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Once we discover we're both autistic and ADHD, it feels like we've unlocked the key to everything.
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But then comes the real question: how do we actually use this key?
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I'm Adria Sophia Melikar, an Audi HD coach who's walked this path myself.
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I've spent over a decade helping hundreds who don't fit the mold to find their own way forward.
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On Audi HD Sparks, we're reimagining what's possible when we stop forcing ourselves to be who we're not and start doing life differently in ways that leave us feeling resourced and alive.
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And the message said that if you just kept showing up, you would eventually get there.
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If you tried hard and put in your dues, you would double your income each year in an upward trajectory.
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And that was the promise.
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And I had people around me who did that.
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And for several years, that was the goal for me too.
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I knew that I was talented, clients felt safe and grounded with me, and I assumed that that was where I was headed.
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And so I kept pushing, thinking I was still getting there, that I just hadn't got there yet, that I would figure it out, and that at some point it would really take off, things would take off because that's what people say is supposed to happen.
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And I was growing, I was building something.
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I had a loyal audience for my old podcast.
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I had collaborators and colleagues who saw me as an expert.
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I was being interviewed on summits and podcasts.
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I was a guest expert in other coaches' groups.
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I was building something, I was growing.
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But then about four years ago, I hit a major burnout that flattened me.
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And I went on a sabbatical from my business for a year and took a contract role for income and stability while I was recovering.
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And when I was inside of Burnout Recovery with the space to look back, I realized something.
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I had experienced what building bigger felt and looked like in my own business.
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And I'd been inside the inner workings of the really big business the founders of my contract role had built.
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And now I recognized that maybe I didn't actually want big.
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Big meant a lot of moving parts, a team to manage, the pressure to sell high dollar packages, a lot of executive function load.
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And I realized that at this point what felt good to me was small and not big.
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And so for the last few years, as I've rebuilt my business post-burnout, I've been rebuilding it intentionally small.
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No big packages, a business model against the best practices I was taught, or that I taught others even lower rates than I've had since I was a beginner.
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And with the goal to structure things for long-term relationships with clients, where stability and depth and reducing big pushes are the goals, are what actually makes it feel good.
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And right now it's just me, no team.
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I don't even have a podcast editor right now, this time around, with this podcast for the past year.
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And honestly, all of the moving parts and the team members that I used to have were supposed to make things easier.
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They were supposed to take things off my plate, but it feels so much lighter now.
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I'm holding all the parts, but I've given myself permission to do less, to only do the most important things and to streamline everything else.
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It may not stay this way forever.
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Now that I'm in more alignment, who knows what will shift?
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And I'm open to it changing, but right now it's just the right size for me.
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And it's not only my business, it's my house, my social life, my holidays, even whether I had kids.
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It is my whole life.
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Hello, it's Adria.
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Welcome to Audi HD Sparks.
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Last week's episode was one half of a listener question.
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When many things take lots of energy, how do we decide whether something is worth having on our plate?
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And today is the other half of that question.
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How do we start shaping our whole lives towards something that's right sized?
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Quick heads up this is the last episode before I go on a mid-season break, which is kind of part of this right sizing and accommodation for myself that I'm testing out.
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And so I'll be back in mid to late November for the rest of season four on my regular Thursdays.
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And in the meantime, if you haven't grabbed the unmasking menu yet, it is free over at unmaskingmenu.com.
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And it's a good place to source sparks from if anything we talk about today gets you thinking.
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The link is in the show notes.
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Okay, so last week we talked about thinning all of the threads that we're holding and how to decide in the moment whether one more thread is worth the spoons.
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But if you find yourself getting stuck over and over, feeling so full that it's a heavy decision whether to say yes when something exciting comes your way, then that might tell you something about your plate as a whole.
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And so today we're zooming out beyond the smaller individual threads into the big picture.
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And sometimes it's not about any one piece, it's about how many big things you're trying to hold at the same time.
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So, say you're looking at your year ahead and you want to write a book, but you also are in the process of moving to a different state.
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And you might also be getting married later this year.
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Each of those is a big spoon project, like a capital P project.
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And ideally, each of those would happen in its own season rather than them all coexisting at once.
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So if I decide I want to write a book, have my wedding, and move all at the same time, then that might just be too many big things to hold.
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And I can predict pretty accurately that burnout is gonna follow.
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Last week I talked about calling ourselves forward, where we draw on extra energy for something that matters, not pushing ourselves, but instead rising towards it and how that's a special occasion move that really has a limit.
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Like we may not be able to do that for more than one big thing a season or at a time.
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And some seasons we may not even be able to call ourselves forward for even one thing.
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And so it might be worth looking at how to space things out if there are a lot of big things and asking the key question: what am I actually able to hold comfortably?
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And if the answer to that question feels murky or you're not sure where your sweet spot is, here's a place to look for clues.
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So in episode 36, not the five-day work week, I looked back through my work history to find a time when work felt okay in my body, when I actually felt settled and like it was the right amount, not understimulated and bored, but also not overwhelmed and frazzled.
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And today I want to widen that out to our whole life.
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So think back.
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At what point did things feel pretty comfortable, stimulated in the right ways, but relaxed, where you could take a week off and feel okay doing that.
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And you may not have the perfect example, but chances are that there's some time in your past that was either close or at least one part of your life was feeling this way.
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What did you have going on?
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What were you working on then?
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What did you not have going on?
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And this often starts to give you the shape of what a right size life might look like for you.
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And of course, things shift throughout our lives.
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Our capacity shifts, like when I entered peramenopause.
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So maybe you're remembering a right-sized time when you were in your 20s, but that doesn't 100% apply to you now in your 40s or 50s.
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But it's somewhere to start.
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It's something to feel into so that your body knows what right-sized feels like.
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So we know when we've arrived there, we can calibrate.
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And right-sized might mean or probably means stepping away from aspirational planning, stepping away from building your life based on what who you wish you were.
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It's not constrained by what makes sense on paper.
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And so for me, that was a shift in perspective.
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For a lot of us, it probably is.
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Maybe that big upward trajectory shouldn't have been my goal or my expectation.
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The question became what does my right-sized life look like when I'm looking at it within what I've already done, within the income I've already been able to reach after trying for 20 years?
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What does it look like with the accommodations and the lifestyle I need to be healthy?
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Rather than waiting for another number or another place I may not be built to get to in the world as it's set up.
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And I've seen this with clients too.
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I had a client in retirement who had started a passion business, a second career done for having a sense of meaning.
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And all of the advice and the business program that she was in was telling her how to build a business, how to grow bigger, how to make more money.
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And but at this stage in her life, she didn't want that to be what she drove for.
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She wanted something small, a handful of clients, holding some workshops to do her work and help some people.
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And so we talked about that vision.
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We dreamed smaller but richer, because small is not a dirty word.
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But also, right sizing doesn't automatically mean that you go smaller.
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It means finding the size that's right for you.
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I had another client who had three different businesses.
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We were talking about burnout, and I asked whether going in three directions was pulling her too thin.
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And she told me that having all three at once was actually her sweet spot.
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It gave her the right amount of stimulation.
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If she held more than that, it would be too much.
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If she held fewer, it just didn't give her enough to feel right, to feel good.
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And so right sizing can be whatever it is for you.
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And it doesn't always, of course, mean just for people who are running their own thing.
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I had a client who came to me in burnout and she had been working reduced hours for months, and she was about to start a new job and trying to have hope.
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But that job was also full-time.
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And so we slowed down and we asked some questions.
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What if it's not possible to fully recover from burnout working 40 hours at this kind of job?
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What if it's not possible to stay out of burnout working 40 hours?
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What if a full work week isn't actually the goal?
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And the question stopped being, how do I survive this job?
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And it became, how do I right size this job?
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Could she work fewer days permanently?
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Could she work more days from home?
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And I'm not saying that every job can bend.
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I know this is the real world.
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We're like working with what we got.
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But asking was a different move than gritting her teeth and hoping it would be different.
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And so the right size can look really different from person to person.
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For one person, it is a handful of clients.
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For another, it's three businesses at once.
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For another, it's the job that doesn't take five full days.
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And the right size isn't only about how much, it can also be about fit.
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Last week I talked about a community call that I continually miss because it happens in the afternoons when my spoons are low.
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But if that call were 10 in the morning, I'd probably show up every time.
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Same people, same call, just a different kind of energy or a different placement.
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You might have three hours of capacity for one kind of work, but if you switch to a different type of work, suddenly you've got capacity to do it for eight hours.
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And that's accurate information about how you work.
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It's not that the three-hour capacity thing was laziness, right?
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When I was still at my contract role, a full day of contract sessions cost me something that a day with my own Audi HD clients doesn't.
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On paper, it was the same structure, but it was really a completely different cost.
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And often on those contract days, I would end up feeling numb by the end of the day.
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Not because of the volume, because by the end of working the contract role, I really wasn't doing that that many sessions.
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I wasn't doing enough to pay the bills, let alone to explain how drained I felt.
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And one day, amidst that numbness, a perfect fit private client inquiry landed in my inbox, and I just couldn't feel the good news.
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And I knew it was time to shift my energy fully back into my own work, the work that took a different kind of energy.
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And that wasn't about my talent or my work ethic.
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And it wasn't only that contract role.
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Across my whole work history, I felt it when something fit and when something tipped into too much.
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And as I was coming out of burnout, I started looking back at the 20 years before my earning amounts, especially, and noticed that I had always hit the same income threshold, even when I was in a professional career.
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Now, of course, if I had stayed in that career, I'm sure I would have kept being promoted with more responsibility and more income, but I had felt constrained and restricted inside the organization I worked for, and I had craved places that I didn't have to mask so hard.
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And so moving into my own work originally, like 13 or so years ago, was a capacity thing too.
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Just like in my own work, my income limit has been around capacity.
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I'm not saying it's impossible for an Audi HD or to be healthy working for someone else.
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I'm sure it is.
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But for me, in the places that I was working and the era that it was, it didn't feel available.
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And my income ceiling wasn't about lacking talent or ambition or skill.
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What I know about myself is that when I'm working on aligned things, I get things done.
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I move fast.
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I'm the definition of determination.
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I am a very hard worker when it is the right work.
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I show up and I'm persistent and I'm thorough.
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The magic Audi HD thoroughness, right?
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Like it's really about capacity.
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My sweet spot is different from that of people who are the ones who are easily doubling their income every year and doing the six-figure and beyond thing.
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In my own work, I would show up for a while and then I'd have to disappear for a while, and then I'd come back and I'd have this rhythm to it, which made it hard to have a higher income amount reached.
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And the number of clients I can work with and be healthy is a lot lower than maybe the more average standard across the neurotypical coaching industry.
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But but small wasn't only a limit, it was also a choice.
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I used to have a team.
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I had virtual assistants who supported client communication, writing and posting on social media, all the logistical pieces of my business.
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And at one point, I had an online business manager who helped me plan launches and directed my VA.
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And I had coaches that I paid thousands of dollars to that helped me with strategy.
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But when you have team members, you're managing people.
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And as an Audi HDer, that can take a lot for me.
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And when I brought my business back in, I had started working with a coach who was also neurodivergent and a spoonie.
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And I noticed that her process was really simple.
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At the end of each session, we would pick the next time to meet.
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And she didn't have a booking link, a big calendar, a team.
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And I thought, oh, this is really nice.
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Like maybe I could do this.
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And so when I came back in, I took that low-demand structure and I applied it to everything.
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With my old podcast, I did social media posts for every episode, sometimes an email to my list.
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And now I really don't post on social media.
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And I put that energy instead into the content itself, into creating the episodes where I actually like putting my energy.
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I used to have a podcast editor.
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Now I edit episodes myself.
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I focus on recording in the same spot in my room the same way each time.
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So I can use the same sound editing template that I created that I can use across episodes.
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And it's actually feeling pretty great.
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And this is rather than making it bigger and bigger, more and more complicated.
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So my touchstone question has been: what's the simpler way I can do this?
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And even during the year or so that I've been producing this podcast, I've done some streamlining.
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I stopped doing episode guides when I noticed they made my production schedule feel heavy, where I want it to feel light.
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Light is what lets me keep going, keep sharing episodes with you.
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So it's the goal.
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Everything I do with this podcast is about sustainability.
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But if any part of you has been thinking that wanting to pare things down means you're settling or giving up, I want to name something.
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Building small isn't the same as playing small.
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As I've been building my business smaller, I've also had the space to really create things that matter to me, like circling with podcast listeners in my by the fire circles, or taking time to dream into each episode of this podcast, or build years-long relationships with clients that feel deep and cozy and like we really know each other.
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So far, I've mostly been talking about work, but right sizing can show up in almost every part of our lives.
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And one is the physical environment that we live in, how much space we have, how much stuff we're taking care of.
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In episode 24, less stuff, more exhale.
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We talked about finding the sweet spot for the amount of stuff we have.
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And this is the same idea, but at the scale of the house itself.
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When my partner and I decided to settle into a 900 square foot home, I was thinking about how it was less to vacuum.
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Like it's all one story, and I'm not lugging a vacuum up and down the stairs.
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I can vacuum the entire house in not too long of a time and have it still be, you know, not feel like a heavy task.
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There's one bathroom that means that there's only one toilet that can break or that I have to clean.
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And it's just less to think about, less to take care of.
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And for my brain, that really matters.
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And my plant collection, which is a special interest.
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Like last summer, when the yard out of my windows was still looking like bare soil and I needed to surround myself with green and life, my indoor plant collection grew really fast.
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But then I started having pest infestations and even watering all of them regularly started to feel like too much.
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And so over the past year, I've slowly been letting things dwindle down.
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I want a plant collection that follows right plant, right place principles, where every species is right for my dry indoor air, the level of light that comes through my windows.
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And when any whenever anything is really struggling, I take it as a sign that it's not right and I move it along.
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And this is the way I've been slowly right sizing my plants.
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And each plant that leaves, I feel this exhale in my body, which is how I know that I haven't yet reached my right size number.
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And then there's money, right sizing our expenses.
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The income you can sustain while staying sane and out of burnout kind of sets the size that your expenses can be.
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Because if your expenses are high, they can keep you burnt out just to cover them, right?
00:20:11.680 --> 00:20:14.480
And so sometimes the move isn't earning more.
00:20:14.640 --> 00:20:21.759
It's looking at what your current life costs and whether it's the right size for the income you can actually sustain and be healthy.
00:20:22.319 --> 00:20:25.119
And for me, that's when the domino effect happened.
00:20:25.359 --> 00:20:27.839
Okay, let me reduce my expenses.
00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:34.960
What does it look like to not have a mortgage, to not need to make more to pay bills, to be able to work less without stress?
00:20:35.200 --> 00:20:37.279
And choosing to have kids was part of this.
00:20:37.440 --> 00:20:44.079
When I was 40 and recovering from burnout, trying to right-size my life, I recognized that it would have been too much.
00:20:44.240 --> 00:20:58.720
And once I took a step in the no kids direction, then it opened the door to create a different kind of communal living situation that didn't revolve around a nuclear family and to buy this intergenerational house where my parents live on the other side of the wall.
00:20:59.839 --> 00:21:03.200
Another place we can right-size is our social life.
00:21:03.440 --> 00:21:10.160
I had a client who had a lot of friends, a lot of contacts, and they felt like they needed to spread themselves between all of them.
00:21:10.319 --> 00:21:15.519
And it made them feel like they were dropping the ball always, or when they showed up, they were just tired.
00:21:15.680 --> 00:21:16.720
And so we talked about it.
00:21:16.799 --> 00:21:18.880
Like, what is your actual friend capacity?
00:21:19.039 --> 00:21:22.559
Maybe you can't spread yourself that wide across that many people.
00:21:22.799 --> 00:21:28.079
Maybe you only have the capacity to be part of one community that you come back to regularly.
00:21:28.240 --> 00:21:30.000
That might be your right size.
00:21:30.400 --> 00:21:35.440
You can listen to episode 26, Peopled Out by Tuesday, to go into that any deeper.
00:21:36.720 --> 00:21:42.880
And since we're heading into holiday season, let's talk about right sizing holidays and events.
00:21:43.200 --> 00:21:47.200
Maybe the end of the year is always overwhelming for you.
00:21:47.359 --> 00:21:50.319
So right sizing could mean changing how you do it.
00:21:50.559 --> 00:21:59.759
A client of mine felt stressed celebrating Christmas, and she started moving toward more earth based traditions, and she found things to celebrate that were about light.
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:05.039
A candle and breathing, slowing down, connecting with the land.
00:22:05.359 --> 00:22:13.279
And so her holiday season felt so much more relaxed and doable than the frenetic pace that she had had before.
00:22:13.759 --> 00:22:20.480
In my family, one thing we've stopped doing many years ago was exchanging physical gifts amongst the adults.
00:22:20.720 --> 00:22:22.480
It was feeling overwhelming.
00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:32.000
And so now on Christmas, we each have a stocking with a few things in it, a lot of them food items, and everyone has pretty much the same things.
00:22:32.079 --> 00:22:35.920
So it's not a high executive function load to buy or to stuff.
00:22:36.160 --> 00:22:40.480
And since it's mostly consumables, it's not a storage load either.
00:22:41.039 --> 00:22:57.279
And we do a big family dinner together, which often means my sister and I are chopping things in the kitchen together, listening to 90s music, which feels like it's become a tradition, and which gives me a chance to make Ukrainian folk dishes and feel connected to my ancestors.
00:22:57.839 --> 00:23:01.119
Mostly it's just spending time together slowly.
00:23:02.160 --> 00:23:05.359
In each of these, I'm not giving up the thing that matters.
00:23:05.440 --> 00:23:09.200
I'm keeping the connection, the celebration, the community.
00:23:09.359 --> 00:23:11.920
I'm just changing the shape so it fits.
00:23:14.160 --> 00:23:17.359
But there can also be grief in right sizing too.
00:23:17.920 --> 00:23:29.279
When we let go of the dream of the big life or the big money, or whatever it was that never felt right size, there's often relief, like letting go of the thing that always had us on edge or stretched thin.
00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:31.200
That exhale is real.
00:23:31.920 --> 00:23:36.240
But even when we know it wasn't right for us, it can still hurt to put it down.
00:23:36.880 --> 00:23:38.480
Both can be here at once.
00:23:38.720 --> 00:23:43.200
The relief doesn't cancel the grief, and the grief does not mean you chose wrong.
00:23:45.119 --> 00:23:50.720
So as we wind up this episode, what sparked for you?
00:23:51.200 --> 00:23:54.880
Maybe it was a possible shift in your work schedule.
00:23:55.119 --> 00:23:59.519
Maybe it was a resonance that you actually want something small and not big.
00:23:59.759 --> 00:24:06.960
Maybe it was a recognition that you actually need things to be big enough and that too small doesn't carry the energy you need to keep going.
00:24:07.759 --> 00:24:13.200
Maybe it was the beginning of a vision of what right size might look like for you.
00:24:13.440 --> 00:24:19.119
Or maybe it was a spark that could help you get a little clearer, something you can follow.
00:24:20.799 --> 00:24:26.960
And if this all feels overwhelming at all, know that you do not have to change everything immediately.
00:24:27.039 --> 00:24:29.119
You don't even have to change anything at all.
00:24:29.839 --> 00:24:33.680
Right sizing your life isn't this decision that you make once.
00:24:33.920 --> 00:24:44.799
It's really something that you keep moving closer to, evolving, and also realigning season by season as your capacity shifts and as you shift with it.
00:24:45.599 --> 00:24:47.599
And I'm doing it right now.
00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:59.279
This upcoming mid-season break is me right-sizing my own season within the podcast, the same way that I've been building this podcast around sustainability.
00:24:59.519 --> 00:25:04.559
And it's giving my energy a chance to catch back up so I can keep creating for you.
00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:11.279
This episode is brought to you by me and my coaching practice.
00:25:11.519 --> 00:25:17.759
As always, if you want support with these things, I've got a couple of open coaching spots at the time of recording.
00:25:18.640 --> 00:25:23.359
Alright, we will be back from mid-season break, mid to late November.
00:25:23.759 --> 00:25:24.799
Talk then.
00:25:28.480 --> 00:25:40.240
Okay, before you go, if you know unmasking matters, but you're so fuzzy on what it actually looks like in your real life, I made something for that.
00:25:40.400 --> 00:25:42.720
It's called the Unmasking Menu.
00:25:42.960 --> 00:25:48.319
Not a plan, just seven sparks your body can actually follow.
00:25:48.559 --> 00:25:51.759
Free over at unmaskingmenu.com.
00:25:52.319 --> 00:26:05.119
And if something in these episodes has finally put words to what you've been living and you're curious what it would feel like to have me as a partner with your particular tangle, I offer one on one coaching for Audi HD women.
00:26:05.279 --> 00:26:08.480
Learn more at adriasophia.com.
00:26:08.880 --> 00:26:10.480
Thanks for being here.
00:00:00.400 --> 00:00:06.400
Once we discover we're both autistic and ADHD, it feels like we've unlocked the key to everything.
00:00:06.639 --> 00:00:11.599
But then comes the real question: how do we actually use this key?
00:00:11.919 --> 00:00:17.359
I'm Adria Sophia Melikar, an Audi HD coach who's walked this path myself.
00:00:17.600 --> 00:00:22.480
I've spent over a decade helping hundreds who don't fit the mold to find their own way forward.
00:00:23.199 --> 00:00:34.799
On Audi HD Sparks, we're reimagining what's possible when we stop forcing ourselves to be who we're not and start doing life differently in ways that leave us feeling resourced and alive.
00:01:00.479 --> 00:01:05.439
And the message said that if you just kept showing up, you would eventually get there.
00:01:05.599 --> 00:01:11.200
If you tried hard and put in your dues, you would double your income each year in an upward trajectory.
00:01:11.359 --> 00:01:12.480
And that was the promise.
00:01:12.640 --> 00:01:14.640
And I had people around me who did that.
00:01:14.879 --> 00:01:17.680
And for several years, that was the goal for me too.
00:01:17.840 --> 00:01:24.640
I knew that I was talented, clients felt safe and grounded with me, and I assumed that that was where I was headed.
00:01:24.799 --> 00:01:39.280
And so I kept pushing, thinking I was still getting there, that I just hadn't got there yet, that I would figure it out, and that at some point it would really take off, things would take off because that's what people say is supposed to happen.
00:01:39.599 --> 00:01:42.239
And I was growing, I was building something.
00:01:42.400 --> 00:01:44.879
I had a loyal audience for my old podcast.
00:01:45.040 --> 00:01:48.879
I had collaborators and colleagues who saw me as an expert.
00:01:49.040 --> 00:01:51.599
I was being interviewed on summits and podcasts.
00:01:51.760 --> 00:01:54.719
I was a guest expert in other coaches' groups.
00:01:54.959 --> 00:01:57.680
I was building something, I was growing.
00:01:57.920 --> 00:02:03.760
But then about four years ago, I hit a major burnout that flattened me.
00:02:03.840 --> 00:02:10.800
And I went on a sabbatical from my business for a year and took a contract role for income and stability while I was recovering.
00:02:11.039 --> 00:02:17.680
And when I was inside of Burnout Recovery with the space to look back, I realized something.
00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:22.719
I had experienced what building bigger felt and looked like in my own business.
00:02:22.879 --> 00:02:28.560
And I'd been inside the inner workings of the really big business the founders of my contract role had built.
00:02:28.719 --> 00:02:33.599
And now I recognized that maybe I didn't actually want big.
00:02:33.840 --> 00:02:42.159
Big meant a lot of moving parts, a team to manage, the pressure to sell high dollar packages, a lot of executive function load.
00:02:42.319 --> 00:02:47.039
And I realized that at this point what felt good to me was small and not big.
00:02:47.199 --> 00:02:53.919
And so for the last few years, as I've rebuilt my business post-burnout, I've been rebuilding it intentionally small.
00:02:54.240 --> 00:03:04.639
No big packages, a business model against the best practices I was taught, or that I taught others even lower rates than I've had since I was a beginner.
00:03:04.879 --> 00:03:15.919
And with the goal to structure things for long-term relationships with clients, where stability and depth and reducing big pushes are the goals, are what actually makes it feel good.
00:03:16.159 --> 00:03:18.159
And right now it's just me, no team.
00:03:18.400 --> 00:03:23.599
I don't even have a podcast editor right now, this time around, with this podcast for the past year.
00:03:23.919 --> 00:03:30.159
And honestly, all of the moving parts and the team members that I used to have were supposed to make things easier.
00:03:30.240 --> 00:03:35.120
They were supposed to take things off my plate, but it feels so much lighter now.
00:03:35.360 --> 00:03:44.560
I'm holding all the parts, but I've given myself permission to do less, to only do the most important things and to streamline everything else.
00:03:44.879 --> 00:03:46.879
It may not stay this way forever.
00:03:47.120 --> 00:03:50.479
Now that I'm in more alignment, who knows what will shift?
00:03:50.560 --> 00:03:55.199
And I'm open to it changing, but right now it's just the right size for me.
00:03:55.680 --> 00:04:02.639
And it's not only my business, it's my house, my social life, my holidays, even whether I had kids.
00:04:02.879 --> 00:04:04.639
It is my whole life.
00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:06.479
Hello, it's Adria.
00:04:06.719 --> 00:04:08.479
Welcome to Audi HD Sparks.
00:04:08.960 --> 00:04:12.479
Last week's episode was one half of a listener question.
00:04:12.719 --> 00:04:18.879
When many things take lots of energy, how do we decide whether something is worth having on our plate?
00:04:19.120 --> 00:04:21.839
And today is the other half of that question.
00:04:22.079 --> 00:04:27.120
How do we start shaping our whole lives towards something that's right sized?
00:04:28.240 --> 00:04:37.920
Quick heads up this is the last episode before I go on a mid-season break, which is kind of part of this right sizing and accommodation for myself that I'm testing out.
00:04:38.079 --> 00:04:43.120
And so I'll be back in mid to late November for the rest of season four on my regular Thursdays.
00:04:44.160 --> 00:04:50.959
And in the meantime, if you haven't grabbed the unmasking menu yet, it is free over at unmaskingmenu.com.
00:04:51.199 --> 00:04:56.720
And it's a good place to source sparks from if anything we talk about today gets you thinking.
00:04:56.959 --> 00:04:58.480
The link is in the show notes.
00:04:59.519 --> 00:05:09.839
Okay, so last week we talked about thinning all of the threads that we're holding and how to decide in the moment whether one more thread is worth the spoons.
00:05:10.480 --> 00:05:22.879
But if you find yourself getting stuck over and over, feeling so full that it's a heavy decision whether to say yes when something exciting comes your way, then that might tell you something about your plate as a whole.
00:05:23.040 --> 00:05:28.480
And so today we're zooming out beyond the smaller individual threads into the big picture.
00:05:29.360 --> 00:05:35.600
And sometimes it's not about any one piece, it's about how many big things you're trying to hold at the same time.
00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:45.120
So, say you're looking at your year ahead and you want to write a book, but you also are in the process of moving to a different state.
00:05:45.279 --> 00:05:48.240
And you might also be getting married later this year.
00:05:48.560 --> 00:05:53.680
Each of those is a big spoon project, like a capital P project.
00:05:53.920 --> 00:05:59.920
And ideally, each of those would happen in its own season rather than them all coexisting at once.
00:06:00.160 --> 00:06:07.920
So if I decide I want to write a book, have my wedding, and move all at the same time, then that might just be too many big things to hold.
00:06:08.000 --> 00:06:12.720
And I can predict pretty accurately that burnout is gonna follow.
00:06:13.120 --> 00:06:26.959
Last week I talked about calling ourselves forward, where we draw on extra energy for something that matters, not pushing ourselves, but instead rising towards it and how that's a special occasion move that really has a limit.
00:06:27.199 --> 00:06:32.720
Like we may not be able to do that for more than one big thing a season or at a time.
00:06:32.879 --> 00:06:37.759
And some seasons we may not even be able to call ourselves forward for even one thing.
00:06:38.000 --> 00:06:49.600
And so it might be worth looking at how to space things out if there are a lot of big things and asking the key question: what am I actually able to hold comfortably?
00:06:50.399 --> 00:06:57.519
And if the answer to that question feels murky or you're not sure where your sweet spot is, here's a place to look for clues.
00:06:57.680 --> 00:07:13.839
So in episode 36, not the five-day work week, I looked back through my work history to find a time when work felt okay in my body, when I actually felt settled and like it was the right amount, not understimulated and bored, but also not overwhelmed and frazzled.
00:07:14.000 --> 00:07:17.920
And today I want to widen that out to our whole life.
00:07:18.399 --> 00:07:19.519
So think back.
00:07:19.920 --> 00:07:29.680
At what point did things feel pretty comfortable, stimulated in the right ways, but relaxed, where you could take a week off and feel okay doing that.
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And you may not have the perfect example, but chances are that there's some time in your past that was either close or at least one part of your life was feeling this way.
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What did you have going on?
00:07:43.040 --> 00:07:44.720
What were you working on then?
00:07:44.959 --> 00:07:47.199
What did you not have going on?
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And this often starts to give you the shape of what a right size life might look like for you.
00:07:54.240 --> 00:07:56.879
And of course, things shift throughout our lives.
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Our capacity shifts, like when I entered peramenopause.
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So maybe you're remembering a right-sized time when you were in your 20s, but that doesn't 100% apply to you now in your 40s or 50s.
00:08:08.560 --> 00:08:09.920
But it's somewhere to start.
00:08:10.079 --> 00:08:14.959
It's something to feel into so that your body knows what right-sized feels like.
00:08:15.199 --> 00:08:18.720
So we know when we've arrived there, we can calibrate.
00:08:19.920 --> 00:08:32.480
And right-sized might mean or probably means stepping away from aspirational planning, stepping away from building your life based on what who you wish you were.
00:08:32.799 --> 00:08:36.480
It's not constrained by what makes sense on paper.
00:08:36.720 --> 00:08:39.440
And so for me, that was a shift in perspective.
00:08:39.519 --> 00:08:41.519
For a lot of us, it probably is.
00:08:41.919 --> 00:08:46.879
Maybe that big upward trajectory shouldn't have been my goal or my expectation.
00:08:47.039 --> 00:08:58.799
The question became what does my right-sized life look like when I'm looking at it within what I've already done, within the income I've already been able to reach after trying for 20 years?
00:08:59.039 --> 00:09:03.360
What does it look like with the accommodations and the lifestyle I need to be healthy?
00:09:04.240 --> 00:09:11.279
Rather than waiting for another number or another place I may not be built to get to in the world as it's set up.
00:09:11.919 --> 00:09:14.080
And I've seen this with clients too.
00:09:14.320 --> 00:09:21.679
I had a client in retirement who had started a passion business, a second career done for having a sense of meaning.
00:09:21.840 --> 00:09:29.120
And all of the advice and the business program that she was in was telling her how to build a business, how to grow bigger, how to make more money.
00:09:29.360 --> 00:09:33.840
And but at this stage in her life, she didn't want that to be what she drove for.
00:09:34.080 --> 00:09:40.240
She wanted something small, a handful of clients, holding some workshops to do her work and help some people.
00:09:40.399 --> 00:09:42.080
And so we talked about that vision.
00:09:42.240 --> 00:09:47.360
We dreamed smaller but richer, because small is not a dirty word.
00:09:48.559 --> 00:09:54.000
But also, right sizing doesn't automatically mean that you go smaller.
00:09:54.240 --> 00:09:56.960
It means finding the size that's right for you.
00:09:57.200 --> 00:09:59.919
I had another client who had three different businesses.
00:10:00.159 --> 00:10:05.200
We were talking about burnout, and I asked whether going in three directions was pulling her too thin.
00:10:05.360 --> 00:10:09.279
And she told me that having all three at once was actually her sweet spot.
00:10:09.440 --> 00:10:11.919
It gave her the right amount of stimulation.
00:10:12.159 --> 00:10:14.320
If she held more than that, it would be too much.
00:10:14.480 --> 00:10:19.200
If she held fewer, it just didn't give her enough to feel right, to feel good.
00:10:19.759 --> 00:10:24.799
And so right sizing can be whatever it is for you.
00:10:24.960 --> 00:10:29.679
And it doesn't always, of course, mean just for people who are running their own thing.
00:10:29.840 --> 00:10:37.919
I had a client who came to me in burnout and she had been working reduced hours for months, and she was about to start a new job and trying to have hope.
00:10:38.159 --> 00:10:40.559
But that job was also full-time.
00:10:40.720 --> 00:10:43.759
And so we slowed down and we asked some questions.
00:10:44.080 --> 00:10:50.399
What if it's not possible to fully recover from burnout working 40 hours at this kind of job?
00:10:50.639 --> 00:10:54.480
What if it's not possible to stay out of burnout working 40 hours?
00:10:54.720 --> 00:10:57.759
What if a full work week isn't actually the goal?
00:10:58.399 --> 00:11:01.360
And the question stopped being, how do I survive this job?
00:11:01.519 --> 00:11:04.559
And it became, how do I right size this job?
00:11:04.960 --> 00:11:07.360
Could she work fewer days permanently?
00:11:07.600 --> 00:11:09.440
Could she work more days from home?
00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:12.080
And I'm not saying that every job can bend.
00:11:12.159 --> 00:11:13.279
I know this is the real world.
00:11:13.519 --> 00:11:15.279
We're like working with what we got.
00:11:15.600 --> 00:11:20.000
But asking was a different move than gritting her teeth and hoping it would be different.
00:11:20.799 --> 00:11:24.639
And so the right size can look really different from person to person.
00:11:24.799 --> 00:11:26.960
For one person, it is a handful of clients.
00:11:27.120 --> 00:11:28.720
For another, it's three businesses at once.
00:11:28.879 --> 00:11:32.159
For another, it's the job that doesn't take five full days.
00:11:32.799 --> 00:11:37.279
And the right size isn't only about how much, it can also be about fit.
00:11:37.840 --> 00:11:44.559
Last week I talked about a community call that I continually miss because it happens in the afternoons when my spoons are low.
00:11:44.799 --> 00:11:48.000
But if that call were 10 in the morning, I'd probably show up every time.
00:11:48.240 --> 00:11:53.519
Same people, same call, just a different kind of energy or a different placement.
00:11:54.879 --> 00:12:03.679
You might have three hours of capacity for one kind of work, but if you switch to a different type of work, suddenly you've got capacity to do it for eight hours.
00:12:03.919 --> 00:12:06.559
And that's accurate information about how you work.
00:12:06.799 --> 00:12:11.120
It's not that the three-hour capacity thing was laziness, right?
00:12:12.720 --> 00:12:20.480
When I was still at my contract role, a full day of contract sessions cost me something that a day with my own Audi HD clients doesn't.
00:12:20.720 --> 00:12:25.600
On paper, it was the same structure, but it was really a completely different cost.
00:12:25.840 --> 00:12:30.639
And often on those contract days, I would end up feeling numb by the end of the day.
00:12:30.799 --> 00:12:38.799
Not because of the volume, because by the end of working the contract role, I really wasn't doing that that many sessions.
00:12:38.879 --> 00:12:43.120
I wasn't doing enough to pay the bills, let alone to explain how drained I felt.
00:12:43.360 --> 00:12:52.080
And one day, amidst that numbness, a perfect fit private client inquiry landed in my inbox, and I just couldn't feel the good news.
00:12:52.320 --> 00:12:58.960
And I knew it was time to shift my energy fully back into my own work, the work that took a different kind of energy.
00:13:00.480 --> 00:13:03.279
And that wasn't about my talent or my work ethic.
00:13:04.240 --> 00:13:06.639
And it wasn't only that contract role.
00:13:06.799 --> 00:13:12.879
Across my whole work history, I felt it when something fit and when something tipped into too much.
00:13:13.440 --> 00:13:28.639
And as I was coming out of burnout, I started looking back at the 20 years before my earning amounts, especially, and noticed that I had always hit the same income threshold, even when I was in a professional career.
00:13:28.879 --> 00:13:44.240
Now, of course, if I had stayed in that career, I'm sure I would have kept being promoted with more responsibility and more income, but I had felt constrained and restricted inside the organization I worked for, and I had craved places that I didn't have to mask so hard.
00:13:44.480 --> 00:13:50.000
And so moving into my own work originally, like 13 or so years ago, was a capacity thing too.
00:13:50.240 --> 00:13:55.279
Just like in my own work, my income limit has been around capacity.
00:13:55.919 --> 00:14:00.879
I'm not saying it's impossible for an Audi HD or to be healthy working for someone else.
00:14:01.039 --> 00:14:02.000
I'm sure it is.
00:14:02.240 --> 00:14:07.840
But for me, in the places that I was working and the era that it was, it didn't feel available.
00:14:08.960 --> 00:14:14.320
And my income ceiling wasn't about lacking talent or ambition or skill.
00:14:14.799 --> 00:14:20.000
What I know about myself is that when I'm working on aligned things, I get things done.
00:14:20.159 --> 00:14:21.360
I move fast.
00:14:21.679 --> 00:14:23.840
I'm the definition of determination.
00:14:23.919 --> 00:14:26.960
I am a very hard worker when it is the right work.
00:14:27.200 --> 00:14:30.240
I show up and I'm persistent and I'm thorough.
00:14:31.919 --> 00:14:34.639
The magic Audi HD thoroughness, right?
00:14:34.879 --> 00:14:36.799
Like it's really about capacity.
00:14:37.440 --> 00:14:46.399
My sweet spot is different from that of people who are the ones who are easily doubling their income every year and doing the six-figure and beyond thing.
00:14:46.720 --> 00:14:59.200
In my own work, I would show up for a while and then I'd have to disappear for a while, and then I'd come back and I'd have this rhythm to it, which made it hard to have a higher income amount reached.
00:14:59.279 --> 00:15:10.000
And the number of clients I can work with and be healthy is a lot lower than maybe the more average standard across the neurotypical coaching industry.
00:15:12.240 --> 00:15:16.399
But but small wasn't only a limit, it was also a choice.
00:15:16.960 --> 00:15:18.480
I used to have a team.
00:15:18.639 --> 00:15:27.039
I had virtual assistants who supported client communication, writing and posting on social media, all the logistical pieces of my business.
00:15:27.200 --> 00:15:32.960
And at one point, I had an online business manager who helped me plan launches and directed my VA.
00:15:33.120 --> 00:15:37.840
And I had coaches that I paid thousands of dollars to that helped me with strategy.
00:15:38.320 --> 00:15:40.960
But when you have team members, you're managing people.
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And as an Audi HDer, that can take a lot for me.
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And when I brought my business back in, I had started working with a coach who was also neurodivergent and a spoonie.
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And I noticed that her process was really simple.
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At the end of each session, we would pick the next time to meet.
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And she didn't have a booking link, a big calendar, a team.
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And I thought, oh, this is really nice.
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Like maybe I could do this.
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And so when I came back in, I took that low-demand structure and I applied it to everything.
00:16:13.200 --> 00:16:19.120
With my old podcast, I did social media posts for every episode, sometimes an email to my list.
00:16:19.360 --> 00:16:22.080
And now I really don't post on social media.
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And I put that energy instead into the content itself, into creating the episodes where I actually like putting my energy.
00:16:29.519 --> 00:16:31.200
I used to have a podcast editor.
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Now I edit episodes myself.
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I focus on recording in the same spot in my room the same way each time.
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So I can use the same sound editing template that I created that I can use across episodes.
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And it's actually feeling pretty great.
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And this is rather than making it bigger and bigger, more and more complicated.
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So my touchstone question has been: what's the simpler way I can do this?
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And even during the year or so that I've been producing this podcast, I've done some streamlining.
00:17:05.440 --> 00:17:11.759
I stopped doing episode guides when I noticed they made my production schedule feel heavy, where I want it to feel light.
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Light is what lets me keep going, keep sharing episodes with you.
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So it's the goal.
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Everything I do with this podcast is about sustainability.
00:17:21.599 --> 00:17:29.200
But if any part of you has been thinking that wanting to pare things down means you're settling or giving up, I want to name something.
00:17:29.680 --> 00:17:33.519
Building small isn't the same as playing small.
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As I've been building my business smaller, I've also had the space to really create things that matter to me, like circling with podcast listeners in my by the fire circles, or taking time to dream into each episode of this podcast, or build years-long relationships with clients that feel deep and cozy and like we really know each other.
00:17:58.400 --> 00:18:05.839
So far, I've mostly been talking about work, but right sizing can show up in almost every part of our lives.
00:18:06.480 --> 00:18:12.480
And one is the physical environment that we live in, how much space we have, how much stuff we're taking care of.
00:18:12.720 --> 00:18:15.920
In episode 24, less stuff, more exhale.
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We talked about finding the sweet spot for the amount of stuff we have.
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And this is the same idea, but at the scale of the house itself.
00:18:23.759 --> 00:18:31.359
When my partner and I decided to settle into a 900 square foot home, I was thinking about how it was less to vacuum.
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Like it's all one story, and I'm not lugging a vacuum up and down the stairs.
00:18:35.599 --> 00:18:44.000
I can vacuum the entire house in not too long of a time and have it still be, you know, not feel like a heavy task.
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There's one bathroom that means that there's only one toilet that can break or that I have to clean.
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And it's just less to think about, less to take care of.
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And for my brain, that really matters.
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And my plant collection, which is a special interest.
00:18:59.279 --> 00:19:09.920
Like last summer, when the yard out of my windows was still looking like bare soil and I needed to surround myself with green and life, my indoor plant collection grew really fast.
00:19:11.519 --> 00:19:19.039
But then I started having pest infestations and even watering all of them regularly started to feel like too much.
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And so over the past year, I've slowly been letting things dwindle down.
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I want a plant collection that follows right plant, right place principles, where every species is right for my dry indoor air, the level of light that comes through my windows.
00:19:34.799 --> 00:19:41.839
And when any whenever anything is really struggling, I take it as a sign that it's not right and I move it along.
00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:45.680
And this is the way I've been slowly right sizing my plants.
00:19:46.079 --> 00:19:54.720
And each plant that leaves, I feel this exhale in my body, which is how I know that I haven't yet reached my right size number.
00:19:55.519 --> 00:19:59.119
And then there's money, right sizing our expenses.
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The income you can sustain while staying sane and out of burnout kind of sets the size that your expenses can be.
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Because if your expenses are high, they can keep you burnt out just to cover them, right?
00:20:11.680 --> 00:20:14.480
And so sometimes the move isn't earning more.
00:20:14.640 --> 00:20:21.759
It's looking at what your current life costs and whether it's the right size for the income you can actually sustain and be healthy.
00:20:22.319 --> 00:20:25.119
And for me, that's when the domino effect happened.
00:20:25.359 --> 00:20:27.839
Okay, let me reduce my expenses.
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What does it look like to not have a mortgage, to not need to make more to pay bills, to be able to work less without stress?
00:20:35.200 --> 00:20:37.279
And choosing to have kids was part of this.
00:20:37.440 --> 00:20:44.079
When I was 40 and recovering from burnout, trying to right-size my life, I recognized that it would have been too much.
00:20:44.240 --> 00:20:58.720
And once I took a step in the no kids direction, then it opened the door to create a different kind of communal living situation that didn't revolve around a nuclear family and to buy this intergenerational house where my parents live on the other side of the wall.
00:20:59.839 --> 00:21:03.200
Another place we can right-size is our social life.
00:21:03.440 --> 00:21:10.160
I had a client who had a lot of friends, a lot of contacts, and they felt like they needed to spread themselves between all of them.
00:21:10.319 --> 00:21:15.519
And it made them feel like they were dropping the ball always, or when they showed up, they were just tired.
00:21:15.680 --> 00:21:16.720
And so we talked about it.
00:21:16.799 --> 00:21:18.880
Like, what is your actual friend capacity?
00:21:19.039 --> 00:21:22.559
Maybe you can't spread yourself that wide across that many people.
00:21:22.799 --> 00:21:28.079
Maybe you only have the capacity to be part of one community that you come back to regularly.
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That might be your right size.
00:21:30.400 --> 00:21:35.440
You can listen to episode 26, Peopled Out by Tuesday, to go into that any deeper.
00:21:36.720 --> 00:21:42.880
And since we're heading into holiday season, let's talk about right sizing holidays and events.
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Maybe the end of the year is always overwhelming for you.
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So right sizing could mean changing how you do it.
00:21:50.559 --> 00:21:59.759
A client of mine felt stressed celebrating Christmas, and she started moving toward more earth based traditions, and she found things to celebrate that were about light.
00:22:00.319 --> 00:22:05.039
A candle and breathing, slowing down, connecting with the land.
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And so her holiday season felt so much more relaxed and doable than the frenetic pace that she had had before.
00:22:13.759 --> 00:22:20.480
In my family, one thing we've stopped doing many years ago was exchanging physical gifts amongst the adults.
00:22:20.720 --> 00:22:22.480
It was feeling overwhelming.
00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:32.000
And so now on Christmas, we each have a stocking with a few things in it, a lot of them food items, and everyone has pretty much the same things.
00:22:32.079 --> 00:22:35.920
So it's not a high executive function load to buy or to stuff.
00:22:36.160 --> 00:22:40.480
And since it's mostly consumables, it's not a storage load either.
00:22:41.039 --> 00:22:57.279
And we do a big family dinner together, which often means my sister and I are chopping things in the kitchen together, listening to 90s music, which feels like it's become a tradition, and which gives me a chance to make Ukrainian folk dishes and feel connected to my ancestors.
00:22:57.839 --> 00:23:01.119
Mostly it's just spending time together slowly.
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In each of these, I'm not giving up the thing that matters.
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I'm keeping the connection, the celebration, the community.
00:23:09.359 --> 00:23:11.920
I'm just changing the shape so it fits.
00:23:14.160 --> 00:23:17.359
But there can also be grief in right sizing too.
00:23:17.920 --> 00:23:29.279
When we let go of the dream of the big life or the big money, or whatever it was that never felt right size, there's often relief, like letting go of the thing that always had us on edge or stretched thin.
00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:31.200
That exhale is real.
00:23:31.920 --> 00:23:36.240
But even when we know it wasn't right for us, it can still hurt to put it down.
00:23:36.880 --> 00:23:38.480
Both can be here at once.
00:23:38.720 --> 00:23:43.200
The relief doesn't cancel the grief, and the grief does not mean you chose wrong.
00:23:45.119 --> 00:23:50.720
So as we wind up this episode, what sparked for you?
00:23:51.200 --> 00:23:54.880
Maybe it was a possible shift in your work schedule.
00:23:55.119 --> 00:23:59.519
Maybe it was a resonance that you actually want something small and not big.
00:23:59.759 --> 00:24:06.960
Maybe it was a recognition that you actually need things to be big enough and that too small doesn't carry the energy you need to keep going.
00:24:07.759 --> 00:24:13.200
Maybe it was the beginning of a vision of what right size might look like for you.
00:24:13.440 --> 00:24:19.119
Or maybe it was a spark that could help you get a little clearer, something you can follow.
00:24:20.799 --> 00:24:26.960
And if this all feels overwhelming at all, know that you do not have to change everything immediately.
00:24:27.039 --> 00:24:29.119
You don't even have to change anything at all.
00:24:29.839 --> 00:24:33.680
Right sizing your life isn't this decision that you make once.
00:24:33.920 --> 00:24:44.799
It's really something that you keep moving closer to, evolving, and also realigning season by season as your capacity shifts and as you shift with it.
00:24:45.599 --> 00:24:47.599
And I'm doing it right now.
00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:59.279
This upcoming mid-season break is me right-sizing my own season within the podcast, the same way that I've been building this podcast around sustainability.
00:24:59.519 --> 00:25:04.559
And it's giving my energy a chance to catch back up so I can keep creating for you.
00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:11.279
This episode is brought to you by me and my coaching practice.
00:25:11.519 --> 00:25:17.759
As always, if you want support with these things, I've got a couple of open coaching spots at the time of recording.
00:25:18.640 --> 00:25:23.359
Alright, we will be back from mid-season break, mid to late November.
00:25:23.759 --> 00:25:24.799
Talk then.
00:25:28.480 --> 00:25:40.240
Okay, before you go, if you know unmasking matters, but you're so fuzzy on what it actually looks like in your real life, I made something for that.
00:25:40.400 --> 00:25:42.720
It's called the Unmasking Menu.
00:25:42.960 --> 00:25:48.319
Not a plan, just seven sparks your body can actually follow.
00:25:48.559 --> 00:25:51.759
Free over at unmaskingmenu.com.
00:25:52.319 --> 00:26:05.119
And if something in these episodes has finally put words to what you've been living and you're curious what it would feel like to have me as a partner with your particular tangle, I offer one on one coaching for Audi HD women.
00:26:05.279 --> 00:26:08.480
Learn more at adriasophia.com.
00:26:08.880 --> 00:26:10.480
Thanks for being here.
