Juggling consulting and kids, with Sara Dean

Sara Dean 00:02

Leah, my identity as a business owner, which I did not realize until my son was born, is such an important and integral part of who I am, and putting that on the back burner because now I was a mom was not an option.

Leah Neaderthal 00:17

Welcome to the Smart Gets Paid podcast with me, Leah Neaderthal, I help women land higher paying clients in their independent consulting businesses, but I've never been a salesperson. My background is in corporate marketing, and when I started my first consulting business, I learned pretty quickly that it's about 1000 times harder to sell your own stuff than it is to sell someone else's. So I taught myself how to do it, and I created the sales approach that I now share with my clients so they can feel more comfortable in the sales process, get more of the right clients and get paid way more for every client contract. So whether your client contracts are $5,000 $100,000 or more, if you want to work with more of the clients you love, do more of the work you love, and get paid more than you ever thought you could, then you're in the right place. Let's do it together. Thanks for tuning in, and don't forget to rate, review and share. H Hey there, Leah here, and thanks for tuning in. I hope that wherever you're listening to this, wherever you are right now, you're having a great week, making some good progress in your business and taking some time for you. So if you've been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that I have two young kids, a boy and a girl, and you've heard me talk about them here and there little snippets about running a business when you have little kids, because I had to tell you, running a business and having kids, especially when they're young, is is a lot. And like, every time I talk to someone whose kids are older than mine, so, you know, like, maybe eight or older, and I tell them that my kids are five and two, they literally all have the same reaction. They all say, Oh, you're really in it and, and I am. I mean, we are, and running a business when you have kids is, is a lot. And, you know, I feel compelled to say here the whole mother caveat, right? Which is, I love my kids. I love being a mom, and you can still love your kids and love being a mom and still admit that, like, it's really hard, but, you know, I just, I just feel compelled to say that, and like having kids. I mean, it goes without saying that it's so much a part of my life. I mean, that's like the understatement of the century, but it's also so much a part of who I am and how I show up as a business owner and how I run my business. And it's the same with a lot of the women I work with, because a lot of the women I work with are also moms, and so naturally, it comes up a lot in conversation or business questions in the academy also, but like, there's no module about running a business when you have kids and like, this isn't like a mompreneur group, but the same way that I can't separate the fact that I'm a mom from the fact that I'm a business owner, many of the Women I work with can't either. So it just comes up a lot, like we were in one of our weekly coaching calls a few weeks ago where one of the members shared that she had just signed two new clients that week with a potential of a third project, and she said that it was perfect timing, because her nanny had been recently poached for more money and more hours, and she was able to counter with more hours, because she had gotten these clients, and that's just one example. And like another one of our Academy members, whose business requires her to travel to her clients, because it's a lot of on site work, the whole reason why she joined the academy is to learn how to get clients on purpose, so that she can on purpose, get more local clients so that she can be home and spend more time with her kids, who are tweens. It's why we're one of the only coaching programs I know of that has a four month maternity leave program, which we're really proud of. And like, I'm not shy about talking about how hard it is to run a business with kids. Like this summer, for example, was really hard. It was the first summer that my five year old was in camp, and we were staying out of the city, and we didn't have the same level of child care that we usually have, and so naturally, that threw some wrenches into running a business. But even though I'm not shy about talking about what's hard about running a business with kids, there are things about having kids that have made me a better business owner. I mean, some of the best lessons I've learned about business. I've learned from my kids, like when we were potty training our son, and in the book we were following called Oh crap, which is one of the you know, go to potty training books, the author writes that you don't start potty training when they're ready, quote, unquote, ready. You do it when they're capable. And that line really stuck with me, and I use it almost once a week on myself when I feel resistance to doing something, this idea that I might not feel ready, but I am capable. And of course, being a mom and running a business has also made me a lot more patient, and I've learned to be able to do things without the conditions being perfect. Like, for example, I'm an elder male. Neil. And I think one of the most elder millennial things I do is I sort of feel like, if it's something that's important or expensive, I have to do it on my laptop. I can't do it on my phone. So for example, like buying plane tickets or writing anything important, like, in my mind, that has to get done on a computer. It can't happen on a phone, but I've learned, because I'm not always at my computer for long stretches of time like I was before, I've learned to do important things on my phone too, like writing an important email or writing newsletters or whatnot. So a lot of things I do just feel less precious, and I can get them done faster and easier, so stuff like that. And so running a consulting business when you have kids, it's so much a part of the lives of so many women that I just had to talk about it here on the podcast. And really, you know, being a parent and running a business affects all of us, even if you aren't a mom, like even if you don't have kids, if you've ever had someone need to reschedule a call because their kid was sick, or their nanny was out, or you've felt the summer slow down with your clients because people tend to take family vacations over the summer, then you know that even if you're not a business owner with kids yourself, then business owners with kids also becomes part of your experience. So I just wanted to talk about that here, and when I thought about doing an episode about being a business owner and a mom, I knew exactly who to talk to my friend and fellow business owner, Sarah Dean. Sarah is the founder of shameless leadership, which is formerly known as the shameless mom Academy. And the shameless mom Academy, and specifically the shameless mom Academy podcast, has one purpose, helping moms take up space with their bodies, with their voices, with their stories, with their advocacy and so for the past almost nine years, Sarah's been sharing lessons and conversations about being a shameless mom to help women stop shrinking and start growing in every aspect of their lives. Before starting the shameless mom Academy, Sarah created, grew and sold a gym in Seattle, which you'll hear her talk about, and she was a longtime fitness professional. And what I've loved about Sarah ever since I met her about eight years ago, and since I've been in the orbit of the shameless mom Academy now the shameless Leadership Academy is that not only is Sarah a business owner and a mom and she can speak from that place, but she's also not at all afraid of talking about how hard and messy and disorienting it can be to become a mother and be a mother, to sort of find yourself in this new place, or have to find yourself again as your own person. And so I've always appreciated how open and real Sarah is in talking about this stuff, because, you know, nothing makes you feel less seen than when you talk about, like, how hard it is to run a business when you're a mom and somebody says to you something like, you know, enjoy it while it lasts. The days are long and the years are short or whatever. And you're like, yes, okay, sure. But like, I was up all night with my kid, and I have a full day of client calls, and I kind of feel like I'm drowning, and so I'm not feeling very, you know, Zen Mother Goddess right now, or, okay, maybe that's just a purely hypothetical situation that literally happened to me. So I'm so excited to talk about running a business and being a mom with Sarah Dean, founder of the shameless mom Academy and now shameless leadership. So if you're a mom and a business owner, no matter what age your kids are, there's something here for you. We talk newborns, we talk toddlers, the tweens and teens. We talk empty nesters. And if you're a mom business owner, or if you have friends who are business owners and also have kids, you'll appreciate this episode. So take a listen to my conversation with Sarah Dean, and I'll come back and share a lesson that you can apply to your business. Sarah, I am so excited to have you here. Thanks for being here.

Sara Dean 08:48

Oh my gosh, Leah, I'm so excited to be here. Thanks for having me.

Leah Neaderthal 08:53

Why don't we start with an easy one. Tell us about tell us about you. Tell us what you do.

Sara Dean 08:59

That's I don't know how easy that is.

Leah Neaderthal 09:01

I know I was just thinking as I said, that that's like the worst question. It's like the worst opener question. So let's just but tell us,

Sara Dean 09:08

I can I can do it. I can do it. I'll just try to do it like in a concise ish way. So I am currently an executive coach and speaker and trainer. I primarily work with women in leadership and organizational teams, which is all sorts of fun, and I know that you work with a lot of consultants that do very similar, if not the exact same, work. So I'm loving the work that I'm doing. I came into this work, though, after hosting a podcast for eight years or so called the shameless mom Academy, where I had the opportunity to work with probably 1000s of, I mean, hundreds of 1000s of moms over the years via the podcast. But then, like really, got to work with hundreds of moms, kind of hands on in various capacities, through coaching and different groups that I ran, and that led me to wanting to support women in bigger. Ways, and also helping women to create bigger ripples, so that it wasn't just me helping one person do one thing, but instead, I could help women who are in roles where they can have big ripples on an organizational level or a systemic level, to really create change. And so that's been really exciting, and I'm very excited about that work, but it comes from, like, on the coattails of a 20 year professional experience where I've been supporting and coaching women in various capacities. And I can't imagine doing anything else in grad school, but I'm like, I'm going to grad school to just keep doing the same thing.

Leah Neaderthal 10:38

Yeah, will you find your thing? Um, just really quick, because you and I met through another coaching program back in the day, which, you know, probably like so many years now, but feels like yesterday, and you had just gone through another, like, a really big career shift. Can you just Yeah, I want to, I want to hear about that. Like, how did you get into this work? What were you doing before?

Sara Dean 11:00

So I spent 15 years working in the fitness industry, and I started in 2003 I wrapped that all up in 2018 around I had my son in 2012 and prior to having my son, and I like so cringe when I talk about this, prior to having my son, I so I had a gym for women in Seattle, which I loved, and to this day still was like one of my most proud accomplishments. But I had also built this online business called Fit healthy moms, and I had a program called six week pregnancy weight loss to help moms lose their baby weight in six weeks. And this is the part that's so cringy for me, because then I had a baby and was like, What am I doing? Like, why am I telling women that they can or should, or should desire to lose weight, like, baby weight in six weeks? And I started to realize that the business that I built, whether it was that business or some of the things I was doing in my my local gym space, I had really been built around helping women shrink their bodies. And once I once, I had that realization it was like I couldn't unsee it, and I had this urgent need to disconnect myself from it. And so I decided that while I loved the women that I was working with, and I love the community that I built, I also wanted to be doing something that helped women take up space as like, the counterpart to helping women shrink their bodies. I tried to do a lot of things to shift our marketing to be like, we don't help women shrink their bodies anymore. We help you get stronger. And people were still like, okay, but like, can we do weigh ins and, like, body measurements? And I was like, Well, no, we're not going to do that anymore. And like, people did not get it. They like that was still really important to them. So I ultimately ended up selling that business in 2018 and went full time into the podcast. So I'd started the podcast in 2016 then sold the business the gym, in 2018 and when I went all in on the podcast in 2018 it was really for me to build a business serving women and moms, specifically at that time, to help them take up space, and especially after becoming moms, where your identity is like, non existent, you don't know who you are, you don't know which way is up. You don't know where you're going, you don't know what your values are like. You don't know anything for sometimes years, if not decades. So that's where that transition happened, and it's been really exciting to help women in really expansive ways since then. I love it.

Leah Neaderthal 13:20

I love it. I love going from like, how do you shrink yourself to how do you take up more space? How do you expand yourself? It's I love that. Well So, and that's such a perfect segue, because the women that I work with are business owners, and many of them are moms, and so you know that idea what you just said about losing yourself, and, you know, not knowing which way is up. And all of those changes that happen are also, you know, happening in the context of trying to run like a whole ass business, right? Like trying to run a real business and serve real clients. And it's funny, even having a conversation about this, because I don't think one conversation could do it right, like this. This topic is, there's Canons could be written. And, you know, said about this, but I wanted to sort of scratch the surface here, because this is very real for so many women that I'm that I'm working with. So when you think about women running businesses, moms running businesses, and moms running specifically like service businesses or consulting businesses, like the one the women that I work with, I'm like, even reading this question, it's like, so this question is so huge, so let's see if we can chip away at it. What do you feel like or what do you hear are the biggest challenges from moms, about balancing being a mom with with running a business? And again, I understand volumes, but, but, yeah. I mean, what do you see? Are the biggest challenges?

Sara Dean 14:48

I see the biggest challenge being that the lines are so blurry, so like, you can it feels like, and especially if you're doing this in the context of, like, working out of your own house, which has been my experience since my son was born. So I feel like I'm never fully like, business Sarah, and I'm never fully mom. Sarah, I'm constantly like, if I'm being present with my kid, I'm thinking about a business thing, like I'm writing an email in my head. And if I'm present working on my business, I'm also like, making sure that my notifications are on so that, like, if the school calls, or if summer camp calls or, or is this the summertime and my kids, like, right on the other side of my wall. So it feels like you can never be all in in one place. And I think that that part is really, really tricky. I also think that we have the superpower of learning to live that way and navigate that way and do a lot of things in spite of that. But I also think one of the things that really tripped me up when when my son was a baby. And I thought that I could run this very full time business when I was when I had my gym. And I thought I could run this like very full time business from home on my computer while my son slept in an ergo on me, which was like a front carrier that I don't even know if they still exist, but so I thought, Oh, I'm going to have this baby. He will sleep on me in an ergo, or a Baby Bjorn or whatever, or baby rap, um, and I'll just, like, sit at my computer all day, and that that's what it's like to be a mom, right? And then I had the baby, and he screamed all the time, and nursing was a nightmare, and I couldn't do I mean, if I got 15 minutes of work in in those first few months, like, 15 minutes a day was a good day, like, where I could actually focus and get, like, one thing done, and I had to really, like, think through, how am I going to build an identity for myself as a working mom, as a business owner, that feels authentic to me, and it became really clear to me pretty quickly that I did not want an identity where it was motherhood first and work second. Now, of course, I would put my kids health, safety, well being before my work any day of the week, but my identity as a business owner, which I did not realize until my son was born, is such an important and integral part of who I am, and putting that on the back burner, because now I was a mom, was not an option. And I like, I tried, I tried to be, like, I'm just gonna be behind the scenes and, like, not really focus on work for a while, and I couldn't do it. It made me absolutely miserable. So I think recognizing, like, Who do you want to be and how do you want to enter into that juggle and make it appropriate for you, no matter what the world tells you, no matter how other people are doing it, I think is the starting point.

Leah Neaderthal 17:27

Yeah, oh my gosh, you're the identities are that's such an important thing. You're right, that oftentimes you don't really have the opportunity or the need to even recognize that in yourself until you have a change or a difference. And I think you know you could have that. You could have a similar, like, identity shift, or, you know, opportunity to look at that if you're taking care of something like, for example, if you have an aging parent, right? And like, if there's anything else that's like, really shifts how you how you spend your time and how you define yourself. And it will say, I think that especially when, well, so like I had, I had my son when I was 39 and, you know, a lot of my peers are having, you know, their first or second kids now, like, you know, now I'm like, 44 I always say, like, you have, like, a whole ass life, like a whole identity. We

Sara Dean 18:24

built a lot of things. We built a big, huge thing and many aspects to it, before this kid came along. And, yeah, which was very eye opening to me, because I did not see

Leah Neaderthal 18:33

that. You don't see it until you're you're in it and and also I think that, like, what you the way you think it's going to be, is so different than how it actually is you. I always felt like, kind of like you, it's like, I'm gonna basically have the business and, and, uh, and it'll also have a kid. Yeah, right, yeah, um, like, if you had a puppy or something, right? Or you, like,

Sara Dean 18:54

it's but I always equated it to like a pie, like, I'll have a baby, and that'll just be like a piece of the pie. Like a small piece of the pie will be like the baby now, but like all the other pieces will still be there. And then after he was born, I was like, oh, like, the whole pie is the baby. And right? So what does that mean for like, all the other pieces that I love and value and cherish and like feel accomplished around and feel proud of, and, you know, want to invest time and energy into and that, like, really flipped me upside down. I was, like, not prepared to give up the pie.

Leah Neaderthal 19:27

Oh, no, I was, I was the whole pie, right? Like, all the things I like were the whole pie. Now the baby's the whole pie, and you have, like, some crumbs, right? Totally. And I will say, I don't, I do. Think this changes, you know, the the relationship to being a parent, being a and being a business owner. I mean, I'm sort of going through it right now, right? So are you a different at a different stage, your child, your your son, is older than than my kids, but, like, it's different as a newborn, and then as, like, a toddler, and then, you know, I'm guessing when they can, like. Wipe their own butts, right? Like life changes, and then tween and teen and college and all of those things. But like, the biggest shift happens, I'm guessing, like, when, you know, right, when the baby happens, yeah, and then, versus, like, turned upside down, yeah,

Sara Dean 20:16

I also it's so my son's 11, now, almost 12, and it's interesting. So I have more time. I mean, he still wants to hang out some time, like, an amount of time, but, like, definitely doesn't need to hang out all the time, um, and doesn't need me for everything, which is, like, very bittersweet, but I can now see this future where I get to, like, take back so much of the pie, which is heartbreaking, because after you give, you know, 11 years, 12 years to the pie, you're like, Wait, hold on, like you just took all the best parts of me, and now you're gonna just leave me. And there's days where you're like, that sounds great, but other days where it sounds pretty heartbreaking. And what I've realized in this year especially, and I realized it really quickly, and took quick action, but I had this realization that I need to be planning for what I'm calling now my next 20 so I'm 48 What do I want to do for my next 20 years? And it's going to like the last 12 have been so much about this kid, and I have to know who I am and who I am becoming as he becomes the person he's going to be, and is not reliant on me, and I don't want to wake up and then be completely lost again, like I was lost when he was born, because I don't know what to do with myself, because I don't have to take care of him all the time. And so for my next 20 I quickly, over the course of a couple months, decided to go back to go back to grad school and decided, like, Okay, I don't even know what I'm going to use a master's degree for, but I'm going to get it because I want to learn more, and I just want to be building who I am, so that as I have more opportunities to, you know, put my pie back together, that I feel like I have the tools and the capabilities in terms of the direction I Want to be growing. And I also, and with executive coaching and business consulting, have more and more clients coming to me when they are on the brink of being empty nesters, and they're saying, I finally get to focus on whatever I want. 24/7, they're like, my kids are going away. And it's so funny. How like ready they are. They're like, my kids are going away. And I'll cry, you know, that week, and then, oh my gosh, I need you to help me figure out what I'm going to do, either, like, professionally, or what I'm going to do with my business, because all of a sudden the options seem endless once you're into that phase of parenting.

Leah Neaderthal 22:34

But I love your taking action on that and thinking about it in advance. So it's not like, Quick, get a hobby or quick, let's redefine yourself. You know this new person that you are. And I think there's something about really holding on to or, like, reclaiming your sense of self and like you're you. You still are a whole person. You still are somebody who, like, has your own intellectual life, right? And layers of identity, exactly layers. I love that. And it's so interesting to think about how this changes. You know, working backwards, right? It's like from empty nester phase to the teenage years to adolescence to toddlers. I mean, so when

Sara Dean 23:15

you're in those initial phases, when you're in the early stages of motherhood, and I find myself still doing this at, you know, again, kid on the brink of 12. But what I learned early on, and especially in those first like six months, was I would when I would have moments to finally squeeze in work, and I'd be like, 20 minutes, I would sit down on my computer and be like, I don't even know what to do, because the list is so long, I don't know, like, what thing to even open to do one thing. And so I became really clear that I was like, okay, the most important thing is that I have, like, a viable business, like this business makes enough money that I can, like, pay my overhead and pay the people working for me. And so I quickly was able to be really conscientious that every day I needed to look at what are the three things I need to do to make my business move forward in some way today, whether it was like filling the pipeline, moving people along the pipeline, making sure that, like, invoicing is done, like getting payments from like, whatever the thing was, which was this immediate permission to let all the extra stuff go, and which meant dropping a lot of balls, and it meant not replying to a lot of emails. I kept on I kept on my maternity autoresponder for like, I think, like 18 months, but, but that clear sense of what are the three things I need to do if I have 45 minutes today, or whatever you're in for you, it might be like one thing a day, but I even use that now when we're in, you know, we were talking earlier before we hit record that like, my son was home for two weeks this summer, sick with pneumonia, and then I've been sick the last couple weeks. And when we're in those moments where you're like, oh my gosh, I don't even know what to do today, because there's so many things and life is pulling me in so many different directions. Really being able to quickly look at your to do list or your action items and say, like, what are. One to three things I need to do today that are the key things, and like, let everything else not matter and let yourself drop all the other balls. And I think that sometimes we get so overwhelmed with so many things that we can't we can't see the like, the trees through the forest, the forest through the trees. Whatever that saying is, we can't see what's most important.

Leah Neaderthal 25:18

Yeah, no, I love that as just quickly getting to it. It's not about, you know, having a to do, you know, having a project management system, or, you know, all of these, like, priorities. It's like, literally, what are the things, right? And then, and then, letting go of everything else, you know, because I think that, like a lot of us, coming from business owners without kids to business owners with kids. I mean, if you're anything like me, like I used to be able to just work forever, like I would, like I would work into the late night. I would work on the weekends. Work was is a happy place for me. I if I had an idea, I would just run with it. And and even now, I still feel like I sort of, I use that time framework as, like, what it what I could get done, right? It's like, oh, yeah, that'll take me two days. Yeah, that would take me two days in, like, pre child, years, half life. Now it takes like, two weeks. I once I gave somebody a book recommendation, this is the big leap, right? Which is a pretty thin book. I was like, Yeah, you could read it in a weekend. If you don't have kids, you'll read it in two weeks if you have kids, right? Two

Sara Dean 26:21

weeks to two months, like, yeah, and probably listen on audio, probably don't sit down

Leah Neaderthal 26:25

and read it. Yeah, yeah. Don't try to sit down. And so I think when you don't have that kind of time, really getting to the habit of like, forcing yourself to be like, what actually matters, right? And that was a big change for me. I was like, I remember, you know, lamenting to our mutual friend, Megan. I was like, I just want to, like, have a day to work. And she was like, you won't have a day to work. This is like, newborn time, right? I was like, you won't have a day, but what can you get done in 45 minutes? What can you get done in 15 minutes? What can you get done on your phone, right? And when you, when you put it through that lens, like, what are the three things to do just it. It just relieves a lot of stress.

Sara Dean 27:04

Yeah, absolutely. And I also find that with that level of discernment, like, it's kind of it becomes a habit where then you're, like, repeatedly able to discern more quickly and more clearly, what are the things that I'm focusing on and what are the things that I'm intentionally saying no to right now. I was interviewing my friend Erica tebbens A year ago, and we were talking, we was like, at the New Year, and we started having this conversation about, like, what are my yeses right now? What are my no's right now? And we came up with this saying that I've continued to use ever since, where we might have a lot of things that we ultimately want to do, but a lot of those things might not be my yes right now. So looking at a list of, like, here's the 47 things, but like, these three are yeses right now, and everything else not my yes right now. It might be a yes next week, next month, next year, in 10 years, like, we can keep it all on the list, but when we're trying to do 97 things as top priorities, you're gonna you're gonna do nothing well and nothing to completion.

Leah Neaderthal 28:02

Yeah, I love that. Yes, right now. And something you said just before, that intentional nos, it's not like I didn't get to it or something I'm gonna feel bad about, which all of the overachievers listening to this. You know, you know, we love to do that to ourselves, but I think it's the intentional No, you know, gives it meaning. You know, I think that so much of what we've talked about so far is like comparing our pre mom lives to our current lives. And, you know, I think the natural inclination, inclination is to look at like what we either can't do or or can't do anymore, or can't do to the to the degree that we used to be. But what about things that we can actually do better in our business as a result of being a mom?

Sara Dean 28:46

This is such a great question, and I know people listening are consulting in various capacities, and I think that there's so much power in this question, and nobody tells us this like we're made to feel inadequate and less than and like right now is not quite your time like you might. You might need to put this on pause for a few years until, like, you know, till you're past this moment of parenting, etc, or the season of life. What I think we have to recognize is that, by virtue of being a parent and a primary caregiver, we suddenly have to learn, develop and really build a sense of mastery around new skills that no one tells you are actually marketable skills. So when I'm talking to women who were and I talk with a lot of executive coaching clients about this, so when I'm talking with women who are working in an organization, and they're looking to either move up or they're looking to be able to sit in a room with mostly men and be able to have, you know, be able to say what they want to say, and feel like they're what they're saying is valuable, even if other people around them are not supporting them in that way or upholding them in those ways. I think we have to be able to embrace that. Because I have done this, I'm qualified to do that. And so when we look at what I have done in motherhood, what have I done in. Motherhood that allows that qualifies me to do the next thing, if you and I'm not in the position of having two kids under the age of five, but so many of my clients have lived that experience, and I know that you're living that experience right now. And when you have that experience of having two little kids young ages, you are like no one can multitask better than you. No one can negotiate better than someone who can negotiate with a toddler, by the way, you have to learn, like, in infinite patience, that nothing else can teach you. You have to learn how to talk in other people's languages. You have to learn how to meet people where they're at. You have to learn how to like, read the room, like, what version of my kid Am I walking into when I pick him up at school or daycare? And then you have to adapt to that really quickly. There's all these skills that are really incredible life skills that lend us to being really powerful in the workforce, or really powerful in terms of being a consultant and going into an organization and being able to read the room, participate in uncomfortable, uncomfortable conversations, manage things when things are unpredictable, like negotiate and or mediate between like, two people who are having this very awkward conversation and looking to you to be or the whole room is looking to you to be like, Oh my gosh, what's she gonna say about this? So those are all skills from parenthood that really lend us to being much stronger in the professional space. But if we don't, if we don't recognize that and label it and own it and honor it, then instead we're going in thinking, I'm just a tired mom today, and I'm not going to be on top of my game the way everyone else is, and we start spending this opposite narrative that is very disempowering. So if we can really embolden ourselves with everything that we have to learn and do in terms of new skills and parenting, then all of a sudden we can really, I think, hold on to and embrace these skills, how these skills are transferable in the workforce and in consulting?

Leah Neaderthal 31:56

Yeah, I love that framing also, because it's so much more like real and actionable than what I think a lot of us see on social media or sort of is in the culture, which is like, You're a super superhero, you're a superwoman, and it's like, I don't feel like a superwoman, you know,

Sara Dean 32:13

nor do you want to be like, I don't want to be. Have you read um, Christy Coulter's book? Exit interview,

Leah Neaderthal 32:21

no, so I'm gonna add it to my list. Oh, my gosh. Oh, good.

Sara Dean 32:25

I listen to the audio, and she does her own audio, and it's amazing. It's about her experience working at Amazon for 10 or 12 years as a woman trying to like be promoted. And it's wild. So Christy talks about how women have to show up, and we do have to show up as superheroes, but not because we want to, not because we're like, excited about it or even proud of it. We're doing it because it's like, the only freaking way to move forward. And we would love to not have to be a superhero like I would actually love to sleep more and love to take off the cape, and love to do way less, and love to not be seen as like, an inspiration. Like, I'm not signing up to be an inspiration. I'm signing up to like, provide for my family and help other people, or whatever like your motivation is, but you're not necessarily signing up to be like I want to do, and be all the things we've been conditioned that, yay, women can do, and be all the things, but we're not going to give them any support to do it. And when we've conditioned men to be able to do all the things, it's been under the guise of you can do all these things because you're going to have a partner who holds down the fort, raises the kids, takes care of all the things, and you go out and provide and those are really different scenarios. And so like, yeah, I just agree with you that, like, no more moms are superheroes, and moms wear capes and blah, blah, blah, like, everyone can have my cape. It's not penetrated in.

Leah Neaderthal 33:46

It's really not helpful. And I think one thing that does come from like, it's one thing I say to myself all the time, just in the the everythingness of running the business and having the kids and everything, I say to myself, like, God, if I can do it like this, then imagine what I could achieve, what it's not imagine what I could achieve, but it's more like if I could do it, if I can run this business right now, given, you know, the age of my children and all of that, like, Man, I this is going to be amazing when I have a little bit more time, or a Little bit more sleep, or incrementally more time over the years, and all of that stuff. So, yes, yeah. I mean, it's just, it's like, a little self congratulatory, I suppose, but that's okay. You just need that sometimes

Sara Dean 34:34

yes, yes. And I think that, like when we're sitting alone in our offices as independent contractors and consultants, that we're like, never sitting there patting our own backs, and we're never like, look at me doing great work today. Instead, we're usually doing the opposite, like, I should work harder, and I should try harder, and I should be making this connection and pitching that and blah, blah, blah. So like being self congratulatory, more of that every day,

Leah Neaderthal 34:56

self congratulatory on the good things and intention. Knows on the not now things, yes, yes. Can we talk about self care as a business owner, mom, and not just like, you know, air quotes, self care spas and all the self care things that you and I see that are like, not really self care. Like, how do you advise? Or what would you advise a woman who's running a business with children trying to get you know, it just in any capacity around self care?

Sara Dean 35:28

Yeah, first of all, I, I don't like the term self care only because of kind of what it's become and how it's portrayed in certain ways, like bubble baths and pedicures, which are great and fine and like, do those things if that brings you joy. But I think of self care, self nourishment. And when we think of self nourishment, that doesn't sound like an option, like nourishing yourself is not an option, it's a must. And so I think we have to get away from this idea that, like, self care is a luxury. That's like, once a month I'm gonna have girls night, or once a month I'm gonna get a pedicure, or whatever the thing is, and it said it needs to be self nourishment every single day, and with the notion that this is what I do to preserve my physical and mental health, which has to be a top priority, because, I mean, I think we all want to, like, actually live long enough to see our children grow up. So whether we're looking at this through like a physical health standpoint or a mental health standpoint, we each have to identify personally for us, like, what are those things that we need to be focusing on? And that looks really different from one person to the next. And so where I will say that for me to maintain my mental health, I need to work out every single morning, and that means getting up a little earlier than I would otherwise have to another person might say, for me to maintain my mental, mental and physical health, I need to make sure I get an extra 30 minutes of sleep in the morning. Those are totally opposite things, but they can be like the way that they nourish individual people are equally valuable, and so depending on you know, your own individual needs. And so I think recognizing, first of all, what are the things that are your that you need to nourish yourself every day and then recognizing why those things are really important, rather than looking at like, well, you know, Instagram says I should exercise every day and eat like three vegetables or have more color on my plate, or whatever, really connecting it to what's important to you. And so I've been able to think through and recognize like patterns and exercise. For me, it's really not about like, doing it for a certain amount of time, or burning a certain amount of calories, or I don't really have any end goal, except for that, I know that it eases my anxiety, and research shows that it also supports people women with ADHD brains and anxiety and ADHD brain. I mean, we've seen it demonstrated in this conversation today already. So for me, like that has to be my non negotiable, for me in the way that I operate. And then, you know, same thing with eating and I'm like, recognizing these are certain things that make me feel good, make me not feel great. I've survived for a really long time not caring about drinking water, but I'm on medication right now, like, If I don't drink my water. Oh, my God, my skin is just like peeling off my body. So now I have, like, this huge water bottle next to my desk all the time, and I'm like, Well, I guess this is I'm nourishing myself now, like I'm the personal trainer who was like, drink all the water, but never drank all the water,

Leah Neaderthal 38:13

right? Yeah,

Sara Dean 38:14

I gotta nourish myself this way. So I think it's always looking at what's what you need for that self nourishment on a regular basis.

Leah Neaderthal 38:21

Yeah, I'm like writing this down on a post. It like not self care, self nourishment, because I think you're right. What you need to nourish is so different than what we think of as care, right? Whether it's exercise or sleep, or, you know, a habit or what have you, when you were talking about exercise, that just really hit me, because I just posted something recently where my daughter just turned two, and for the first year of her life, I think I, I think I worked out like just a handful of times, and I'm a former triathlete, like, I don't shy away from exercise, but she was a terrible sleeper and all, and I put it in the realm of self care, and I so it didn't work out. And then she started sleeping better. And so for the second year of her life, I started working out, and I just got notified by, like, the peloton app that says you have a 52 week workout streak, which just was isolation, meaningful to me, right? I was like, Oh, thank you. I just, I did it. You know, for me it was, it was about the habit, not that I would say it's about the habit, not the hardness, right? Just it's about showing up, right? Yeah, and that's because that's what really nourished me. And I'm curious what you'd say to this. I think that, as a business owner and somebody who derives her identity from the business and or the work or the intellectual pursuit of that, I think that self nourishment can be especially where, like when you're like, in this shit with your with your kids, right? I think self nourishing can be like doing one thing for your business, first thing you know, like making that something you do. First thing before you do anything else is that, what do you how do you feel about that? Oh,

Sara Dean 39:57

my gosh. Well, you might have noticed I started laughing because. So I subscribed, and I'm this is probably familiar to you, so we can roll our eyes together, but I totally subscribe to, like, Miracle Morning stuff for a while, and I'm assuming, yes, see, so you know what I mean. And miracle, the miracle morning, I'm not saying it's a bad thing. It's a book by Hal Elrod, lovely guy, from what I've heard, but it's the system that, like, every morning, you get up and you do these six things, I think, for 10 minutes or more each. So you're now looking at like, this is minimally an hour long process. So everyone who's a parent listening just was just like, stop listening, because they're like, Yeah, I'm not going to get up and do like an hour of something. So I tried to do that in all these various forms, and I was like, I'll do like five minutes of the five minutes of each thing, or three minutes of each thing, because, like, this is the formula. And what I realized is I like getting up and having sitting and having coffee by myself and just kind of poking around and work stuff on my laptop before my kid gets up. And so I love getting up and, like, checking in on work stuff and just kind of being, like a little I'm not super productive. I'm just, like, piddling around and stuff. So absolutely and sometimes I am productive, I'm like, I'm gonna knock this thing out really quick. But I think that we get to determine, like, what that means for us. And so if you want to do this, like, hour plus routine of your miracle morning, of six tasks and all these different things, go for it. But also, if you want to, like, get up and spend 30 minutes on Instagram while you were drinking your coffee. Sure if that works for you. Great. If you're recognizing ways that that doesn't work for you, like, take accountability for that you're a grown up, you can figure it out. Yeah, do it. Like, do what works for you

Leah Neaderthal 41:34

totally. And I think if that, I just, I would tell my clients. And you know anyone listening like, if that, if what nourishes you and it nourishes the identity that of you as a business owner is to poke around in your email or to, like, respond to somebody real quick. Like, I say, do it because, yeah, I'm also, like, a total box checker. Like, I I'm somebody who puts things on my to do list, to like, cross them off, right? Give it to yourself, and don't judge yourself for it. Um, real quick story on the Miracle Morning guy, which, so I read that book, right? And if you check it out, Miracle Morning like there is, there is something to it. People love this stuff, right? But I it was a few years into running my coaching business, and, you know, trying to, like, figure out what I what my unique point of view was, and my unique framework and all of that stuff, and beating my head against the wall, just trying to be, like, the most innovative. And then I read this book, and I it's a, it's like, 10 pages. That's, like, really short, yeah. And I put the, it's and I put the book down, and I was like, Are you saying his whole IP is wake up an hour early? Here I am building, you know, beating my head against the wall, trying to, like, have, you know, do the most know, do the most innovative thing. And his thing is, like, wake up an hour early. I'm like, you've got to be kidding me, yeah.

Sara Dean 42:47

And he's still, like, singing the same tune. I mean, I read that book 10 or 12 years ago, and it wasn't a new book at that time. I think it was reasonably new, but, like, you know, probably three to five years old. So I think we're now looking at like, you know, 15 or so years later, and he's still talking about his miracle mornings. Yeah, he's still

Leah Neaderthal 43:06

still telling people to wake up an hour early. And so he said no shade to Hal Elrod. He's got something that really, you know, he works for him and works for a lot of people. And I will say, if you are a high achieving woman listening to this podcast, trying to figure out, like, the best way to do leadership, consulting or marketing consulting or what have you, it's you don't have to be the most innovative, right? You just have to say what you you know, say what you do. I

Sara Dean 43:31

also think our desire to be innovative can often come at a cost of being being really unclear to our people what we do and how we do it. I need. I've gotten that feedback about my own stuff. I have a really good friend, and she a couple years ago, she's like, I just want to, if you're open to some feedback, I just want you to know that as someone watching your business, I'm having a hard time distinguishing between your offers. And she has a similar business. She's like, it things just seem a little muddy right now, like you're talking about this thing and that thing, but, and the more she told me, but I was like, Oh my gosh, you're so right. And she's like, Yeah, so if it's not clear to me, and like, I know your business pretty well, it might be why people don't know which offer to choose. It's like, oh my gosh, I probably could just do one offer. Yeah, it was super valuable feedback. I

Leah Neaderthal 44:18

love that feedback from somebody who, like, actually gets it, you know who? Yeah, is really trying to be helpful and really gets it?

Sara Dean 44:25

Yeah. Last

Leah Neaderthal 44:26

very big question, yeah. So again, I'm like, reading the questions I wrote. It's like, laughable. How big this question is. You're gonna laugh at me. What advice would you give to other moms who are running consulting businesses. Top three, let's say top three pieces of advice. Okay, I mean, I will say also Sarah's entire life is advice for moms and business owners. So, I mean, there's again, volumes, but top three,

Sara Dean 44:55

so first is mm. Knowing what your values are, and then being values aligned in your personal and professional decision making, which sounds really clean and clear and simple, and it's gets real muddy. And I mean, this has gotten muddy for me when I've, like, looked at what I'm saying yes to in terms of working with an organization and what they want me to do, or just what the organization values are, or like, you know, things that are happening in the media with the organization at any given time. So I think that that sounds like a very

Leah Neaderthal 45:30

specific example, that you are specific

Sara Dean 45:33

example, but there have been times when the example I'm thinking of is just a company. Wanted me to come in and do some stuff on women in leadership. Yet they were like, we really was a company of all male. The whole leadership team was male. And they were like, we really want to commit to, like, supporting women this year, and it's like, a really big focus for us, and we have a budget for it, and blah, blah, blah. And so I sent that they wanted me to pitch them a couple different ideas. Couple different ideas, and I sent them this whole proposal, and then they saw the numbers, which, like, I'm not top tier cost wise, and they were like, well, we're gonna put this. This is a really important issue for us, but we're gonna just push pause for a minute. Let's circle back next year. And this was, like, this was a year and a half ago or something, so, but I'm like, this is like, your top priority this year, but you want to circle back in nine months. So I was like, and now I see your values, and I actually don't know that I want to be the woman in the room sitting with all of you, because, like, This actually seems like it's going to be maybe futile. So it was so that was that. So recognizing those values, staying values aligned, would be the first thing. Secondly, I would say, to be looking ahead at Who am I becoming. I was I'm always still, I say this a lot, and it comes straight from Michelle Obama's book, but like looking at who am I becoming, and so in this moment, whatever season you're in, who are you becoming in this moment? And so if I'm in a moment where I'm in a it's a sticky parenting time and it's a sticky business time, who do I want to be in this moment and how, who do I want to be at the end of this moment? So how will I grow through this or how will I respond in this moment in order to move forward, which was a huge test for my me, my parenting, my business throughout like from 2020 to 2022, plus, just through the pandemic, and having to make so many big decisions on a family level and professional level. And then third piece of advice, I think, would be to create fun. And I think that women business owners are not the best at having fun. I think that we desire fun, but I think we are so caught up in and I should say women business owners, who are moms, I think that we're so caught up in getting things done that we forget about the fun. And I also think that the fun changes. Like, what was fun for me before my son was born is really different than what's fun for me now. And so, you know, fun for me, 12 years ago might have been like eight o'clock at night, done with work for the day. Like, let's go have drinks and dinner somewhere fun, fun and fancy. And now it's like eight o'clock at night, done with work and family stuff and like, let's take the dog for a walk, because that's when I get my kid to talk about, like, all the gossip. So fun can look really different, but knowing what it is, and then building that in, making sure that you're getting that, whether that's like in you know, whether that incorporates a family member or not, it's all on your own or just with a friend.

Leah Neaderthal 48:28

I love that reminder to because I will just acknowledge that I am when I'm when I'm knee deep in kids and knee deep in business. I do not bring all the fun to to this family, thank God. My my wife, is a lot more whimsical than I am, and I tend to be in like a moment of mild stress at all times, but, but it's such a good reminder, because you have to, you have to release the pressure valve totally,

Sara Dean 48:56

if you like, if everyone listening stops to say, like, when did I last have fun? You might not even be able to think of it and like that indicates that this is something that you really need to like. I think at a certain point in running a business and parenting, that fun does not happen on its own. You actually have to like, intentionally create the fun, and so go take responsibility for that. And that's part of your self nourishment, by the way. Like you can check that self nourishment box when you're like, oh, okay, this friend who makes me like, laugh until I'm peeing my pants, when did I last on time with that person? Like, that's my self nourishment for this day or this week or whatever. Oh,

Leah Neaderthal 49:33

such a great reminder. Sarah, where can people find you? All

Sara Dean 49:37

the places. So, um, my main website is Sarah dean.com There's no h and Sarah so S, A, R, A, D, E, A n, if people want to connect on LinkedIn, I love connecting on LinkedIn, and I love getting DMS. Makes me feel very important. So please DM me if you listen to this episode and you just want to say hi, I have a podcast called shameless leadership. So if you just look search up. Any podcast app search for shameless leadership. And when you do that search, you will see that there's over 900 episodes. And the first 900 episodes were actually the shameless mom Academy, and we rebranded at episode 900 to shameless leadership. So if you like Leah said, I have a lot of advice. I have 900 episodes of advice. If you go to shameless leadership, and you'll get that whole feed for the last eight years of me podcasting, giving really specific advice to moms.

Leah Neaderthal 50:29

It's a great podcast, and you might check out this with me.

Sara Dean 50:34

Yes, yes. So the episode with Leah is, it's in like, the 880s

Leah Neaderthal 50:39

I think, yeah, wise, just go to your podcast app and

Sara Dean 50:42

subscribe. Just get on there and scroll a little ways down there right subscribe to the podcast,

Leah Neaderthal 50:47

then scroll a little ways down. You'll find it, and you'll find a wealth of of knowledge. Sarah, thank you so much for being here and it's tackling this huge topic with us today.

Sara Dean 50:58

Oh, thank you so much. Leah, this was so fun.

Leah Neaderthal 51:04

Such a good conversation with Sarah, and there were so many good nuggets. So if anything in our conversation spoke to you, post about it on LinkedIn and tag Sarah and me so we can see it and give you a shout out. And I love how Sarah was talking about identities, because it's something I even still struggle with, like, even a few years in, wanting to be a great mom and wanting to be a great business owner, and just what it means and where I find my sense of self, and I still struggle with time, like, my time not being fully my own again, even five years in, I still feel like I'm learning how to be a different person. And I was reminded of it when my sister in law had a baby a few months ago, and she's been really close with us and with both of our kids. And I remember we were talking and her son was a few weeks old, and she was remembering a time a few years back when my son was like, really little, maybe eight or nine months, and how at the end of a conversation with her and her husband, I said to her, You guys just don't realize how hard this is. And so fast forward now, when her son is a few weeks old, and she said to me, you know, I was thinking about that conversation we had and how hard things are. And at the time, I thought I got it, because we were spending so much time with you guys, but I really get it now. She said, the hard isn't about the diapers or even the sleep. It's about not being able to be the boss of yourself anymore, like just to take a walk or go out to a coffee shop or whatever whenever you want to. The hard is how you spend your time and your sense of who you are. And she's right, and maybe that changes over time as your kids get older, but for where I am now, that's really present for me. And so I want to leave you with one thing that really changed this for me for the better. This is for all the moms out there, and I've told it to my clients who are parents, and we've had some members of the academy who've had babies while they're in the program and gone on maternity leave. And I've told this to them too, and it's a piece of advice I got from a college friend of mine whose kids are maybe five, six years older than mine, and I heard it a few years ago. So this was back in sort of like mid to late pandemic times. I went to the suburbs outside of New York City, which we call upstate, but is really like 45 minutes away, and I went to see some college friends for the night, and I stayed over at Stacey's house because she lived near where we're going. So the next morning, it was Sunday and Stacy's husband had taken her kids to Sunday school at the synagogue. And so it was just the two of us, and I was getting ready to leave. And so since we were in the suburbs and I had our car, and it's just so much easier to go to Whole Foods in the suburbs than in Brooklyn, I figured I'd just go to Whole Foods before I headed back. And so I asked Stacy, you know, like when I come to Whole Foods with me, I mean, it's not like going to the grocery stores, like how I hang out with people, but, you know, it was like late pandemic, and we had all been socially starved. And I was like, why not? You know, maybe we could go grocery shopping together. And she said, No, thanks. I have a rule I sort of live by as a mom. And then she said to me something that I've remembered to this day and that I tell every parent, it's a rule she lives by that she told me, and it goes, when you have a moment to yourself, don't give it to anyone else. I'll say that again. When you have a moment to yourself, don't give it to anyone else. Because, like, How many times have you found yourself with a free moment and you start to, you know, unload the dishwasher or do the laundry or just do things related to your kids or your family, and then we still feel like we have no time for ourselves, because we take this time that we've gotten for ourselves and we fill it with things for other people. But I've stopped doing that thanks to that phrase, when you get a moment to yourself, don't give it to anyone else. And it's not like I'm some master of self care or self nourishment or I'm some sort of domestic labor Zen Goddess. I say that phrase to myself all the time, not because I'm so good at putting myself first, but because I'm not, because I have the same conditioning that all of us have around putting other people first. Just around being productive, around being able to relax once the work is done, which, of course, it's never done. And so I tell myself that phrase all the time, because I need the reminder. But when you're a mom and you can stop the automatic, you know, quote, doing things for other people, it really does help. It just happened a couple weeks ago too, like my wife took the kids with her to run an errand, and it turned into an impromptu meetup with their aunts and uncles. And even though I had already decided to work out while they went on their errand, when it turned into an impromptu meetup, I found myself with even more free time than I thought I would have, and I was this close to emptying the dishwasher, and I said to myself, when you get a moment to yourself. Don't give it to anyone else. And so instead of doing that, instead of emptying the dishwasher, I sat down and read a book, and it was bliss. It felt so luxurious. And you know what, after an hour or so, I did get up and change the laundry and unload the dishwasher, but I had done something for myself first. So when you're a mom and a business owner or a business owner and a mom and you're giving so much of yourself to your family and to your clients, don't forget to give something to yourself. And when you get a moment to yourself, don't give it to anyone else. That's one way you can make sure to center yourself in your business and your life and fill up your own cup first you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai