Beating Perfection Paralysis

03/03/20 • 31 min

Remember when you’d work your tush off just so that you get handed a shiny gold star in front of the whole class?

Yeah, us too.

Our theory is that this behavior is why so many women in business identify as perfectionists today.

When we had a show of hands in our community, there were SO many of you who identified as loud and proud perfectionists.

And, we can definitely relate.

But, perfectionism has a dark side. And that’s what we’ll be exploring in today’s episode. Tune in to learn more about how to reign in your perfectionism and find the courage to fail (with pride).

Here’s a peek at what else you can expect:

Our own struggles with perfectionism
How the quest for perfection can damage your business
Baby-steps to help you get over wanting to be perfect 24/7
Why we embrace the ‘B minus’ Method
Why the perfectionism you picked up at school and uni might not work in business

RESOURCES

Seth Godin - Linchpin (and the concept of ‘Ship It’)

Know Your Numbers

In our business, we're big fans of financial literacy and accountability. Knowing your numbers is an essential aspect of building a successful business and inherent responsibility for any entrepreneur.

What you focus on grows, so pay attention to your money.

We use Bench for our bookkeeping. It's simple, elegant and saves us so many hours that would otherwise be spent neck-deep in receipts on the other side of a spreadsheet.

Each month our transactions are automatically imported into Bench and we get on-demand financial reports. We even enjoy opening up our profit and loss statement to review each month. When tax time comes around, we are up to date and ready to go. And this is what Financial Empowerment feels like.

Use this link to save 20% off your Bench Accounting plan for the first six months!

This podcast is brought to you by Namastream

This podcast is brought to you by the Namastream software platform. Namastream is an easy to use platform that helps you build and sell your own courses memberships and live-streamed programs. Go from idea to open for business in just minutes. Unlike other startups, Namastream was created by women for women. If you're looking for a simple, streamlined way to build and grow an online business. You can learn more at Namastream.com

This Week’s Joy: It’s Peloton Bike! (Tune in to hear about Jeni’s newfound love)

This Week’s Hustle: Two words - Inbox. Zero. This week, we finally cleared out our inboxes to zero and are actually surprised by how clean and visible our mailbox looks. Mental peace is an added bonus.

Remember when you’d work your tush off just so that you get handed a shiny gold star in front of the whole class?

Yeah, us too.

Our theory is that this behavior is why so many women in business identify as perfectionists today.

When we had a show of hands in our community, there were SO many of you who identified as loud and proud perfectionists.

And, we can definitely relate.

Here’s a peek at what else you can expect:

Our own struggles with perfectionism
How the quest for perfection can damage your business
Baby-steps to help you get over wanting to be perfect 24/7
Why we embrace the ‘B minus’ Method
Why the perfectionism you picked up at school and uni might not work in business

RESOURCES

Seth Godin - Linchpin (and the concept of ‘Ship It’)

Know Your Numbers

What you focus on grows, so pay attention to your money.

We use Bench for our bookkeeping. It's simple, elegant and saves us so many hours that would otherwise be spent neck-deep in receipts on the other side of a spreadsheet.

Use this link to save 20% off your Bench Accounting plan for the first six months!

This podcast is brought to you by Namastream

This Week’s Joy: It’s Peloton Bike! (Tune in to hear about Jeni’s newfound love)

Previous Episode

Fighting Burnout with Boundaries

With more and more women getting into online business, we decided that it was time to have an honest conversation about what it means to grow an online business in 2020.

Running an online business has its advantages: you can work when you want, where you want, while wearing what you want. But...there’s a downside.

People who work a 9-5 can switch off at the end of the day, but as business owners that’s a habit we need to intentionally cultivate (and it isn’t easy!). When your entire business can be accessed on your iPhone, the urge to check-in can be almost impossible to resist. If you aren’t militant about safeguarding your boundaries, all of a sudden it can feel like you’re working all the time. Tune into this week’s episode to hear about setting boundaries and maintaining work-life balance as an entrepreneur.

Here’s a peek into what else you can expect:

How to spot the time-sucks in your day.
The importance of disconnecting and taking that vacation!
Seth Godin’s work-life philosophy.
The challenge of being truly anonymous in the age of Instagram.
The pressure to always promote your brand or voice a public opinion.

RESOURCES

‘What if surfing was your job?’ by Seth Godin
‘Workaholics’ by Seth Godin

This Week’s Joy:

Move towards a more sustainable lifestyle by thinking about your lifestyle and recycling by trying out zero-waste products from https://notoxlife.com/.

This Week’s Hustle:

Our upcoming retreat in Wickaninnish Inn in Tofino, Canada and all our photo and video content we’re planning to do there.

Know Your Numbers

What you focus on grows, so pay attention to your money.

We use Bench for our bookkeeping. It's simple, elegant and saves us so many hours that would otherwise be spent neck-deep in receipts on the other side of a spreadsheet.

Use this link to save 20% off your Bench Accounting plan for the first six months!

This podcast is brought to you by Namastream.

Next Episode

Thinking about THINX: The Rise of Purplewashing

We’re a female-owned software company, and take a LOT pride in what we’ve built.

And we love supporting other woman-owned ventures, which is part of the reason we were both big fans of THINX. This was a product developed by women, for women, and it helped to change the public conversation about women’s bodies.

Good for women, and good for the environment? Consider us sold.

So when we heard about what went down with THINX and Miki Agrawal, we knew we needed to talk about it.

Investigative journalists did a little digging and found that both THINX underwear, and their work environment, were toxic.

As consumers, we felt duped. But as business owners, we were curious to see how this would pan out.

As female business owners, this sparked a lot of conversations about the ethics of branding, the reality of female-owned business, and why being female-owned doesn’t necessarily imply feminist.

Here’s a peek at what else you can expect:

The strict standards for female business owners
Cancel culture and the space to fail
Our main takeaways from THINX
Taking ownership of our failures
The ripple effect of the failure of one female-owned business
Can you be a feminist company and still be aiming for rapid growth?

RESOURCES

Know Your Numbers

What you focus on grows, so pay attention to your money.

We use Bench for our bookkeeping. It's simple, elegant and saves us so many hours that would otherwise be spent neck-deep in receipts on the other side of a spreadsheet.

Use this link to save 20% off your Bench Accounting plan for the first six months!

This podcast is brought to you by Namastream

This Week’s Joy: We’re big fans of Taylor Swift as a person (‘Shake it Off’ is still the best advice ever) which is why this week’s joy and hustle are all about her!

We recommend watching Taylor’s NPR Tiny Desk concert, especially with your little girl if you want to show her what a great role model looks like.

This Week’s Hustle: Seriously, we cannot get enough of Miss Americana, Taylor’s Netflix documentary. We love that we get to see Taylor evolve from this people-pleasing girl, to a woman who’s not afraid to speak her own mind.