1: Overwhelm, building a second brain, kids, taxes and filofaxes.

An in-depth conversation between Laura and Nathan on dealing with the stresses of your personal life when they run over into your work life.

Show Notes

Expect more detailed summaries soon :)

Links from today's episode:

How to Build the Ultimate Productivity System (2022)

Pieter Levels: Making $2.7M A Year With No Employees

Building a second brain

Get in touch: [e-mail]

Creators & Guests

Host

Laura Elizabeth

Founder of Client Portal

Host

Nathan Powell

Founder of Feature Flux

What is The Non-Tech Founders' Podcast?

Fortnightly conversations about running a business as a non-technical founder. Join Laura and Nathan as they navigate the developer-dominated world of entrepreneurship, bootstrapping and beyond.

Laura
All right, we are live for our second episode of the non tech founder podcast. So yeah, last time, we basically just introduced ourselves, what we're up to who we are, or that kind of stuff. So hopefully you've listened to that. So you know a little bit about who we are. But today, we were hoping to just dive into something that's actually been something that we've both been struggling with, on and off over the years. And for me, personally, I'm not sure about you, Nathan, but recently, a lot recently, which is the topic of overwhelm,

Nathan
yes. Overwhelm, are we talking overwhelm in our personal lives and our business lives, or crossover or

Laura
I think both because for me, I Well, so for anyone who doesn't know, I had a had my first daughter, and last year and a half ago, and so my life has become a lot more busy. And before I had her I was I could sort of work when I wanted. You know, I didn't often work during the week, but I worked a lot of weekends, for some reason. And then I take days off during the week. And you know, if I didn't feel like working today, it doesn't matter. I can work tonight if I feel better working in the evening. But now I can't do that I have a very dedicated amount of time that I have to work. So I have to work while she's in nursery. I have to work between about eight o'clock and about one or 2pm. That's it. Monday to Friday, nothing over the weekend. I just can't make it happen. And that sounds like a lot of time. But it's actually surprisingly not. And I was finding that the weeks were just going by and I was getting nothing done or things were cropping up like tax I absolutely despise. VAT. It's just the worst thing in the world. Oh,

Nathan
Europe. Oh,

Laura
it's just because we, you know, we said in the last episode, I lived in the US for a while I didn't really have to worry about it too much. Probably should have but I didn't really. Now I'm back in the UK, I really have to worry about it. And it's it's almost a full time job. It's been a year and a half. And I still feel like I'm just about getting the hang of it. But just I felt like my time was just constantly taken up. And I was never, I was pushing aside all the things that I really wanted to do like a redesign for the client portal website, new blog posts for my Design Academy audience and I sort of have been feeling like I've been letting a lot of people down, despite the fact that people are pretty okay. Like, they're not really complaining. I've had a few comments saying, oh, yeah, I've noticed you haven't been as active. But I've just been feeling awful about it, to be honest. And I've just been massively trying to figure out how I can simplify my personal life and my professional life. So I can feel like I'm getting stuff done. And not constantly just running to catch up. So that yeah, that's that's me. That's sort of where I'm at. But I know you've had similar struggles in the past. And maybe a little bit.

Nathan
Yeah, pretty sure. Yeah, yeah, I'm feeling a bit better at the moment, I'm in a bit of a better place at the moment. And I guess that as well it goes, everything kind of goes hand in hand doesn't it? Once things start getting a bit difficult, then it affects everything, or at least did this for me anyway, in my personal life, I'm struggling with anything effects, you know, effects my work life as well. And I think it's particularly relevant to folks like us who work from home and work from us at work for ourselves as well, because you don't have that separation of office life. And then home life. And to be honest, I don't know how people do who work in an office and have children, especially young children, you know, at least at least your your, your little ones in the nursery in the mornings now. But before then even, it's impossible. And I don't know how

parents, with, with kids managed to work full time. I

mean, I just I really struggled to get anything done. I mean, my situation is slightly different to yours. So I'm separated and I have my, my daughter is shared custody. So two weeks out of the month, she's with me, and two weeks out of the month, she's with her mother so but the weeks that were that I'm with her, I really really struggled to dig out the time to get enough work done. And then I like you were saying about taxes and stuff, but even just the most even more basic stuff, you know, just doing shopping and sort of services and you know, and having to nip out and get something and like I think of myself pretty much now as unemployable because I don't know how I would ever cope with all of these things having to go back to another job. It's a real struggle. And then as like I said, once you're in a if you do start to cave under the pressure and everything and so few hours that you have, then You know, you do start to take that dive down towards Oh, this is crap, this is going really badly, I'm doing a bad job, I don't have enough time and then you lose the energy to want to do that stuff anyway. And taxes is a great example. Because you know, Europe and taxes is just a nightmare. You know, when I look at the guys and gals, I know in the States, as you mentioned, it just seems like I mean, I'm sure somebody will correct us or correct me, but it just seems like it's so easy over the states. It's just like, you don't even have to worry about tax obviously you do. But I put out a question on Twitter yesterday asking stripe or paddle for the for the for the new sauce that I'm building. And everyone was just like well paddle sort of like your tax but stripe if you want to get it going. And I was like, but who doesn't have to worry about tax is like you can't run a business here without you know, automatically including this. So this all this additional stuff. But um, yeah, for me, it's kind of cyclic goes in cycles, you know, this whole overwhelmed and like I said, I do a really poor job in dividing the two. So once one thing starts going poorly, it seeps over heavily into the other. And I struggle as well I think with ways to try and make that better. I know that you you're big into your systems, I think that's something I struggle with, as that helped you in any way to sort of try and clear up make that divide between the two worlds. And

Laura
yeah, definitely I've had to so I've been in that super low point quite recently, where I've just thought this is just unsustainable. I've been sort of managing making it work, but I'm just exhausted completely. And but the good thing is, is I feel like I'm coming out of the other end of it now. So I've put a few things in place that have really helped me so if anyone else is in a similar situation and you're struggling hopefully this might help you too. But basically for for the longest time ever since I can remember I've been an avid filofax user, so I love my Filofax. I get the refills. Yeah. Well, this is it. So I, I get made fun of like daily by my friends and family, for having carrying this filofax around. And I just love writing things down. And it was just great. But it was getting to the point where it's just not working anymore. It's not how it's not how things work anymore. It was too complicated. So I needed to have a way to have everything work related in a calendar, have everything for my personal life and a calendar. I have all my husband stuff in a calendar because we both do similar things. And if I'm doing a podcast interview, sometimes it would clash with him doing a podcast interview, and we're like, Well, who gets the room with the mic. And it was just a scramble. So and you know, when you accept invites on Facebook or in your email, there's always the Add to Calendar option. And I wouldn't have that I'd have to add it to my Filofax. So I've basically set up my calendars now. So I use fantastical because I've got a lot of different calendars in different places, and fantastical just kind of collates them, it's not very expensive. And it's actually actually it's a pain to set up. To be honest, it's need to dedicate a day because you have to set it up on every device you use separately. And it's it's just a lot, adding all your different accounts and adding your apple calendar, if you use like an iPhone or something, there's a few extra steps and you got to get it syncing. And then there's issues a bit of a pain. But now it's set up, it's really good because I have these different calendar sets. So I have the work calendar sets were all of my work calendars. So from my apple one, because sometimes events get added there. Sometimes people send events to my Google calendar. And sometimes I add them myself. So everything gets collated. I've got my personal one, and then I've got my joint. And I can just sort of see at a glance, everything that I've got the week, which to most people is not anything revolutionary, most people use calendar. But I think just setting it all up properly. And getting it all collated in fantastical was a huge help. But then alongside that I use the Reminders app, which is another iOS app, which is basically exactly the same as Todoist, which I was going to sign up for until I realised that they're essentially the same app reminders is just I think, honestly, the name reminders is a terrible name for it, because it's not really about reminders. It is a To Do app, it's not. I was like why isn't this reminding me I've put a reminder in and it's not telling me because it's not actually a Reminders app. It's a to do list app that you can also set reminders on. So I have my Reminders app and basically I just dump everything into three different folders. So I've got my personal, I've got my work and I've got my family, which is my joint. And every time I think of a task doesn't matter how tiny is for example, it's I've got I just put one in this morning which is open greenhouse door. I have to do that every day and sometimes I forget it And then close it at night. So I just added in, and then you sort of just scheduled the to dues. If I know when I'm going to do it, I'll schedule it for a certain day, if I don't know where I'm going to do it, but it's something I need to do at some point, I just leave it, but it's out of my head. And it's just all in this app. And then when I get some time, maybe like once or twice a week or something, I'll go through all the unscheduled to dues and see is there any way I can schedule that. So it's really nice. And I've been using, I've been doing this for a few weeks now. And it's really nice having these two apps where I can just look the night before I look at what's scheduled what's on my to do list for tomorrow, and what's on my calendar for tomorrow. Because events and to dues are different. So that's why I like having the separate. And then I can tick them all off. If I don't finish them at the end of the day, I just reschedule them or just remove it entirely. And then I don't stress about oh, I didn't finish my to do list today. Because some days you're not going to but it's all gone anyway. And that's just, it's just helped me so much. It didn't take a whole day to set up. But it's just been amazing. And I've been trying to also schedule a lot less. So in my head, I think, oh, I can work from eight till one a day, the amount I can do between eight to one in my head is different from the amount I can do in reality. So I'm also just getting more realistic about what I can achieve.

Nathan
Are you strict? Are you strict as well, though, in the sense that Okay, so you've got from eight to one working like that is actual work time. And as you said, it's always less than you imagine. But are you strict in that? No, that's actually to sit down and get the work done. So there's no email, there's no kind of, there's no being on Slack talking possibly to you know, is that delegated sitting down designing or writing or marketing time.

Laura
It's pretty strict in that I don't, I don't really go in my inbox very often. So I've started, I've actually got a support person now to help out with my inbox, which has been amazing, very long overdue, like, it's something that I should have done such a long time ago. So I don't go into my inbox. I don't really go into Slack. And yeah, I just tried to work. But what I will say is I'm not the eight to one isn't always working time. So it's also things that I have to do in my personal life. For example, last week, I've had to I'm decluttering the house and on my to do list was I need to go through my clothes and just get rid of stuff and just make some room and things and that was during my work time. But that's fine, because that's something that needed needed doing and I don't the whole benefit.

Nathan
It's more it's more like I was gonna say it's more like just available time as opposed to work time isn't it? Literally the only hours I have available to get stuff done.

Laura
Yeah, exactly. And I think the beauty of what we do and why a lot of people want to do this is because you don't have to work nine to five but I don't know about you Nathan but I have this like mindset that Monday to Friday nine to five I should be working because that's what you do. That's like what we've always been taught, we went to school we did that. And I have to think yeah, I have to remind myself I don't have to work every hour that I am available to work so

Nathan
that's particularly when particularly when when your world is more product based than consulting based obviously if you're consulting then that's it, you're still trading your your time for for money. But if you're into that product space, then it is a little different. And I think that's part of the reason why we want to be there isn't it it's because of that quality of life, the you know, and that sort of air quotes lifestyle business, which means you know what, I can choose a little bit I do have some more freedom with regards to those few hours that I have, you know, when I want to go out on a ride or I want to go out and whatever the case might be something you mentioned just now about organising the best thing I ever did, or the best thing I've done this year because I'm terrible as well organising all my time. And I've tried the To Do lists, and I've tried, you know, the calendars, I still use my calendar, you know, anytime anything comes up, it goes in the calendar. But the best thing I did this this year, and I'm just showing the camera to Laura was by the Apple Watch. I thought it was going to be a ridiculous buy. And I felt guilty about buying it. But every single thing now as soon as it comes into my head goes into a reminder. And because I think I'm verging on I don't know verging on ADHD or whatever, it's just if it doesn't get done now it never gets done. And inevitably, I'm not carrying around my Filofax, or pen and paper or whatever. So literally now as soon as it comes into my head, I just hurry up the phone and say, remind me in an hour or remind me tomorrow morning, like you're opening up the green house, you know, I do that. Absolutely everything now, and it's really really helping. I mean, I really didn't imagine that I was going to be so appreciative. Yeah, the Apple Watch.

Laura
Yeah, I completely agree. I got an Apple watch too. After a long time of just Oh, that's so gimmicky and silly. Why do I need it but yeah, it but the thing is I watched a YouTube video. It was called building the ultimate productivity system. I remember who it was by I was actually when I was researching animations for a video that I'm doing for client portals. So I wasn't looking for a productivity system. I just liked the animations that the guy used. And but I got into the content. And it's basically this whole like, Have you heard of the book building a second brain by

Nathan
Thiago rings? A bell rings a bell?

Laura
Yeah, it's, I haven't read it. And to be honest, I don't really think I need to. But it's basically exactly what you say. It's like, if you need to do something, don't keep it in your head ever your head is just not a great place to store things that you need to do my upline down, no. And so like having an Apple Watch, like you say, like, I have to go in and I put the laundry in, it's going to be done in three hours. So I say, hey, remind me in three hours to switch to the wash or something or anything for work or just anything that that very second that it's in my head, it goes down. And it's so nice knowing that it's sort of filed away. So when I'm when I'm, when I have a minute to spare, like maybe in the morning, when I'm having a cup of coffee or something, or I'm waiting for something I can just go through, and you know, remind myself of all these things that need doing. But it is you have to get into the habit, because what he says in this video, and I'll try and like link to the video, I'll be able to find it. So you can watch it because it is really good. He sort of says, you know, there's really, it's completely pointless having anything, if you don't do that if you don't just put everything down. There's no point you're not, you're not really benefiting from it. So you have to train yourself to do that. Which is hard.

Nathan
I don't think it's like any habit. I've been I'm more than aware that I look like a bit of a nutter now as I walk down the street, and suddenly something will come into my head and people see me talking to my watch, you know, but it's working. And it really is working. And like I said, I'm really happy about this change, because it was a real struggle, just forgetting so many things. And that creates more stress that and then you feel even guilty, because you're forgetting things, and you're not handing in things maybe on time or not getting to this appointment or getting to that appointment. And I think it all just comes together until you just finally just collapse or explode or whatever your reaction is, unfortunately, everyone around yourself as well.

Laura
Yeah, it is. It's really tough. And I think a lot of people, I was talking to my family about it the other day, it just it. I don't know if it is a modern problem, but it feels like a modern problem. I mean, my parents were saying they were like, I don't remember feeling this busy at years ago. And they were like, I think it's age. But we were all saying no, we feel the same. Super like overwhelmed, I think because we're so connected. And we're so like, there's just a lot going on. I think it's a problem that I would say

Nathan
connection is a huge part of it. The fact I mean, ironically, he says after buying an Apple watch, you know, I hate being connected 24/7. For me, this is like a tangent, sort of a way to sidestep some of that stuff. Ironically, even though I'm more connected now than ever through this, but that always being on you know, it is such a it's so difficult. And I think they I think our parents probably did feel a lot freer from this sort of level of stress. I mean, sure they had their other, their own problems at the time or whatever, not being able to make enough money coming in or whatever. But yeah, they didn't work the way we work now where everything is digital, everything is online, everything is an email, everything has a Slack message, everything is competing for your attention as well. Whereas I think, you know, my mom and dad went to work in the morning, we were in school, they came back and then that was it. There was there were no other distractions, so to speak, you know, there was the TV and the phone. And the phone was in the hole on a cable he stuck to the wall.

Laura
Yeah, it does seem a lot simpler. But I love technology, but it is a it's a balance. It's definitely a balance. Yeah,

Nathan
I think. Sorry. Well,

Laura
I was gonna say I'm curious, because I know I think I mentioned this earlier. So when you are you mentioned it in the last episode. I think when during your story, there was one point where you completely just went away, you just you had like, Yeah, you had like a bunch of you had a big YouTube following. And then you just, you just got rid of it. And I'm sort of curious was that due to being overwhelmed?

Nathan
I think it's, I think it's a mix of overwhelm and the fact that I've never really been comfortable being in front of people as if I had something important to say kind of thing. Again, I appreciate the irony of being on a podcast talking about it. But yeah, I've never been comfortable and even Twitter bothers me. I mean, I've cancelled my Twitter account more times than I can remember just that whole thing of you know, here I am speaking truth, listen to me and all that kind of stuff. So I think when I when I sold when I sold new see I for some reason. I just thought it was the opportunity to get rid of everything and say right I'm going into the mountains So I'll be back in a couple of years, and I cancelled everything I am. I have a YouTube channel at the time as well, which was the only thing I was doing sort of for fun, shall we say? I mean, YouTube, just everything

you should be doing. Okay. Two years. That's

Laura
a long time.

Nathan
Yeah, pretty much I think it was looking back it was, I wasn't, I was gonna say stupid that was, that was my natural inclination to say it was stupid. But it was, it was a reaction to how I felt, I think, to the whole, you know, being on all the time, and I wrote about this, even when I was freelancing, like 2013, this whole being on all the time, it just, it really wears me down personally, you know, being attached, I tried going back to a non smartphone last year, in a bid to try and cut this connectivity down, and I lasted less than 48 hours, because I couldn't work with my back, it is impossible nowadays, unless you truly do want to go home it, you know, it's it's impossible to try and, and, and sort of remove yourself. But I realise now that, you know, I think probably five or six months ago, whenever it was that I came back from the dead, so to speak, and had to get back on Twitter's unfortunately, I think unless you have a lot of money behind you unless you have some kind of initial funding that can just buy a shedload of ads and you need to be visible in some way or another you need to be within a community, whether that's Twitter or in, you know, in sort of Facebook groups and LinkedIn, all that stuff. It's so hard to do anything now, outside of these digital realms that, you know, we've, we've built ourselves into. And you know, if I sound too downer, the whole digital thing, I mean, I'm not obviously I work in that sphere, but I just do find finding that balance very difficult. And like I said, had to come back. You know, if I want to start working again, or want to start building a new digital business, I've got to put my face to it. Because I don't have the money just to throw at it.

Laura
Yeah, what was it like coming back? Was it different? Does it feel like you're just starting completely from scratch? You feel like you've got something behind you? And no,

Nathan
no, I felt like it was 99% that I was coming back from scratch. I mean, I did sort of connect with the people I could still think of and I think probably that was where we stopped reconnected, reaching out to people I knew from the past, but I didn't. And it's interesting, because when you go back into Twitter, and this is obviously a just something that's in people, when they see that you are a new account, and that you have no Twitter followers, there's this preconceived notion that you're probably not worth the time, or probably not worth spending much. I mean, not everyone, obviously, I've, I've met loads of great people already and received loads of help from people who either don't know me at all or barely, barely know me. And I think that's something we can talk about in a future episode, just that, you know, really helping people out within the within the sort of digital sphere. But there is definitely that thing of like, Are there no one kind of thing, you know, look 25 followers or whatever, and trying to build a business, they must be a newbie, and that was probably my personal perception as well. But

Laura
no, I think there is there is a prejudice, I guess. And it's something that everyone's experience, because obviously, unless you're super famous anyway, no one starts with 1000s of followers. So everyone has to start from that. And it is hard when you you know, you feel like a nobody and you feel like you're not worth time. And how do you how do you break through that? So, for me, it was so long ago that I was I was starting out and I don't consider myself. Particularly, I don't consider myself famous or anything remotely like that at all. But over the over the years, you know, you have gradually got more followers. I don't have a huge amount, but I don't even know how many I have. But it's it's an okay amount. You know, it's socially acceptable amount. So, but I don't remember, really, how I how I was how I would, how I went about growing that I don't think I did anything specifically it just sort of happened. So it's sort of interesting that you're going through that now. Because, you know, it's just it's a lot. It's a lot more relatable. You know, what are the things that you're doing and Twitter so different now? I know there's other networks and stuff, you know, all the threads? Everything that's going on? It just it's just

Nathan
different. Yeah, if the chances are if you post a thread, I'm probably unfollowing. You.

Laura
Yeah, I almost did back when they first started cropping up. I was I did and I wrote an article about it was a bunch of design tips. It was a guest post and I was gonna write a thread about them, just like the top ones. And then I never got I just got finished. I think it's in my notes. And then the whole thread thing just went a bit bonkers and I started hating them and I started seeing how much everyone else hated them. And I was like, Yeah, I can't. I can't take this now I'm not that's not May I just it would come across as so fake and just Yeah. Yeah,

Nathan
it comes across as fake anyway, if I see a thread to me, it's just this is marketing. This is here's 10 Great ways or 10 things I learned through selling my business. And it's just, no, I've got no time for that.

Laura
Yeah. And so abstract as well, it's like build a community. And well, okay, what does that mean, and also how?

Nathan
I think going back to your point before, though, about the sort of, you know, you've built this following over time, and you can't even remember how, you know, how it was done or started, I think it's just, it's just the natural effects of you building the products, you know, and being there all these years and all your content and stuff. And I think, you know, it's just a natural evolution for that. So going back to the beginning, and like you said, things have changed a lot as well, and social media and stuff. So I guess it's just something that I'll see over time and see how it goes. And I mean, I remember years and years ago, going for a design interview, which I didn't get in the end, but it was for an Australian SAS. And they were already I think, doing a few million in ARR. And doing really well and the founder, I think had like 60 followers on Twitter. I was just like, This guy is my hero. This is this is who I want to be. And in fact, I checked him out not long ago, and he's still only got a couple of 100 Twitter followers, and they're absolutely slave. It's just like, That, for me is the ideal.

Laura
Yeah, me too. Actually, there's a really good podcast I listened to a few weeks ago, I'll see if I can find it and put it in the notes. It was kind of a hit was was it the guy who didn't know medalist? Something, I can't remember his name, but I'll try and find it. And it's basically he doesn't really do anything on social media. He's, he's full on lifestyle business. But he does really well. I'm like, Yeah, everything he was saying was so relatable to me, because I don't want to build, I don't, I'm not really building to sell or building an exit. For example, I'm happy to just keep doing this. Because it's fun. I'm not massively into like, extreme growth or anything like that. I really just want a lifestyle business that does well, and I really enjoy doing it. And it really, it really resonated with me, and it made me think about all these people who were doing so well, but aren't constantly on Twitter aren't constantly, you know, putting themselves out there. And I do to your point earlier, where you said, unless you've got a lot of investment behind you, or something happens, you do sort of need to put yourself out there a bit. I think that's true. I think you do need to do, you do need to do something, but you don't have to be a massive influencer. As such, you just need to be, you know, it might sound a bit silly, but you just need to be like connecting with people and talking to people. I know, for me when I was first starting out, and even now I reply to most most emails that come to me, that's just a general question or replying to a question that I asked I reply to them all, personally still. And I just think that helps. It helps me it doesn't take up too much time. But yeah, you do need to do something. And I think this would be a really good episode to just actually dig into probably a few episodes, to be honest, because there's a lot to say about building an audience and getting started. And it's the thing that people want to know about.

Nathan
Think because well, it can make it can make the difference between success or failure. I really do believe that. Because if you think, you know, for example, I'm building my SAS app. Now, you know, if I had a significantly larger audience, I think, maybe erroneously that I would have significantly higher chances of at least having that initial sort of kick in the right direction, you know, when it launches, now with a couple of 100 followers, and you know, that kind of thing. So I definitely think that'd be something really good to dive into. Because it's, it's, this is very simple, but at the same time, I think it's complex, because it's a huge amount of work building. Some kind of audience.

Laura
Yeah, it's simple in theory, but difficult. It's difficult to pull off. It takes a lot of perseverance, it definitely possible because it is it there's really there's no tricks, it's it really is as simple as simple as they say. It just takes time. But yeah, it's definitely something we should talk about. Because it's a really big deal. It's like it it's hard, like you say, not just building a product, but then also trying to build a following so much easier if you've already got that following. And that's one thing I feel like I did write back when I was freelancing, as I was building a following alongside freelancing, even though I wasn't I wasn't creating a course I was trying to build a following. With the thought that at some point, I will create a course and it was many, many years until I did that I was speaking at conferences, doing guest posts, podcasts, all this stuff, for really no seemingly good reason other than hoping that maybe people would fall I may or sign up to my newsletter, you know, or something like that. And that really didn't work. It worked. Yeah, it really did. But I didn't wait until I had something that I could sell. Or I didn't wait until I felt like I had. I had more to say or I didn't wait until I felt more confident or however, whatever the 1000 of the reasons I could have given for waiting. And that's one thing I think I did that really helped.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai