Podcast S2:E8 - Rhythms for Parenting with Shari Medini
You can connect with Shari Medini over on Instagram or on her website!
Show notes:
(Please note that these are computer generated and therefore imperfect).
Ellie: Welcome to the capable collective podcast,
a place for women who want to ditch the overwhelm and learn
to run their business with ease. I'm your host, Ellie McBride. And I firmly believe that as women and non-binary folks, we are best as a collective. So together with my expert guests. We are sharing the tools, systems and ethos behind a simple yet thriving business.
This season, we are talking all about working with your natural rhythms and the episodes will be coming out every other Wednesday. I'm so excited to dive into topics like working with your menstrual cycle, living with lunar cycles, living seasonally, working from a place of rest and creating boundaries and so much more.
Ready to dive in? [00:01:00] Let's go. Shari Medini and Karissa Tunis are the coauthors of parenting. While working from home, a monthly guide to help parents balance their careers, connect with their kids and establish their inner strength. They are also the co-owners of the popular parenting website. Adore them parenting.com with six kids between them and over a decade of work from home experience. They love sharing strategies that help fellow parents minimize the overwhelm while trying to juggle it all.
We are here with Sherry and she and her business partner have some amazing stuff they do around working from home and parenting. And that balance that push and pull that seems to happen. And obviously there's, I'm hoping that she has some awesome wisdom for us because it's been a pandemic and we've all been doing this and hearing more about some of fear, the information that she has, I'm really excited for it.
So before we get into that, though, [00:02:00] we're going to start off with a rapid fire round. Are you ready?
Shari Medini: I'm ready.
Ellie: All right. Shari. Tell me where you're from.
Shari Medini: So I'm in the United States. I'm in Pennsylvania and like Amish country USA.
Ellie: All right. And what are your preferred pronouns?
Shari Medini: So she, her, her my preferred pronouns.
Ellie: When did you start your business?
Shari Medini: We launched adorethemparenting.com about four years ago. And it's kind of taken different shapes as we've gone through, but four years ago.
Ellie: And what do you love about your business?
Shari Medini: I love that. I get to do a little bit of everything. I love that Carissa and I get to steer the ship and call the shots and figure out what works well for us and how we are able to mold our business so that it fits into our lives instead of taking over our lives.
But yeah, there's, I mean, I don't, I, I could talk about that for the entire episode.
Ellie: That's a good news though. Right? So that means you've been successful in building your business in a way that is fulfilling. And that's, that is half the challenge is because I think sometimes we get to the point where we're like, I want to do this thing because I love it.
Or because I want to serve these types of people and still getting all the rest of the pieces to be fulfilling to that as a challenge.
Shari Medini: It's a constant trial and error. We still go through that where you're like, you know what, this isn't working, something's not working. We need to go back to the drawing board, you know, and that's tough as the further you grow and the more you go along, it can be a little bit difficult, more difficult to pivot because you feel like this is what we've been doing.
This is what has worked, but it's worked maybe on a business front, but maybe not on a personal front. So. Sometimes trying to shift those things and make sure that everything is working overall can be tough. Yeah.
Ellie: And so in season one, we had a guest on from Portland, Oregon, uh, Ashley Gartland and she talked quite a lot about [00:04:00] how business should evolve with your life.
Your life evolves. You can't just let your business be stagnant.
Shari Medini: For sure. Especially with kids, you know, as a parent, like every stage is so different when you have. The babies and toddlers at home, your work life is going to need to look very different. But if you have older ones, that'll let you work for more hours at a time.
You know, that that can look different as well. Even, you know, I know that you touch on this as well, which I love, but like, Season to season, right. That maybe I'm able to hit it really hard right now. Cause my kids are back in school full time, but over the summer they're home. So I need to plan ahead and make sure that, that we take it a little bit easier business wise, as much as we can so that I can tune back into that family life.
Ellie: Absolutely. I always like to ask this. Because I mostly interview small business owners. They're still the preneurs. And sometimes there's [00:05:00] a misconception that we do all the things and it is lovely. Like you said, to be able to do all the things and wear the hats, but we also can't actually do that longterm forever.
Right. So tell me about what help you have in your business.
Shari Medini: So you say all of that, but at the moment, it is really it's Karissa and I. It's kind of always fun that we've had a lot of clients. So once they find out that it's just the two of us, they're like, really? I thought you had a whole team like behind this.
Like, it's just, you guys were like, yep. It's just us. That's not to say that, you know, we don't consider that. Or we might take on more people in the future. But what we've found is sometimes even managing someone else, even outsourcing those, getting someone else up to speed, those kinds of things are really time-consuming and can be a bigger financial investment.
And we also really see the value in making sure that [00:06:00] we understand all of those aspects as well. So like one of our, our questions to give you like a practical, real life example was like, okay, we really wanted to work on SEO. We could have hired out. We could have hired an SEO specialist to revamp the website, but that would have been first of all, a big financial commitment.
Second of all, it would have been a project based thing. And once they left, we would have had to like hire them again for the future. Whereas since we took the time and the energy and the effort to work through and take that on as a project ourselves. We learned those skills. And we were able to continue to implement that for every new article that we add to the website, we know what we're doing, you know, we have a better idea of that.
And since you know, it really depends, of course, you want to play to your strengths, but we've just found that for what we do and at this current stage, and also because we want so much [00:07:00] flexibility. In our business still that it's actually been beneficial to just keep it her and I, and then it also makes us stay really lean in that eye.
So I used to do a lot of freelance work for different companies. There were so many companies that were hiring out or paying for services or systems, not truly knowing if they were working. I think always it's a valuable investment if it's working for your business. But I just saw company after company throwing money out the window in the name of, well, this is what we should be doing.
Right. Whereas since Chris and I are so close to it still, we are always evaluating. Is this worth our time? If not, maybe we don't need to do it right now. And. I enjoy being up close and personal with that, I understand that as businesses scale, you know, or depending on what [00:08:00] those goals are, I mean, we're in the digital space.
We're writing books. Like a lot of that can be really personal. It can be really flexible. So I understand that some businesses in some industries. It's not as feasible, but at least for us, it's worked to keep it a little bit smaller, despite the temptation to not,
Ellie: I'm not like I'm not a proponent for outsourcing for the sake of outsourcing, but I really believe in evaluating where your time, energy and money are going and figuring out.
What that balance looks like for you and that you can make more money, but you cannot make more time. And so right. If you're having evaluations with those and you know that it's working for you, then there's no point really, but at the same time, unlike, I'd say a lot of my audience and a lot of my clients, you do have to have you.
Yes. Um, which does not happen for a lot of the people that I work with, um, or that are in the community, they're there on their own. Um, and so having just, even if it's a virtual assistant to take on five hours a month [00:09:00] makes a huge difference. Right.
Shari Medini: I think that's a really important point though, because since there's two of us, but it's also two of us that know all the things.
So. We are able to, you know, when Carissa is having a harder time, you know, where has a really busy season of life, like having a baby, you know, I'm able to kind of step up and balance that, but you're right. If it's, if it's only you, that I think that's the reason we've been able to be successful is that.
It is a true partnership that day-to-day, we tweak month to month, even year to year, you know, it's, it's kind of the, the scales have kind of tipped back and forth depending on who needs to pull a little extra weight.
Ellie: Yeah. And then the other thing I want to say is when I talking about what kind of help you have in your business, um, I'm not always just talking about.
Hired help. Um, I want to talk about the other supports and things you might have. So for me in business, I've had therapy at times. I've had my husband, we [00:10:00] had a cleaner for a while actually cannot wait until she can come back. Um, like things like that. So just other things that help you make help make running a business possible for you.
Shari Medini: Yeah. I will say both of our husbands are so helpful and so supportive. Especially, you know, over the last year or so, they've, they've also been working from home and have more flexibility. And even with writing this book, like that was how we were able to make things happen, that it was like, okay, for these two weeks, like, I can't do anything besides right.
And you're on deck, you know? And it was. We were able to make that work. That yes, I was still there physically, and I was there if somebody needed lunch or, and he had a call or whatever, but like mentally to know that you're the one in charge of keeping track of all the things for the next few weeks. Um, cause my brain has an entire book in it and it can't hold much else.
That is huge. That's, [00:11:00] that's huge to have that and to have someone that. Is not only willing to step in, but if happy to do that. Yeah.
Ellie: I think having, again, that's another form of a true partnership, right? Having those people in your life, whether it be a business partner, a life partner, a, you know, in my, my world, like my assistant is everything to me and I know I can trust them with anything.
Um, and those types of things. So people that you can really just pass the ball to.
Shari Medini: Yeah, that's amazing. It's uh, it's,
Ellie: it's so necessary.
Shari Medini: The other person now that like with you saying that, so we signed with a literary agent as well for this book, and she has also been an incredible support for this part of the process to have someone that understands the industry that has been here before, that can advocate for us that can, you know, act as our therapist from time to time and, you know, um, she's she has been absolutely wonderful.
[00:12:00] That's so good to hear. And I think, I think you're right. I think if you can find that right person, like, it sounds like you found an amazing fit for your assistant, then, then it is incredible, but there could definitely be some trial and error in that too. I've I've heard some good stories in some rough ones.
Ellie: So I actually found him my assistant because at the time I was a virtual assistant, um, specializing in tech and I was assigned a project and I was like, I can't, this is not the type of work I do, but I would be happy to project manage this. Right. So we went over and we hired several other virtual assistants and he shown he was the best out of this pack of five or six virtual assistants.
And Eddie time, one got sick, one did horrible work and he covered all of that and fixed everything. And he's just really detail oriented and the way that I work with him, cause you're right. Outsourcing can be really labor intensive as far as teaching people and bringing them up to speed and making sure that they can do the work at the level and detailed that you need them [00:13:00] to do.
But for him, I just record them a video. I just do a screen tutorial and it's done, and he has that process in a Sonic card and he can refer. So if that process happens once a year, I still never need to teach it again. If that process happens every week, I don't have to think about it and he can literally follow it over and over again.
And so it takes one time of me sitting down and doing the task that I was probably going to have to do. Anyway, we'll talking over it until explaining what I'm doing. Yeah. That's awesome. It's super easy to make sure that I have help.
Shari Medini: Yeah. That's amazing. And even having that other person like with Karissa and I, it's so helpful to have another person to just bounce things off of.
And I mean, even if that's like, here's an idea and the other person is like, We don't need to go down that rabbit hole right now. Um, which she's usually that person for me. Um, you know, here's my idea of the day and she's like, no, no, no. We're good. Let's stay on track here. Um, but just having that, having someone else that you can even talk to about your business is huge.
Ellie: Yeah. I have a question that isn't on my script at all, but I'm wondering, do you guys, um, know what your, like any grammar Myers-Briggs types would be? I want to, I'm just really curious to see if they pair, like what they, what they might be.
Shari Medini: I'll have to ask her if she's gone. I'm a nine. I fell deep into the Enneagram with all, with all the fad, you know, when all of that had the, you know, the books and all of that.
Actually, I don't know what, what she is. That'd be really interesting to find out. So what pairs? Well, with the nine, I'm
Ellie: not an expert, but I would really want to know like, um, how that works, because like I'm on a team right now. Um, I'm phasing out my very last client for my VA days. And I've been with her for like years and I love her, but I just, in order to make things pop, make it possible to go home for six weeks later this year and things like that.
I just need to not have that anymore. And every single person on that team is an Enneagram one, but with a different lean, if that it works [00:15:00] because we're not all the same person, but we all are buried. Driven and detail focused. Yeah.
Shari Medini: Will appreciate that in each other. Yeah. That's so funny.
Ellie: So it is really interesting, but anyway, if you find out, let me know, I would be now no funny.
And then I will Google.
Shari Medini: Yeah.
Ellie: So anyway
Today we're talking about sort of your specialty. We're talking about family rhythms and how that works. Especially when you're a person working from home and running a business while raising a family. So tell me a little bit about that.
Shari Medini: That's a big question, but as I touched on a little bit, I mean, so much of it is going to depend the ages of your kids, what season of life, your families, and if there are other things that you guys might be dealing with, but it's so important to stay tuned into all of that.
Even so like right now, for example, that my kids are back in school. Like after I go pick them up from school, [00:16:00] they need a break, they need downtime. They will like grab their iPads and just go beg for a little bit. They need to like, not talk to anybody and just kind of rest and relax a little bit. And it can be tempting to be like, okay, well, why don't we just squeeze in homework quick?
Or why don't we just knock that off the plate? Or for me that like, okay, they're occupied. Maybe I'll jump back on the computer and get a little bit of work done. But what I've noticed, like family rhythm wise is it, they need that downtime. So that's a good opportunity for me to take that downtime too.
And like yesterday, like poured myself a big glass of ice tea since it was nice out and like went out back with a book and read a couple pages and just kind of like, you know, decompressed a little bit myself and recharged because the other factor of family life is that like, It is so 24 seven that there are often, even if you don't have activities planned for that evening, there's other things there's homework that comes up or just whatever it's busy [00:17:00] from sunup to sundown.
So we need that chance to rest and recharge. You know, we get asked a lot, like, okay, what does that daily routine look like? You know, what does, you know, what do you do? What's your schedule? And my days look very different from each other. And that was something that I had to adapt to, you know, from the moment that my son, my first son was born and kind of came into the world being like, I'm not following anyone's rules.
I, you know, he was not a baby. That nap te did not sleep well. Like we just kinda, it appended. Any idea that I had, that we were still going to live a very scheduled life, but that's benefited me because I can be, if I wake up and everybody's good and I have energy, I can get so much done in that day. But then that also, I've kind of given myself permission that if I'm waking up and you know, we're kind of groggy or we're off, or you're just kind of having one of those days, giving yourself permission to go with that, to listen [00:18:00] to your body, to let it rest a little bit more to put stuff off because.
I can tell you from firsthand experience, like if you try to push through and work on those days or get a ton done, or like push yourself past that point, nothing's going to come easily. Everything is going to feel difficult. Whereas if you take that time to rest and recharge, you can get twice the amount of stuff done the following day.
If you actually listen. To kind of what's going on internally.
Ellie: With yourself and then also with your family. So kind of tuning in to seeing how, not just how you're feeling for the day, but how your kids are feeling and your partner's feeling. Yeah.
Shari Medini: Especially over the course of this past year. Like there were days where my kids weren't.
Okay. Like, you know, w we're as of recording this we're two days away from the year anniversary of when like school shut down and thinking back to that, like, There were times when, like, even though I had stuff that I felt like I needed to [00:19:00] do on the to-do list, I knew my ten-year-old, he wasn't. Okay. And everything just needed to be dropped, to focus on him and help him through and give him space to talk and cry and be angry and, and, and then figure out what what's a distraction we can go do.
And, you know, do something fun together. So it really you're so right. That we need to constantly be evaluating our priorities and our values. And how's everybody doing? You know, how's how, how are we all doing here and what needs my attention
Ellie: for sure. And I'm just thinking like, essentially what I'm hearing is in a way that it's far more important to hold space for where everybody in your family is at.
Than to be constantly productive and turning out everything that you think you need to do. And you talked about this before, but you're [00:20:00] really focusing on prioritizing and doing what you have bandwidth for at the time, which is really cool to hear.
Shari Medini: I know I've experienced this myself where, you know, the to-do list fills up and you feel guilty about all of those things you're not getting to, but then eventually like a month or two goes by of you not getting to those.
And. They don't seem to be a priority anymore. They don't seem to matter, or maybe they resolved themselves. And I kind of took those, those things as a learning experience to be like, if I get to them great, but kind of shifting my thinking and Carissa and I are just always trying to evaluate, what's going to make the biggest impact.
You know, when you talk about time, the limited resource, you know, how can I, how can I make the biggest impact for the least amount of time? Something that she's adopted and into her days. And now I've started doing as well is she will break up her [00:21:00] dates. So we kind of want to like zoom out and look at our rhythms over the course of a week, or look at what we need to do over the course of a week.
Instead of trying to find that like daily balance that can make you feel stressed and overwhelmed and pulled into many different directions. So we have work days, family days and house stays. So every day, there's going to be things that you have to do in each of those categories, you know, likely you're going to have to wash some dishes to make sure that funk doesn't grow right.
And you're going to have to answer some pressing emails and your kids need fed every day. And you know, all of those like daily tasks, but if you're able to pick a singular focus, For that day, it frees you up and it lessens that like decision fatigue. So if I'm like today's a work day, I'm not going to feel guilty.
If my kids are on their screens a little extra. If I have a free couple of minutes, I'm working on something for work. Those are the days where I'm on my laptop, you know, morning [00:22:00] tonight that I'm, it's a Workday and everybody knows that everybody's supposed to go. For our family day of, then I know that I'm able to take those days, fill up my kids' buckets and enjoy that quality time, but also unplugged from some of the work stuff and give myself that space.
And especially right now, those family days don't have to be anything crazy. You know, it's not like we're going on these big excursions right now, but it just means like maybe we play that board game that we never got around to, or. We have a movie night or something like that. And then those house Steve's same kind of thing where it's like, okay, today's the day that like, I'm switching the laundry every, you know, all day, you know, cleaning the floors or whatever that might be.
But it's just helpful to consolidate that and to give yourself a little bit of clarity so that you don't feel. Guilty [00:23:00] about the things you're not doing, because you're, you're like, okay, well today's a house day and I know tomorrow is going to be a work day. So like, I will even go and turn off my notifications on certain emails, um, which is another benefit of partnership that if I'm like, Hey Chris, we're going to do a family day.
I'm going to turn off my notifications. But if you need me, you know, text me, call me like whatever I have something pressing comes up, but. It, it gives you a little bit more freedom to just focus on one element of your life. And that just can, it can be really calming to have that clarity.
Ellie: Yeah. As opposed to being scattered among all the things all the time.
It's something that I talk about in a smaller scale is batching. And this is sort of like that sort of like batching. It is a little, but with the flexibility of knowing that some of these things do have to kind of cross boundaries, but for the most part, you have a singular focus. I love that.
Shari Medini: And it's like a bigger picture batching almost.
Yeah. Cause we'll even, I mean, we'll do that. [00:24:00] Like we talked about those seasons of life, even having those conversations of, okay, what do we want to do now? And what is that going to look like a couple months from now?
Ellie: Yeah. So I have two follow-up questions that I was thinking about the first is how do you communicate those days and work that in with your family life?
So how do you make sure your kids and your partner and everything are on board with your theme dates?
Shari Medini: Yeah. Now that my kids, I have a seven-year-old and a ten-year-old and they are able to understand a lot of that. And it's really fun to kind of even involve them in some of the work stuff that, you know, I'll share with them, something that I'm working on.
Or if I'm designing graphics, I'll be like here. What do you think? Like, did you like this one or this one? Or what color should this be? And. So kind of bring them into those conversations and explain, you know, like, Hey, I need to go do this project. If you need something, you know, ask dad, if you really need something, you can come check, check in with [00:25:00] me.
But. We have those conversations that right now, like their school is their job, but me and daddy, we have our own jobs too. And this is part of how we provide for our family. And this is why we get to live in a nice house and enjoy fun things. And you get your toys and, you know, like it's, it's kind of part of that whole, we're a team together.
We all have our role and they're really, really good about that. But the other thing we found, especially if you have young kids at home, If you can meet their needs first, they're much more likely to let you get some of that on uninterrupted work time. So it's tempting to be like, okay, they look like they're playing nicely over there.
I'm just going to sneak in and sneak over to my computer and get some stuff done. And you know, within five minutes it's like, honey, I need you. So instead what, at one point Karesa always shares. She had three toddlers [00:26:00] at home at the same time. Um, she was stay at home. She was worked from home, but what they would do is like everyone would pile into the kitchen, fill up all the sippy cups, grab some snacks, you know, make it fun along the way everyone would check into the bathroom and make sure everybody was taken care of.
And then they would head in and dump out and she would help them create this like place set up. So combining different toys, that would be really interactive for them. So that it allowed for open-ended play. And then she would grab her laptop and sit on the couch and supervise, but it was also that boundary of like, I know you have everything you need, you have your sippy cup, you have your snacks, we went potty and you have a fun toy thing.
And mommy needs to get a little bit of work done and being able to just be transparent about that, but also be a little bit proactive about that. Because sometimes all your kids need of, like, they just want to [00:27:00] chat with somebody for a little bit. They want to tell you a story or, you know, whatever that is.
So like making sure we give them that chance, we can also shift our language so that it's in a little bit more of a positive light. So if you're working, instead of being like. You know, I can't help you right now, or like, why do you keep interrupting me? Kind of like I know, and I would love to play with you too, but I need to focus on this.
And if you can let me focus on this, I'll be done quicker and then we get to hang out. But just trying to keep that as positive as possible that it's not that you don't want to spend time with them. It's you have a lot of things on your plate and that's okay..
Yeah.
Ellie: I really liked that. Like making sure that the needs are taken care of.
And I mean, that goes for kids, but that also goes for lots of things. It goes for ourselves making you, we would all be more productive and not just productive, but like if we all took care of ourselves before the day started, imagine our days, right. If we took care of all of those types of things, it would feel so much [00:28:00] easier.
I talk about this on the podcast a couple of times, but it's always, it's always example that comes into my head and I think it's just a really, like, I'm a millennial thing. But it's the whole idea of the Sims. Right?
Shari Medini: I love it. That's perfect. I mean, any of those, like rollercoaster tycoon, or like whatever, like if something, if the Park's too dirty or it's too crowded or the rides, or, you know, like everything kind of has to, and there's going to be some give and take because we have limited resources. But you're right.
Those are at least the gauges to keep an eye on. Right. And they do matter, they do impact everything else.
So
Ellie: my other question was how did you and HERSA come to start working together? How did that partnership form that so solid over these past several years?
Shari Medini: Yeah. We met through a mutual friend. We met on the playground.
We happened to be [00:29:00] there with all our kids and it was something that we really recognized that we saw. We were dealing with similar struggles, but we also like had a similar vision of where we wanted to go. And that was in motherhood and family life. But also business wise, you know, we both kind of had this hunger for something more, but we were also facing, you know, especially at that time.
And it's continued on that. Like, The parenting content being put out was the stuff that it was like, the stuff that would go viral have a little bit of that shock value, or it would be, you know, complaining about your kids are horrible. Your husband's horrible. Everything sucks. You know, poor me. And like while sometimes relatable, sometimes funny, it wasn't helpful in the long run.
And Chris and I found ourselves in this place where we were consuming that negative content. We started to see our [00:30:00] own lives through that lens. So that if you know, my husband left, uh, the toothpaste lid off, you know, I was just like, oh, can you believe him? You know, like nitpick these stupid little. So we wanted to start a parenting community and a website that shared we weren't gonna sugar coat it.
You know, we, weren't going to say everything is rainbows and butterflies, but also. What can we do about it? We are in control of our own lives. We can troubleshoot these things that are bothering us and being able to take that approach to business, to life, to, to parenting. Um, we wanted to be able to share that with other people as well.
Ellie: I think we've all seen those articles or the memes on Facebook that do make it really easy to focus on the negative. And as somebody who struggled like. It's so funny, cause I'm really a chipper type person in the sense that I'm really upbeat, [00:31:00] but I would be my, my neuro wiring is I see the negative first in everything I do, my husband hates it, but so right.
It reinforces it like, and that's why some people who do gratitude practices and things it's so important. Cause you can. Rewire your brain in either direction. If you only start reading and focusing on negative things or vice versa. And I think that's really interesting to hear.
Shari Medini: Yeah,, it's really true. I mean, we saw it in our own lives, but I think it's powerful to know that you can change that.
Like. I know a lot of people feel stuck. Like, like you just said, you know, like, this is the way I am, and this is just, but you haven't accepted that as like, well, this is just the way I am. And this is how I see the world. You're like, this is what seems to come naturally. So I need to kind of work to shift that and you have to be extra careful about what you're taking in, if you're already, you know, [00:32:00] have that shift.
So it it's huge. And it's huge because if we can start to do that, We're wiring our kids' brains as they grow up. And it's so important. I mean, it breaks my heart when some of thieves bloggers and, you know, authors that are putting out these books that are essentially an articles essentially complaining about their kids.
What does that do to that relationship that, you know, as a parent? Yes. You are an individual. Yes. You have your own life. Yes. You are allowed to feel your feelings. However, there can be ripple effects from that because you are responsible for other human beings and there's stuff there, you know, that, that, that lives on for a long time.
And we're starting to see that the, you know, those very first, like family blogger, kids growing up and talking about their experiences and [00:33:00] it's tough. It's really tough. So we, we try to. Be aware of, you know, how can we be helpful, but also how can we foster kind of a healthier family view? Yeah.
Ellie: You're, you're helping make sure that while the narrative is real, it's
Shari Medini: not combative.
So I feel like a lot of times when we're doing this, it, it kind of takes on that like parent versus kid kind of mentality. Whereas like, how can we look at this as. A family, like I have strengths and weaknesses, husband strength, and my kids have strengths and weaknesses. So like we can acknowledge all of that.
And that's not to say that, you know, we can't vent to a friend or have bad days or feel frustrated or, you know, go through that. But, you know, we do, we just need to be careful overall that at the end of the day, the kids always know, you know, you're there. Yeah,
Ellie: Absolutely. So having Ron back to [00:34:00] kind of, um, family rhythms, are there a few tools or resources you would recommend to help people establish or update their family rhythms?
Shari Medini: That's a really hard one just because it can look so different. And I feel like a lot of what we do is almost giving people permission to customize it according to what works for them. Right? So like in this phase of life, so Carissa, um, with her baby, she's now in a different stage of life where if the baby didn't sleep all night long, she might need to go back and take a nap with him so that she can be productive for the rest of the day and giving herself permission to do that.
That might mean that she has to, you know, work till like 10 or 11 that night here or there, or take those tiny moments in time and, and take advantage of 15 minute chunks of time to get something done. But I think just really giving herself permission to customize that there [00:35:00] are a lot of ideas that can go into that.
I think the other piece is. Really just objectively listing out what you expect yourself to do over the course of the day. And like, is that even possible? Like, can you do all of those things? Um, or do we need to kind of rethink that and being really careful? I mean, over this last year, it was like, start from scratch, right?
Everything wiped, clean, you have nothing planned. You have nothing scheduled. You have very little commitments for better, for worse. So, how can we be intentional about adding those things back in what is valuable to us, whether that's, you know, kid activities. I think I'm curious to hear your perspective on this too, without kids, but as a parent, I think a lot of parents feel the pressure to give their kids every opportunity possible that, oh, that looks like that has.
Good potential. Um, I know even I even suffered [00:36:00] with that with business, but like, Ooh, that looks promising. Maybe that would lead to a good opportunity. Maybe we should do that too. And you just start adding all of these things in the name of it's only once a month or, you know, it's only once a week or whatever.
And before you know it, your calendar is full and there is no time left to breathe, to evaluate, to reflect. And it can just be. It can snowball and be really cyclical. So simplifying as much as possible saying no to the thing, you know, being really critical of what you add into your life. And that gives you the space to customize and troubleshoot a little bit more.
Ellie: And so I guess what I'm hearing is like, What I'm looking for is not the fact that things can't be customized because they should be nobody's the same. No businesses are the same. No, family's the same. No children are the same. Sure. If people were to start assessing that thing. So you've mentioned creating a list of everything you expect to get to get [00:37:00] done in the day.
But if somebody is looking to start saying, okay, how do I get more intentional with this? But in a way, that's going to work for me. How would that look?
Shari Medini: Karissa and I, we tend, I feel like we naturally tend to work strategically and trying to help people think a little bit more critically about those little things.
So thinking further down the road, so I'll even do this with my kids, you know? Okay. If we say yes to this, then what, then what then after that, what, or, you know, if we're looking at a big thing, it's like, Maybe you would resonate with this, but that worst case scenario, brain, like letting yourself look at that, like, okay, what is worst case scenario?
How would we deal with it? What would happen next? And evaluating had a friend the one time where she was, you know, trying to figure out I'm homeschooling my kids. I enjoy homeschooling my kids. I don't know if this [00:38:00] works and private school is really expensive. But right now, I don't have a whole lot of time to work.
And just stepping through that process, looking at all the options on the table. Cause I would say, okay, what about public school? She's like, well, I don't think we would send them to public school. Like not saying you would, but let's look at that option. So if you sent them to public school, you have more time and it's free.
There's some pros in that column, right? Like look at all the options. Even if they don't feel like options, even if they are a big sacrifice. Carissa moved down to South Carolina. A couple of years ago, she had lived in Pennsylvania, her whole life, her, they took their family and up and moved. And that was something you had to look at that like, are there going to be sacrifices?
Are there going to be struggles? Is it worth it? And I think so often we're looking at today and we're not thinking longer term and trying, trying to be really purposeful in, um, making those [00:39:00] relationships. Maybe there's a business opportunity where you work for free today, but you establish a connection with someone that you can tap into a year or two from now.
And just trying to be, think a little bit more long-term about what do I want this to look like? Of course we understand right now, more than ever that you don't know what tomorrow's going to look like. So I understand that there's a little bit of a contradiction there, um, that we can't plan super far ahead.
But, you know, even for this book, it was like, we knew we needed a bigger platform. So we knew we needed to focus on that SEO and growing our email subscriber list and doing all of that so that we could reach that end goal. And, you know, goal planning, I think is it's kind of, there's a lot that comes to mind when you think like goal planning.
So even if you're not getting super specific, just zooming out again, The other thing I think too, that we can try [00:40:00] things and if it doesn't work, we can just switch it. That goes for business. That goes for parenting. I mean, I can't tell you, I'm like, let's just try it if it works great. If not. Oh, well, yeah.
Ellie: Being willing to pivot is a huge thing. Huge. What I'm hearing is that. You need to zoom out. And part of zooming out is figuring out what your goals are and the way that I do this, and not that this would maybe work for everybody is figuring out what your ideal day or ideal week or ideal month would look like.
And so zooming out and finding those, and then obviously allowing for the flexibility for it. Not to be the ideal, right? Because with life in general, but especially I think with kids, it's like things are going to be thrown. A wrench will be thrown into the plan. Somebody will get sick. Something will happen and you will have to adjust, but having an idea of what the, the best case scenario would be helps you to say no to the wrong opportunity is it helps you to prioritize the [00:41:00] things that will move the needle better.
Shari Medini: It really helps with the motivation aspect or those moments where you're like, you can feel like you're working towards something. So like, Maybe this week. So like for example, this week, um, I have, I believe eight podcast interviews. Like it's kind of intense, it's more scheduled than my weeks. Typically look like there's a lot going on, but I know that like, back to that batching, like March is podcast month for us over here as we're recording this, like that was the goal that was the priority.
Scheduling, following up, recording these so that. We get our book out into the world and looking at it that way. But I think it's helpful to know that things can be temporarily hard to get to a better place.
Ellie: Yes it's okay. For things to have seasons of hustle, if you're not there constantly. Yeah. Um, like I think there's usually a season of [00:42:00] hustle when you were very first getting started, right.
Or like right now I'm in a little bit of a season of hustle as I'm running this three-day challenge next week. And. I have extra work that comes with that, trying to promote it, try to get people in and trying to actually write it. And this is all on top of my actual day-to-day job. So being okay with the fact that like last night I sat in front of the TV with a glass of whiskey and wrote my email sequence and that was okay.
Shari Medini: Yeah. Also, I love that. That's something that I've been trying to incorporate more is partnering something. I don't necessarily like with something that I do. Like, so like I did gymnastics up through college, so it was college gymnastics season on TV. So every Friday night, They would, it would be like back-to-back gymnastics meets on TV.
And I was like, you know what? This'll be good. Friday nights are my laundry and gymnastics nights. So I will switch laundry. I will fold laundry, but I get to do something I enjoy. And it's not so [00:43:00] miserable.
Ellie: Yes. And I feel the same. Every single Sunday, I spend somewhere between one and three hours in the kitchen doing our meal prep.
And I do this, even though we do not work out of that home anymore, because it means that if. We're having Coles at the same time, different times, they're staggering or whatever it means, no matter what our day looks like for you, different jobs, we can still have healthy food that tastes really nice. Yeah.
And yeah, it helps us save money. Like we're calling, we're always trying to be like, okay, what's our next financial goal. And right now it's saving to move back to the U S and a couple of years. Wow. And so that's something that I do, but you know what I do when I do it, I watch RuPaul's drag race. I watch whatever else on Netflix that isn't.
Something that I need to Hawkeye, you know, it's not something that I need to like catch every minute of. Yeah. And I just enjoy three hours in the kitchen to myself, with TV.
Shari Medini: I know. Well, and Karissa does this. We're like she has playlists for everything. Like they have like a morning playlist, like get up and get ready for school.
They have, [00:44:00] you know, while she's driving her daughter to soccer, they'll do a different playlist while they're cooking dinner. They'll listen to some like, and just. It's a meat. I mean, it sounds so stupid. Right. But like, we all know that feeling when you turn on a favorite song or you hear, you know, something that's really nostalgic and like it boosts your mood instantly set the tone.
Yeah.
Ellie: Yeah. I mean, music has such power around that type of stuff. Not only for the positive side, but you could, you know, you hear a song and instantly you're crying. So like I know like the using the harnessing the power of those types of things is really
Shari Medini: smart. Yeah. Yeah.
Ellie: All right. So wrapping up, what would you say is your guys's biggest win in business so far?
Shari Medini: Um, the book and so parenting while working from home, having a book physically out there in the world on a bookshelves, you know, that was one of those goals was to get to this point and to have that be a reality. It was also so centering that [00:45:00] you can feel pulled in so many different directions, but having this book deal was that moment where I was like, okay, this is what I want to do.
Like this, this, I can let everything else fall to the wayside. And I want to write books and to have that be a reality was, was huge. It was so amazing.
Ellie: Yeah. So staying in line with your, your intuition and your core and, um, As our next podcast, guests will say, because I've recorded hers before this one. Um, she will say keeping in line with your true north, um, is something really important too
Shari Medini: Aligns with, you know, we talked about any Agram a little bit and what we want our days to look like.
And honestly, I mean, I've, I've been in other positions where. It did, you know, consulting and stuff and worked with us. And that was like in speaking and like, that's all exciting and it's stuff I enjoy, but it drains me where [00:46:00] sitting in my sweat pants with a cup of tea and writing that fills me up like that.
Just recharges. Like I, I just enjoy every aspect of it. There's nothing about that. That makes me feel uncomfortable. Which tells me that's the right fit, because I feel like so often we're ignoring our intuition and we're saying like, it's fine. I'll ignore that. I feel a little bit off. It doesn't feel quite right, but like, this is what it, what I need to do.
And sometimes you need to do those things and be out of your comfort zone for a season. But if you can find that thing where you're not fighting yourself, then it's a pretty incredible experience. Yeah.
Ellie: And I think for me, it's things like this. Yeah. I hate writing. I it's not. He hates too strong of a word, but I do find it raining.
I find like running or writing my blogs, those types of things really draining and that I've pivoted to doing more of this podcasting and more video content because. I can [00:47:00] talk for days. That's amazing.
Shari Medini: Yeah. And it's acknowledging that, like how often do we compare our own weaknesses to someone else's strengths?
Like I'm sure there's plenty of people that look in there, like. Oh, my goodness. How does Ellie talk all day? Every day? Like, what's wrong with me? Like, I, I can barely like be on the phone with, for 20 minutes with my friend before I'm like ready to go hide in a hole, you know, like we're all so different and there is space for all of those. Yeah. And
Ellie: Takes all types. Right. It takes all kinds. So on the flip side of that, what would you say has been your biggest mistake or learning experience in your business? We were
Shari Medini: trying to think of a specific example. So a couple, I don't know how long ago this was at this point, but a little while back, we spent time and energy and effort into like creating a pitch deck.
And we decided like, maybe we want to go this like venture capital route. Maybe we want to kind of take this [00:48:00] to the next level and try that direction and see what happens. We are both so glad that that did not work out. Because we would have had to cater to someone else's priorities, you know, and it would have changed our direction.
It would have changed our flexibility while it would have looked nice on a financial standpoint, a lot of other things would have suffered and sometimes that slow and steady growth that you're able to grow into. Is a better path forward because you can't, you have the flexibility, you are not accountable to someone else that is strictly looking at the bottom line because that's not always the best indicator.
It's nice. We all, you know, that's why we're doing this, right.
Ellie: I'm all for women making money all for it, but you're right. Look on the only thing to business. If I wanted to be making a lot more money, I would be working a lot more. If not that it has to go that way. I don't believe you always have to work hard to [00:49:00] make good money, right.
Shari Medini: Or there might be a different industry. We all know, like there's other things I could be doing that make a lot more money than writing books, but that's not where my heart is. Right.
Ellie: So for me, like I've chosen, I can run my entire business in about three days a week, maybe an extra half a day for running this podcast.
And if I wanted to work more or work differently, I could probably make more money, but I like what I do. And that's so much more important than making a ton of money and I'm on track to eventually make a fair chunk of money. Yeah.
Shari Medini: I think that's a really good point too though, to know. I'm sure you could also fill the rest of you could fill the other four days and work every day and not have it make a bigger impact necessarily like it could, if you're working smart, you could double what you're doing and double the amount of time.
But I feel like so many get so many people get caught in that trap of like, I need to work this many days or this many hours. [00:50:00] But how much of that is actually making a difference, you know,
Ellie: it's that, that human thing that we do, that we will fill all the time, given with time close to letting ourselves chill. Yeah. You take really long lunches. I watched TV over lunch. I wish I could get my husband to come hang out with me over lunch, but he watches YouTube videos over lunch, learning about code and other things. And so essentially he takes his like sort of half working lunches.
Are you guys working on anything exciting? I know you guys are promoting the book right now. Is there anything else exciting that you're working on?
Shari Medini: Yeah, so that's the main focus currently is we keep talking about, and what's the focus, is it spreading the word about this book, but the long-term goal being as well, that there's more books on the horizon.
And since the world of publishing, it's a very long. Process, you know, it can be 18 months to two years til a book is out in the world. This one was rushed out, which was a [00:51:00] crazy whirlwind of an experience, but typically we're looking a lot further out. So our minds are there. Those ideas are brewing for, for future books as well.
Ellie: And I think you'll probably learn a lot as we all do when we put something out into the world about not just the process, but also how people react, respond and what they, what they need to hear from you next.
Shari Medini: It's been amazing, like market research that doing a lot of these types of things and hearing from readers, we have what resonates with them and also like the challenges that we keep hearing, you know, coming up that we're, we're excited.
We're excited to fill that need.
Ellie: Yes. All right. So tell people where they can find you in your book.
Shari Medini: Sure. So if you go to adorethemparenting.com. You can find everything there. You can reach out to us directly. If you have questions, we have a lot of articles, resources, free, printables, all that good stuff.
And our buck is available from all major retailers. So if you want to do [00:52:00] that or check in with your local bookstore and see if they have it in stock or request it. We'd appreciate it.
Ellie: Yeah. I'm wondering here over, because a lot of my audience would be who you are in the UK and Ireland. Um, but it would probably be available online pretty easily for you.
Shari Medini: It should be. Yeah. I think you Google it parenting while working from home. It should pop up for you.
Ellie: Well, good. Well, thank you so much for coming on.
Shari Medini: Thank you for having me. This was really fun.
Ellie: It has been.,
thank you for listening to the capable collective podcast. I really hope you enjoy this episode and I've gotten value from it. If you did, please subscribe on your chosen listening platform. And if you happen to be listening over on apple podcasts. Please take a moment to leave a review. It helps other people to find and trust this podcast.
And it would mean the world to me, this episode was [00:53:00] edited by Emily Crosby media. She's amazing to work with. And if you are looking to start a podcast or for some practical media solutions, definitely check her out. Thank you so much. Again, have a great day.
