I made it to Denver! With the whole family of course…
My kids are happily attending their new schools (which is a big deal). I have a desk and an office. I’ve filled out my client roster for September.
As far as how big changes and cross country moves can go, this was a home run! Nothing lost and nothing late.
And now that my business is back online I wanted to share some insights from this season…
1) Don’t fight the seasons
Our society seems to hold “constant forward motion” as the highest priority. So when something gets in the way or slows that down it can cause some major challenges between the ears!
One thing I’ve learned over the years (and from this book about seasons), seasons are cyclical. Enjoy them. Embrace them. And watch your stress melt away.
Fighting the seasons is what leads to burnout, wasted energy, and discontent.
Practical note: one way I embraced this crazy busy season of moving across the country was cutting my client load in half. Scary? Yes. But it allowed me to get through the season while still enjoying my family and life along the way! I dramatically underestimated how distracting life would be the 3 weeks surrounding moving day and I was incredibly grateful to still be able to serve the clients I kept on with my full energy and heart.
2) Avoid “meta stress” with an information system
There’s the stress that comes from needing to do and remember a lot of things, and then there’s the “meta stress” that comes from endlessly worrying about everything because you don’t have a system to capture, process, organize, and see everything in one place.
I’ve used numerous systems over the years (and another new one now) – more on those later. Even if it’s just a whiteboard or a notebook, find a place where you can keep track of important & slow moving projects. Getting them out of your head will free up space (and again, lower your stress).
Practical note: I used ClickUp to manage finding a new home in a hot market, selling our current home, moving out, and moving in without dropping any balls. Here’s a screen shot of my house hunting dashboard which helped us confidently make decisions after seeing dozens of homes (they all run together).
3) Never stop marketing (duh?)
I did. I don’t recommend it. It fell off the truck in that whole bit about seasons above.
If you’re in business then you know, when you stop marketing you become completely dependent on referrals and outside forces. Which is fine for a season (see what I did there), but not ideal.
If I had to do this move over again I would setup great systems to create and distribute marketing content in a way that would work really well even while I was really busy.
For example:
- Loom videos → YouTube, Newsletter, Social (I can shoot those on my phone)
- Podcast intro & outro pre-recorded so I can just record the “meat & potatoes” (even on my phone) and be done.
- Setup a simple way to publish content. I wrote this on Notion by the way without ever logging into a website builder… but I didn’t set this up until after the move 😩.
Practical note: I have a high level professional marketing background. I know this stuff. But did none of it.
You’ll notice what I described here is NOT revolutionary tactics, but having a lightweight system in place BEFORE things got hectic. It’s the system that provides the leverage (and consistency), not the tactic.
One last thing…
A lesson I learned long ago from my very wise wife of 14+ years, your busy season isn’t going to end. There’s rarely a magical land of more lax deadlines, low stress, and an abundance of free time to spend on the things you neglected before.
So stop waiting for it and start organizing your life, work, and workflow to work better in the season that you’re in.
That’s what this is all about.
My season of less focus on my business has brought new ideas, inspiration, and connections. I’ve reshaped my core service, and I’m about to open the doors to something new I’m building with Justus Murimi.
Stay tuned, it’s Spring here.
