109: Dark Side to Being Perfectly Productive

Welcome to the shoot it straight podcast. I’m your host, Sabrina Gebhardt here. I will share an honest take on what it’s like to be a female creative entrepreneur while balancing business, motherhood, and life. Myself, along with my guests, we’ll get vulnerable through honest conversations and relatable stories because we’re willing to go there.

If you’re trying to find balance in this exciting place you’re in yet, willing to talk about the hard stuff too, The shoot it straight podcast is here to share practical and tangible takeaways to help you shoot it straight.

Welcome back to the shoot. It’s straight podcast. My friends, I’m going to dive straight in today because this is a topic that comes up a ton. And especially when I’m coaching my one to one students or the women inside of my Root to Rise mastermind, this topic of productivity comes up so often and I get it.

Truly. I get it. Most entrepreneurs want to be productive and get all the things done. We want to be great moms and partners and also run badass businesses. We want to hit goals and also have time for self care. We want to maximize all the hours in the day and win an award for efficiency. We wanna get to the end of our to-do list and earn an evening off and a good night’s sleep.

And to be honest, a lot of times I’m in the same camp. Okay? I wanna check as many tasks off as possible, and the current iteration of my business and this season of life that I’m in, it seems like there are endless tasks. As you know, I run this podcast. I also run a membership. I have multiple courses. I teach women inside of a mastermind and one to one coaching containers.

And I also still photograph clients on a regular basis. And all of this is in addition to being a busy mom of three and all of the stuff that comes with that. The amount of things I want to accomplish on any given day is a lot, like a lot, a lot. When I have deadlines or goals that I’m aiming for, I will do all of the productivity hacks that you read about.

I’ll set my phone on, do not disturb. I will set timers and work in sprints. I will set up Office, somewhere outside of my house, away from distractions. Sometimes I will even block off entire weekends, check myself into a hotel, and really hunker down and focus. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a more productive version of yourself, but the problem comes like with many things when we become obsessed with productivity, believe it or not, there are negative side effects to pushing and striving towards this hyper productive life to becoming obsessed with ultimate productivity.

And that’s exactly what I want to share about today. So we’re going to dive straight in and we’re going to look at what some of these negative side effects are. Number one, your emotions become stuck. Oftentimes when we become hyper fixated on productivity, we bottle up and ignore anything that gets in the way.

And that can often mean our emotions, right? We don’t have time for a cry session or to get angry. And so we stuff the emotions down and we keep moving forward. Over time, this can lead to our emotions physically becoming stuck, even if we do end up in a place where we’re ready to release emotions and process things, we find that we can’t.

This is a situation, to be totally honest, that is pretty common for me. For years and years of my life, all the way back to high school and college, productivity and achieving was an obsession for me. I wouldn’t let my emotions get in the way, and so I stuffed them down. And to this day, I have a really hard time releasing emotions.

It doesn’t feel natural to allow myself to cry. I’ve been working on this for years because I know that crying is actually a really, really healthy way to release, but it doesn’t come easily for me. Maybe you’ve experienced the same thing, or maybe you struggle with releasing a different emotion. Either way, you don’t want them to become stuck.

When emotions become stuck in the body long term, they can cause physical pain and ailments. I know this sounds crazy and maybe a little woo, but it’s true. And there’s actually a lot of data out there to prove it. The next side effect, or what I’m saying, dark side of becoming obsessed with productivity is that our lives become like that of a robot.

Think about it. When we design our days and our weeks around getting as much done as possible, when every moment of every day is planned and scheduled and utilized, we leave no room for the world around us. We miss out on a lot of of daily magic and beauty and even opportunities when the pace and focus of our day is on a to do list.

We’re missing everything else. This may sound really, really extreme, but whether or not you think this is something you struggle with, let me share some examples to prove my point. Have you ever had a really full day and a really long list and in the middle you get a text from a friend inviting you for a last minute lunch date.

You immediately have this pang of regret in your gut because you wish you could join her and you would love to catch up but you just don’t have the time or the capacity. Your day and to do list and getting everything done is more important. And so you have to turn your friend down. Another example.

What about you have a really full day and a really lofty task list, and it starts to storm outside instinctively. You wish that you could just walk away from your computer and your list and curl up on the couch with a good book, but you can’t stop. Okay. You can’t stop. You can’t allow yourself to stop and enjoy a stormy day and to slow down.

Yet. Another example might be that your toddler went down for a nap. And you run to your computer to start your productivity sprint during nap time because you count on those hours every day, except today she won’t nap. She’s on the verge of giving it up and she’s begging to play with you instead. You have a pit in your stomach because you can’t possibly give her time during those precious productive hours that you set aside.

I’m telling you these stories, not to make you feel guilty, not to stress you out, but to point out all of the different ways day in and day out. We are missing out on opportunities to connect and enjoy life and enjoy people because we are so focused on this obsession with productivity. And when we strip away all this joy and all this beauty from our life, we become a shell of ourselves.

We become robots. Okay. It’s not good. Another negative side effect to this obsession with productivity is that even though we are craving it, we are actually lacking creativity. Okay. So we are craving being creative, right? You’re listening to this podcast because you are a photographer. You are a creative entrepreneur.

You’re someone who prioritizes creativity and it’s an important part of your soul and your life and you feel like you’re craving it, right? It’s what you’re meant to do. It’s what you love. It fuels a passion that you have, but you’re actually lacking it. Okay. That’s why you’re craving it. It’s because you feel this lack of creativity.

We don’t have the capacity to be creative because there isn’t room for it in our lives. Similar to the last point, we’re too busy. Our minds are too focused. Our schedules are too tight to allow ourselves time and space to breathe. Creativity requires this space. You have to have time and space and capacity to flourish creatively.

That’s why our best ideas often come in the shower or on a long walk because we aren’t tackling tasks in those moments and there’s a bit of room. Our minds can wonder, okay, we have space to breathe and creativity blooms. So, again, for all the creative entrepreneurs listening, if you’re feeling a lack of creativity in your life or in your work lately, or if the creativity you once had seems to feel like it’s faded away, an obsession with productivity could be to blame here.

One of the topics that I get asked about the most as a business coach is marketing. Photographers ask me how to get more inquiries from ideal clients, how to make social media work for them, and generally how to be more effective when it comes to marketing. While they’re asking me these questions, I hear the same sentiments over and over again.

Marketing feels tedious. Nothing seems to work. I can’t seem to be consistent and more. If this sounds familiar to you, then I have something really fun to share. I have a new free guide called Magical Momentum. This is a 30 day done for you marketing plan that is designed to connect you with your ideal clients.

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com backslash momentum. And now back to the show. So before I end this episode, I do want to leave you with a few tips for being productive, but not in an obsessive and perfect way, because here’s the deal. Productivity to some extent is important. We have to get things done. We do. We can’t just live in this eternal vacation mode as dreamy as that sounds.

As entrepreneurs, there are things that need to happen for our business to run and to grow. But how can we be productive without allowing ourselves to become obsessed with productivity? So I alluded to some of these tips earlier in the podcast using do not disturb mode, setting timers for work sprints, working outside of your home.

But I have a few more suggestions for you that aren’t quite as obvious. So if you want to have some productivity, okay, but you don’t want to be in that obsessive place, you want to get off of that obsessive hamster wheel. Here are a few suggestions I have for you. Number one, put less on your list. This really does sound counterintuitive, intuitive, but it’s so true.

And I’m going to explain this to you. Normally you might start a Monday morning with a to do list of 10 things that you need to accomplish that day. Maybe you get through five and then you end the day frustrated with yourself. You start Tuesday morning with a new list plus the five things you didn’t get done yesterday.

Of course, you don’t get through everything again. You end the day frustrated again. Day in and day out goes like this and mentally you’re drained. Because you feel like you’re working so hard, but you’re telling yourself stories like, I never get anything done, or I’m so unproductive, or why am I so slow?

My friend, of course, none of those stories are true, but our minds love to exaggerate. And when this happens day in and day out, weekend and week out, our mindset starts to believe these stories. We believe these negative stories and we continue to end each week feeling frustrated and unaccomplished. This feeling bleeds into our personal lives and it’s really not pretty.

Okay. Now. Let’s look at the flip side of this story. Let’s say you decide to try this tip and put less on your list. This would look like starting Monday morning with three tasks on your list instead of ten. You easily get through all three things and you’re able to tackle one or two of the things from Tuesday’s list.

You end the day feeling like a rock star because you cleared your list and got ahead of the game for the week. You take this energy into Tuesday and the rest of the week runs much the same. The best part is you get so ahead on your task list that when your business bestie invites you to coffee on Friday, you have the time to say yes, because why not?

You end the week feeling successful and accomplished and your brain is telling you so much. Your mindset becomes filled with excitement and positivity. Like I am productive, I get things done. I am great at running a business and this positive mindset and energy now bleeds over week after week and it extends into your personal life.

In those two situations, isn’t it super obvious that you are better off putting less on your plate? This practice actually makes you more productive because of the mindset piece. Okay. Because your mind now believes that you are productive, believes that you get things done, believes that you accomplish your list.

It really is a pretty magical shift. Another suggestion to improve productivity without becoming obsessive is to allow more time for each task. So here’s the deal, my friend, when we plan our week and our to do list, we are literally terrible at judging how long something we will take. We almost always grossly underestimate how long it will take.

My friend, Amanda Warfield of the chasing simple podcast once told me that when we are planning our time and tasks, we should double. The amount of time something will take when she told me this, my mind was blown, but honestly, it’s so true. A really beautiful thing happens when we allow more time for each task.

We actually create margin in our day. When we have margin, we aren’t frantic when a task takes longer than expected because we have the extra time built in. We aren’t frazzled when we get a call from the school nurse and we have to drop everything and pick up a sick kid. We have margin built into our day that allows for life to happen and shift.

The margin creates ease. And when we are working from a place of ease, we are so much more productive. We are able to think clearly. We are able to complete tasks with more focus and things don’t feel as hard because there is so much less chaos in our lives. So the next time you’re mapping out your week and your task list, I highly recommend doubling the amount of time you think things will take.

So the third thing to support productivity without becoming obsessed is to bake white space into your calendar. In case you’re new to my world, white space is this practice of planning a block of time for yourself on a weekly or monthly basis. White space is time that you don’t work, you don’t run errands, you don’t have to take care of your kids.

This is time for you and you alone. It’s time to rest and rejuvenate, rejuvenate and refuel. So yes, I’m telling you to bake in white space into your calendar and it’s actually going to support your productivity. Why? Everyone needs a break, okay? No one is meant to go, go, go nonstop. I’m sure you’ve seen that meme, that even computers need to be turned off from time to time.

This is the same principle here, okay? You need time away from your computer. You need time away from social media. You need time away from thinking about what your clients need. You need time away from deadlines and to-do lists and your kids. You need time to refuel and reset, and that’s what giving yourself white space will do.

Okay, if you’re someone who actively practices taking a Sabbath, okay, maybe you take Sunday fully away from everything, or maybe you don’t do that, but you take a vacation every year. When you come home from a vacation, Or start your Monday morning after taking the Sabbath off, you probably feel so much more energized and ready to dive in because you gave yourself that break.

Okay. The difference with white space is that this is just for you and you alone. When you’re on a vacation, you’re with your partner, what you’re with your kids, you know, it’s a fun adventure, but it’s not super restful, right? Anybody who has kids knows that like a vacation with kids is not really a vacation.

You know, you need a vacation from your vacation. And the same thing goes for your Sabbath, right? You’re probably spending the day with your family, okay? Maybe you’re resetting the house. Maybe you’re going on a picnic, taking the kids to the park. Maybe you went to church. It’s not for you. Yes, it’s a break from work, but you’re mentally not recharging yourself the same way that you could if you were alone.

Okay? So I want you to bake in this white space. I want you to give yourself this gift and see how your productivity takes off when you do that. And the last tip to increase your protect productivity without becoming obsessed is to stop over committing. This goes along with the other three tips I gave you.

It’s kind of repeating it, but in a different set of words, okay? Stop putting too much on your calendar. And I mean this personally and professionally. Okay. Stop saying yes to clients. When you know that you’re booked, stop squeezing people into every single available spot on your calendar. Again, that goes for clients.

It also goes for personal things. If you can’t seem to say no to the school PTA, or to the volunteer opportunities, or to the neighbor who needs something every five minutes, or to your mother in law, or to clients, or whoever it is, you have got to learn to stop over committing and say no. I don’t mean you need to say no to everything.

I don’t mean you need to burn it all down, but you cannot give yourself white space. You cannot build in margin in your week. You can’t do any of these things if you continue to overcommit because your calendar won’t let you. Okay. When you are over committed, you don’t have time for yourself and you don’t have the proper time for your business because you’re over capacity.

So you need to stop saying yes to everything. And with that, my friend, we’ve come to the end of this episode, and I really hope that you have enjoyed this chat and learned something new. I hope that you are walking away encouraged and inspired to slow down a bit and take your foot off the gas a little.

That’s it for today. We’ll see you next week. Thanks so much for listening to the shoot it straight podcast. You can find all the full show notes and details from today’s episode at sabrinagebhart. com backslash podcast. Come find me and connect over on the gram at Sabrina Gebhardt photography. If you’re loving the podcast, I’d be honored if you hit that subscribe button and leave me a review until next time, my friends shoot it straight.