THE INSPIRATION PLACE PODCAST
Today, I’ve invited a guest expert on how to design your ideal week. Whether that means making more time for your art or more time for your family. In this podcast, you’ll discover how to structure your days and your week; how themed days and themed weeks help facilitate your flow and focus; baby steps you can start taking today to start outsourcing menial tasks; and why a morning routine can set you up for a successful day. But before we get there, I wanted to tell you about today’s freebie. Since I’m always fascinated by other’s morning routines, the freebie for this episode is a morning focus checklist. Please download the checklist and let a perfectly focus morning set you up for the rest of the day. To grab this checklist, go to schulmanart.com/19 for a link to that or anything else that we mentioned during today’s episode.
All right, so now back to the show. Today’s guest teaches small business owners how to make an abundant full time income, working part time hours, just as she’s been able to do with her three-day work week. This serial entrepreneur discovered that she could get more done in less time after the reality of childcare limits her work hours to just three days a week. She discovered that not only could she get more done but she had the most profitable year in her business when she wasn’t overworked and exhausted. This guest has been featured in Business Insider, Entrepreneur on Fire, She Means Business podcasts and the Huffington Post. Her coaching and teachings have helped thousands embrace the idea that full time income and part time hours is not just a dream, but can be their reality too.
On today’s episode will be talking about how artists construct their days and weeks to have four-day weekends with their families. Please welcome to the inspiration place Cailen Ascher.
Miriam Schulman:
Hi, Cailen. Thanks for joining the show.
Cailen Ascher:
Thank you for having me, Miriam. I’m so excited for our conversation today.
Miriam Schulman:
This is going to be so great. So the reason I invited you, Cailen is because my audiences always ask me how to find more time for their art or another variation of that is there always asking me how do I find the time to do it all. So I recently had on the podcast, Mike Michalowicz, with his new book, Clockwork (Design Your Business to Run Itself) and I also have had on, Alex Pang his reach search actually proves that you do get more done by working less. So I know that your message fits in perfectly what we’ve been talking about on this podcast. I can’t wait to dive in and get my audience some actionable steps that they can start taking today.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, I love that.
Miriam Schulman:
Okay. So Cailen, as I mentioned before, this became actually something you discovered as a necessity after the birth of your first child. Would you like to share a little bit of that?
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, happy to. So prior to becoming a mom, I obviously had more time to just throw at my work. Prior to having a baby, I was working full time hours and really struggling. You know, I was making not even a part time income from all those hours I was putting in. Baby arrives (this is almost four years ago now) and I sort of had this moment where I was like should I just give up my business and give up my work and be a full time mom? Since it’s not really contributing financially to our household, or should I give it a go? But I knew I could only get childcare for three days a week.
Cailen Ascher:
So thought I would give it one last try. Something really profound shifted within the first few months of doing this as I realized I was being so much more clear in my priorities and in my timing and what I would say no to and what I would say yes to and I just started functioning more like a business owner and someone who was smart in business instead of just throwing all my hours at my work and hoping that that would excess. I became much more strategic. And so within a year of that, I was making probably just in a few months, I made more than I made the whole previous year. The following year when my daughter had just turned one, was my first six- figure year.
Miriam Schulman:
That’s amazing. Congratulations.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, it was really remarkable that after all these years, was about seven years of really struggling in my business, that this shift to actually working fewer hours but being smarter and more intentional about things like my business really took off.
Miriam Schulman:
Rather than doing what I call “random acts of marketing”.
Cailen Ascher:
Yes. I like that.
Miriam Schulman:
One of the myths that– So I know your children are still very young. Mine are the other end of that spectrum. My baby just went to college so one myth that I know, that a lot of young mothers have, is when your kids get older you’re going to have more time. And actually I can tell you that is not true. Little kids little problems, big kids big problems. So it’s really great to establish a shorter, more concise work week early on, cause as your kids get older, it really doesn’t change– the neediness factors doesn’t don’t really change.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah.
Miriam Schulman:
So I don’t know if it’s true if you found that with the clients you’ve worked with.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah. I find that most of the women who I work with (I work predominantly with women) they are– they always need time for things outside of their work. The fact that I can shine some light on that path of what it looked like for me and what it could look like for them, is always useful. I mean, even if you don’t have kids. If you are trying to work around a full time job or a part time job or doing freelance work and to support your art, there’s always the need to be more strategic in your time because time is a limited resource.
Miriam Schulman:
And so as our energy.
Cailen Ascher:
And our energy. Right?
Miriam Schulman:
Yeah. So you can’t be wasting your energy on things that don’t matter. So Cailen, what would you suggest is the first step for designing your perfect work week?
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah. I think the first step with most things that were looking to change or to shift is to bring some awareness to it. What are we currently doing? What’s not working and what is working? An exercise I often give people is to track their time for a few days to see what there’s actually spending their time doing. The clincher is to try not to change anything you’re doing.
Miriam Schulman:
Right. It’s like a food diary.
Cailen Ascher:
Exactly.
Miriam Schulman:
Like you really don’t want to write down that spoon.
Cailen Ascher:
Like oh my gosh yeah.
Miriam Schulman:
I just ate right before this call. Standing in front of the pantry.
Cailen Ascher:
Exactly. It’s bringing that “shining the light of awareness on it” and seeing where your time is actually going. For me, that was really really eye opening that I was ping ponging between different things and landing on a similar activity. Maybe I was, you know, writing or something like that. I’d be writing it in different time chunks instead of just batching all my writing together in the morning when I know I have my best energy for that type of creative content. I think it’s really key to be a witness of your current habits and step into it from there. What would a day look like for you if you were tracking your time? Like how do you manage your time and your energy?
Miriam Schulman:
That’s a great question. I mean I’ve already– Because I’ve been in business for a while, I’ve already implemented a lot of steps and I actually have help with that. I know for my friends are still trying to do it all there’s the ping ponging back and forth between posting on social media, answering emails. A lot of these activities that artists do are similar to anybody who’s trying to sell anything. So you still are managing the communications that surround selling your art just as you would in any other space where you’re managing communication around that. But in addition, we also have to create the art. I think that’s why I really like your concept of doing theme weeks. I think it would really help my audience a lot. Can you describe how you do that and we’ll talk about how that would work for an artist?
Cailen Ascher:
Exactly. Yeah. Something that I do in my business and I often suggest to my clients who are looking to cut back to maybe a three day work week, four day work week, is to work on a bi-weekly schedule. For me, as a coach, it looks like grouping all of my coaching clients on my A-week and then leaving my B-week open for content creation projects, big thinking, team meetings. Things that actually move my business forward rather than just working with the people I’m currently working with.
Cailen Ascher:
And so with the example you provided, I imagine it’s helpful as an artist to have space to create. I would imagine maybe a week or a day where you just– you don’t have any other tasks before you other than just being present with your art, with the project that you’re currently working on. And then on your B-week, maybe do a lot of, you know, batch your social media posts and get everything scheduled out for the next two, three, four weeks. And function in that kind of way to all your marketing, obviously with customer service stuff, you probably would have to carve out time to be responsive every week, but I imagine there would be really clean ways to start batching it. I’d love to hear you have some ideas further beyond what I just shared.
Miriam Schulman:
Yeah. I think it’s a great idea to do either a day that is only working on your art. It’s definitely impossible to context switch. Once you get your head into the marketing, it’s very difficult. Which is– I don’t really like to use, you know, “left brain-right brain” terminology. But to me, it’s more the idea if you’re getting to something very strategic and working on something where your inner critic is going to be very active. It’s very difficult then to switch that off and be free and create. It’s hard to go back and forth. There needs to be a clean break. Whether you’re saying you’re going to dedicate a week to creating art and the following week is going to be on marketing activities or this is only on Wednesday is your day to paint.
Miriam Schulman:
Another way that I have definitely done it in my business (when I was more on my own) was the mornings were for communication and the afternoon I spent creating. I love your idea of theming and blocking your time. I think that’s a suggestion that should work for anybody. One thing that I know Cailen about you is that used to be a certified yoga instructor.
Cailen Ascher:
Yes.
Miriam Schulman:
And you have a very specific morning routine that includes yoga. That’s something that I know my audience would love to hear about, because part about only working three days a week, is that when you do show up to work whether it’s to create art or do your marketing, that you’re fully focused and present. I know that your morning routine must play a huge role in that. Would you share with us, your morning routine?
Cailen Ascher:
Yes, yes. I’m happy to. I’m an early riser and so that that works and I guess my favor for the morning routine. I imagine there would be ways to ground yourself throughout the day. Maybe having an evening routine if you’re looking to kind of like clear energy and be present and grounded for whatever you’re working on. For me, I wake up usually around 5:30 which is ahead of my– I’ve got two small people in my life that wake up extremely early and I try to beat them by waking up earlier when the house is quiet. I do a bit of meditation. Like you said, I’ve gone through yoga certification many many years ago and so I– meditation has been a part of my life for many years now but it’s–
Miriam Schulman:
What does that look like for you? I’m sorry to interrupt. I’m so curious about that.
Cailen Ascher:
No. Yeah. I’m happy to– So for me right now, I can usually carve out about 10 to 15 minutes for my meditation and so usually it’s me on my cushion. I love sitting in my dark family room in front of our big picture window. Often it’s just focusing on the breath to get me started. I’m a very visual person and so my meditations include a lot of visualization. That’s what keeps me present in my body at the moment instead of letting my mind go off into the duties for the day and so I often envision a goal that I have coming to fruition, something that I’m looking forward to enjoying with my family.
Cailen Ascher:
You know, maybe something way down the road, but ultimately the goal for me is to be vibing in a very like feel good energetic place by the time I come out of that. But if you’re just getting started, I recommend even as little as three minutes of just like quiet breathing can be so settling and really really helpful. Especially before you’re looking to tap into something so authentic and pure as your creativity. It’s like you can’t just throw yourself into it after a chaotic morning with the kids. I would imagine. I know I can’t do that for my work. It doesn’t necessarily require all those depths of creativity at all moments. So for me starting with meditations is really helpful.
Cailen Ascher:
And then I do a bit of a home yoga practice. Some mornings it’s a little bit like cat cow which is just on your hands and knees to get the spine moving, other days that I used some down dog, some days I have more time for a full practice that even just a poser two can feel really good to just get the body moving. This could also just look like stretching. You know? Like if you’re kind of freaked out about yoga, like sitting quietly breathing a little bit and then just getting up and doing some morning stretches to get the blood flowing, get your energy moving. I think that feels really good. And then I’ll go out for a jog in our neighborhood to really wake up and get in that exercise before my day has to be transitioned over to like feeding a one and a half year old.
Miriam Schulman:
This is all before they wake up or is your husband helping?
Cailen Ascher:
My husband at this point is corralling them. Kind of as I head out for my job, they’re waking and coming downstairs and so–
Miriam Schulman:
Okay. All right. I will just chime in with what that has looked like for me over the years. I’ve lived with an 18 year old and a 20 year old and also do not wake up at 5:30. First my husband does wake up at that time but usually I don’t wake up with him. I shift my work week. My work day doesn’t start till 10 because like you I have to exercise or I cannot focus and sometimes I will fool myself into thinking and if I go to the computer first and I get that morning rush of energy that a lot of us have after you just had your coffee or tea or whatever, and you have your ideas going, and I I’m a fool myself into thinking that’s where I need to be but i found consistently that if I start in that place without exercising then I will burnout much faster and I will not have a productive day when I start off there. Usually something bad will happen later in the day like I’ll back my car into the neighbors car. I always do an 8:30 exercise routine. My work day starts after my children go to school.
Cailen Ascher:
Yes. Makes sense.
Miriam Schulman:
So that has gotten to be a little earlier as it used to be. I would walk them to school when they’re in elementary school and that would be my exercise. Then when the bus came to pick them up when they’re older, then I would plan my exercise around that and not start my day till 10 so that I would have that focus to be efficient and get as much done as I could before they came home. So just sharing that and things– like i said in the beginning of our call what happens is as they get older they are just as needy it’s just a different version of needy.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah. A different version of needy, right?
Miriam Schulman:
Yeah. You know, you don’t want your 2 year old to have poison and you don’t want a 15 year old to put poison in their mouth either. And the 15 year old is a little harder to chase down so.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah. I would imagine. All the things I have to look forward to.
Miriam Schulman:
I’m sorry, but you have girls, right?
Cailen Ascher:
I’ve got 2 girls, yeah.
Miriam Schulman:
Yeah sometimes they can be easier than– I have one of each. What is one of the first things that you suggest people start outsourcing? When you take a look at what their– So we’ve gotten our theme days and gotten rid of some of the things that were wasting time and but now there’s still things that you when you’re working for a client said you know what just says it needs to be done by you. What are some of the first things that you tell clients to start outsourcing?
Cailen Ascher:
So I think a great place to start (it can be very individual) is to outsource anything you don’t enjoy or aren’t good at. When you find those two pieces overlapping, that’s the stuff to start with.
Miriam Schulman:
Okay.
Cailen Ascher:
For me in my industry, a lot of people use Facebook ads and I imagine, you know, that might be something that comes up from time to time with certain artists depending on what they’re doing. I hated figuring out the algorithms of these Facebook ads. It felt really confusing. I’m a logical person, and felt illogical. And so that was the thing I started with because I was like this will be so easy to handle off because I hate it. I’m not good at it but I know my business needs this. So for anyone who’s thinking yeah it’s time to get some help, get some support, see what are those items that you do regularly that every time it comes up you’re just like “Ugh, this again?”. Or you know it takes up so much of your time cause you’re not in your zone of genius around it, that getting that time back would be so valuable that it’s totally worth paying someone $20.00 an hour or whatever to handle it for you.
Cailen Ascher:
I think that’s a really valuable place to start or sometimes starting on the home front I guess. If I’m really thinking about it the first thing I hired someone for was child care. That I got somebody to be watching my babies so that I could find time for my work so maybe that would be a smarter place to start if you have small children or something like that to have someone there for them or maybe if you find yourself cleaning the house. Something like that.
Miriam Schulman:
First of all, absolutely house care.
Cailen Ascher:
Yes, yes.
Miriam Schulman:
I would also encourage people to think of it as this type of mindset. If you’re like Cailen or where I was ten years ago in my business when I started hiring help, I started paying somebody to do tasks in my business that I felt didn’t have to be done by me so that I could spend time with my children. So my kids were too old for babysitting but I enjoyed spending time with them or I wanted to help them with their homework and having somebody taking care of things for me was worth it. Definitely worth it. Especially things like social media. If you have somebody hosting things on your behalf, they’re not gonna get sucked into your friend’s drama.
Cailen Ascher:
They can get in and out much more cleanly. Yeah. They don’t care. Yeah.
Miriam Schulman:
That’s right. It’s not their Facebook account. Not their friends. Also one other thing I would say is don’t be afraid to pay for tools that help automate these things for you. Those are really worth money. Do you have any favorite tools you like to use?
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah. I love– Well, my entire business is run on Google Drive. Like everything is organized there. And so if you’re someone who needs to be organized in that way, I have got folders upon sub folders for each of my projects that have a different place and it keeps me very organized. Since it’s a cloud service, my team has access to it too, which is great. As far as kind of managing your team working with your team, Asana is really really helpful getting your–
Miriam Schulman:
Which is what we use in my business. I love it.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah and I think unless you might need some super lux features, it’s free for, you know, most basic functions of Asana which is fantastic. And for me, scheduling appointments was taking a lot of time with my client. So I imagine artists who need to meet with potential buyers and, you know, or people who are commissioning them for projects, having something like Calendly, where you can make your time available when it feels good for you and then people can just figure out and book themselves instead of that back and forth garbage that happens when you’re trying to like set it up over email.
Miriam Schulman:
Right, right. I definitely wish they had one of those scheduling tools. I was using Calendly and I recently switched to Acuity. I definitely wish I had that when I first started out with scheduling the portrait photo shoot as that was always the biggest stumbling block for securing the client getting that first appointment on the calendar. I think that would be huge for people who are doing that type of work.
Miriam Schulman:
All right Cailen, this was so enlightening. Thank you so much for spending this time with us today. Do you have anything else you want to add before we call this show complete?
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, I would love to and this is something I share with my clients, my community a lot. It’s that the journey that we’re on in our life and in our business has to align with where we want to go. So many of the women come to me and say, “Oh well, I’ll do that when I’m making a certain amount of money” or “I need to hustle now and I need to push myself and work all the time because then when I’m successful I can cut back to fewer hours or have more time with my kids”. And if you’re not baking it in along the way, the final version isn’t going to have it either. So take into account what you really are looking for in your life, in your business. Start in whatever small ways you can. Making those little incremental upgrades to get yourself an alignment for where you envision yourself going.
Miriam Schulman:
I love that incremental upgrades.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, that’s it. That’s one of my key teachings. It’s in all my programs.
Miriam Schulman:
That’s what I do when I want to buy a Chanel lipstick. I say it’s an incremental upgrade.
Cailen Ascher:
That’s a good one.
Miriam Schulman:
It’s not the Chanel bag. It’s just the lipstick. All right well thanks so much for joining us today Cailen. Don’t forget you can get her freebie which is a workbook, How to Start Designing Your Day and you’re going to be able to find that on my show notes which is schulmanart.com/19. You can also listen to Cailen’s podcast The Three Day Work Week which is super helpful and also inspiring. We’ve included links to her website in case you want to work with her some more.
Miriam Schulman:
So anyway, I don’t want to take up any of your time, but it was really fun to talk to you and get to know you better.
Cailen Ascher:
Yeah, ditto Miriam. This is awesome. Thanks so much for having me on the show and it seems like it off to a great start so good for you I mean this is– it’s a big thing when you do that initial launch push so.
Miriam Schulman:
Anyway, thanks for being a part of it. I really appreciate it.
Cailen Ascher:
Of course, yeah. Let us know when it’s rolling out and will hopefully be in touch before then anyway.
Miriam Schulman:
Yes, for sure.
Cailen Ascher:
Cool. Take care girl. Bye
Miriam Schulman:
Bye.
Miriam Schulman:
Thanks for listening. If you found this episode valuable, please subscribe to the inspiration place on Itunes or wherever you get your podcast so you don’t miss any future episodes when I’ll be speaking with other thought leaders and artist industry insiders. Don’t forget to grab your freebie for this episode which you can find on schulmanart.com/19 to get a link to that or anything else we discussed in this podcast. So that’s it for this episode and have an amazing and inspirational day.
Thank you for listening to the Inspiration Place podcast. Connect with us on facebook.com/schulmanart, on Instagram @schulmanart and ofcourse on schulmanart.com.
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