Latest / The Life-First Solopreneur / 77. Prioritize Mental Health: Self-Care Tips for Solopreneurs with Leah Marone
Transcript
- Leah Marone (00:00): When are you multitasking and when don't you need to? When can you just be? Stress anxiety is so future-based and past-based. We're missing that present and that's what really helps balance us out. Speaker 2 (00:15): Welcome to the One-Person Business podcast, the show for solopreneurs, consultants and contractors who are ready to take charge of their business and reclaim their freedom. Join us as we bring you inspiring stories, invaluable insights and practical strategies from successful solopreneurs and industry experts, empowering you to create a thriving business that aligns with your unique goals and allows you to live life on your own terms. Here are your hosts, Joe Rando and Carly Ries. Carly Ries (00:45): Welcome to the One-Person Business podcast. I'm one of your hosts, Carly Ries. Joe Rando (00:49): And I'm Joe Rando. Carly Ries (00:50): We had an episode recently that was kind of similar to the topic that we're going to talk about today, but we want to be focusing on mental health for our audience and for solopreneurs. I think that's something people struggle with a lot when they're working alone, whether it's the solitude or just that they don't know where to find answers. We really want to be shedding light on this as much as possible. This is not a repeat episode of a similar one that we had with Renee La Tour and those published a few weeks ago. We're going to go much more in depth. We actually have an actual psychotherapist on today. Leah, I'm so excited that you're here. Leah Marone is a psychotherapist with over 20 years of experience based in Charlotte, North Carolina. She has facilitated over 20,000 therapy sessions. (01:38): I can't even do the math on that, how many that is in a week. She writes for Psychology Today and is an expert form contributor for Newsweek. That tiny publication that you may have heard of. Leah was a former anxiety run, division one basketball player, which has led to her passion for working with athletes and coaches on combating pressure, imposter syndrome, which I have definitely fallen victim to, perfectionism and performance anxiety. As a mental wellness consultant, Leah works with companies and nonprofits on topics such as anxiety and stress, burnout, compassion fatigue, productivity, effective communication, and emotional intelligence. We want to dabble in a few of these things today. So Leah, welcome to the show. Leah Marone (02:21): Thank you so much for having me. I'm very excited about just the topic and who I'm speaking to. I'm thrilled to be here. Thanks for having me. Carly Ries (02:30): Something we hear time and time again, and I may have asked this in the past, but I like hearing people's different responses. So many times you'll hear a solopreneur say, "oh, I'm so stressed", or, "oh, I'm so anxious right now", and they kind of use those terms interchangeably. Is there a difference? Leah Marone (02:48): Yes. That's a great question. The skinny of it is that stress is triggered by external stimulus and typically there's an ending. If you think about it as, my in-laws are coming to town, or I have a big call tomorrow, or I have this deadline for this project. And that's not to say that there can be several at a time that are triggering us, but it's typically an identifiable external thing. And if we are not mindful of managing our stress, which we're going to have peaks of stress, that's just natural. That's part of being human and searching for progression and delving into new things. That's normal. But if you were in this perpetual state of stress and you're not doing a great job of letting air out of your balloon, if you will, then that's, whether you're highly prone or not to anxiety, that's the internal triggers. (03:40): The internal things, the false narratives. It's the living futuristically. It's living in the past. Anxiety is anything but living in the here and now. It's anticipating. A lot of times, unfortunately, those have negative tense to them where we're thinking of the worst case scenarios. A lot of times you'll see, typically people that struggle with a lot of anxiety, they tend to sometimes externally look very calm and cool, and inside they're going a million miles an hour. They've gotten used to, well, this is how I operate. It's this internal drive. It's just this lens that we're seeing things through. So again, the distinction is stress is external triggers and anxieties are those internal triggers, kind of our narratives, how we process things. So they're different. They have similar symptoms, but they're different with how they arrive. Joe Rando (04:36): It sounds to me like stress is easier to manage because it's got something out in the world that you can address. Is that true or are they equally difficult or depends? Leah Marone (04:48): It kind of depends on the scenario. Sometimes those narratives or those thought patterns and anxious cycles as we call them, those can be incredibly strenuous and exhausting. Not that stress isn't, but those can be exhausting because a lot of times when we are presented with a stressor, anxiety just accompanies it. It's like we are looking at something and then we're like, oh my gosh, I'm so frazzled. I have this, I have all these things on my to-do list. Then we move in to that negative self-talk of why do I always feel like this? What's wrong with me? Why can't I get this together? Why do I do this? Other people probably think this. That's more of that self-talk, more of that internal, so they can go simultaneously, but that's why when we look at stress management and why it's so important, it's really kind of soothing and almost anticipating or combating that internal relationship we have with ourselves in diffusing that inner critic and the negative self-talk that really fuels that anxiety. Carly Ries (05:56): For Solopreneurs it's, can I provide for my family this week? Am I good enough to fly solo? That imposter syndrome we were talking about. There are just so many things that could enter your head at any given moment. You were talking about stress management. How can people control or manage their anxiety and how can they prevent it? Then how can they bounce back? You also said it's exhausting and solopreneurs can't afford to be exhausted. They have an entire business to run. What would your tips be for that? Leah Marone (06:24): Many solopreneurs and just people in general, unfortunately these days almost think it's weird or uncomfortable if they're not stressed, are not going a million miles an hour. It's very interesting. It's like, "oh, I just need a break. Oh, I need some time away. Oh, I need this." But then when they might be able to block that out or have that, they can't be present with it. It's so interesting. If you think about that perpetual, I have to do this, I have to do this, I have to do this. We've kind of conditioned ourselves to be in this constant state of urgency and when we're not there, it's very interesting. I hear from so many people, and I know this has happened to me. Once you go on that vacation, once you have that day off and you're like, wow, I'm out of my rhythm. (07:08): I really need to break free and have some time to rejuvenate and relax, guess what? All those suppression bubbles, all those things that you've pushed down and almost suppressed because you are in this constant state of urgency with to-do items and things to do and these deeper worries. You're pushing all these other things down. You're not being mindful of clearing that clutter on your own so when we have that pocket, whether we're sleeping or whether we're going on vacation, that's when the body and the mind recognize, "Here's some space. We've got to clear this clutter" and all that stuff starts coming up. It's terrible because a lot of people go on vacation and they're like, I was an anxious mess and I was away from my work, or I was away from this. It was still there, but all these other things started coming up, and that's a great indicator that you are not maintaining or in the maintenance process of clearing your own clutter, of just having any type of presence work of any type of just connection and self-connection work and the body and the mind take over. That's what panic attacks are essentially. Carly Ries (08:10): It's so funny you said that. I was thinking a week after I got engaged years ago, and my husband and I decided to go on vacation two weeks after. We were gone for a week and day two, I was like, we need to do this. My mind was just racing. We have to get this done, we have to get this done. And he was like, whoa. The person I proposed to a week ago was not a bridezilla, and now you're totally turning into one. It was because I just took a step out of the day-to-day and my mind was like, "there's so much we need to do" (08:38): That was maybe a trivial thing, but I can totally see how winding down can just release everything. Leah Marone (08:48): We get emotional hangovers. A lot of times it's like we'll get through a really rigorous stretch of something or week or something has ended, and a lot of times you'll find that you were able to keep it together. You're kind of in that fight or flight mode, and then all of a sudden after you're done and you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so glad that's over, I can relax, there's this sense of relief. A lot of times, again, just because you were in that state of action, sometimes those things that you had to suppress in order to survive and to execute, they resurface. Joe Rando (09:16): I love this because I think so many people feel like when they do go on that vacation or take that break and then all of a sudden all this stuff comes up, they feel like "something's really wrong with me. Something's really wrong that I can't take a vacation". If you know why, now you can at least say, "no, it's not something wrong with me. It's something wrong maybe with the way I'm operating my business and my life". That's really helpful to have that perspective to understand why that kind of thing is happening. Thank you. Carly Ries (09:47): I want to circle back to something else we're talking about, and something that was in your intro too was the imposter syndrome. I feel like solopreneurs dict into that time and time again. I mentioned that I have. How do you get rid of that little guy that's telling you you can't do it, and that's telling you you're in the wrong space. Go back to your corporate job. Leah Marone (10:06): Well, I think the first thing to really highlight is just from experience too, I know I've suffered from it myself, but it is interesting. I think a lot of people that suffer from imposter syndrome or traits of it is, they are go-getters typically. In the eyes of other people they're successful and they take risks and they're willing to put themselves out there. So already, they're at this level of success, but they still suffer from, "gosh, I'm just not good enough". And in some ways that has propelled them to keep taking those risks, to keep fighting, and it's served them justice and to stay motivated and structured. But like anything, it can get to be too much and that's when that negative self comes in. That's when those false narratives kind of come in and almost self-sabotage. (10:57): It's interesting to think about that voice of "you're not good enough" or "you entered this space, and everyone in this space probably thinks, why are they here? Why is she here? Why is he here?" That notion, that's your ego talking. But also, if you identify it as your protector, we have several protectors that we have gathered over the years probably since we were little kids for various reasons. That protector does not want you to fail. That protector wants to prevent you from embarrassment or shame or walking away saying "that was terrible". If you really fact check yourself and pull from the data that you've had, your data, that's probably not happened very much given that most people that suffer from that are willing to take risks and logically can say, "I know that this is a process. I know it's not black and white", but when we fall into that black and white, all or nothing thinking, our protector is ignited. (11:52): Our protector, the one saying, "well, you don't want to look like an idiot, or You're not good enough, or you don't have your degree from there, or you didn't do this or you didn't talk to this person". That is your protector coming in way too fierce. I think rather than trying to combat it and shut it down, we have to work how to collaborate with it. We have to acknowledge that that part of me is actually trying to protect me. That part of me though is not trusting the other parts of me that are really motivated, that are highly successful, that take risks that have done X, Y, and Z. I think where we misstep that is, we judge . What's wrong with me? Why am I not confident? Everyone else is confident at this point in my career? I should be confident rather than judging, rather than trying to combat. It's aligning with that protector, it's aligning with that imposter and trying to soothe it and trying to have it gain trust in us. That's just a really great reframe in general. When you have those inhibitions or "oh my gosh, I can't believe I'm doing this", or "what's wrong with", those are your protective layers. They're there for a reason. You don't want them to go away. You just need to work with them. Carly Ries (13:02): Absolutely. Working with that is such a great point. I feel like if people can get that more under control, it'll help with the other pressure that they have with running a business. Solopreneurs have so much on their shoulders, and so just to get that out of their system, it will be super helpful. But what about running the rest of the business? How can solopreneurs alleviate that pressure of just handling everything from marketing to operations to responding to client, customer emails? There's just a lot. Do you have any tips for letting them take it one step at a time? Leah Marone (13:38): Well, you said it. It's that one step at a time, one step at a time. But that's so hard. I think all of us, probably everyone even listening would give someone else the best advice when it's like, oh, well you do. You have to take things one step at a time, and you really have to be patient with yourself, and you have to acknowledge that when you took this leap of faith, you knew it was going to be overwhelming. We all know how to spit that game, but it's applying it. I think again, the biggest thing involved in it is just really being aware of how we're talking to ourselves and that fierce competitor, that fierce inner critic that we have that's driving, "Be productive, be productive, be productive." We have to acknowledge that that's a great part of us. (14:18): But I think it also a lot of times leads us into that multitasking. It leads us into that frenzy. Most solopreneurs that I meet with, some of them are just highly stressed all the time. They have not found the art of let me for just the majority of time, refrain from multitasking. Let me try to focus on one task. I know that's not reality all the time, but one task at a time and really try to diffuse and silence other things that could distract me, especially that voice inside saying, you're not being productive enough. This isn't really worth your time. Let's do something else. And they're just jumping from one thing to another. There's the frenzy, the urgency. So once you start to diffuse that, once you know that this is your clock and that you are a go-getter, you are able to do this, things start to shift a little bit. But it's that multitasking. People are even doing it with their self-care. It's amazing how many people I talk to and they're like, "yeah, I like to watch Netflix, but I also like to play Candy Crush, and I also like to have a snack, and I also like to talk somebody at the same time." All these things are canceling each other out. It's like running on a treadmill and eating chocolate cake. Which one are you trying to do? Carly Ries (15:33): That doesn't sound too bad though. Joe Rando (15:35): You're saying meditating while I'm riding my bike is a bad idea. Is that what you're saying? Leah Marone (15:39): That's okay. I would be cautious, but I think meditating depends on how you're meditating. If you're meditating full blown, with your eyes shut, that's different. But there's that presence meditation that is a difference. Joe Rando (15:53): This just drives home the point so much. We have so much stuff coming at us. I mean the slack and the email and the text messages, and then you start thinking about the brain going on and saying, I should do this. I got to do, oh, I got to do that. I got to do that. And It's nuts. I've been working at it and I haven't worked hard enough yet at cutting down that noise and trying to do more. I was a notorious multitasker and it was not good. But it's hard. Carly Ries (16:30): Some people say they thrive off of stress and that they get their best work done when they're constantly busy, constantly emotion, constantly have pressure on themselves. What do you say to those people? Leah Marone (16:44): Those people, and we're stereotyping here, but I think a lot of times those people also are really good at recovery. They have pockets of time or they're like, I work my ass off during the day and I do this and I get it all done and I'm efficient. But those people also know and are stellar at recovery. That's what I found. When you're great at recovery, you got it. You think about even just being an athlete or being knee deep into something, all in, not even knee deep, but all the way in. You work really hard, you are focused, you got it. But once that game's over, you know how to recover, how to validate yourself. You have those pockets so that you're not a victim of that just up and flow burnout pattern and crashing and burning. I think that's the distinction because I know people that are just like, man, they're just churning it out and churning it out. But those are the people too that when they are recovering, when they're relaxing, when they're nurturing other parts of who they are, they're all in with that too. And that's pretty amazing. Carly Ries (17:56): I'm so glad you said nurturing who they are, because as a solopreneur, you're working with yourself. You might work with contractors, but a relationship that people often neglect to focus on is the relationship with themselves. I know you were just talking about some of the pointers for the people that have the quick recovery, but for people that don't have a quick recovery, what can they do to foster that relationship? Leah Marone (18:19): Sure, And a lot of times when I get in front of people, they've already crashed and burned and it's like, okay, now what do I do? And a lot of times we can Google self-care stuff all day if we want and we can even probably spit some out, but self-care again is more in depth than that. It is fostering and nurturing that relationship with ourselves. I think there are so many transitions throughout the day that we don't take advantage of. The common answer is like, "well, you need to do this and you need to do this". Well, I don't have time. You might not, but if you think about the transitions that you have, whether it's brushing your teeth or changing your clothes or getting in your car and physically going somewhere different, those are many pockets, several pockets throughout the day for you to even have a few seconds of a reset. (19:14): What I mean by that is just you got to train yourself, you've got to get in the habit. Even that quick breath, even that quick, "let me just look around and see what my current environment has to offer." Thinking about you at a red light, most of us at a red light, we're so quick to pulling out our phone. Did someone text me? Is there any updates? Do I have an email? Rather than just taking those moments at a red light, whether it's five seconds or the whole minute or what have you, that you just revert back to your five senses and think, what do I see? What do I hear? I may have been at this intersection hundreds of times, but there's always something different to pick up on. Those mini bursts of presence in any form is almost like if you have a whiteboard and you wipe it clean. (19:57): Now, don't get me wrong, stuff might be filling right back up. But, you get that cleanse, you get that really quick cleanse, and you have an opportunity to check in, how am I doing? Where am I at? What do I see? We don't do that enough. Again, we're conditioning ourselves to be so incredibly highly stimulated, so incredibly nonstop because if we're not and we're not being productive, we're not being effective. We don't want this enough. That we've got to change. We have to reframe that. I think a really great framework that you could use too, and some of you may have this, but having those bookends, thinking of your day as a bookend and whether you have 50 roles, and you will if you're a solopreneur or entrepreneur, but you have more roles than that, I am guessing, not just professionally. (20:47): Thinking though about what you can have that's sacred and just yours in the morning. It can look different day to day. Something in the evening that you're incredibly deliberate with that acknowledges the middle might be chaos, might be pretty unpredictable, might not be a whole lot that you can control, but I'm going to have these two things that are mine. That could be going to the gym, listening to something, going for a walk or whatever it is. It could be having your cup of coffee in silence and not checking your email and eating breakfast at the same time. Having these pockets of presence, opportunity to sit with you. It's just something that we need to get better at and having that cleanse. Otherwise our balloon is just constantly filling up and we're not doing a good job of letting air out and then we pop. Then we have to rebuild and we have to gear ourselves up. The same cycle just keeps going and going and going. Carly Ries (21:45): And reminding ourselves it's okay to be bored too. My five-year-old the other day was like, oh, mommy, I'm bored. And I was like, okay, one, we've been home for two minutes. But I said, "honey. That's so awesome." And she was like, "why is that so awesome?" so I go, "now you can go be creative and let your imagination run. I'm so excited for you that you're bored." She was kind of like, what you talking about, and as I was saying it, I was like, I say this to a five-year-old, but why don't I say this to my friends and why don't I say this to adults? We just forgot what that feels like in the tech era. Leah Marone (22:32): We are so out of shape, I like to use that a lot out of shape. Joe Rando (22:35): Out of shape is a great way to say it. I used to sit there with nothing going on and think of some interesting idea and now I scroll. I just pull up my smartphone and see what's going on in the New York Times or whatever. My next phase is to knock that off for sure. Leah Marone (22:54): Yeah. I think a lot of people say, what's the one piece of advice? It doesn't have to be hours upon hours, we don't have that. But using what you have. Using those transitions and really being real with what you typically do in those. Even as you're taking a shower, are you constantly just running through your to-do list? Is that helpful? Great. If not, think of just these pockets when you're brushing your teeth, all these things. When are you multitasking and when don't you need to? When can you just be? Again, stress anxiety is so future-based and past base, and we're missing that present. And that's what really helps balance us out. Carly Ries (23:36): It's funny because we think that if we take the time to do all of this, we're just going to get stressed out when the reality is this prevents the burnout. Leah Marone (23:45): And that's really hard to shift that. I get it. It's like, well, if I don't do this and I don't do this, then I'm going to miss out or I'm not working hard enough and then I'm not going to be able to relax and I'm not going to achieve my goals. Again, there's that fear. That too, I think you label as that's your protector and your protector is coming in way too hot and you need to soothe it. You need to channel some of that resilience and some of that confidence that if you don't check that email or send that email at 1:00 AM nobody's going to die. It's going to be okay. If you know too that you're probably going to be firing on all cylinders if you try to get some more sleep versus being up with that urgency, because guess what? The next day you're going to find other things that are going to create that urgency. It's not like the next day you're going to be lounging by the pool. Carly Ries (24:34): It's so funny. One of my close friends is a neurosurgeon, and I'm like, okay, if she doesn't respond to her text, that's one thing. If I don't respond to a text, an email might go out 10 minutes late who cares. It's putting in perspective. I'm not trying to diminish what we're doing. We love helping solopreneurs, but things can can wait. They aren't as urgent as we think they are. Something I wanted to ask you, I think you talked about this previously throughout your content, and Joe and I, we don't give advice from a, "you should do this" because we're just here to help. Who are we to say that we are the experts on experts? But I think you said at one point that advice can fuel burnout, and we're talking about burnout, so I was like, oh my gosh, am I fueling my own burnout? Is that true or is that not true? Giving advice? Leah Marone (25:32): So yes, I think in a lot of times what the advice I'm talking about isn't that if someone comes to you and it's a pretty clear cut concrete issue, like, oh yes, this is how you do this, or this is the tool that you would use to make this spreadsheet. Those are concrete, that's fine. You're walking through some thing that's not emotional in nature. If you kind of evaluate your relationships, whether it's people that you collaborate with, whether it's your children, whether it's your partners, your friends, just taking a moment and noticing as you're in conversations with people or just in general, are you really quick, especially when there's emotion involved or some sort of issue, are you incredibly quick to just giving advice? Are you quick to take that false ownership of what really should lay with that person? What I mean by that is a lot of times people are so quick to relate to them, they're so quick to give advice, rather than being kind of that space creator for other people. (26:34): It's like they have stock or ownership in all these other things, all these other issues that are not necessarily theirs. When I'm saying this, I'm not saying you should just be you and not help anybody and not lead with empathy. I'm not saying that, but I think what we're doing is, again, we lack patience, especially even in our interactions with the people that we love most. We're not coming with curiosity. We're coming with like, oh, you should do this. And not to say our advice isn't good, but as well as I do, people don't do it. They've got to have their own flavor to it. We have to meet them where they're at. I think it can create that burnout or compassion fatigue as I like to call it, because we're not executing these conversations correctly. If you think, for example, my job as a psychotherapist, as a clinician, a lot of people will say, how do you do it? (27:22): How do you give advice all day? I say, well, I'm really not, because if I did and I said "well, this is exactly what you should do, or you need to break up with him," or giving this really concrete advice for these incredibly complex emotional situations, I would not sleep. I would be totally over invested in all of my patients' lives, my friends' lives, my family's lives. Not to say that I never slip up and I am not, but man, it's almost like I also would be creating this codependency of like, oh, Leah's going to fix this, or Leah will structure this, or Leah's really got ownership of this, so I'll just circle back to her. That creates that burnout. Being really aware of how we enter conversations, the role that we acquire, the space that we create. I like to say too, and this is the title of my book coming out, is Supporting Rather Than Solving. Support Don't Solve. That gives people the reps they need to problem solve, to gain that confidence and resilience, and it limits us from taking that false ownership and having this false sense of stock in all these things which really creates that burnout and can be incredibly exhausting. It doesn't need to be. Carly Ries (28:30): I think that's just so important for solopreneurs to keep in mind too when they're trying to help their customers, trying to help their clients. Just keep that in mind. That's why I wanted to ask you this question. I think a lot of them, myself included, are so quick to be like, this is what I know. And that might be to their detriment. Joe Rando (28:49): I think an important point you made is that you can get invested in this hand handout, this advice, and people won't do it. Even in management, the accepted wisdom is don't tell people what to do, particularly for something important that they're going to be doing a lot of work on. Get them to figure out what to do. Hopefully it kind of aligns with your vision, but not just sit there going, okay, I want you to do this. Because guess what, they're not going to have buy-in. Then if it doesn't work, it's like, sorry, here you go. So that makes a lot of sense to approach it that way. Leah Marone (29:25): Yeah, it's allowing people to get those reps in. I think as well, you're right, even just asking people, well, let's look at this. Tell me what your options might be. Tell me what your next steps might be. It's asking those right questions and coming from that curiosity, so people again go through that process and that problem solving skills that a lot of us lack. Carly Ries (29:47): Yeah, absolutely. Leah, this has been wonderful. I feel like this topic is just so helpful for solopreneurs . Like we were saying, we just want to shed light on this because it often doesn't go discussed. As a solopreneur, you kind of want to hold your head high and be like, oh, I've got all this covered to validate flying solo, and they don't need to. They're not alone. So we just wanted to bring that to everybody's attention and everybody listening. Leah, this has been so wonderful. We are curious. We ask every guest this question, what is your favorite quote about success? Leah Marone (30:20): I think it stems from my childhood and my basketball days, but "You miss a hundred percent of the shots you don't take." Carly Ries (30:28): Spoken like a true basketball player. That's just resonated with me as an athlete and just as a person. So I think from a little girl, I was always thankfully encouraged to just take risks, go out there, what's the worst that can happen? I think that really helps. It builds that confidence and you get your reps in for sure. (30:52): That's great. I love the quote. Where can people find you if they want to learn more about you or reach out to you? Leah Marone (30:58): My website is leahmarone.com and there's a lot more info in there. You can connect with me on LinkedIn. My email is just leah@leahmarone.com. I'm happy to help, whether it's helping you set boundaries or even if you do have a team or anything like that. But yeah, I feel like it's an isolating thing, but it doesn't have to be. Even though you're doing everything alone, it's interesting to springboard. Make sure you have those people in your worlds that you can be candid with and authentic with. I think that's incredibly important. Carly Ries (31:36): It's funny because when we cut to the outro of this podcast, the first line people are going to hear is flying solo in business doesn't mean you're alone. So glad you just said that. Thanks for taking that up, and we really appreciate you coming on the show. Thank you so much. Leah Marone (31:52): Oh, my pleasure. Thank you. Carly Ries (31:54): And listeners, we hope you enjoyed it as much as we do, and we look forward to seeing you on the next episode of the One-Person Business podcast. Have a great week. Closing (32:06): You may be going solo in business, but that doesn't mean you're alone. In fact, millions of people are in your shoes running a one person business and figuring it out as they go. So why not connect with them and learn from each other's successes and failures? At LifeStarr, we're creating a one-person business community where you can go to meet and get advice from other solopreneurs. Be sure to join in on the conversations at community.lifestarr.com.