Start Rising Podcast
The Start Rising Podcast, hosted by Caiti Courtier, is a show for entrepreneurs seeking personal growth and heightened positivity who are taking imperfect action. The podcast focuses on the topics of resilience and overcoming obstacles to achieve success, with an emphasis on questioning old beliefs and learning valuable lessons along the way. The podcast is aimed at entrepreneurs who may feel isolated on their journey and are looking for support during the beginning through growth stages of their business. By listening to the Start Rising Podcast, individuals can connect with like-minded individuals and gain inspiration to pursue their big audacious goals.
Start Rising Podcast
Episode 41: Lessons in Prioritizing
Hello there! As a new mum, I've recently been introduced to a whole new world of love, wonder and, well, challenges. This episode talks about the new lessons my baby Ollie, now two months old, and how he's become my tiny guru on self-worth and productivity. As I navigate this new role, I'm learning that there's no worthiness fairy that anoints some people worthy and others not. It's inherent in all of us, and my son has reminded me of that.
Managing time has become an entirely new beast, with motherhood and entrepreneurship vying for my attention. However, it's also become clearer to me what tasks deserve it. This episode throws light on my thoughts about the Pareto Principle, and how it's helping me separate the fluff from what truly matters. You'll also get a peek into my journey with Amazon's KDP journals, a venture I've undertaken alongside motherhood. Tune in, and let's explore together how embracing our worthiness can lead to a more fulfilling life and entrepreneurial success.
Check out my Letters to Ollie memory journal here
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Hello and welcome in to the next episode of the Start Rising podcast. You are here with your host, katie Courier, coming to you from my new setup with my new microphone, and also my little co-host, who is two months old and sleeping on my lap. So if you hear him sucking on him's dummy or pacifier or just making little baby cues, you understand where the noise is coming from. That's my son, ollie. He is two months old and I share a little bit about it on the episode before this. But yes, there is a good chance my co-host may be joining us because he does not like to sleep in his bassinet by himself for very long. So this way we get a contact nap and we get a little bit longer. So we learn and we pivot. Anywho, i want to share a lesson with you that I've noticed since having him. So he was born in April and it is currently in June, towards the end of it. So I have been a little bit slower in getting back to the podcasting of things, as Postpartum is quite the journey itself and just learning how to know his cues and balance things and make sure I'm taking care of myself as well, but the piece that I feel like he has taught me, is understanding our level of worthiness when it comes to our ventures that we want to take on. Basically, we've all heard that old adage of we are worthy just as we are And I know I didn't particularly believe that I'm in. Yeah, that's a nice thing to say Yes, we are worthy. There's no worthiness fairy that comes down and anoints us and deems some people worthy, some people not. There's no stamp that, basically, is stamped on the heads of babies when they come out This is as they're worthy or not. And somewhere along the way between that baby-ness to us as adults, we're going to lose that And I think that's what holds us all back as far as some of the entrepreneurial stuff for even taking risks in our life. That slows us down in our tracks or has us really take that second guess and hesitate, and then we may lose opportunities out of that hesitation.
Speaker 1:The reason Ollie comes into this is because, as you do with a newborn baby, you spend a lot of time looking at them, doting on them and just in awe of this human being that's now in your life that spent nine months growing inside you if you were pregnant or if you adopted. You spend so much time staring at them and just in awe of everything that they've brought to your life And part of what I've noticed in myself as well. I've been embracing the kind of like talking to him like I wish I would talk to myself really, and I whisper affirmations to him. I tell him he is worthy, i tell him he is loved and I tell him he can do everything and anything that he sets his mind to, which is interesting because those are the same things that I wish to tell myself. Yet I seem to only believe it if I'm telling it to him. So you may or may not relate, but looking at him and realising that he is worthy just as he is, and telling him that too, it's making me realise that within myself that that's the truth for us as well, and you can't really look at a newborn baby and think I'm not worthy or they are not worthy, and it's definitely given me a whole new perspective of things. So my challenge to you is to spend some time over the next few days and as uncomfortable as it may be, standing in front of the mirror, looking at yourself in the eyes and telling yourself that you are worthy And I know that's probably a hard pill to swallow for the most of us, because we may not have ever actually outroutly said that to ourselves, and the key is you've got to say it out loud. You may have to say it a couple of times until you feel like you actually mean it, but it's something that's really we probably really need And that may be a hold up for a lot of us. So that's a starting challenge for you. Is that worthiness factor? So that's one of the lessons that I've definitely learned from him, and that perspective shift has been everything Because, along with the time that's minimized, like condensed, as far as your opportunity to do things for yourself or towards your business or whatever you have after you have kids, and the time and the energy and the stuff it's hard to put words to.
Speaker 1:It's like sped up, like you condense it, like you choose what is fluff and what's not fluff, like what's the most important thing to do and what's not. And you really have to take away the excuses. Like something that I've noticed myself doing is I would typically get stuck on something that I was doing and I would say, oh well, i can't do that because I got stuck, but using this nap time piece is you just do it. There's no time to circle back to it. There's no time to you just quickly jump on Google, google whatever you need to, youtube or whatever that may be that you need to get the answer. And it's also reinforced. That whole idea of he's a mirror of what I give to myself. I also give to him And that's challenging my level of, i suppose, self-compassion and self-productivity with those pieces. So I know I'm doing what I can for me because I know it'll end up benefiting him as well. So that has been a little bit of a mental challenge.
Speaker 1:There's been a whole host of things that I'm sure, while not all of you may have children, there's aspects of this that we can take and we can apply to our life without having kids, without having kids Or with having kids, or maybe having kids that are older. This maybe serves as a little bit of a reminder to you for those pieces that you are worthy And putting stuff off as an answer for maybe you don't have the answer yet. It's a form of an excuse, and part of this excuse piece and condensed time periods, i'm basically having to ask myself questions that are going to identify the tasks that are actually going to make a difference. So we've all heard of that gosh, pareto, pareto. Gosh can't talk. But the Pareto principle, the 80-20, that 20% of your tasks will give you 80% of your results And really looking to zero in on what are those things that are going to make a difference for you and actually get the results you want to do in the condensed time that you have, i found myself asking is this small potatoes? Is this worth my time? And you probably have your own version of that But really asking those questions as to is this actually going to make a difference or is this just productive fluff that I'm engaging in And I think so much of the early stage entrepreneur, pre-making, much income is probably centered mostly around fluff, because it's the busy stuff that won't actually get you the results and what actually get the ability for people to pay you for what you offer and your services.
Speaker 1:So my recommendation to you is asking yourself is this the 20% that's going to get me 80% of my results, or is this the fluff that you're feeling busy with? Because a lot of the time, the fluff and the busyness means you don't have to put yourself out there, you don't have to be vulnerable, you don't have to be visible. You can do the busy work and make it sound like, oh, i'm working on my whatever. This is So asking yourself what are those A1 tasks, those level A's, level ones that you need to get done? And something example with me is I've come up with a, basically born out of something I was already doing. So what I do is I actually make, like Amazon, kdp journals and I design the covers, design the manuscripts for the insides, and then I publish them on Amazon.
Speaker 1:But I found myself, ever since Ollie was born, was basically had a running notes tab and I would write down little memories of things that would fall outside of the standard milestone journals that you say like alright, first time they smiled, first time they clapped, first time they did what, whatever it was. Basically, there was a lot of gaps that I would notice day to day that, going through post-partum recovery, i was probably not going to remember things as well as I wanted to, so I wanted to make sure I documented it. So here we have this running notes app between myself and my husband. We would document how old he was and what he did. So I basically created a journal of it. So the beginning of it talks about, like the parenting journey and how to use the journal, which encompasses parenting prompts. So it's like, and then it has blank pages for you to fill in your own memories If there's stuff that you want to write down and document about your child that you don't have an idea as to what to write.
Speaker 1:So there's prompts like what's something that you did that made me smile today, or some beautiful thing. I saw a whole host of like 70 some prompts that I came up with and put in the journal and then published it on Amazon. But part of what I knew I needed to do because it's a hard concept to explain if you just see the cover of a book that says letters to, and then dot, dot, dot the space for you to write in your child's name and then preserving your parenting journey I knew I needed to be able to get this out as well to other places. So part of what I did, ollie, was napping on my shoulder and typically doing a TikTok or some type of video or some type of post. I would procrastinate like no one's business, because it is more challenging to put yourself out there and be vulnerable and visible.
Speaker 1:So I knew I only had moments before he would wake up and it was just like ripping off the band-aid. Put him on your shoulder, face the back of his head to the camera and just quickly record on TikTok and just show up as you are No makeup done, no, whatnot, maybe a filter or two, but getting it done. Ripping off that bandaid because time is of the essence And I would have previously overthought that, delayed that and put it off for days and potentially weeks on end, using the condensed time to your advantage. And just ripping off the bandaid, knowing that 20% of action was going to get me seen in front of people. And to see those actions. I hope you may even hear him be cooing at the moment, but doing those things in order to make the difference and get the impact and stop overthinking and stop using excuses and things like that. Oh, he's doing his little cues. You might be able to hear him. I'm not sure with this microphone if it'll pick that up, but he's cooing and little sucking on his binky in my arms.
Speaker 1:Anyway, that's what I wanted to talk to you about today to just ask yourself are these things going to get me the results that I need And how much am I procrastinating, doing the things that are going to get me the results and sharing the lessons. As it applies to my new chapter of motherhood, which hopefully it'll be something that you will relate to and journey along the way, i'm sure there's stuff that can be taken out of it, regardless of if you are a parent or not. You're most welcome along this journey, as it takes new and different shapes for me, and follow along how things go with Oli And, if you are interested, letters to Oli is on Amazon and is a great gift for a new parent or even yourself. I plan to make more videos and post about it and just rip that bandaid off and do the uncomfortable things with posting on TikTok So you may see it there. Anyway, i'll leave you to it and I'll see you in the next episode. Thanks for tuning in.