Back in Episode 420, I told you how we made the decision to not do Summer Camp, and instead keep our three kids home for the summer. Me being a solopreneur, my wife being a nurse, we were able to modify our work schedules to save some money, a lot of money really, and spend more time with our family. But I was worried that my business might suffer. So, in today's episode, I am going to give us a grade. We'll look at how we did answer the question, was it worth it? And then answer the question, what's next? Would we do it again?
In Streamlined Solopreneur Accelerated, I'm gonna talk about why I want a more scalable business, and I'll do a time-tracking check-in. If you want to get that and every episode early and ad-free, you can sign up over at [streamlined.fm/join]. But for now, let's get to it.
Welcome to the Streamlined Solopreneur, a show for busy solopreneurs to help you improve your systems and processes so you can build a business while spending your time the way you want. I know you're busy, so let's get started.
Okay, everybody. Welcome. Welcome to the Streamlined Solopreneur.
Let's start with, how did I do? Now, if you haven't listened to Episode 420, you can go to [streamlined.fm/420], and you can kind of listen to my thoughts on how I think this summer would go and how we were planning to do it. I gave that episode a little listen, before recording this and planning this episode. And so, I'm gonna kinda give myself a grade, and then we'll talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly before moving on to answering some of the other questions.
So, first of all, the grade. I would give us a solid B. I think we did a good job overall. My wife did a, I think, a much better job than I did, if I'm being honest, with keeping the kids active and entertained. There were very few moments where we, like, really lost our tempers, I think. And so, overall, I think we did a pretty good job. Could things be better? Yes. I'll talk about that later. But, for now, I would say, I'm pretty pleased overall with the things that went well.
So, let's do the good, the bad, and the ugly.
First of all, the good. There were a few things that were signals for me that things went well. First one really very concrete example is the zoo trip. So, it was July 12th. That's my son's birthday. It was one of the Fridays where I was able to work. My wife had off. And I knew that that afternoon, I'd be working less because we were getting some new furniture, including, like, a big girl bed for my oldest. And my wife was going to a, kind of play date sort of trip with her work friends and their kids to a local zoo. And so I wasn't gonna go to this. It wasn't for my son's birthday. It was kinda preplanned. It was like a work friends trip. And, because the weather looked spotty, everybody bailed. And so it ended up turning into unexpectedly, just my wife and our kids. And then I feel like the point of the trip changed. And so I decided I would go to the zoo. It was my son's birthday. It was just my family.
And so, the point of that is, that I was able to take extra days if I wanted to. Right? The whole point, somebody recently, my friend, Justin Freeman, who founded and sold LearnDash, asked on Twitter recently, How do you measure success? And I said, I measure success by asking myself, can I knock off of work for a day to spend time with my family? And this trip was like a shining example of that because I was already working less for the summer, and this was very unexpected, and I was able to do it. And that's really important to me. So, I mean, I might not be making as much as, you know, some of the big creators. But, I mean, if I'm being honest, most of us are not. But, I am able to have the flexibility to spend time with my family. And that is a big measure of success for me, even more so here because I was working for sometimes 3 days a week. And so I was already working less. We were doing a bunch of travel, and I was still, I still felt comfortable in doing this.
The second really shining example of the good was that I was able to disconnect for our family vacation. I didn't even bring my laptop. And while I did check email because coming home to, like, hundreds of emails in my inbox would stress me out more than actually just marking most of those emails read on vacation. I think I responded to exactly one email, and that was from a friend about a thing. And so I think, incredible success.
Didn't even bring my laptop. Like, couldn't have brought my iPad, but I don't like working from my iPad. So, like, I couldn't have even done appreciable work if I wanted to. I didn't bring my recording gear. I might have brought my DJI microphone from my phone, but I didn't take it out, didn't record anything, just disconnected. I did bring a notebook because if I did get ideas or thoughts, I did wanna record them, but I did no appreciable work on vacation. And I think that is a big deal. Not because you should do work on vacation. It's the exact opposite.
I think people think that it's okay to, or that they do it for whatever reason. Right? I got a lot of, I got a couple of, oh, you forgot your laptop. And I was like, no. No. It was on purpose. And I got a a lot more, good for you. Right? And I think, like, good for you should not be the default to I'm not working on my vacation. When you say I'm not working on vacation, people should say, yeah. That's the point of vacation. Right? If you say I'm gonna do some work on vacation, I think, you know, and I mean, this is like, I'm a bit of a hypocrite here because I did work, I have worked on vacation where I've, like, accidentally scheduled podcast recordings on vacation with guests I was excited to interview, so I didn't wanna move it.
But the goal for me is, vacations are vacations, and always has been. So, when I had a full-time job, one of my bosses emailed me while I was on vacation, and the email said, like, Joe, if you have some downtime and I don't know what the rest of that email said. Like, I deleted it. I'm on vacation. This is my time. Right? Similarly, when I was out on paternity leave at another job, a project manager put a meeting on my calendar before I got back, and I declined it. And I messaged them, and I said, hey. I don't exist until April 9th. That was when my paternity leave was up. And they pushed back a little bit and said, like, well, the person you need to meet with is gonna be on vacation. I was like, we can do it via email then. Like, I don't exist while I am on leave.
And so, like, I'm very, I find those boundaries to be very important, and I think it's hard to keep them when you're self employed because, you know, when you're self employed, you don't get paid vacation, really. You know, it's your income more or less relies on the work that you're doing. Which is why in accelerated, I wanna talk about building a more scalable solopreneur business. I don't want employees. I'll just say that right off the bat. So, like, if you wanna tune into that, again, [streamlined.fm/join].
Okay. And the last thing in the good that was like, a little bit of a tangent. And the last thing in the good is I didn't work any full weekend days. Right? So, during the pandemic, if I couldn't work on a weekday, I took that Saturday to work. Right? That was, like, the arrangement that my wife and I had. My business was in a way worse spot then. But I didn't feel, you know, I would write my newsletter Sunday mornings, like, before my kids got up, just because I was, you know, that that's like good writing time for me. But, I didn't go to my office for any full day. If there was a time when the babies were napping and my wife and daughter were out, maybe I would come to the office and do something. But me, like, it didn't take any time away from my family. And that was another big win for me. Right? Because I default to if I feel behind, I'm gonna work. My office is right below our family room. Right? I'm gonna walk downstairs and work. And so the fact that I didn't feel that pull or if I did, I resisted it is that's a big win.
Those wins were huge. Right? So that's the good. Right? And hearing all that good, you might think like, oh, that that feels like an A. Right? But I'm a harsh grader on myself, at least. I was a pretty easy grader when I taught college.
And there were some bad and some ugly. Right? Like, bringing the grade down. So the bad. The days where I wasn't motivated felt amplified. Right? It was like, I can actually work this day, and I'm not feeling it. And now I'm losing a work like, it's a self goal. Right? You're an own goal. And so it made me feel even worse because if there was, like, a Thursday when I wasn't feeling motivated and my wife usually worked on Fridays, well, now it's like, if she's not working the weekend, I'm probably not working Monday either. Right? So it's like, now this is 5 days in a row I'm not working. Or even if she was not working on a Monday or it's, like, still 2 days in a row where I wasn't getting work done, and that felt worse to me. And that's when I really felt the pull of, like, I can make some time up on the weekend. But, again, I didn't want to. Right? That was not the point of me running my business is being able to spend time with my family, not being shackled to my desk. So, that was one bad.
Another bad is I didn't feel like I scaled back the amount of stuff I was trying to do. I think, I really think I added to my plate. Like, the 3rd bad years related. I might have taken on more or too much. Right? I'm working on a couple of LinkedIn Learning courses right now as I record this. And, like, to be frank, it would have been stupid to say no. Like, it was a very good opportunity. It would have been stupid for me to say no to them, but, like, I was also at Podcast Movement, and we had a vacation, and I became president of the Home and School Association for my kids' school. And so, like, that's a lot of work and more work than I think I expected it even though the expectations were managed. And so, like, I probably bit off more than I could chew, didn't scale back as much, took on more clients, and started doing more content work.
So, I'm certain, like, certain aspects of my work have suffered. And so, that's like, that's the bad. Right? But, again, like, the bad kinda pales in comparison to the good. Like, okay. We all have days where we're not feeling motivated, and, you know, we all probably take on more than we can. I'll say, like, on a personal note, I don't know if this is bad or ugly, but, like, I wasn't feeling motivated to eat well or exercise. I will say eating eating well is hard for me. Like, I love food and I love, like, garbage food to, you know, it's like, I don't get why people watch, like, trash TV shows like Real Housewives or Love is Blind. But also, I eat like garbage all the time, and I'm sure people don't understand why I can't choke down a salad once in a while, which I do, but, it's like, very rare. I hate it. I do like exercise, though, and I wasn't feeling motivated to work out very much this summer because, like, I felt the time crunch, and I didn't make time to work out. And so I'm definitely feeling that in multiple ways. And, I think I would like to think that now that the school year is starting, I'm gonna fix that. So, that is I'll probably put that under ugly. I think that's probably an ugly, because I really don't like the way I feel right now.
Okay. So speaking of the ugly, there were some missteps in communication. Right? There were a few times when my wife and I never fought. Well, I've never raised in the 10-plus years we've been together. One of the first things I told myself because, like, I will yell at my parents, right, when we, as an adult, when we argue, like, we just like the way that we as emotional Italians argue is loud, and we yell at each other. And I told myself that when my wife and I first started dating, I would never raise my voice to her. And that has been true. I've never raised my voice to my wife.
But we did like, we we usually get, like, real quiet, and there's like, this tension and they hate it. And that happened a couple of times this summer. And, like, that was gonna happen. Right? Like, we were at the beginning of the summer, we were not managing the clock well. Like, we were just kind of surviving. By the end of the summer, I feel like we started thriving a little bit. And so, you know, there were, I don't like that. I hate that. It's rare, and it makes me feel bad for several days. And yes, we like, we talked through it, obviously. But, you know, I think there were just that happened. Right?
I also wrote rushed through here in my outline. And I'm gonna say, like, I've, I don't know exactly what I meant here. I wrote rushed through and personal things. The personal things were like the eating and exercising. Like, I just don't feel, like I did that well. There were also times when I really lost my temper, and I feel awful about it. I don't like doing that. And so, you know, I think, like, the bad definitely pales in comparison to the good, but the ugly are things I definitely need to work on.
And so, like, the missteps I think we've got that. Missteps in communication. I'm gonna say, like, I feel like I rushed, maybe I rushed through, like, spending time with my kids some days because I was getting stressed. I don't really know what I meant by that. But, like, and then the personal things, the health things are things that I definitely could've done better.
So how did I do? I think a solid B. The good was really good. The bad was okay. The ugly stuff, I definitely need to work on. I think really that's it. Right? The bad is stuff that, while preventable, is kinda like a fact of life.
The ugly are things that are preventable and not inevitable and should not happen. I think that's really the difference between bad and ugly.
Okay. So, I've been talking longer about how I did. So, let us go into asking the question, Was it Worth It?
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Okay. Was it worth it? Yes. Absolutely. As I was planning this, I got wistful, and I hope I don't do it here. And, like, I feel like I've been crying in front of people a lot, and that's not, it's okay for men to cry. I'm fully subscribed to that. I still don't like doing it all the time, though.
So, okay. Yes. It was worth it. The time I get to spend with my family is super important. Two of my three kids now are in full-time school, which means that most of the waking hours during the week, I don't see them. I see them for maybe an hour before school after they wake up and we get ready, and I see them for a few hours, like, 2 or 3 hours after school before bedtime, which means that they are someone else's for most of the week. And that's a huge bummer.
And it would have also been true if we had sent them to Summer Camp. And so, like, this is something I need to really remember. Right? That thought should prevent the ugly. Right? So the time I got to spend with my family was important.
Also, I clarified my business a lot, like, it wasn't just like a success as a solopreneur parent. It was a success as a solopreneur. And part of that is I'm in a couple of masterminds that have really helped me. And part of it is that when you don't have the time to mess around, you need to clarify. Right?
Last week's episode with Emily, we didn't have a lot of time. And so we had to keep it really tight. We had to keep that conversation tight. And, you know, I'm recording this a little bit ahead of time, so I'm not seeing, like, the full effect on the stats. But so far, so good. Keeping it focused is good.
So I clarified my business and who my target audience is. I did hire, my friend Hollie Arnett, to help me with branding, which I think is going to help a lot. It's an investment that I think is really important because, as I'll talk about more in the pro in the accelerated in the pro show, I need to have laser focus on who I serve and how I serve them. And I started to see the fruits of that this summer. I landed more clients, especially, like, one-offs for the audits or one-off coaching calls. I landed a new coaching client. I have a lot of leads coming in. So, I think that all in all, yes, it was worth it.
I wanted, I wanna do this exercise really quick, which is what would have, what have needed to happen for me to say no this summer was not worth it because family is such a strong part of my identity. And I should say, like, the reason for that is definitely my parents. Like, my dad would always leave the house at 5 AM so that he could leave work by 3 PM so that he could see us in extracurricular activities or sports. He was at every baseball game. He was at every drama club play I was in. And that like, I barely know what my dad did. I think he was, like, data assurance for Verizon. But, like, I remember seeing him at all those things.
Actually, there's one thing. This probably informs the zoo story. We were going to see and, like, now as a dad, I totally get it. But, we were going to see the lion king, and, it was my mom and me and my three brothers and my two cousins, my mom's cousins. And I asked my dad if he was coming, and he said no. He was gonna stay home, and I got sad. And I remember, like, right before the movie started, he walked in and he was wearing just like a leather jacket with no shirt underneath, like and I've definitely been there before. Like, I would say no and then feel really bad and then, like, rush out as quickly as possible. So, like, my dad taught me how to be a good dad.
So, anyway, what would have led me to say no to this question? I think if I felt my kids were worse off being home than going to Summer Camp, like, if they just had, like, a terrible summer, and, like, didn't do anything.
But that's not the case. Right? They did lots of stuff. And, like, yeah, our babysitter helped, and my father-in-law helped. And, but, like, they went to a creek a lot, and they spent a lot of time outside, and they went to a theme park. My daughter started cello lessons. You know, my son takes great joy in watching the lawnmower guys. So, like, just really good. They had a great summer, I think, all around.
And then the other thing that would make me say no is if my business completely fell apart or, like, if I had no clients, if I lost my mainstream, my main line of income, if I had no prospects, if I stopped producing content. Right? If it was like, at the end of the summer, I just, like, I am, my business is where it was 2 or 3 years ago, I would have said no. Like, obviously, I'm not doing a good job of balancing family life with work life. But neither of those things are even remotely true. So I would say it was well worth it.
And so, what's next? is the next question. Right? And so I had a note here. My wife and I need to talk about it. We did talk about it. And I think we both agree. I don't think. I know. We both agree. We will do this again next year. I think that, again, the good, the bad, the ugly. The good well outweighs the bad and the ugly.
Now, there are t some changes I would make. Right? So I'll give you the changes I would make, and then I will give you some actionable advice if you are considering this for a long break or for next summer. Because I will say the other side of things, right, maybe this is also what I meant by personal things.
Our refrigerator died at the beginning of the summer. It was very considerate. It died right in the middle of a Memorial Day sale. So we saved some money on the actual appliance, but it would have been better to not have to buy it. So our refrigerator died at the beginning of the summer, and our dishwasher died at the end of the summer. Very inconsiderate to not wait until Labor Day for that. So, like, we didn't save as much money as we had hoped we would because we had to spend on appliances, but also it wasn't an extra amount of money on appliances. It was we had that money ready to go.
So, changes I think, we would need to make is having more structure. Again, my wife was better at this. I have, like a weird phobia of, like, taking my kids out somewhere. And I think it's, I'll talk about this in another episode, but I'm changing my yearly theme from control to assume neutral intent. And I think it's just like, I assume that danger is around every corner, and that's very stressful when you have three kids. So, I definitely need more structure. I need to take them out to places more. You know, we're also trying to save money, so I didn't wanna spend a bunch of money going to a bunch of places, but that ended up happening anyway because that's an inevitability of the summer.
More check-ins, with my wife and the kids probably. I mean, Theresa is very articulate. So, I think doing more check-ins, maybe a couple times a week. How are things going? How are you feeling? Is there anything we can do? We started doing that more later in the summer and giving each other time, but knowing that going in is gonna be super helpful.
Time blocking and time boxing, I think I need to do this on the days when I was feeling unmotivated. You know, I think, At Your Best by Carey Nieuwhof is a book that was very impactful to me, and he talks about your green zone. I don't know that this summer I had, like, a steady green zone, right, which is green, yellow, and red zones. Like, green is your most productive time. Red is your least productive time where you're not at your best. And so, like, what tasks can you do in the red zone? So I would think about that more timeboxing more and having a set schedule or set tasks for like, based on how I'm feeling so that even if I'm unmotivated, I can get certain things done. Or tell myself when I'm unmotivated, like, hey. Now would be a good time to go for a walk.
Building in some margin to my schedule. Right? If I assume I'm going to work 3 days a week and I get that extra 4th day, it'll be great. Right? It'll feel like the unmotivated days are not lost days, and it'll feel like I'm getting bonus time instead of losing time.
And save a little more money. Right? I thought, hey. This is, I guess I viewed the funds that we were saving from not sending my kids to summer camp and daycare as actualized funds, and they are not. Right? It's just money not going out of my bank account. And so we did end up spending, I think, a little bit more than expected. So I'd like to save a little bit more money.
Now, things are gonna change next year because my daughter, my youngest will be moving from daycare to saint, to my kid's current school. Right? It's a Catholic school. So we're not moving tuition-free anytime soon, but it will be cheaper and, there probably won't be any summer daycare for that reason.
Okay. So actionable advice. Know your schedule. Build in time for the unknowns. Right? Just because summer is happening, and you're trying to plan your kids at home doesn't mean that things are not gonna come up. Things are gonna come up.
Save some extra money. Right? Don't look at the money you're not saving, you're saving as money you have. Save some extra money for extra stuff.
Create some margin in your schedule and cherish the time you have. This was something I wish I told myself more over the summer. I'm getting bonus time with my kids. Right? I'm lucky that I work from home. And even though my kid literally just threw a temper tantrum and screamed upstairs for my wife, I hope that doesn't come through. I think I have a good enough setup that it's not gonna come through. But, cherish the time that you have, because soon all 3 of my kids will be in school full time, and I'm only gonna see them on weekends and a few hours before and after school.
And the summer, I'm lucky enough that my wife and I both have schedules that allow us to spend time with our family. Right? I know. I'm gonna, like, smack talk a little bit here because I don't get it. But I know people who work full time and then spend their Sundays at the golf course or the salon or whatever, every week. Right? Doing this once in a while is really important. Right? Make time for yourself for sure. But I just can't see myself not seeing my kids for most of 6 days out of 7 days. That just doesn't jive with me. I wanna be a dad. I want, I've always, I was born a dad. Like, as far as my mannerisms go and the jokes I make, and I know I could do better, and I'm trying to do better. But, like, being around for my kids is just too important to me.
So, I mean, you know, I guess I'm not smack-talking anybody specifically. I just, I know these things happen, and it's not the way I think because I wanna cherish. If you're listening to this podcast, you probably feel the same way. Right? Cherish the time you have with your kids because it does go by fast. And so, I think that's it for this episode.
How did I do? I think we did a good job. We did well enough that we're not like this. We're not doing it next year. We're gonna do it next year, and I think we're gonna do it better.
So, thanks so much for listening. You can find any show notes I talked about over at [streamlined.fm/432]. You can also head over there to sign up for Streamlined Solopreneur Accelerated where you'll get every episode early, ad-free, and extended.
And one more thing. I mentioned this in my newsletter, but I'm trying a little experiment. So I'll link this too in the description in the show notes. I'm doing a free private podcast called Joe's Audio Notes that focuses more on the solopreneurship side of things. So these will be thoughts I have throughout the day. My goal is to make these episodes 6 minutes or fewer, and you can get it completely for free. It is private, and so, you know, you'll have to put in your email address. But put in your email address, and you'll get this free private podcast called Joe's Audio Notes, where I talk about solopreneurship things on my mind, being a parent, and podcasting because that is my main business. So, I will link that in the show notes as well, but you can also go over to [casabona.org/notes].
Thanks so much for listening. Thanks to our sponsors. And until next time, I'll see you out there.