Success is not dependent on time

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In this episode, I am going to talk about why you don’t need more time to be successful. That actually, success has nothing to do with time. Our brains only think we need “more time” to be successful because we’ve never pushed ourselves to think otherwise. I will break down the way a balanced person views success and explain exactly how they are able to achieve more in less time.

Success does not define you. Who you are as a person has nothing to do with being successful. You are a good mom, wife & worker despite your outward successes. When you believe this, you are free to achieve, try, take risks, say no, do all the things because it doesn’t define who you are.

And when you believe that success is not dependent on time you will begin to push your brain to think more creatively so you reach the desired outcome in shorter periods of time.

Topics In This Episode:

  • Why success and time feel so dependent on each other

  • How we’ve been indoctrinated to believe we need more time

  • How achieving more doesn’t mean you need more time

  • How a balanced person thinks about success and time

  • Your outward success does not define you

Show Notes:

Want some additional support to creating work-life balance? Check out the Work-Life Balance Formula, a free training where I teach you the exact equation for feeling present at home and happy at work. Click here to sign up: www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.net/balanceformula

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Transcript

Intro

In this episode, I am going to be talking about why you don’t need more time to be successful. That actually, success has nothing to do with time. Our brains only think we need “more time” to be successful because we’ve never pushed ourselves to think otherwise. I will break down the way a balanced person views success and explain exactly how they are able to achieve more in less time. Ready? Let’s get to it.


Welcome to the ambitious and balanced working mom podcast, the place for women who want to balance their ambitious career goals with their life as a mom. If you’re looking to feel more confident, decisive, and productive at both work and home then this is the place for you. I’m your host Rebecca Olson, let’s get to it! 


Alright working moms, I'm looking forward to jumping into this topic today because this is a day-in, day-out conversation I have with my clients. I literally just got off the phone talking about this with one of my clients before I’m recording this podcast, so I know how relevant it is to all of us.


Today, we are talking about how success is not related to the amount of time you put in and the pitfall of thinking “I need more time” in order to get things done and create balance. 


I’m going to debunk the idea that success and time are closely related, share how a balanced person would define success, and give you two specific ways to start un-marbling success and time. 


Here’s how the story goes for most of us…


How life has been like for most working moms.

Before kids, we can spend as much time as we want working, and for most of us, this isn’t a problem. We like to work. We enjoy the impact we are making. It feels purposeful and motivating. It’s how we WANT to spend our time and there seems to be plenty of time to still work out or spend time with our spouse, so it just doesn’t feel like a problem. But then our kids come along and we realize we can’t operate this way anymore, or more specifically we don't want to operate this way anymore. We can’t work 10+ hours every day, because if we did, we would never see our kids or we would be so exhausted when we are with our kids that we can’t be present. 


The secret to work-life balance.

What we understand, fundamentally, is that we need to squeeze more productivity out of the time we spend working. So that we work less but achieve more. It almost feels like the secret to work-life balance. 


How our brains work.

The problem is, our brains equate working more with success. Our culture connects hard work with working more hours. And then companies reward that hard work with promotions, raises, and accolades. So getting ahead in our career feels dependent on working more hours because that seems to be how the system works.  


Can you relate to ‘spending more time with your kids makes you a better mom’?

Similarly, we as women, tend to hold a subconscious (or sometimes very conscious view) that we would be better moms if we spent more time with our kids. That we would be more successful as a mom, and that can mean more patient, more connected, more influential, more present, more fun – however you want to define success in motherhood – if we spent more time with our kids. But, if it was true that spending more time with your kids would make you a better mom, then every stay-at-home mom would be considered better than every working mom because stay-at-home moms spend all day with their kids. But of course, we all know that isn't true. 


More time does not make you a better worker, a better wife, a better mom, a better daughter, or friend.


To use an overused phrase: It's not about quantity, it's about…quality.


The quality of our work decreases after long hours.

And the quality of our work takes a huge dive when we overwork. Stanford did a study (and I will put a link in the show notes about this) that showed a dramatic drop in productivity after 50 hours of work and almost pointless productivity after 55.


Others show that the average American only puts in 3 hours of actual productive work time in a day. The rest of the time is filled with snack breaks, chatting with colleagues, dealing with interruptions, personal agendas, social media, etc… 


So, even though studies would show it isn’t true, we are almost indoctrinated to believe that the amount of time that we put into something is what makes us successful or more productive.


Since starting my coaching business almost 6 years ago, I’ve spent a lot of energy considering time worked and feeling successful. Because even though I work for myself and I set my own hours, for several years I struggled with feeling terrible about myself for working less than 40 hours. No employer was telling me to work and defining success for me…but my brain wanted to continue to offer that working less meant I wasn’t enough and that I wasn’t successful.


Here is how it sounded in my brain:

  • You’re not doing enough Rebecca.

  • Your business won’t be successful if you don’t work more. 

  • People that work more make more money. 

  • A good business owner puts all of themselves into their business. 

  • Working more would show more passion. 

  • You could change more lives with coaching if you worked more. 


I know these are the same thoughts that you all have if you work in a traditional employer-based job because I had them too, and not just after I started having kids. I remember not taking vacation time for fear of appearing not committed to my job. Feeling guilty for taking dentist appointments or doctor's appointments during the day, for fear that my boss would look down on me and that I would be seen as not enough. 


After my daughter was born, I felt like I needed to work more to prove my passion and commitment to my job after maternity. 


How this feels as a working mom.

If I take it into my role as a mom, that feeling of failing because my to-do list is a mile long. Feeling behind, not good enough, not successful because I simply can’t get it all done. Most of us would say, “I just wish there were more hours in a day.” But not to actually enjoy life more, but to get more stuff done! 


You can kinda see what is happening here, right? It’s almost laughable. It’s not just that more time makes you more successful on the outside (more accomplished, less to-do’s, more promotions, more money). We also have internalized it, so that we think we need to be doing more, working more, in order to feel successful as humans. 


Productivity, checking off the boxes, more money, getting things right - SUCCESS … it all feels very deeply connected to time. But it's not.


How to get out of the ‘More Time’ mindset.

We actually have to teach our brains, to believe something else. 


We have to redefine success for this next season of our life. This season of being a working mom. Because as long as success is connected to time - as long as you believe that, we will always feel like we are failing. Like we are failing in our roles and failing as a human, like we are not good enough.


And to create a balanced life, we cannot always think we are failing or be in constant fear of failure. 


How do we redefine success?

Alright so, let’s talk about that a bit. I feel like I have framed up the problem pretty well here…let’s talk about redefining success. If it has nothing to do with time, what does it have to do with?


Now, I want you to take a moment and really think about this. Pause the podcast if you have to for a moment. How do you think a balanced person would define success?


A few things come to mind for me, a balanced person defines success based on either the outcome or the growth. Did you achieve the goal or did you learn how to do it better next time? 


What is success for a balanced person?

Success for a balanced person is about going all-in to a few things, instead of trying to do all the things. Success is setting achievable expectations for what can be accomplished in a given amount of time. Success is pushing your brain outside of the box to achieve more with less. Success is living life on your own terms and deriving happiness from all the things you do. Success is about living in your wants, not your needs. Success is about optimizing the effort you put in. 


You might be thinking that you care a lot about these things too! You care a lot about the outcome as well. And that is why you work as much as you do or need to work more because you think it will make the outcome better. it will make your presentation better, you'll accomplish more, you'll have a cleaner house, you'll make more memories with your kids. You want all those things too, of course. 


The difference between an unbalanced mind and how they view success vs a balanced mind.

So, here is the difference then, I’m going to break it down into two parts:

  1. A balanced person does not think they need more time in order to get to the outcome they want and because they believe that they push themselves to achieve more in less time. 

  2. How good they are as a human, worker, mom and wife doesn’t depend on them achieving the outcome. They might be disappointed, but they don’t take it personally.  


Let's talk about that first one that a balanced person doesn't think they need more time in order to get to the outcome they want.


What a balanced person does well is set containers for the amount of time they're willing to spend on something. They don't want work to bleed into home life, and they don't want household chores to overtake their time with their family and so they protect that time by creating containers for how long they're willing to work on something. They don't allow themselves to say if I don't get this done I'll just work on it after the kids go to sleep. Or I'll just work on the weekend. They don't allow themselves that out. So what that forces them to do is to get creative with the container of time they've decided to work on something. They know they don't have an endless amount of time and so they are more focused, are clear on their priorities, they minimize distractions, and they're willing to walk away and be done even when it's not 100% there. 


How I create a balanced mindset in my own life.

I've been working on this in my own life. When it comes to work projects, like writing an email or even this podcast for example, I decide the container of time I’m going to work on it. And when I’m getting close to the end of that time and I know I’m not going to finish it with the approach that I am using, then I have to shift my approach. I decide to go to bullet points instead of writing every word out, or I shift to be more direct and less storytelling. I decide that fitting it into the container of time is more important than perfecting it. 


Now, I know you know how to do this. Because I know you all have. Let’s just say, you have a client deadline at 5pm today. There is no way you can push it off. You have to get it done by 5pm, what do you do?


Here’s my guess, you’re going to tell your team that you have to get something done and that you are not available. You’re going to turn off your phone and your notifications, you’re going to turn off your emails, you’re going to turn off slack, and you are just going to put your head down and start working. And whenever you get stuck in the middle of writing or whatever it is you’re doing and you kind of have that moment of ‘Oh, I don’t know if this is the right thing to do..’, you push through it because you know you don’t have time. So you just make a quicker and more decisive decision on the way you are going to word it or how you are going to approach it because you know that your container of time is dwindling down. We have all done this. We do it under pressure. That is why a lot of people say they are procrastinators and they do better with deadlines because they are able to push themselves through the really hard moments where they have to get more decisive and more focused. 


What you need to learn how to do, and what balanced people have learned how to do, is to do this without the deadline. They just decide to do it because it creates the life that they want.


Those that experience a lot of balance set a container AHEAD OF TIME for how long they are going to spend on something, and then they stick to it. 


How to not relate your worth to the amount of work you do.

Then the second point, achieving the desired outcome doesn’t make me better. I just did an entire episode on this where I talk all about our accomplished vs our human value, so I am only going to touch on this briefly. People that experience a lot of balance in their life don’t see themselves and how good they are through the lens of their accomplishments. Which means they are not dependent on getting through their to-do lists or being successful to feel good. They feel confident in who they are, they can let go of failures quickly, take risks or put themselves out there. They are not DEFINED by their success or lack thereof. 


When they don’t achieve the outcome they desire, instead of beating themselves up they feel sad and then ask, what could I do differently next time? They get more curious than critical.


As an example of this, I yelled at my kids the other day. No parent likes doing that. That is not the result of the outcome we wanted, even though of course the kids stopped what they were doing. My kids were roughhousing and not listening and I snapped. It happens to all of us. But instead of walking away telling myself I am a horrible parent, I took a pause in my bedroom, cried, felt all the icky feelings for doing something I didn’t want to do. I didn’t get to the result I wanted – which was to defuse the situation without escalating my own emotions. I literally gave myself a hug. And eventually, after allowing some space for disappointment, I got curious with myself and I said, ‘what could I have done differently?’. And in this case, I decided I had waited too long to step in. I had to ask several times for them to stop and they didn’t. And what I needed to do was simply step in after I had asked once so that my emotions didn’t escalate. That’s it. I didn’t allow all the negative self-talk or “shoulds” or judgments. I didn’t beat myself up, I didn’t tell myself “I’m a bad mom”. I didn’t let the failure define who I was. 


Alright, so let me recap for a moment. 


Success is not dependent on time. You don’t need “more time” to have a balanced life. Success is defined by either achieving the desired outcome in the time you set to do it or learning from not achieving it. When you believe that success is not dependent on time you will begin to push your brain to think more creatively so you reach the desired outcome in shorter periods of time. 


Success does not define you.

Who you are as a person has nothing to do with being successful. You are a good mom, wife and worker despite your outward successes. When you believe this, you are free to achieve, try, take risks, say no, do all the things because it doesn’t define who you are.


Conclusion

Alright ambitious and balanced working moms, I’m hoping you’re feeling inspired by this podcast. Inspired to really redefine success for you. I would love to hear from you if something in this podcast really grabbed your attention, send me an email. My email is always in the show notes. Success does not define you, who you are as a person. It has nothing to do with being successful. You are a good mom, wife and worker, despite your outward success and when you believe this, you are actually free to achieve more. To try, to take risks, to say no and to do all the things because it doesn't define who you are.


Alright ambitious and balanced working moms, let’s go out there and redefine success and let’s get to it.

Rebecca Olson