How to Reduce Decision Fatigue And Overwhelm As A Female Entrepreneur With Kate Evans

Decision fatigue and entrepreneur overwhelm are two of the biggest things that I see holding female entrepreneurs back. And I don't just mean the big overwhelming moments that we face on a regular basis in our businesses. I'm talking about the thousand micro tiny decisions that we have to make every single day to keep us functioning. The ones that are actually draining our energy before we've even opened our laptop.

things like what to eat today, what tasks to prioritise, what to do next, what are going to wear to our meeting, The accumulation of all of these micro decisions is super real and it is exhausting, is overwhelming and it is one of the causes of low productivity that nobody really talks about, particularly if you are a female entrepreneur.

But if you are someone who is trying to start a grown online business and you constantly feel like you're spinning place, overwhelmed, making zero progress and genuinely cannot figure out why, the answer is almost never that you're lazy or not working hard enough. In my experience, it is almost always that you don't have the right foundation underneath you. You don't have the routines, you don't have the structures, you don't have the support system. And I know this because I've lived it myself. Now as entrepreneurs,

particularly if you've left a nine to five to start your own online business, we have this habit of rebelling against routine, rebelling against any structures because we've tried so hard to escape those routines, we've tried so hard to escape those structures, which generally when we are running a business as an entrepreneur, we need an element of routine and an element of structure.

without any real structure, without any real systems and I learnt this the hard way that that is not how I'm going to create freedom in my life which is essentially why I was setting up my business If anything I was anything but free back then. It's only over the past six years that I've learned that actually I need to create a business within structure, within routines, within a framework because otherwise your business just turns into chaos and in today's episode we're going to be talking about

how to manage that chaos, how to eliminate the decision fatigue, how to stop procrastination and make us more productive in our business by decluttering all the things that we don't need and creating those simplified routines and systems to support us. Now, before we go into the episode, I just want to talk to you a little bit about my program, The Freedom Model Method, because essentially my experiences going through burnout in the early stages of my career.

having not had any routines, structural systems to support me set up is exactly why I created this programme because I don't want you as an entrepreneur who is coming out of their nine to five and starting an online business to go through the same challenges that I did. That burnout that I spoke to earlier wiped me out for months at a time in my business and I don't want that same thing to happen to you because you didn't have the structure, didn't have the solid foundations, you didn't have the systems to support you

the business that you want to build. Now a little bit of feedback that I get quite often on LinkedIn is that people are scared, of the stress of starting an online business. Now if you set up your business with solid foundations, you are going to build a business designed to work for you, not feel like one that you are working for. And that was the mistake that I made. I made myself another job rather than actually creating myself a business. Now that essentially is a recipe for decision fatigue, recipe for

overwhelm recipe of unproductivity because we're going to go into a fight-flight-freeze response because we haven't got any structure to support the growth. Now the way I look at building a business is exactly the same way that you would build a house. You have to have solid foundations first in order to build it from the ground up. Now in my program, the 3D model method foundations, this is exactly what I teach you. I teach you those foundations to build an online business from the ground up so that it tackles that overwhelming, eliminates the decision fatigue and the not

knowing where to start or what to do next it just gives you a really clear simple path forward and an action plan that you can follow to build your online business. So if that sounds exactly like what you need right now the link for that is in the description you can go and check out after this episode and in this episode we're going to delve into this subject even in more detail today. I can't wait to talk about this because it's so relevant in my life right now and you'll hear in the episode exactly why it's so relevant in my life but today on the show I have got Kate Evans she's a psychologist

a life coach and the author of Ditch Your Shit, Decluttering Your Mindset to Decluttering Your Home. It's her brand new book and you can go and get it now. The link is in the show notes. And through her business, Soulful Space Coaching, and her private therapy practice, has spent decades helping women strip back the excess physically and mentally so they can think more clearly, feel more grounded, and finally build a life that feels lighter instead of constantly stressful or overwhelming. Today we are going to get into what

decision-making fatigue is actually doing to your brain, why female entrepreneurs carry a heavy decision load more so than many people realize, and how to reduce decision fatigue by building a decision-making support system that works in your life, not just on paper. I'm super excited to work with Kate to the podcast, and she gives some amazing tips today on how to declutter your life and create a system that supports your decision fatigue.

Hey Kate, welcome I would love to hear a little bit more about you,

So I'm a psychologist, a life coach, a decluttering coach and

together, And it launched me into this work of helping people declutter their homes, but it's not just about decluttering your home, it's decluttering your internal self too. so the work that I do is actually quite integrative. It's about

getting yourself clear and grounded and

understanding where everything is and like in a house if you've got a whole bunch of excess on top of all the good stuff you can't find anything it's the same as in your internal life if there's a bunch of excess you can't find all the good stuff but on top of that i'm a

⁓ a cat mother and I live in the Chicago area in the US and that's me.

amazing and I'm really curious to know you obviously went through this own decluttering process yourself what was the process of leading up to that like what was that turning point for you why you said it is time for me to declutter my house my life all of the things

some

So I had done the work. had.

more

more and I was slowing myself down and that gave me time to think and to look at things and what I started doing was I got into YouTube. and I started watching YouTube videos on like cleaning and decluttering I got fascinated with this stuff

And now I had been a self-proclaimed slob. And if you read my book, you hear about my story. And I really, my house was just, it was a mess.

in watching these videos, I got this idea that well, maybe I could do something different. And I just one day literally just got frustrated enough with this one drawer of tank tops that I you know, if you go into a drawer and everything is layered on top of it, of everything else, you can't find the stuff that's on the bottom.

And I was frustrated enough with that I decided I was gonna try the file folding method that Marie Kondo, the organizing expert who's written many books and has TV shows and whatever, that she describes that a lot of people say I would never do that and I had said I would never do that. So one day I just went I'm gonna do this. Pulled everything out of that drawer.

got rid of half of the things and then file folded these things so they're like all set up with little soldiers and I could see everything and went and kind of mind blown and

And I decided I have to do the entire house.

I'm giving myself three months to touch everything in the house because I can't stand this. it's like it clicked. And I've always said as a therapist that like, if I knew what the magic switch was for everyone, I would be a bajillionaire.

But you know, it's a little different for everybody. But if you take care of these different parts of yourself, you will get to this place where you believe in your ability to create change. And in that moment, I believed in my ability. I created a plan and I followed through on that plan. And my house is still organized and tidy and I'm no longer a slob.

I'm no longer a sloth. What a statement. That's amazing. And I think there's something definitely to be said about when you do empty out all those drawers and you have to make a bit of mess, right, in order to clean it up. And I think that's just how life generally works. So it's a great metaphor that you're talking about, obviously, like physical spaces, because it's also a great metaphor

Ta-da!

Okay.

I'm not.

for building a business, for relationships sometimes, for pretty much every aspect of life, we kind of have to look at the situation, which in your case was mess in your house, and then kind of tear it all apart to put it back together in a more organised way. And we're talking about this in the physical sense, but you obviously mentioned earlier, is also internal as well. We also have internal cuts, declutter.

coming.

Yeah.

that we have to do. So talk to me a little bit about that connection between our physical environment, our physical decluttering and doing that work internally as well. Where's that connection formed?

When we get overwhelmed, which happens a lot in our lives, doesn't it?

We have, we've got too many things that we're doing. We've got too many things that we're trying to keep track of. We're trying to do all the things. We're trying to take care of our homes. We're trying to take care of our relationships. We're trying to do our jobs, take care of kids, be in our families, be in our friendships, be human beings, take care of ourselves. mean, how many different areas are we trying to take care of, right?

It gets to be a lot. There's so much noise in our heads, right? That's a lot of clutter. Well, you have to bring that noise down. Okay, well, how do you do that? Gosh, It feels like a big task.

But you have to simplify and I had mentioned slowing down earlier and it does require slowing down which it feels very frightening to people sometimes the idea of not doing all the things. You're not going to be able to do all the things you are going to have to make some decisions. You're going to have to choose that some things are going to have to leave because you cannot do all the things. It is that's just how it works. Just like in your physical space.

in your home you can't have all of the things you can't own all of the things there's some things that are they're getting in the way of the good stuff inside so being willing to step back and slow down and that may require you to do some journaling make some lists

talk to a friend, talk to your partner, whatever it is, but that's slowing down to actually look at yourself and say, what is it that is the most important? And so it's about prioritizing and being intentional. Awareness, prioritization, and intentionality.

So that's really what is going to help you to get to that internal space.

Yeah, it makes sense and I think a lot of the time when we have that internal clutter it feels like

overwhelmed, right? We're just completely overwhelmed because like you said, there's so many different moving parts. There's so many different things. We can't prioritize all of them. We can't put our attention on all of them at any one time. Although we might try and probably not succeed and we do try and that then leads to this overwhelming feeling of, I've got to make another decision. ⁓ I've got to try and figure this part out of my life. And it's really, really overwhelming. And when you

And we do.

are in that overwhelmed state, your nervous system is out of balance, in which case then that leads to then procrastination and freeze mode or fight-flight freeze response, depending on which one you vete. Personally, I do the freeze most of the time in that decision fatigue. And I would be interested to understand from your perspective, how does that decision fatigue happen in like a logical order? Like what are the things that we

you

should be looking out for if we do feel like we are overwhelmed. We do have a lot of clutter going on in our heads, as well as our physical spaces. How are we going to overcome that decision fatigue to start reorganising everything from the ground up, as you did with your house, as you've probably done internally as well, as I've done quite a lot of times in my life, although right now, definitely in a phase of decision fatigue again. I would just love to hear from your side in the most real way possible.

Hahaha

what is actually happening to us when we are in that phase of decision fatigue.

So our brains are, I mean, let's really, let's start like from the literal inside out. So our hippocampus is like this kind of watchtower that is kind of looking out for things that are scary. And then it sees things that it identifies as frightening and then it talks to the amygdala and the amygdala says,

my gosh, scary things. And then it sends out that fight flight freeze thing. And that's the part of us that then says what we're supposed to do.

So that's our brain giving us those signals and the more traumatized we are. And when I talk about trauma, yes, there are those things that we know about, like if you have witnessed or experienced really, really, really awful things. But there's also those things, that are those traumas that are that you have. You have.

done, you've been overwhelmed over and over and over and over again and your brain can get kind of traumatized by that and to and so then those parts of your brain will start to react out of fear and do the fight flight freeze thing and I'm going tell you that I have a tendency to do the freeze thing as well. I will avoid avoid avoid and procrastinate like I'm

you know, effort. That is just how I roll. And it does not do me any good. It doesn't do any of us any good. So then what we need to do is we need to have awareness of ourselves. because it's for each person to know.

What is the thing that tells me I'm starting to do this again? I'm starting to freak out. I'm starting to become overwhelmed. What are my physical responses that tell me this is happening? Does my heart start to beat faster? Does my breathing get strange? Do I notice that I'm, you know, I'm reading a lot or I'm eating or I'm doing other things other than what I really need to be doing? Okay, so this is I'm not doing the things that I need to be doing.

and there's all this stuff and if I just have to make one more decision I'm going to scream.

those decisions probably still need to be made.

What you're gonna need to do is you're have to face them at some point, but you're gonna have to chunk them down. We call this chunking down when we bring things into these groups of, what are the categories? So if you have house stuff, you have work stuff, you have kid stuff, okay.

Write these things down. Instead of trying to store it all in your head, because your head is overwhelmed. Your head can't hold the information anymore. Please stop doing this to your poor little brain. Do not ask it to hold things. Write it down. If you like to write things in your phone, write it in your phone. Great. I like to physically write things down. I'm old school. I'm analog. I admit it.

If you'd like to write things in your computer, However you do it, write it down, get it out of your head, but chunk it down. Then, in these categories, pick one thing, one thing from each category maybe, that is the thing that needs to get done. And so for today, pick three things that have a star by them.

those three things are going to get done today If anything else happens today, that's awesome. That's a bonus, but these three things have to get done Nothing else has to get done So you don't have to make any other decisions. You don't have to do anything else just these three things

When you check something off of your list, it starts making it little easier to free up your brain to make the decisions. Because it feels a little bit more like, I accomplished something. So making decisions starts to feel a little bit easier because you feel a little bit of relief.

That being said, you also might need to simplify your life, because you might also be just asking a little too much of yourself. I mean, that is something to consider.

Overwhelm it does come because we have so many different aspects of life right like we have Even just micro decisions on a daily basis can overwhelm us like for me for example as of right now I've just come back from a retreat that I was doing over the past two weeks Where I was in the most quiet location ever I had no decisions to be made my food was literally handed to me. I knew where I was sleeping I knew where I was working someone was doing my laundry all I had to do was

Exist, it was amazing. Exist and show up for the workout, exist and do the work that I needed to do. That was literally the only decisions that I needed to make. And I think specifically for women and specifically for female entrepreneurs, decision fatigue and overwhelm is so prominent because we're thinking about all of these other things that might need to be going on in our life, particularly if you have kids, particularly if you're in a relationship or a partnership where you are, I don't know, doing the household chores or...

Yes.

or whatever it might be, or like your partner has a job and you're running your business, or whatever your circumstances, it just feels like there's this extra layer of pressure specifically when you have a business. And for me, I went to this retreat because I was like, I need to eliminate my decisions from my life for five minutes, particularly around food. For me, food is a really big stressor and causes me so much decision fatigue because I have loads of food allergies. So for when I'm choosing,

eat is so stressful for me. I live in Thailand and the dumb thing is to eat out pretty much most meals. I don't really cook so for me to actually think about, I know this is a massive first world privilege problem to have, but for me to think about where I'm eating for the day actually causes me quite a lot of stress and a lot of decision fatigue because I have to factor in all of these allergies and it makes it and I don't particularly like repetition in food. I find it quite boring so having to go to the same place

I'm going to this retreat and I was taking away from all of these decisions. was like, wow, my nervous system was so far. I was the most at peace that I felt in a really, really long time. And I've come back over the past couple of days and suddenly boom, I'm back into my real life. Not that my real life is particularly stressful. I don't have any major, major, major things that I am like responsible for other than my business and looking after myself because I don't have children or anything like that. But suddenly boom, I'm back.

into my reality. have to deal with like this food decision making, I have to figure out where I'm going to work and how I'm going to structure my day again and I suddenly have been like super overwhelmed the past 48 hours because I've gone from this like super controlled environment to having all of these decisions back on me and it sounds like such a silly problem because these are none of them are bad decisions but in my head all of these micro decisions they feel like such bigger things because there's just this overarching feeling of overwhelm with all of

and they're building up, building up because they fit into so many different aspects of my life. It's not just in one area. So, hello cat. And it's very overwhelming. I think, I don't know, I'd love to hear your take on this, but do you feel like for female entrepreneurs specifically, they have a way heavier decision load than men do? Because this retreat that I was at, for just as an example, it was pretty much all men, because it was a fitness

retreat

so there was like 10 men three women or something which was quite an interesting dynamic but they just don't seem to have any challenge like making these decisions it was like some of them were literally like okay this is what my plan is today I'm going to do it and then there's me thinking I've got all these different options I could do all of these different things and it just felt like such a different different mindset different mentality so I'd love to hear your take on like how does this impact women more so than it does men

I'm so glad that you brought up the female aspect of this because it is something that I really wanted to touch on. And so thank you. it's women actually, statistically speaking, they do about one and half times more.

of the work in our culture around household stuff, child rearing and everything, so then men do. And I'm just talking about statistics here. And this is not about saying anything negative about men. I know some guys who are amazing fathers, amazing guys who do a lot of the work around homes, but this is

Statistically speaking that is what women do and so when you are also running a business or you just

working outside the home in addition to doing that one and a half times. when back in, so after World War II, there was this whole thing of women are now going to, especially in, so I'm talking from an American standpoint, but I do think that this also applied to other countries, especially in Europe.

and I think Australia as well. But.

that I, women were like, they would call it coming out of the kitchen. I've, that there was going to be this whole thing of like women were going to come and they were going to work in the workplace. And then we have, you know, women's movement and women were going to have equal things to men. That is a bunch of BS because what ended up happening was it was not that there was equal anything. It's that women are doing

all the stuff. They're still doing all the traditional so-called I'm doing the bunny ears with my fingers in the air quotes of the traditional roles of child rearing home care and working outside the home. And men are doing some of those things while continuing to work outside the home and just

we have not gotten to any sort of an equal thing. And so what ends up happening is that women are, to use a technical term, fried.

And I just want to say I've experienced what you were describing because my husband and I, every couple of years go to an all-inclusive resort. We go to the Sandals Resorts in the Caribbean. And we always get a room that has a butler because we're super bougie.

And I have said that like after a couple of days, I realized that I've like forgotten how to do anything for myself. That like, because it what happens is that they like, they make your your reservations for for you, they get your your your cabana or your seats by the pool or the beach for you. They like walk you to the restaurant at night for your reservation.

which is like, you know, sometimes like a hundred yards from your room and it's kind of silly but it's sweet and they're really adorable and lovely and it but I really they get your drinks and your food they bring it to you and I really feel as though I forget how to do anything other than maybe like clothe myself like and and it's wonderful

is so nice because I'm I'm shot like my brain is completely like I it's like a frying pan with a couple of eggs in it that's where I'm at and I think that what I can tell you that the women that I work with they they feel the same you my clients so okay all that to say then women especially

are in this place of fatigue because they're making all these little decisions they're okay I

Get up in the morning, do this, do that. Feed kids this. Get ready for work. Do this, put things in car or not. Get groceries. Get to office if office is in home like it is for me. Or drive to office. I do things for work. Make phone calls while also doing emails to things for kids or for home. Maybe for myself.

I will in the middle of my day be making an order for groceries because I don't even go to the grocery store anymore. have the groceries brought to me because to go to the grocery store just makes my head want to explode. Okay, when am I going to do XYZ? I was talking with my husband about this this weekend. Actually had a little bit of a cry fest. Going to admit.

of how overwhelmed I am with all of the little things, all the little decisions of, okay, these things, this needs, I have to do this and this and I have to do this for my social media, for my business and for the marketing for my book and I have to do that and this has to get done and this and I have these clients at these times and I have to organize this and da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da

I don't know what to do for you. And I said, was like, I don't even know what you can do for me. And so he was very sweet. He went down and he'd like changed over the laundry and he took the garbage out and stuff. And he's really lovely, but.

it's in some ways it's stuff that I've actually put on myself because I want these things. I want my business. I want to write books and I want to have all the things. So, hmm, what do I need to do for myself?

I need to sit down, write my list. I need to do the things I'm telling you guys to do. But what I'm also going to say is we need routines. You talked about the overwhelm of having to make all these decisions for, you know, because you have the allergies.

I know a lot of people who have similar things like that where they've got an aspect of their lives that requires additional focus, additional energy. And so because of that, have to put more into that.

So all the more reason why we need routines in our lives. And so for you around the food, because you are, you know, you are eating out, like there isn't a routine of you're not like meal prepping. Okay. So we're not going to give you that advice, but we're going to say, okay, other areas of your life, we definitely want you to have routines. Like we want you to have like a morning routine where you don't have to make decisions. You want you to have a nighttime routine where you don't have to make

decisions. We want you to have like basic routines throughout your week. It's like on Mondays I do this on Wednesdays I do this on Thursdays I do this like basic routines so you don't have to make as many decisions. Like for myself I have my mornings like this morning I was getting up I was getting ready to record with Hugh and for me we're recording at a fairly early hour at 730 a.m. for me which is fine because I get up early and

I have a routine. I get up, I wash my face, I go downstairs, I feed cats, I empty dishwasher, I put together my morning drinks and everything I do. I did 20 minutes of yoga, came upstairs, got dressed, put makeup on, did hair, came into my office, did things. That is a routine. I didn't have to think about anything this morning. That's how I survive.

because I'm not having to think about those things because I've slowly but surely put together these routines. So the routine thing is something I really wanted to stress for everybody.

I agree. think one thing that I notice in myself and with the clients that I work with who are typically coming out of a nine to five and starting their own thing is that they rebel against routine so many years they've had their own dictate routine dictated to them where they have to be at work at a certain time. That means they have to get up at a certain time. That means they have to be ready by a certain time. That means that they have their lunch at a certain time.

and

they can leave at a certain time, they get home at a certain time. And for me, definitely when I was in my nine to five, I resented that routine so much as one of the biggest reasons why I left because it just felt like my whole life was being dictated to me. So then when I then went on to start my business six years ago, I rebelled completely, completely against any form of routine and was like, I don't want routine, I don't work well in routine, I don't like structure, no, I'm working on my own.

Mm-hmm.

terms. Now then what happened of course is that I then burnt out because I didn't have any of those routines have I didn't have any of that structure and I had to learn the really hard way that actually routines are really beneficial for a human being to function like a normal human being and there has to be an element of stability and structure in your life. ⁓

in order for you to function because otherwise you do have so much decision fatigue, so much overwhelm, so many things that are working against you rather than for you. And now, since I've gone through that experience, I am really particular about routines and having structure and having stability, particularly if you are growing or starting a business. If your business is just that you're happy to just maintain it for a while.

then maybe it's not as beneficial. But if you really wanna start or grow your business, you have to have those things in place to eliminate the noise, eliminate the overwhelm, eliminate the decision fatigue, because otherwise it's gonna be really hard for you to put one foot in front of the other and take those steps forward to do the things that you want to do. And I think, for me personally, I learned that the really hard way, and that's now why I teach what I teach in terms of creating a freedom-based business.

You have to have those basic foundations in place. You have to have some level of routine. You have to think about how you want to work and structure your day because otherwise, to be honest, it's all just going to fall apart and crumble around you and let me be the proof and experience of that. But yeah, think having a system, having a routine is super important. For me personally, I've had a really solid morning routine for a long time. However, I always wanted to shift my day earlier.

So

that's actually one of the main reasons I went on this retreat over the past couple of weeks because the wake-up time was 6 a.m. We're going on a 630 a.m. Run I normally wake up at like 830 9 and I really struggle to wake up at that time and then I start my day But obviously I'm starting my day a bit later So I'm really trying to shift that routine earlier and then have a really solid bedtime routine that allows me to wake up at that time and I can really see the difference in the productivity levels my energy levels since I've

shifted that routine over the past couple of weeks and I'm really trying to make it into a habit at this point since I've come back and try and integrate that as seamlessly as I possibly can but I really now looking back can obviously understand the full importance of the routine but one thing that I would consider myself a very self-aware person and you mentioned earlier you have to have that awareness in order to make the changes and even myself as an aware person knows that she needs

a routine, knows what she needs to do and I think you mentioned this for yourself a minute ago as well but then maybe the system that we've set up for ourselves just doesn't quite support us so how can we create a decision-making system that actually works in practice even when we are really overwhelmed or having that decision fatigue particularly for female entrepreneurs?

Simplicity. I cannot stress this enough. Simplicity.

your brain is, I mentioned the whole fried thing, your brain is not going to want to make too many decisions. So we want our routines. We want to have something to fall back on. okay, and have you heard of the kiss?

but nobody remembers that it came from them. But the concept basically just is to keep everything as simple as possible, to have as few steps as possible. Because human beings, when it comes down to it, we don't like extra steps. Anything more than three steps, we are not likely to actually follow through on. So.

as an entrepreneur or at home, anywhere in your life. When you're working on something, want to keep things, you want to keep your systems as simple as humanly possible. And if you can keep things to three steps or less, if you can figure out how to have it be two steps or one step, that's amazing.

that's going to really make it so that you have a good fallback position so that when your brain decides to go on vacation without you, you can still keep going and you have so many, so many fewer, I don't even think that's good English, so fewer decisions to make and you can...

and figure out what the next thing is to do. So three steps or less, there.

Yeah, I think that is definitely the key. think if there's anything that I've learned personally and in my business over the past couple of years, the more simple it is, the easier everything is going to be. Going back to that three step rule, going back to that three things on your to-do list kind of thing, that is a game changer when it comes to overwhelm because you're probably going to do more than that, right? There's a good chance that if you've got three things on your to-do list, they might all be really small things, in which case you can probably tick off something

the next day as well but I have definitely learned that technique myself over the past few years. I think it's also the same with tabs right like when you have hundreds of tabs open and right now I'm just looking at my screen and thinking I definitely do have more than three open but I think when you you minimalise some things and simplify something so much to just having the rule of three in all of these aspects of the things that we're talking about it is going to become so much easier to digest so much easier to

to understand what it is that you need to do. So much easier to just do those things on autopilot rather than having to think about that and make it into such a big, heavy, overwhelming thing.

Mm-hmm.

If someone is feeling like they are really overwhelmed, are feeling like I mentioned earlier, they've got all of these decisions, maybe they've got extra layers to those decisions as well, other people to make decisions for, what is the first thing that they need to do today to try and get them on that path to eliminating their decision fatigue and overwhelm?

So the first thing is you need to take a deep breath. And why? I'm going to give you the science of this, okay? And inhale is going to activate your sympathetic nervous system. That is the thing that brings oxygen in and tells your brain, ha ha, we're going to do something. This is exciting. All right, let's go. Your exhale.

That's the thing that activates your parasympathetic nervous system that tells your brain and your body, okay, we're okay, we can relax, all is well. Deep breath in, exhale out. ⁓

Full exhale. And if you can do the whole diaphragmatic, inhale from your belly, all the better. Like really do this. Like I tell clients to do a deep breath and I can't see them breathing. If I can't see you breathe, you are not doing a deep breath. Sorry, but you're not. And so I will make them do it again until I can see them breathe, until I can hear them breathe. I think you heard, I think it came across

on the audio. I hope it did. I don't know. But I want people to hear me breathe. So I want to hear you breathe as well. So take a deep breath and then I'm going tell you the next thing. Then let your shoulders drop down out of your ears because you're holding your shoulders up into your ears as if they're earrings. It's not going to do you any good. Okay? Start with your body.

Relax your belly. Now, maybe spin around and turn away from your computer. Put your phone down. Okay.

Now, if you want to organize your day, maybe pick up a piece paper. All right, like I said before, if you want to write down your phone, okay, pick up your phone again. Great, all right, whatever. But take care to prepare your body first. And then go on with the rest of this.

there's a lot of stress and tension stored in our body, right? And doing somatic practices, like taking the deep breaths, even like shaking it out, stopping, pushing yourself out of the situation. It's really powerful because from what I understand, and I'm no expert in this subject, I can only speak from my personal experiences, is that sometimes you need a physiological shift in order to then shift into a different situation.

So even something like just going outside looking at the Sun or like going for a five minute second walk or something It shifts you out of the current state that you're in and puts you into the state that you a bit more of a neutral or calm state So that you can then come back and then you can write your list and you can you can release all of the things that are actually in your brain You've released after you've released all of the tension that's in your body

Yes.

Absolutely.

This is about resetting that nervous system. You had noted nervous system earlier and

your nervous system, like it's just if it's jangling, like how can you focus? How can you make decisions? How can you do anything? You can't do anything. And I tell my clients over and over again, take a break, step away. Don't push yourself. If you push yourself until you're burnt out, you're not going to want to continue. You're not going to want to come back the next day. You're going to want to run away.

So that's where avoidance and procrastination starts to come in. But if you stop, go up to 80 % and then stop. Walk away. Go walk in some grass or something like you say. Go out in nature. Take those breaths. Reset your somatic self. And then when you're ready, return.

it. ⁓

It's important to remember that this is not just about achieving stuff. It's also about making sure that your entire person can continue to do. was talking to a client yesterday who she's a really amazing person and she always pushes herself to her limits. so she like push, push, push, push, push, burns out and then drops down.

and then can do next to nothing.

And then she'll climb back up until she burns out and she does this over and over and over again. And she does this very, important work in an area where there really isn't anybody else who does the sort of work that she does. And so she feels incredibly pressured to say yes to doing more work. And that's why she keeps doing this. But really, if she keeps herself just at 80 percent, then she can be available

and present at ⁓ a greater level than if she keeps on burning herself out and that's the work that she's working on. So take care of yourselves. It's worth it. You're worth it. In case you didn't know that.

At the end of the day, all we've got is ourselves and if we're running our business, we have to look after our physical self, mental self for us to even be able to show up. So everything that you've shared today is super important. I hope it helps anybody that is feeling that overwhelm and pressure and the stress and the signs in their physical body to eliminate some of that, to eliminate some of the decision fatigue, to make more better informed decisions and to eliminate any overwhelm that they're

currently

feeling because I can totally relate with how horrendous that can feel sometimes and how big it can feel. It feels like it's like as giant as a house when normally actually the problem is small as a little gift box but we like to magnify things right so that is definitely something that I think we should all aspire to and going back to like my whole mission of like helping people achieve freedom one of the biggest freedoms that you can achieve is mental freedom and learning how

Yeah.

to deal with this overwhelm and deal with the decluttering and the decision making is gonna really help benefit your mental and emotional freedom as well. So thank you so much for sharing all that today. Before we wrap up, I would also love to hear what freedom actually looks like and means for you in your current phase of life.

now, freedom is what I have built for myself, giving myself freedom as an entrepreneur to make my own schedule, to be able to spend time with friends and family as I choose, to do the work that I love, to finally, I've finally written and published a book and to be able to continue to write, really to

So have my life in my control and to be able to take a nap whenever I bloody well please.

Yes, taking

an app whenever you please. I absolutely love that. And tell us a little bit more about your book and how we can find you and connect with you.

Alright,

so my book is called Ditch Your Shit, Decluttering Your Mindset to Declutter Your Home. And it is about the mental and emotional experience of decluttering your home. The first half really is all about mental and emotional things. And so that is great. Even if you're not in a really intense place of decluttering your home, it's really good for any person.

of your life and then the second half is applying all of that to the various areas of your home and so you can find that pretty much anywhere on the internet of course on amazon in all of the various countries that amazon you know has spread itself to and

Honestly, it's I've been finding it has it slowly trickled to many of the countries around the world including Asia, Australia, UK. It's kind of everywhere. It's very exciting. go check it out.

Thank you so much for having me on Sophie. This has been lovely.

If this conversation has made you realise that entrepreneur overwhelm and decision fatigue are not just personality flaws, they're actually symptoms of a system that was never built for you. I want you to sit with that for a second because that is exactly why I built the Freedom Model Method Foundations, my signature programme. As I mentioned at the beginning, I burn out trying to build my business with zero structure, zero routine and zero foundations. And I learned the hard way that freedom without a framework is just chaos, just chaos. And you'll never actually go

to get the freedom you desire because you don't have the foundations that allowing you to create it. So that is why I've created the Freedom Model Method Foundation. It is the online program that I wish I'd had from day one because it would have taught me how to build a business with minimal stress involved. It would be a business that actually works for me and one that doesn't let me burn out in the process because it is built with solid foundations and a system and a structure to support the way that I want to live and support the freedom goals that I have. It has been designed specifically to help you eliminate any noise,

reduce the causes of low productivity and build an online business that actually works for you without burning yourself into the ground to do it, without throwing things at the wall. I'm going to give you the actual action steps that you're going to take to create it and I'm going to be there live showing up for you to support you throughout your online business journey. So if you are tired of being overwhelmed before you've even started or you have started your online business and you're still spinning your wheels and feeling overwhelmed by taking your next action, this is essentially your next step. I've added the link into the show.

notes so you can go and check it out right now and see if it's a great fit for you and genuinely this episode was come at the right time for me because I needed to hear some of the advice that Kate gave today and I really hope it lands for anyone who is also in that deep freeze right now. You're not broken, you can change this, you're not just overwhelmed, you're just overloaded and that is definitely fixable so anything that any suggestions that Kate made today I definitely recommend you go and test them out for yourself particularly

that like moment of take a breath.

get it out of your body and then write all of the thoughts down that are in your head. That is going to make such a big impact in reducing your decision fatigue and the overwhelm that you've got in your business. If you love this episode, please do me a favour and support the show by liking, subscribing and following the podcast. I really appreciate it and it helps me continue to show up and create content for you like this for any freedom founders that are building their online business right now. I'll see you next time.