I’ve added in some buffer for workability. And here’s when I’m committed to having it done. And I can just feel that. I know for me, we really at one point, were very much in such a great rhythm with that. And then I feel like me, as a leader, I set the tone. And I have been like, oh, I can’t get that done this week, I’ll do it next week. And like, then I’ll do it the week off. And just, it’s not the vibe, it’s not how I like to do it. And I feel like that then creates a different team environment as well to see the leader of the business doing that.
And it all works out. But it’s just the the posture of it like that, the approach is not the approach I want to have. So I think that is something to go. And myself coaching as a bit of a like, undercurrent, there’s kind of the top of mind things I look at in self coaching, which is what I think about that day. And then there’s the things that are in the background. And these are the things as well. Like yesterday, I had a meeting with Michelle and Aditi, the PGSD coaches, we have a monthly call where we talk about how the calls are going how we can make them even better, like what we’re working on all these different things.
And with that, we were just talking about how or at least my experience is, when I’m feeling like everything’s going well, that is the best time to get coaching even though my brain is like, well, everything’s going great, I’m feeling pretty good, I don’t really need any coaching. But that’s when you get to coach on the undercurrent things that aren’t acute concerns. Like they’re not things that are urgent or top of mind, but they are themes and thought patterns that are there and are creating results that we don’t want. And it’s only once you kind of can be in that place often where you’ve got rid of or you don’t have any urgent concerns, you can then look at the the undercurrent and the things that are really having a big impact on your life, your business, your mindset that wouldn’t come up because you’re not really thinking about it.
For example, one of mine is networking. And like why I’m not really networking, and not putting myself forward for opportunities and things like that, like that’s not top of mind for me that I’m thinking about, or stressing about, or feeling the direct pain of on a daily basis. But that is something that is impacting the business, it is something that I want to do as well. And so like having the opportunity to look at that that really often, like the best time and that comes up when I’m feeling pretty good about everything in the business and I can have the time and space to look at that.
So you’re having this kind of undercurrent this mindset of like not just looking at what you’re thinking about today, but what the undercurrent is what the themes are beneath the surface can be so helpful. So with my self coaching, I’ve been divided up into top of mind and then kind of like an undercurrent. And I think for my undercurrent, I really need to review my commitment levels. actually talked about this in an episode I recorded yesterday that’s going to be part of the PGSD, September launch debrief episode that I do. So it’ll come out then but I talk about like conditional commitment and clean commitment and entitlement and just really like how to be fully committed to the result in a clean way that isn’t controlling, like this thing wishing commitment and control is really important for perfectionist because we think those are one of the same and that we feel committed, we are often controlling.
But that isn’t what I would call clean commitment. So anyway, I do think that for myself is looking at my commitment levels, because I haven’t done much thinking about my growth goal for the year of 1 million, like I’ve thought about, obviously, a lot of things related to that, but like direct thinking about it. And the goal for the launch. And just I’ve been very committed to keeping things painfully simple and like doing certain other periphery activities, but actually being committed to the goal itself. And being committed to the launch goal hasn’t actually been on my radar.
And I think there’s some thoughts to look out there, potentially, most likely, I’m not feeling like it’s going to happen. And so my brains like hey, let’s still keep working towards it. But let’s not actually directly thinking about the goal. So I want to look at that. And I’m doing my I’m gonna wrap up in a second. But I’m doing myself coaching at the moment in my apple notes, or whatever you call it. An INotes on my MacBook, I love handwriting notes and journaling. But it just I can do so much more self coaching when I’m typing because I’m quicker at typing. And I’ve found that the quality of the self coaching, the thoughts that come out hasn’t been dramatically different.
And so I can also just review it really easily and copy and paste things into my self coaching curriculum. So I do have a little folder called 90 days of self coaching. And I within that have a few things pinned to the top one of them is my self coaching curriculum. So when there’s something that comes up in my self coaching for that day, and I think like this would be good to coach on another day as well. I just copy and paste it in there. I’m really working on a system for my self coaching curriculum. And we talked about it in PGSD, but I want to just update it a bit, and have it be even more helpful. So I’m really working on that at the moment.
And I also have a few other things pinned in that folder, which is like if I hear a really great question on a podcast, interview or episode, and I’m like, Oh, I’d love to actually think about that for myself. I just have like a journaling questions. Note. And I write down and usually who it’s who said it what episode it was on in case I want to go back for more context. And just what the question is. And that has been really great as well. So I have some ones in there from, like Tim Ferriss, for example. And just other people that it can just be the most random statement, they say it doesn’t have to be them saying, here’s a question for you to think about.
Usually, they just say, a throwaway remark and like, oh, like, let’s look at that. So yeah, I’m working on that self coaching curriculum as a tool so that you always know what to get coached on. Like, we want to make sure and we talked about this yesterday, our PGSDers always know what they could get coaching on, they always know what they can self coach are not from a place of I need to fix myself, and there’s so much work to do. But like, there’s always I’m always aware of what’s going on in my brain that might be unhelpful, and I love the self coaching curriculum idea, because you don’t like it because you just park your ideas for self coaching and your prompts for self coaching somewhere, I think it really helps to reinforce that you don’t have to do all the things and do all the coaching and like change all your thoughts or whatever, like you can just identify them and say, Hey, I like want to come back and have a look at this thought.
But it’s also okay for me to just note it and let it stay the same. And not be in this all or nothing mindset. Because I know for a lot of us who love personal development, we can be thinking like if I see a thought or a limiting belief, or whatever, I like have to get rid of it completely before I can make any progress. And it really isn’t like that. And our human brains will just produce a lot of unhelpful thoughts for good reason. But it will do that pretty reliably. And so I just love having a tool that helps me to identify that for myself, without then creating this idea that I shouldn’t have any limiting beliefs. Like I’m always going to have beliefs that limit me in some way.
And that’s not a problem and I can achieve things I could never even dream of achieving and still have limiting beliefs there. There are there’s obviously progress to be made when you can get a new perspective on one of them and change one of them and that’s what I’m have to think about it like just one mental shift or epiphany or new perspective, can open up so much possibility. So it’s not a problem that you have other thoughts going on that aren’t helpful. So that’s just the way I like to look at it. And the way that we approach it as well in PGSD is like, you’re not this thing to be fixed and that you’re broken. And even with perfectionism, most people talk about overcoming it.
And then it’s this toxic thing. And it’s like, perfectionism is really just a set of beliefs, like you have perfectionist thoughts. And if we can just shift one of those perfectionist thoughts into something a bit more growth minded, you will see dramatic change in yourself and your business. And then if we can do another one, then there’s change again. And so it’s just really taking that incremental approach and knowing that’s the quickest way to get results versus trying to look at everything all at once and change it all at once. Like you can just choose, for example, like we have the perfectionism quiz, you can just have a look at what your biggest sign of perfectionism is.
It’ll be linked up in the show notes if you want to do it, and you haven’t yet but you can just focus on doing self coaching around that and using your outline to help you with that. So say for example, if it’s procrastination, you don’t have to also work on overthinking even if you are overthinking or you don’t also have to work on burn out even if you are burning out like you can just work on one thing and trust you’ll get so many benefits from that. So that’s my update for the morning. I am going to park in a second. So it has been a nice drive actually. It’s gone very quickly. And yeah, I will talk to you soon.
I’m on my drive home. Now it is five past three. Well, actually, I’m not on the way home, I’m on the way to my friend’s place. We’re doing a workout together with three of us. So I have wrapped up my work day. And I am just gonna reflect on what ended up happening today. Because I kind of like the thing I said, I wouldn’t do I did. And I think that this happened to all of us anyway, I just wanted to chat about it and update you.
But today, I got in, I did my PGSD coaching call. And actually, that turned out to be a whole thing in like, four plus years of PGSD. I think maybe there’s one call, I’ve needed to reschedule. And being late to a call, like, today, I needed to be 15 minutes late. That just doesn’t happen. So that it happened today. It’s all good. And I talked about it a bit on that call, actually, to really just give a reminder that it happens to everyone and to not beat yourself up about that happening. But to make a long story short, well, it is a short story in a way. And this is preventable. And this is when it can be the easiest to beat ourselves up.
But what happened was that my phone, what’s it called your internet plan, or whatever my phone plan had expired, and the Internet along with it, which I hadn’t realized. And so I then couldn’t open the gate to where I was parking. And I couldn’t also update my internet plan my phone plan because I didn’t have access to the internet. And so I needed to figure out how to get access to the internet to update my phone plan, because my car details had expired. And then go back to try and park again and open the gate and hope that that was the issue about why the gate wasn’t opening park and then walk the five minute walk to the co working space, and then go to the meeting room where I was gonna do the call and set things up and then do the call.
So I didn’t realize that that was an issue until about 10 minutes before the call. And so I ended up figuring out what to do, which was basically drive near my co working space, and then get access to the internet that way and then drive back. But it did take a bit of time. So right before the call, like two minutes before the call I message Daisy. And I said it because knowing that she would be on the call and said, Hey, I’m going to be 15 minutes late, are you able to kick off the call? She does leave some of the call. So I said are you able to kick off the call. And I will be there in 15 minutes time.
And we did that and it all worked out. And everyone’s still had a great experience. But yeah, that was not the plan. That was not what I had expected to happen or counted on. But it’s just knowing that we all have those moments where even like, we cause others inconvenience, or end up not fulfilling a commitment we’ve made because of something that was completely preventable. And that can be frustrating to ourselves, and we just feel can feel bad about it. But ultimately, I didn’t really feel bad about it. In the sense that I didn’t beat myself up about it. I was like, Okay, well, I’m definitely updating my card details.
So that doesn’t happen again. And maybe give myself a bit of extra time ahead of time to allow for that to happen. But ultimately, I forgive myself for that happening. And I’m moving forward. So that feels very common sense easy for me to share that. But I know that in the past, that would have been a big deal and may have even prevented me like just the thought of that experience may have prevented me from committing to doing calls and things like that. So yeah, I hope that hearing that helps you to be able to commit to things knowing that if for some reason you aren’t able to fill that commitment, there are often so many other solutions and workarounds and things that can be done to just be able to keep on rolling and moving ahead.
And a lot of times in many ways, it’s better to commit to something and then if you’re not able to follow through with it to adjust then not to commit at all, obviously, I haven’t thought that through fully, or probably I’m sure a lot of exceptions to that. We want to be committed to things but ultimately, sometimes there are going to be circumstances where we’re never going to know all the what ifs the ends the buts. And so we just need to commit and trust ourselves to keep things workable and be flexible.
So I had that call this morning. And then I think I was saying this morning that my plan was to do my weekly review, and to do the Power Hour, and those things would be my first stop this morning. What I ended up doing, and I hope this share is like, just helps to remind you about the realities of being human and all of that, and that I adjusted my plan. So after that call this morning, I felt so inspired to record an episode for the podcast, and to talk about what was discussed on that call, because kind of following on from me talking about that experience I had this morning, one of our PGSDers was coached on feeling bad about feeling bad, essentially.
And I won’t go into that concept here. Because I have recorded a different episode about it. I’m not sure when that would be released. But the synopsis is that the right word, the summary is that we often feel more bad than we need to because we feel shame, inadequacy, regret, perhaps. And then we judge ourselves for feeling that way, instead of just letting it be okay, that we feel that way. And by allowing ourselves to have those feelings and not have to fix them or telling ourselves we should know better than to be feeling that way. We’ve already worked on it with our coaching or with a therapist or whatever. And so we should be past that by now. Like that kind of self talk doesn’t allow us to actually move through it.
And it only creates more suffering. So I recorded an episode sharing a bit more about that and some personal stories relating to that. And then what I ended up doing was checking in on everyone on Asana. Nowadays, they just like I had said, I wouldn’t do that. But it did feel really good to just, there are a few little add mini bits that I was needing to do. And just to kind of get a lay of the land and what I definitely needed to have done because today is my last work day of the week. I work three days. And I do that at the moment midweek. So Tuesday to Thursday, and then I have Friday to Monday inclusive off.
So I’m about to have four days, where am I not working, I don’t check in on anything, I don’t go into Asana, I don’t go into Slack, like I’m not connected to work. So I was making sure because as well, I hadn’t done my Power Hour fully at the beginning of the week. So normally, I don’t need to make sure everything will be done by the end of today, because that’s been considered when I did my planning. But in this case, that wasn’t true. So I was just making sure that everything that was needed from me, as well with the launch coming up, like everything that was needed for me has been delivered, and that everyone’s able to keep moving forward that things over the days that I’m off.
So I did that after recording the episode, I think the episode was maybe 20 minutes long. And then I… What did I do, I prepped as well for the call that I had with Daisy. And then I had that call. And we ended up going 15 minutes over. And we try to keep our calls really to the time that they are. And that’s something that we’ve been working on. But Daisy and I plan to the agenda for the meeting that we will be having next week, like the planning meeting to just talk about what we need to get out of that meeting. And so we can really use that time wisely because we haven’t done a high level planning meeting for client success before.
So that was really fun to just talk about the bigger picture plans for PGSD. If you’re not familiar with the goals that I have for the business, and the vision, and our mission is helping imperfections, entrepreneurs get out of their own way. And then really it’s having the program be at the moment. That’s like the one thing that we sell at the $50 million mark, we’ll probably have another offer or two. But thinking about what is the vision for PGSD and really having that been. Yes, a coaching program and serving a lot of people. But ultimately, I want to be able to help more people than a group coaching program is really equipped to help like if we had a $50 million business with a group coaching program, that that would be I think it would maybe like 8000 or 10,000 people that we’d have in that program.
So there would need to be some changes to the format of the program to make sure everyone in there has an incredible experience and still has that personal feel, and all of that, but ultimately, we are wanting to help millions of people to be productive and get out of their own way. And so I’m wanting to create power planning to be a tool that can be mentioned alongside conversations about other productivity methods like David Allen’s getting things done and things like that, like I want this to be part of the productivity conversation. And so that needs to, that means that it needs to be kind of sharing it with the masses approach, and really having PGSD be a way to help people get incredible results, but also to be able to figure out how to really have people create that in a fully self sufficient way so that we can share as a tool.
And people see a lot of success with that, obviously, I already talked about power planning on the podcast and sharing the steps and things like that. But really, it is, I mean, I always believe in coaching and support and how beneficial that is. But really, it’s understanding what, what are the things that come up, and just getting to coach so many people inside PGSD, and seeing their power planning and troubleshooting it with them and all of that. And just noticing the things that we are saying over and over again, or the questions that commonly come up and baking the answer to that into the process itself. So that everyone who uses it is able to get incredible results, even if they don’t have coaching. And they’re able to use it as a self coaching tool, not just a productivity tool.
So I have big goals and a big vision for that. And so we’re just wanting to make sure that the updates we make to PGSD. And the way that we do things are going to incorporate that in and help us in that direction. And so we think about the $50 million vision, so that’s for the year 2031. Then what else was at the 2025 is 5 million, and what that would look like. So that would be about 800 PGSDers in that year or 800 to 1000 depending on payment plans and things like that. So thinking about, Okay, what would the program need to look like so we can still deliver incredible results, and everyone still has that support needed and that community feel like I really want to make sure we keep that feeling of this being a safe space for people to share.
And when they really feel like everyone that gets them in support, someone doesn’t judge them. So go, we’re just talking about that, and how to have PGSD really be able to grow into its next iterations. So that was a great to do that. And then I had lunch with Jen, my friend, we went and got some Vietnamese, what are they called rice paper rolls, and just had a chat. And I was sharing with her actually about my plans for the podcast. And thinking about what a new format could look like, and potentially doing a lot more episodes and having them be chatty ones like this. And just hearing Jen’s thoughts on that was really interesting.
So I won’t share more on that in this one, because I’ll talk about that in a different episode. But that was really great to chat with her. And I had I think one hour, I had said I want to be back working again by 145. And so we were and with that as well, like I wanted to just stay in chat for like two more hours was like, Oh, I’d said 145. It’s 145. I’m going to go back to my desk and like let this conversation wrap up. So yeah, I think that’s something as well that I have been working on or I’m still working on that. I am pretty good at being on time places. And that wasn’t always the case. Like I really had to learn how to be on time and giving myself a lot of time for workability and plans changing and things like that.
And now it’s also like leaving on time, especially if I don’t have any, like commitment after that. And I can just stay somewhere for ages and, or if like the only commitment I have often something else is a commitment to myself. Finishing things on time and I’ve talked about this in a work context, I call it landing the plane like just knowing that there’s so many like, you might need to do so many different things between like takeoff and landing. But I love the idea of like I’m in Brisbane and thinking about like landing and a little you take off from Brisbane and land obviously it’s too long, I think at the moment to do a direct flight, basically the other side of the world but you can land on a tiny strip of cement, like on a tiny tarmac on the other side of the world and like that’s so precise that I’m going to land on this exact piece of cement that is like just wide enough for a plane.
And I love that idea of that precision. So I’ve developed a skill set around that with work. But what I’m wanting to do is really continue developing that with my personal life. And when I say okay, like, I’m going to leave whatever, catch up with friends at this time, that when it’s that time, even if I’m having a great time, obviously, there’s exceptions to that or whatever. But I keep that commitment with myself and can disrupt things up. And yeah, I feel like there’s some thoughts within that that aren’t helpful that stopped me from wrapping things up. And like, I don’t know, but I’m working on that. And it’s just really a matter of like, okay, well, now I’m gonna move on to the next thing. And doing that, so yeah, getting better at that.
Then I did my Power Hour, essentially like my power planning for next week. And I did my weekly review within that as well, actually. So before my meeting with Daisy, I prepped for that. And then I did my weekly review, while I was pumping, I am breastfeeding the boys. So I when I’m working, then I’m also pumping. So I was pumping and doing that weekly review. And just noticing, like why I didn’t really do my power planning fully. And then yeah, then I did my Power Hour, like next week and the week after I did it for but two of the days, the following week are just going to be days with Renae that we are planning for the marketing Saturday for next year.
And there’ll be an agenda for that to come. But I want to prep for that next week. And then next week, I want to look at the operation side and really give myself space for that. So it was good. Just closing out this week, knowing that I have created a situation like with the podcasts and other things that I have do that I am going to have the time to just go deep into that. But when I was planning out my week, I want to make sure, and this is part of power planning, I think any, you know, planning properly, is that you are really clear about the outcome. And as much as possible, avoid, kind of like when you’re time blocking, and you just say things like, like operations or admin or whatever, that’s so vague.
If someone else was to look at your calendar, they wouldn’t really know what that meant to what done looks like. And so recently on a PGSD coaching call, I shared my little, I guess, set of prompts that I use to create something into a project. So instead of it being this big, vague and nebulous thing, where at the moment for me, it’s like, I need to look at all the operations staff and I need to figure out who I need to hire and what would their job description be like, and I already did that, like I went out to market to look for someone, I think it was in May. But I want to review that and update it’s just a very vague blobby feels like it could take you know three months kind of task.
And so what I actually put in my power planning was that at 9am on Tuesday, which is my first hour of the week, that I am going to do my project creation tool about the operations. And then after that I’ve scheduled a power hour to plan out what comes from that. Because I don’t yet without doing that project creation, I didn’t have time to do it today, I didn’t prioritize doing it today. I don’t know what to put in my calendar, I know that if it’s just this operations vague task, then I might, you know, be doing things related to that. But I’m just going to kind of click around and like suss things out.
And it’s not actually going to be a really productive use of my time. And I want to make sure I am using my time really wisely or as wisely as I can. So during that time with the project creation tool, which is again, just a really a set of prompts to take something from being vague to specific, I’m going to be looking at what does done look like? What’s the timeframe? What are the needle movers? What are the things I need to put on my not to do list? And really get clear about that. And then I’ll be able to, from there identify tasks that are maybe 30 minutes or an hour long, and not even tasks, but outcomes like results that I’m creating.
And then this is something that I learned from Brooke Castillo is really to plan for results rather than activities. So instead of saying, you know, for example, I have signed up. I don’t think I’ve mentioned this yet. Sign up for a program to help me with Asana and looking at that and kind of creating a high level I plan for Asana. And that’s I think it’s called Asana masters. But Paul Minors is the creator of that, who I found on YouTube. But I am wanting to begin working through that next week. But instead of saying, like in my calendar, having a blog for like the asana program like that, for me to learn, you know, how to create a structure for it and things like that, because we haven’t looked at that as a team since 2019.
And there are definitely some big updates needed simple ones, but powerful one. So instead of just having like, work on that, it’s really getting specific about like, Okay, what actually, am I wanting to have a look at, like, which modules am I wanting to do? How long would they take, which ones am I wanting to do, but not going to do till later, and kind of getting really specific, so it’d be like, module one, complete within whatever time module one implemented, whatever specific things are flowing from that. So it’s always looking at the specific thing. That way, it’s so much easier to have that time be productive, and get something out of it versus just being like, Oh, I’ll work on this kind of activity.
That’s when we don’t feel like we’re making any progress because we just end up like a putting it off usually, because it doesn’t feel important. And we prioritize things that are specific. And this is actually I was coaching a PGSDer on this recently, about how like, they were in a part time job. And they found themselves prioritizing the tasks from their part time job, over their business, even though they’re working that part time job. So they have time to build the business. But they are prioritizing that, basically, because there’s a clear deadline, it’s very, like, the way it’s been set up means that their brain is like, Okay, I know what to do. I know when it’s due by, I know the consequence of not having that done. Which means for example, I might get fired, or I might be performance manage.
And so our brains like cool, that’s important, I will do that. And it deprioritizes. The big needle movers that have a much bigger consequence, for example, not actually being able to build a business and do the thing you want to do with your life. But because it’s so vague, our brain really just places value on the specific thing. And it’s much easier to tackle and grapple with that. And if there’s any mindsets around it, it’s easier to overcome it when things are specific.
So our brains will prioritize, especially as well, like client work and things like that, over the needle movers that are often like we purely have to manage ourselves to get them done, there’s no external deadline, there is no one creating that clarity. So we really need to learn to create it ourselves. So that’s what I’m doing with that project creation tool is making a project for myself around the operations and handing that over versus it just been something I’m tinkering away at. And that’s going to be my first hour on Monday.
So it’s also been really great just been at the co working space as well, I’ve been working from home. And I love working from home. And I’ve learned how to be really productive from home as well. But being in a space where the like, when I’m at home, I just want to see the kids and see Steve and like all of that. And so just being in a work environment around other people who are working, I really enjoy that. And I feel like there’s like for every one minute I have at home, I get two minutes. I don’t know if that makes sense. But I just feel more spaciousness in the time that I have.
And I’m just finding it currently easier to focus. So there’s definitely times like just you can change your mindset around work and working from home. And I’ve talked about that before. And I’ve done the work to create a self image that I can be really productive when I’m working from home. And I don’t have anyone else to work alongside me and there are distractions. But also, you can just also change your environment and make edits there. And so in this season, it just feels really good to have a commute, and to not be at the home at the home at my house all the time.
And so yeah, I just noticed in that last little bit that having 30 minutes with my brain was like, well, that’s not enough to do the Power Hour and whatever. And obviously, like it’s not enough to a full one, but I’d already put in clean rest and different things like that ahead of time. Like I wasn’t starting from scratch. So I was like actually, I’m just gonna do it and see how far I get. And I easily got it done ahead of time, like in that time. Sorry. So that’s just something that is good to always question. I think when our brains say I don’t have enough time and if you get present to like, how like a minute is actually a decent amount of time, but we’re often just so distracted that we don’t notice how substantial a minute is.
So I’ve just been paying more attention to that as well. But yeah, that is really my update for today. And what I ended up doing, I’m almost at my friend’s place. So I’m going to wrap this up but I hope hearing about my day has been helpful or interesting or whatever, and it’s definitely been enjoyable to chat through it. And I know I love hearing about this kind of thing but plan is to do a workout we’re doing lower body and then to do what am I doing picking Liddy up, going home having dinner and I have my coaching call with the Aditi tonight. And that’s my day today. So yeah, I will wrap it up here and I will talk to you in the next episode.
Outro
Before you go, I just want to mention something that will be really helpful for you if you have been getting in your own way with your marketing, with showing up and putting yourself out there and doing it consistently. Maybe you’re someone who creates a content calendar, for example, the perfect content calendar, and then you abandon it a couple of weeks later and just completely ghost to your followers. If you can relate to any of that, then I want to point you to the perfectionism quiz that I created. It’s called the perfectionism quiz. And it’s going to have you understand yourself more and also know which of the five signs of perfectionism is making you get in your own way, you will likely be able to relate to all of them.
So we have overthinking procrastination, burnout, fear of judgment, all or nothing thinking, but there is going to be one of them that is more dominant for you. And just understanding that is going to help make your work on overcoming perfectionism and releasing your perfectionism handbrake is going to make it that much more tangible and practical. And especially if you’re power planning, you’re going to be really be able to focus on that area. And it’s just, if you’re anything like me, I just love knowing more about myself. So if that’s you, you can go to samlaurabrown.com/quiz to take it it’s completely free. And it’s so helpful.