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>> Carlee: Hi, everyone. Welcome back to the Stress Less Show. This week, we are talking mental and physical illness and how it's gotten in the way of your business growth. We want to know, has mental or physical illness gotten in the way of your business growth? Hi, I'm Carly Myers. I'm your stress management expert. And this month, we're actually talking how to work less to achieve more. I brought on expert Sue Allen Clayton, who is the founder of the Solopreneur Academy for Women, an online community that provides education and encouragement to female business owners. I'm super excited to talk about this topic. Often times when we talk about productivity, we talk about working less. We're thinking about freeing up more time for those luxury items. But our well-being is not one of those luxury items. So I'm really, really excited to have you on the show, Sue.
>> Sue: Thank you. I'm excited to be here. I love talking about this topic.
>> Carlee: Awesome. So why don't we start by? I know I gave like a general introduction of who you are and what you do, but would you mind sharing just a little bit more about who you are, why you why you're here, why you why this message is so important to you?
>> Sue: Well, I have been a solopreneur for more than 20 years. And during that time, most of the time, I spent as a freelance writer. But I got interested in burnout and mental health for solopreneurs. And so that's why I'm here. And from a personal level, I've really experienced a lot of blips during my solopreneur career. I had two kids. I dealt with pregnancy loss. I had dental issues. I've had a couple of major surgeries. I've had a car accident. So I've had to learn how to work around some of these physical and mental challenges. And I've actually just completed an e-book that I wanted to share with people. How to do it!
>> Carlee: I love that. So I'm really excited about Sue's e-book and we're gonna get to that later on in the show on how to get that. But I'm curious, like for those of us who are solopreneurs or business owners and we are experiencing work, maybe we're going through a moment of dealing with physical illness or we our mental health is really a struggle right now. What do you recommend in order to just make it through, something that we can implement like now or know right now?
>> Sue: I have three things I wanted to just touch on briefly in our time. And the first one is that we're not alone. And then we're going to talk a little bit about understanding your illness and how to be successful. I think that if you look at statistics and I have some notes here, but we think that everyone else in the world is problem free and we're not. If you look at depression, there are 18 million American adults that are depressed. PTSD affects eight million American adults. Bipolar disorder affects six million people. Addiction affects 21 million Americans. Chronic pain affects 50 million Americans with 20 million having enough pain that they have difficulty working. And if you look just overall, the US Census Bureau reported that one in five Americans is living with a disability. So there are a lot of people out there who are suffering and suffering in silence. And I think a great example is Lady Gaga. Right? You look at her Instagram feed and it is this beautiful, powerful, amazing, talented woman. And recently she talked to Oprah and said, you know, she was raped at 19. She's had all these traumas. She was a cutter. She has PTSD. She suffers from chronic pain. That is a great example of someone who looks perfect but is actually suffering underneath. So I think the first thing we need to do is recognize that we are not alone. And then the second thing is to really understand our illness or illnesses that they are generally not random. So look at what causes your pain or your anxiety or your depression, what triggers it. And it might be weather, hormones, stress. It might be physical activity, allergens, foods. I was in a pain management group on Facebook and people were talking about the full moon was causing all these people's pain to to flare. And that's something I had never thought of. I'm not really sure how it works, but if you know that full moons make your pain worse, then you have the ability to plan around it, which gives you a feeling of control and. So really, once you know that you can create a work schedule that takes your health issues into consideration, you're not working when you don't feel well. So, for example, if you get migraines that are home or... hormone based and you know that there is going to be two or three days of the month that you are down with migraines, accept that. Don't try and work. Don't try and push through it. Just that's part of who you are. For me, I had, as I mentioned, a car accident. I have a lot of I herniated all the discs in my neck. And so I am very careful about working. I have to take a break every hour on the computer. I have to. I can only do four hours a day in front of the computer and then I have to move to a chair. But that kind of gives me a sense of control over my business. And I am super productive, probably more productive than a lot of people because I am so focused on what I need to do. And then the final thing is the old hare and the tortoise fable. Right. You have the the hare that's strong and athletic and arrogant. And he challenges this poor little tortoise to a race. And then he goes and has a nap. Well, the tortoise is just plugging along and the tortoise wins the race. And I feel like that is a great story for anyone who has chronic illness, whether physical or mental, that you just have to focus, be deliberate with your time and you can win the race when you are slow and plodding. So with that said, do everything you can to make your time as productive as possible. Have the most comfortable ergonomic environment that you can so that your work day is as productive as it can be. Automate everything. So your billing, your invoicing, your social media posts, whatever you can do so that if you're not feeling well, you can create it when you're feeling well and it still continues to run when you're not feeling well. I also recommend that you call it outsourcing with abandon, right? Everything that you possibly can. And that doesn't mean necessarily that you have a virtual assistant or someone helping with your business, but just like Staples delivers printer ink, you know, they'll deliver the next day. That's something that you can do, which is outsourcing that makes your life easier. I have dogs. Chewy dot com does a great job of delivering dog food. Right? And I don't have to schlep 20 pounds worth of food around and. And then the other thing that it's important to do is create procedures so that when you are working, you're not wasting time reinventing the wheel because like for me, creating videos. I know you do the audio's podcast. It is a like 30 stage process. Right. And if you already have that process in place, then you are able to...To be more efficient and effective in the time that you're working, so really focusing on slow and steady wins the race I think is a great mantra for people who have physical or mental issues.
>> Carlee: Yeah, I feel like systems have saved my life. Like, really, you know, I use Asana as my task management software. And as soon as I know, like this is my system, I create a template. And then I just, you know, copy it every time I need to do it. And that is like I don't even have to think about it. My staff know what to do. Yes, it has been a lifesaver. And I just want to circle back to about, you know, understanding that you're not alone. I mean, there's a reason that that health is the number four top stressor in the United States. I mean, when you said that number, 50 million, I had no idea. But I knew that it's the fourth top stressor. And to know that you're not alone is is such a key thing, because when we get into that headspace, it's like we're digging ourselves into a hole. We can't then see the options. But for those of us who are listening at home, we want to know, what do you do to take care of your health while running your business or even going to work? What is the thing that you do to take care of you despite mental health, despite physical illness, etc.?
>> Sue: I have a whole routine and I you know, I start with waking up in the morning because of my pain issue. I don't sleep well. I give myself like 90 minutes to have a coffee and get to my desk. I stretch first. I have a timer set, so I'm working no more than an hour. I go for regular massages. I have a whole routine that keeps me healthy and I deliberately apply that. I feel like if you're suffering from physically or emotional illnesses, that has to be job one. And then from there I can work because I'm taking care of my body.
>> Carlee: So for those of you over at home, we'd love to hear what you do at home. Please comment below. And now we said we were gonna circle back to your e-book, Sue. We'd love to hear what it is and how to get it at home.
>> Sue: So it's called How to Run a Solo business When Your Health Gets In the Way and you can go to solopreneur Academy dot com backslash guides and you will see it.
>> Carlee: Awesome. Awesome. So guys, make sure to click that link. It'll be in the show notes to check out Sue's e-book. It's going to have lots of tips and tools on really how to run your solo business. When, of course, the name speaks for itself. Right? Now, we also, since it's the month of January, we also want to invite you to a very special stress less company, free online training, How to Break Free From Busy and Stress Less. It's happening on Wednesday, January twenty ninth at 1:00 p.m. And the link for that will be in the show notes as well. Now. This concludes this episode of the Stress Less Show. If you enjoyed this week's episode, let us know by giving us a big old thumbs up and hitting that follow or subscribe button. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next week.