Summary: In this episode, Kim Mickelsen, a self-care expert, shares with us 5 tips on caring for yourself while having a business. As business owners, we can stress ourselves out. Visit Kim’s site: JourneywithKim.net
SPEAKERS: Kim Mickelson and Becky Beach
Audio duration: 48m:48s
Becky Beach: 00:00
Did you know you have the power to change your life? It all depends on your beliefs. If you have limiting beliefs, you’re limit yourself. I’m Becky Beach. I’m here to help you overcome your limiting beliefs. So, you can design your dream life. This is the Becky beach show.
00:19
Hey! everybody. Welcome to the Becky Beach show. I’m Becky beach and joining me today is a self-care expert, Kim Mickelson. So glad to have you today.
Kim Mickelson: 00:29
Thank you so excited to be here. Thanks so much for having me.
Becky Beach: 00:33
Oh, yeah. So, I understand you have lots of self-care tips for busy moms that are starting a business?
Kim Mickelson: 00:40
I do. Yes, self-care is so important and we kind of put it on the back burner. And I’m here to remind you and everyone listening and myself how important it is to practice self-care for your business, for life in general.
Becky Beach: 00:55
Oh, yeah. because if what can happen is you can end up getting set yourself burned out if you just neglect yourself.
Kim Mickelson: 01:03
Absolutely yes! we business owners are creative, we are passionate, and we tend to work long hours and before you know it, you look at the clock and you realize you haven’t moved, and you haven’t had enough water and you had too much coffee.
Becky Beach: 01:20
I got my water here and so I will remember to stay hydrated.
Kim Mickelson: 01:25
Yeah, right. I don’t remember to drink it. Yeah, so I’ll be just touching on about five tips I came up with to keep things simple and hopefully people could remember them. And we’ll kind of go over them and get people thinking about how important it is to practice that self-care for yourself, for your family and of course, ultimately, for business.
Becky Beach: 01:50
Before we get started, could you introduce yourself and tell everybody where you’re coming from? how’d you get into this?
Kim Mickelson: 01:56
Yeah, sure. So, I have been in the wellness, fitness, weight loss space for over 24 years. And I did stop, I just had a moment in time where I stopped everything, about two years ago, I closed my local business doors. Quite a few people upset, love all my ladies, but I do miss them, but it was just something I had to do, and I stopped my online coaching. And I still have a newsletter I send out and motivating people inspiring people sharing recipes, I still love to do that. But actively coaching, I do not do that anymore but instead I really took a liking to creating content for myself when I had my weight loss and fitness business. But I realized, part of the self-care too, and pulling hair out and struggling with time management, like “Wow! this could be really something useful for other entrepreneurs in the same space as I was in”. So, I really loved creating content and then that’s what I do. I create healthy habits, wellness, fitness content for entrepreneurs in that space, where shop owners that need that content. It’s done for you and editable and yeah, so that’s what I do now.
Becky Beach: 03:21
That’s great, what’s your website?
Kim Mickelson: 03:25
journeywithkim.net
Becky Beach: 03:27
journeywithkim.net, I’ll make sure I put that in the show notes. You can always find the show notes at www.mombeach.com/podcast. That’s where I have all the show notes. You can find out more about Kim and look at her website, read her content. And it’s really nice. So, let’s get into those tips you mentioned before, can you share them with us?
Kim Mickelson: 03:48
Absolutely. Yeah! So, self-care is the top in the town. It’s been talked about for quite a few years now. So, we do hear about self-care. We know we’re supposed to practice self-care but like I said, business owners are more passionate. We have that drive, that motivation. We wake up we’re ready to put on that computer and go all day long and juggle family, our spouse or our parents and life, possibly another job. So, we tend to put self-care on the backburner and it’s just so typical. I do it myself. So, I have to constantly remind myself, that’s probably why I remind others because it helps me along the way.
04:39
Business owners are uncomfortably busy with tasks, deadlines, to do list, family needs, another job. So, we run ourselves ragged, and we have the hardest time with self-care. Like I said, “because we’re passionate excited. We’re on a mission to succeed”, so we push ourselves. So, the whole notion of having a business and being successful is in typically we hear do more, work more, work harder, work longer and I can even say, I can’t remember who I heard this from. It was a TED Talk Podcast a while ago, I was kind of thumbing through, and it was Elon Musk. There was a story about Elon Musk, he’s super successful with Tesla and everything. He’s developed and he was saying, you must work 80 to 100 hours a week to be successful. that’s insane. So, but that’s what he does. And we’re not here to judge and he’s very successful. However, I think he’s still only in his 40s. I’m older than that and if he continues, that it’s just not sustainable. he’s been divorced twice, he said that when he’s with his children, he is on his phone and responding to emails nonstop. So again, we’re not judging, that’s his life, but he’s just not healthy. So, the whole notion going back to do more, get more done, you’ll be more productive that way, work a million hours a week, it’s just not doable, for the long term, it does havoc on the body, on the mind, on the spirit, it’s just not healthy.
06:36
So, your level of anxiety can be an indicator of our self-care gauge. How often do we feel anxious sitting at our computer, we’re kind of can’t make a decision anymore? we’re end up not being productive. We’re sitting there and scrolling on Facebook or whatever. The anxiety could start to creep up on us and that’s like, time for some self-care. We’ll touch on exactly what self-care is, and some tips to help keep you motivated. So, when we hear about self-care, what do we think of? We think of automatically most of us think of manicures, pedicures, facials, bubble baths.
Becky Beach: 07:20
Yeah, that’s what all I am.
Kim Mickelson: 07:24
That’s all wonderful. They’re wonderful things. However, that’s just a little part of self-care. That’s just a couple things that self-care could consist of. So, self-care goes way beyond that and it’s not an indulgence. It’s rather a discipline. So, self-care is a discipline. Just like if we didn’t have a business, we all know, we’re supposed to exercise, we’re supposed to drink water, we’re supposed to eat healthy. But when we add that to the business side of it, we have to realize that taking care of ourselves is ultimately going to take care of our business, if we’re not practicing self-care, we’re not practicing business care. So, bring that back to the business.
08:15
Self-Care is having the mindset to care for your needs, your well-being, your mind, your body, your soul, and prioritizing your wellness needs, so that you can be effective in your business building, and of course, tending to family and your life that you need to take care of things. So, self-care is more than just a manicure and a pedicure. So now we’re going to go into the five steps to self-care when running a business.
08:48
The number one is mindset. So, it’s like business, right Becky? you know, what business to be successful. You have to have the right mindset, which is the right belief.
Becky Beach: 09:02
I never thought of using self-care as of mindset, that’s new.
Kim Mickelson: 09:07
Yeah, mindset is really with everything in life, to be successful in anything, you have to have the right mindset. So, to be successful, or to practice self-care. Your mindset is a belief. So, you have to believe in self-care that it’s going to be and have a positive impact on yourself, your family, and your business. If you don’t believe that or you don’t even think about that, you just tend to not do it as much.
09:43
When I would tell the ladies that were my members with my fitness, I would always tell them that you have to believe that you’re important enough. It goes back to the self-love, the self-care, your health is important. It’s not just something to do, it’s something we have to do to just for our mind, body, and soul, which reflects on our business productivity. So, when we run a business, we have to have the mindset or the belief that if we do A, B, and C, we will be successful. We believe in our business model, our product, or our service, when we have a business, we believe in our product, we believe in our service, we believe in ourselves, hopefully and we must believe in ourselves to successfully run a business. So, the same applies to self-care believe, we must believe in what self-care is and how important it is and understand why it’s important. Healthy Habits, equal healthy mind, body and ultimately a healthy business.
10:54
So, understanding how important it is to practice self-care for our well-being. Mindset is simply a belief system, like I said, and adding the knowledge part of it pushes our mindset in the right direction. So, understanding, for example, we’ll touch on this a little bit more next but understanding that drinking coffee, all day while we’re working at our computer is going to dehydrate us, it’s going to make us fatigued because we’re dehydrated. But drinking more water throughout the day is going to hydrate us, it’s going to wake us up, it’s going to give us more energy and more clarity, to focus on our business. So that’s the knowledge part that goes along with being mindful. So, the belief and the knowledge to practice the self-care to be productive in business.
Becky Beach: 11:50
[inaudible 11:50] the coffee like what I’ll do is I’ll drink a cup in the morning, and then I’ll just have it another cup. I keep doing it. I must have I drink, like three cups a day. I didn’t realize it had dehydrated me so badly. we’re sure I’m sure a lot of people listening right now would think the same. Like they did not know they’re dehydrating themselves.
Kim Mickelson: 12:07
Right. So, like, one cup is great. It allows you to get more alert, wake up a little bit, have a little more clarity. But we tend to want to sip it all day. I don’t know about you, but it’s just nice to have that cup in hand.
Becky Beach: 12:21
Yeah, it’s like nice and warm and…
Kim Mickelson: 12:25
It goes with the computer and yeah, I battle that as well. But again, having the mindset when I say to myself, “Okay, I’m not going to have any more coffee, I already had two cups, not having any more, I’m going to switch to water hydrate because it’s going to help me be more productive instead of falling asleep, dehydrating me and all that good stuff”. So, anyway, let’s move on to number two. So, number one was mindset.
12:52
Number two is practice daily self-care essentials. So, I break that up with number three is kind of goes along with it. But we’ll tackle number two as far as the essential, so self-care essentials are unlike the mani, the pedi or the bubble bath, they’re all wonderful things, but they’re not essential. So, what’s essential would-be exercise, Okay. how many time we sit at our computer. It’s been hours, like literally, time flies. I don’t know about you, but time flies when I’m on the computer and I have every intention like most of us will start exercising after I finished this task, or after I finish making this bundle. you know, on Monday when this bundle is done, and the deadline is done. I’ll start my exercise. when Monday comes another task to do because we’re creative. we love to keep going and produce more content or whatever we’re doing with our business. And that tomorrow never comes that, Monday never comes, that “Okay”, four o’clock, I’ll do it. It never comes because then the kids need us, they are getting off the bus, dinner needs to be made. the spouse needs us, bath time, homework time and we don’t do it. So, we need to do that. We need to set aside exercise, and I know most of us have heard of like a morning schedule that miracle morning. What is it?
Becky Beach: 14:26
Hal Elrod.
Kim Mickelson: 14:30
Yes. Hal Elrod, great book, The Miracle Morning and the miracle equation and I think it’s the Miracle Morning. But yeah, that changed my life waking up early. Finding that productivity time. Waking up, even if it’s 15 to 20 minutes earlier, and stretching, meditating, prayer time, journaling, whatever it is, those are essential for your well-being.
Becky Beach: 14:57
Yeah, this makes so much sense.
Kim Mickelson: 15:00
And even if it’s just a little walk outside or if you have a treadmill because now the weather out be changing parts of the US or wherever you’re from, the winter comes, getting that- even if it’s 15 minutes of every morning, getting that walk going the blood flow, it really helps with mindset, productivity, and happiness. you’re happier throughout the day, you got your workout in. water intake is an essential, we know that we need to stay hydrated, and being at the computer all day, it’s easy to forget about drinking water and drinking more coffee.
Becky Beach: 15:35
yeah, it’s so true.
Kim Mickelson: 15:37
Eating healthy. How many times do we as moms, my kids are older, they’re college age, and then now one is older than that, graduated, but when I had the kids, I would make them something healthy. Get on my computer, do my thing and then I would grab a bag of chips and rolled up [inaudible 15:57] we want to tend to be busy and we don’t take care of our own needs when it comes to it. so, first course exercise, healthy eating water intake, prayer, or meditation, of course posture when we sit at this computer. [inaudible 16:17]
Becky Beach: 16:18
I was slouching. Oh, no.
Kim Mickelson: 16:20
Well, I can tell you Becky I actually went to the doctor and then I had another doctor’s appointment because of the head forward for all these three years, head forward on the computer causing Hunch [sysco 16:33], posing issues down the arm and carpal tunnel issues, the whole-
Becky Beach: 16:40
Yeah, it is terrible.
Kim Mickelson: 16:42
It is terrible and because I wasn’t practicing a self-care routine with sitting at the computer, right?
Becky Beach: 16:50
Yeah, I’m like, trying to stretch out my back.
Kim Mickelson: 16:54
Yeah. So, doing all these things, these are the essentials for health, for longevity, for health, in the long run. we are fine today but we don’t know about next week, next month, next year or five years from now and we want to be functional at our desk, we want to feel good. We don’t want to be had aches and pains and dealing with doctor’s appointments when we could be working. So those are the self-care essentials that I like to categorize
Becky Beach: 17:24
I just really love that because I need to get up early and exercise too. Because as I’ve been like, I just came off of a three-hour training. I was sitting at the computer for three hours doing a training and I shouldn’t even think to get up like I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I get, Yes, You supposed to get up after how many hours you can get up?
Kim Mickelson: 17:42
Well, you should get up every 20 minutes.
Becky Beach: 17:44
Oh, really? 20 minutes?
Kim Mickelson: 17:47
So, your hip flexors are the most overworked muscle because we’re sitting, and you figure right where you’re increases when you’re sitting down. So, you’re never stretching that muscle. So, we start to get hip issues, back issues hamstrings get tight. The forward head motion so our neck has that what do they call that where the spine goes straight instead of the natural curve from the head forward and the shoulders forward?
Becky Beach: 18:15
Oh, wow, no idea it sounds awful in our word. [inaudible 18:18]
Kim Mickelson: 18:21
but these are the things that we need to care for our mind and body and of course the Spirit just to stay healthy and whole as we have a successful business, being productive with family and business of course.
Becky Beach: 18:37
Yeah, so, difficult. You know, I have a six-year-old child, he goes to school during the day so I’m like here by myself, but just work and work because I’m a small business owner, I don’t no longer have a nine to five. So, it is kind of hard to take care of myself. I’m just neglecting my needs.
Kim Mickelson: 18:55
Yeah. And that’s very common and we as caregivers, and as women, we’re natural caregivers and we have a lot on our plate and then we want to be successful with our business. Yeah, we tend to just put ourselves back there and with your child I’m sure you get him to his whatever ballgames or appointments on time and feed them healthier foods and we do not think about ourselves like that.
19:25
But yeah, so just waking up a little earlier. You don’t have to wake up an hour earlier just a little bit earlier. You’ll be having a cup of coffee to wake up and a glass of water, get everything moving in your body and waking up and then stretch. Do a little exercise and go quiet time. Whatever it is that makes you happy, which we’ll go into number three.
19:46
Number three is practicing daily self-care moments. So, the me moments are things like the manicure, the pedicure, the facials, the bubble bath, lunch with girlfriends, going for a walk just doing things that make you happy no rhyme or reason there are things that make you happy.
20:08
So, Becky, let me ask you what do you like to do? What are some things that you’re me moments that make you happy that are not work related?
Becky Beach: 20:16
Well, I just love to get these bath bombs from Lush you are sort of lush, these beautiful bath bombs are like incredible. And you put them in the water they think the whole bath, a different color and they’re sparkles and it’s like a big bath full of sunshine and I like to dip in there and just soak and soak for like maybe an hour if I can and but then I hear the knock the door here like, “knock knock- mama, mama, mama”, so I am like, “Ow It’s time to get out”.
Kim Mickelson: 20:45
Those bath bombs are fun. I remember my daughter went through a phase of wanting them for every holiday. they’re really cool.
Becky Beach: 20:50
Oh, yeah. I got like a pumpkin one recently. And I use that. Yeah, so it’s really cool, things.
Kim Mickelson: 20:57
Yeah. So that would be considered a me moment, self-care, self-therapy moment, I should say. So, things that are not essential, like exercise and all that, that we really have to do to maintain a healthy lifestyle, but things that just make us happy and bring peace to our day. And we should be doing that every day. If it’s 15 minutes, that’s fine. If it’s an hour, if it’s the whole day, you take off and you over a week. I remember I actually I read an article. Again, I don’t know who wrote it. But I remember hearing Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, I know it was Bill Gates, he was saying, for his success, he would- he’s able to do this, of course, take off a whole week and go off in I don’t know, wherever he went by himself. And just to have peace, time, and clarity. would not that be nice?
Becky Beach: 21:52
Np, yeah, I’m never going to get that, I got a little six-year-old tornado. He’s not going to let me do that.
Kim Mickelson: 21:59
That’s extreme. But as far as like a success tip with your business, you know, having that me time, I had a business coach years ago, her name was Joy. And I remember she was going to- she lives out, I want to see Arizona or out west somewhere. And I remember she was taking a trip to New York City at the time for three days, her husband was like, go for it, just to have her peace and her clarity. And so, I just think that’s so important, If you can do a couple of days, that’s fantastic but most of us can’t. So even if we, like I said, do something a lunch with a girlfriend, a date night, but something that is your time just totally dedicated to what makes you happy. That brings that to our business, and it makes us just more productive.
Becky Beach: 22:52
Yeah, another thing I like to do is I got started cricket crafting, on the cricket, and I don’t sell anything I make I just make just for fun. Could that be self-care, too?
Kim Mickelson: 23:03
Sure. Absolutely! Yep. If you enjoy doing it, it’s absolutely a self-care tactic. Yes. Good for you. Good for you.
23:11
That brings us to number four, which is schedule dates with yourself in pen. So, I’d like to say I used to tell my ladies at fitness this as well. So, if you’re going to do if you’re going to exercise to say three days a week, you’re going to do some cardio, and then you’re going to do weights on Tuesdays and Thursdays or yoga or whatever. Schedule it in your calendar as if it were an appointment with a doctor because and put it in pen, so you can’t erase it and change it. So that if your girlfriend that calls you and needs you, “oh, Becky, I need you on Tuesday at three o’clock to help me move, are you available?” And typically, we like to say yes to our friends and our family or whatever and you’d be like, “No, I have a date with myself”. You don’t tell them that
Becky Beach: 24:04
They’ll go, “why-what are we talking about you lose your marbles again”.
Kim Mickelson: 24:10
But you know just to have that date with yourself and make it important write in pen as if it were a doctor’s appointment that you cannot cancel. So that is your self-care in written down in your calendar, in your agenda book that you just can’t cancel because if we don’t write it down and have that date written down with ourselves chances are most of us will cancel because we put everybody and everything before ourselves.
Becky Beach: 24:41
So, true. I like the idea of having a, like a self-appointment. I really like that and I’m going to do that.
Kim Mickelson: 24:53
Yeah. And just you know, making yourself priority. You can’t cancel put it in pen and that’s your appointment and it and you’re not to tell your friends anything beyond that you’re going to whatever you’re going to go do but and especially with exercise, we find that exercise is just so- you either like it or you don’t. Most of us don’t enjoy it. I guess we enjoy walking or whatever and we enjoy the results but to actually go, “alright, four o’clock, I got to go exercise”. We typically don’t say “Yay, we do exercise right now”, Most of us anyway, I’m sure there’s people that love it.
25:33
So, when you have that calendar, like with work when we have our business and we wake up and we look at our to do for the day, and the first few three things that are the most important things we want to tackle. We have to do that with our self-care as well. So, we have to say what are we doing today, “okay, at four o’clock, I’m going to exercise or I’m going to go with posture, or I’m going to stretch or I’m going to walk or whatever. That’s something we have to do. No and’s if’s or but’s. It’s just like your business, you have to get it done. Just like your family functions, you have to get them done. You have to do that for yourself. And that goes back to the mindset and the knowledge of the benefit that it’s going to give you which circles back to the productivity of your business.
Becky Beach: 26:21
What would happen if you just decide not to do self-care? Like what do you think would eventually happen? You just get burned out and stressed out? Or This is why it’s so important because you got to think about what would happen if I don’t do this? Because if you think about consequences, you know?
Kim Mickelson: 26:36
Absolutely. And that comes to number five, which is “practicing the pause”. So, I like to say practice the pause with owning a business comes burnout. I think we all could agree with that it’s exciting, we’re passionate, could go for long hours, we work probably harder and longer on our own business than we can in a corporate business or for somebody else. But when we don’t have this, a pause, and relieve ourselves from that burnout, it just we get anxiety, frustration, we can possibly take it out on family, and friends just out of frustration. And I could say, I opened up an email, and you may have as well, I’m not sure if you’re on the same email list as this person. But they were talking about having a business and just being so overworked and it was one of those emails just with the authentic story. It was a really great email. And she was just talking about how she’s had an awful day, just a fresh and she’s the sweetest person ever and she does kind of the whole printable and content creation. And she just had such an awful day yelling at the kids, everything went wrong. Come to find out. She’s just overworked. And she’s been doing a lot of content producing, coaching, this that and the other because we’re so passionate, and we’re so excited and we have these deadlines, and we want to be successful. And we see the success starting and we want to continue because we don’t want to lose our mojo, you know.
Becky Beach: 27:56
Yeah, so true.
Kim Mickelson: 28:23
Yeah. So, when we overwork, we burn out, we get anxiety, we get frustrated, and we take it out on others not meaning to, of course. So that was interesting, an email that came throughout the week on that topic, and it was interesting, but I like to say and to remind people the power of the pause. So, throughout the day, take those mini pauses. So, you know, it should be at least every 30 minutes, it really should just to get up to go stretch. I purposely leave my water now today because we’re doing this I have it near me, but I leave it in the kitchen. I’m sitting in my dining room, I’ve worked in my dining room lately, but I leave it in the kitchen because it makes me get up. It makes me pause. I have that intention of pausing. I drink my water I stretch, maybe walk down the hallway a little bit open the front door and get some fresh air and then I sit back down.
Becky Beach: 29:25
So, I have a timer, so I could probably set my timer for every 20 minutes and I can get up and stretch and stuff like do time blocks, is that what you do?
Kim Mickelson: 29:36
I have done that. I have done that before. Yes. And there’s you know, I don’t remember the name of it. There’s the website that you can go to and set the timer and then it’ll chime, can’t remember the name of it. This was years ago. I used to do that. But yeah, but now my thing is my water. I leave it up there and so every 20-30 minutes I get up and I chug my water stretch and all that.
Becky Beach: 29:56
yeah, I have an Apple Watch and it all tells me to [inaudible 30:01], that means I got to get up and stuff like that. So that’s also pretty helpful.
Kim Mickelson: 30:06
Absolutely, as long as you pay attention to it and don’t just ignore.
Becky Beach: 30:10
Oh, yeah, I’ll just ignore it. I ignore it all the time and it stop, because I’ll just sit for long periods of time, and I just won’t get up, I’ll just sit and sit and sit, I heard, that is bad for your heart, Is that true?
Kim Mickelson: 30:23
Yes, it’s bad for your body Overall, it really is. And right now, Becky, you may feel fine, you may feel healthy, you may feel strong, but it won’t sustain, you will not continue sitting for long hours, wreaks havoc on the body, inside and outside. like I said, the posture, the posture alone, you can’t possibly stay-
Becky Beach: 30:49
Can’t get my posture back up, I was slouching again. You know, got you got to tell me.
Kim Mickelson: 30:55
You can’t possibly sit like this nonstop, we can’t, we are shifting, we’re doing this or whatever. So, we tend to do this again. So, by getting up and moving and opening your arms, so this is really good for people that do this all day.
31:12
So, opening up, opening up the chest and I’m going to do this, I send pictures of this to my kids, we Snapchat and because they’re ones in Philly, in Philadelphia, and ones in Maryland, by Baltimore. So, we always Snapchat. So, I tell them to do the chin tuck. I don’t know if you have seen that. So, kind of already head forward on the computer. So, if lean it on your on-chin tuck- chin tuck this way. [sysco 31:35] It helps with the spinal alignment, so important.
Becky Beach: 31:45
Oh, yeah, I do. I feel I do feel my spine. So, what I’m doing is I’m tucking my chin and I do feel-
Kim Mickelson: 31:50
you don’t look down or up. Just it’s really just pushing in. So instead of forward, it’s pushing in.
Becky Beach: 31:58
Oh, I see. My back is like, I pull on my back, I need to stop sitting so much. I just sit way too much.
Kim Mickelson: 32:04
knew that. And that right there is your mindset and the knowledge, putting it together of how important it is. To practice this particular self-care.
Becky Beach: 32:15
So yeah, I’ve been I’ve been spent like $1,000 on an uplift standing desk, and I never make it stand.
Kim Mickelson: 32:21
That is a good thing. I often think of that as well and we have a small house-
32:29
But yeah, that’s a great idea then to stand and work as well, definitely. But so, you know, regular breaks, So rest is the secret to success, resting the mind and resting your body from the position of sitting. It’s all just a recipe for success. So, rest = success, we think of that. And rest could be anything, it could be something that makes you happy going for a walk. once you’ve completed your exercise, you feel good about it. You’re changing your mindset when you need clarity. It all is self-care. And it all helps with productivity for sure and health, Of course, we want to be healthy for our family. Because you know that saying “if mama ain’t happy, nobody happy, if mama ain’t practice it’s self-care, mama ain’t having a nice productive business”, right?
Becky Beach: 33:28
Oh, yeah, definitely. 100% true. Wow.
Kim Mickelson: 33:32
So, regular breaks can restore motivation, prevent decision fatigue, and increase productivity and creativity. So that was number five. that’s pretty much my tips for self-care.
Becky Beach: 33:50
This is, like, really awesome. Like, I just learned so much. Like, I have been neglecting myself back. But it’s weird because I’ll tell my mom beach audience that how to do self-care because I’m really, like, an evangelist for self-care. But then I don’t do it myself. So, I’m not following my own advice. I need to start you’re like using that self-care planner I made, I don’t even use it myself. I have known people use it.
Kim Mickelson: 34:18
Yeah. I completely understand. I mean, even having my business where I was actively coaching people with exercise, self-care, you know, everything eating healthy, we do challenges. I would put myself on the back burner and I wouldn’t do what I was preaching. And it’s just so easy. We get busy. We are passionate about what we want to do, and we have that tunnel vision of success for our business and nothing else matters. Of course, our family matters and we know we have to take care of them but it’s so easy to neglect ourselves. So yeah, get that plan route, live it out. [sysco 35:05]
Becky Beach: 35:07
You’re definitely right. There’s like, it seems we’re supposed to do the hustle. That’s what Gary Vaynerchuk is always telling. He’s like, “Oh, you got to hustle, hustle, hustle”. And even opens up his phone when he’s with his kids too, it’s just like, Elon Musk does, you know?
Kim Mickelson: 35:22
It’s like, we want to be successful, but we want to grow old gracefully and be successful. We don’t want to just have the short-term enjoyment with the success. We don’t want to have ailments, aches and pains and we go into physical therapists and neurologist because we’ve got spinal issues and overweight and aches and pains.
Becky Beach: 35:42
Yeah, stretch my back. Yeah.
Kim Mickelson: 35:45
Yeah, but seriously, we really have to do that. So, listening to your body, doing things often that makes you feel good, and feel happy. And more productive, and creating and keeping boundaries, of course. So, pending yourself in on your calendar, and basically your self-care habits, your finances, and your business can all intertwine. So, I’m changing the way you think and feel about your work, how you use your time, it takes time. But it’s a mindset and just baby steps, that’s all.
Becky Beach: 36:22
Yeah, it’s very simple. You just got I liked it, my favorite thing that you’ve said today was, like getting up, get a pen and writing in a calendar date and that’s your self-care time. And you treat it as a doctor’s appointment. I really like that. I think that’s really going to help a lot of people listening and watching.
Kim Mickelson: 36:24
Yeah, we can’t cancel on yourself. You’re important. We need to realize that we are important and what we’re doing is important, just like our family is important.
Becky Beach: 36:53
Yeah, there’s so many moms, they just put themselves last, but you got to put yourself first because if you’re being on an airplane like that, the stewardess goes, you know that? That was that thing called like a, like a breathing mask and say, you got to put on yourself, first. You put on yourself first. And then after you put on yourself, you can start helping other people put it on them. But as moms, we almost forget that we got to put our mask off first, you know?
Kim Mickelson: 37:21
Absolutely! Yeah. And we’re pulled in so many different directions. we want to be great moms and do for our children, we want to care for them, make sure they eat well, and they have their activities and all their things going on. And we want to have special time with them quality time with them. And then we have aging parents, we’re taking care of our parents, we have our spouse, our significantly other, whatever. And then there’s just not enough time in the day. So again, self-care doesn’t need to be all day long. It just needs to be routine, it needs to be daily, for sure. It could be 15 minutes, like I said it could be 30 minutes, it could be an hour or longer, but we do need to practice it daily, Absolutely. And we’ll notice too, that there is less anxiety. We are maintaining our creativity, we’re getting the mind block, power of the pause, just pause, go just do something else, even if it’s for 20 minutes, come back refreshed. it’s so easy to constantly think of work, constantly think. We have creative minds, That you don’t ever think of you’re just always thinking of the next thing to do. [sysco 38:42]
Becky Beach: 38:43
Yeah. Last night I was up until like, 2 AM, because I was just thinking so much about stuff, I want to do today I was thinking about like this actual talk you’re having, I’ll think like, “Oh, I hope that lady is good. She’s like really talkative and doesn’t leave behind and stuff”. So, I got to do all the talking. So, I was kind of worried about that. So, I was just thinking about that. that was the stuff, like all night, and it finally at 2 AM. Like I say, gosh, what am I doing? So, I list this meditation on YouTube, and it helped me go back to sleep. It was really good.
Kim Mickelson: 39:16
That’s good. Yeah, you know, what I find too, is I call it and I’ve heard this before, this is not my term, years ago, listening to a podcast, probably, but a brain dump. I don’t know if you do brain dump. So, I have an app on my phone and it’s like the “To Do” app, I have an Android phone. And I have a brain dump folder in the app and anytime I think of something or whether I’m driving out, just voice text it to myself or whatever and right before bed, I try to do a brain dump. I don’t always do this, but I know it does help when I have done it. So, it’s kind of like an evening self-care practice. So, at night before bed, of course, it’s good to turn off all electronics and have that clarity without thinking of work. And even if you journal, have that brain dump of whatever’s on your mind, whatever you’re worried about tomorrow or whatever, because we know we wake up in the middle of the night to get water or to use the bathroom, then we’re up and-
Becky Beach: 40:20
Remind me again, drink some water.
Kim Mickelson: 40:23
There you go. Cheers.
40:27
When we are up in the middle of the night, the world is ending, we’re worried about our kids, worried about work or thinking of work. But keep a notebook like something, a piece of paper next to your bed. And even you have to just jot down what’s on your mind and that’ll clear it out of your mind. And then you can rest a little easier. I noticed that helps as well. So, brain dump before bed, and keep a journal next to your bed so that when you have those in the middle of the night moments, you just jot it down. Because we know in the morning, I never remember what I was thinking of what was so magnified in the middle of the night. I can’t remember in the morning, I don’t know about you.
Becky Beach: 41:06
I have terrible handwriting when I’m really tired like I’ll this write and look like chicken scratch, you would all say what the hell did I write? Like, I wonder that, what happened? Because I don’t think I could write legibly, I’m really tired. Maybe we could do like that. You can maybe kind of like record your voice or something and there’s like a Voice app where you can record memos and stuff.
Kim Mickelson: 41:22
I mean, sure there is but even if you write chicken scratch and you can’t read it in the morning, the point being is you’re dumping it out of your brain at that time, which gives you that peace of mind to rest and go back to sleep.
Becky Beach: 41:38
Okay, makes sense. So, it doesn’t really matter. If you can read it the next day, you know, the point is to have it like out there if you’re monitored, like dumping all everything out of your head onto paper, or even if you’re doing like the voice like I was thinking you can do. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Kim Mickelson: 41:58
Yeah. So just being consistent with it and ultimately, it brings back that productivity with our business and when we’re happy with our business we are happy.
Becky Beach: 42:10
Yes, I find myself sometimes I’ll be like yelling at my kid just because I’m really stressed and irritable. My bed alarm that must feel be like that. [sysco 42:18] and because you just find yourself doing that. And I was thinking maybe I’m just not getting enough self-care. So, I’m like taking out my frustration on my child, and yelling him for the stupidest things like just leaving dirty dishes or making it or spilling like some milk. He spilt milk in the kitchen. I was like, [inaudible 43:32] I can’t believe I did that and feel so embarrassed.
Kim Mickelson: 42:35
I did the same thing, I think we are all [inaudible 42:39] again, we’re on a mission, we’re working hard and we’re trying to accomplish something, and we get distracted. And we’re trying to juggle and we’re human, we’re human beings, we’re not meant to be perfect. That’s for sure.
42:58
So, every once in a while, we have those moments and I’m the same way. I like to say too, we have those peak moments. I’m not sure if I touched on this. So, with our productivity, I don’t know about you, but my peak moments are earlier in the day. So, I don’t know if it’s the coffee in the morning, but I’m alert. I’m super productive in the morning. I love getting up like my ideal time would be five o’clock sometimes if I’m not sleeping, well.
Becky Beach: 43:25
Five o’clock? That’s too early for me.
Kim Mickelson: 43:29
I don’t get up early like that. I’m cranky. I feel like I wasted my morning. I didn’t do my morning routine. Yeah, so I help my husband. He has a home improvement business. So, I help him with that sometimes when he needs me. And he has to be on a job at 8 o’clock in the morning. And I’m so cranky because that is my peak time after I’ve had my coffee. I’ve done my morning ritual and then I dive in and say seven o’clock I sit at my desk and I’m in full productivity mode. I don’t want to stop and go to work with him and do home improvement stuff.
Becky Beach: 44:09
Yeah, sounds got boring. Yeah, me neither.
Kim Mickelson: 44:13
I’ll be at work with him and I’m just like, [inaudible 44:16], he’s like, “do you want to just go home?” And I’m like, “yeah”.
44:19
Yeah. So having that knowing when your key moments are. So, if you’re a nighttime person and you’re more productive at night, that’s great. That’s your time, you schedule your other stuff earlier. Your non-work-related stuff earlier. I am a morning person. I am not an evening person. I completely shut down at night. So, I get nothing done. I literally could be like [inaudible 44:46] nothing gets done. even a glass of wine doesn’t help but yeah, so having the peak moments and knowing when your peak moments of work and doing work then its great too.
Becky Beach: 45:03
Yeah, it’s really awesome how you need to just know yourself like, how do you feel? Do you feel like getting up early? Do you feel like staying up late? And like, it’s good to listen to yourself? Like, I really liked that.
Kim Mickelson: 45:14
Yes. Listen to your needs your wants, what makes you happy? Because many moms, we do for everybody else. We don’t do what makes our ourselves happy enough, I’m sure you know, at times, but not enough and we need to do for ourselves, because ultimately, it reflects on the family atmosphere and the business productivity and the overall successful life.
Becky Beach: 45:41
Yes, like I was having an argument last night with my husband and I was saying that women as a species should have like four arms and hands instead of just two, because that just makes more sense because women do so much more. Like when he gets home from work. I’m expected to make dinner, though I’m expected to have the house clean. And during the day, I’m working, too. So, what is the deal with this?
Kim Mickelson: 46:03
Yeah, I know, that’s where the boundaries too, like, what I like to do, so one of my breaks that I’ll do, so if I have a couple of days where I’m home, and I don’t do work with my husband, and I could really get a lot done. I take my breaks, and one of my breaks and sometimes I don’t want to, I’m in the middle of doing something I don’t want to break, I want to continue but I know I’m going to get burned out. I know I’m sitting too long. So, I’ll get up and I’ll make dinner, I’ll start preparing dinner, it might be like 2, 3 o’clock. But that’s my pause time I’m not thinking of work, I’m getting dinner done. So, I’m being productive with the household, it’s done. So that when my husband does come home and he’s hungry, comes home from the gym, whatever, he’s hungry, it’s done. And then I can go back to my activity on my computer, or whatever I’m working on. But yeah, just practicing the pause to get stuff done is just something else we need to do.
Becky Beach: 47:02
I just been loving this talk so much. Like I’ve learned it’s just like an incredible amount of information about self-care like that even know about before and I get my favorite thing was penciling in, you know what you’re going to be doing. And I like the mindset shift. It’s just been such an amazing conversation we’ve been having. And I’m just so thrilled that you were able to come on today, Kim and share everything you know, like you just got an abundance of knowledge about this.
Kim Mickelson: 47:27
Thank you, Becky, I appreciate it. I appreciate you having me on and being able to share some things. we all need those reminders. Like I said, we hear about it all the time and create content about it. But we have to implement it. We really do. And that’s again, where the mindset and the knowledge about the benefits comes in.
Becky Beach: 47:46
So again, Kim’s website, is journeywithkim.net. And I’ll have it in the show notes at www.mombeach.com/podcast. And again, I’m just so happy to have you, Kim, and I’m so glad you came on today and hopefully our listeners been enjoying this this conversation too. It’s just been great.
48:05
So again, go to www.mombeach.com/podcast, for show notes.
Kim Mickelson: 48:11
Great. Thank you so much, Becky. I appreciate it.
Becky Beach: 48:14
Yes. Hope you have an excellent day. Goodbye.
Kim Mickelson: 48:19
Thank you. Bye bye.
Becky Beach: 48:21
Thank you so much for listening to the Becky Beach show. Please go to www.mombeach.com/podcast, to learn more about my podcast and for show notes. if you want a 2024 free printable gold planner, please go to www.mombeach.com/subscribe.
48:39
I hope you enjoyed today’s episode. Have a great day. Goodbye.
Transcribed by Neeraj_Chand
