Real Productivity Solutions without the Hustle

Aug 17

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Consistent motivation can be a real struggle as an entrepreneur. Listen in to today's podcast as psychologist Jenna Hellberg shares her framework for creating a sustainable business that feels good.

Jenna helps service-based business owners be productive, work-life-balanced humans. She leans on her experience as a psychologist and background as a Finn to help solopreneurs find practical ways to be more productive without the hustle.

Website // Instagram // Podcast // Framework

The episode:

Katrina Widener: Hi everyone and welcome back to the Badass Business Squad podcast. I'm very excited because we have Jenna on today, our second Finnish guest. Which just makes me internally happy. I met Jenna through Melanie Lea, one of the previous guest experts, and so I'm very excited to have you on. Would you mind introducing yourself to everybody quickly?

Jenna Hellberg: Sure. I'm so happy to be here, I'm so excited. Melanie introduced us in a way. So my name is Jenna Hellberg. I work with service based business owners you know, they're already seeing success in their business, they're great at what they do. And because of this they feel like business should kind of objectively be good, but they don't feel quite right behind the scenes. They often describe that they struggle with kind of following through on things that they like to do. Like if they have a project or a business update in mind, they somehow just can't get to them. Maybe they prioritize the client work or they just start working longer hours to try and fit this stuff in. Even if they did have the time for some reason, they just avoid it cuz they feel like they can't bring themselves to do the thing. So, I lean on my training as a psychologist and my experience as a photography business owner, and then just as a practical Fin, to try to help them find these practical shifts that help them spend more of their time on the things that they actually wanna do. That they actually care about.

Katrina Widener: Yeah. Thank you so much for coming on. I love so many of the things that you bring to this conversation. And for everyone listening today, we're gonna be talking about exactly what you were talking about. How people can often see that self discipline is what's gonna get them to that next stage.

Jenna Hellberg: Mm-hmm.

Katrina Widener: And maybe that's not where actually the problem lies and we aren't all made with consistent access to a lot of willpower. But I really appreciate that you're also bringing your background as a psychologist and as a Fin and just your own personal experience as well to this conversation. Cuz I think that this is something that people struggle with all the time is this idea of, "I should just be able to force myself to do this thing." and that's just not how we as human beings operate. So I'm excited to dive in.

Jenna Hellberg: Yes!

Katrina Widener: So I think people have probably gotten a good idea of what we're gonna be talking about today, but just to make sure that everyone is on the same page, I was hoping you wouldn't mind sharing a little bit about your expectation of trying to hustle your way to this end goal. And also just a little bit of like how you've seen it show up in other entrepreneurs?

Jenna Hellberg: Yes, for sure. So I think there are a couple of things that are in the background of this. So many of us start out in a regular job, and even before that we were in an environment where putting in more work resulted in some kind of reward. So school, and then later the regular work environment. And I had that, I worked as a psychologist, I had, you know, the regular job with the regular hours. If you worked overtime, you get paid overtime, that kind of thing. But when we start our businesses we maybe don't have that model of how we can make business work and how we should do the thing. At least when I started out the prevailing message out there was, "You just have to hustle, hustle. You just have to do all the things. Try all the things. Take all the jobs."

And I just went with that, and I think that's kind of what many of us do. At first it can feel great. It's like, "Yeah, I'm getting so much done. I'm doing all these things. I'm getting out there." But at least for me after a few years it was just like, "I can't." Things started to get harder. It was harder to do the new things and add on more stuff. So it's kind of like that high achiever from school is trying to still do more and more and more to see results and it's just not working. And I think what a lot of us start to do then is like, "Okay it's the hustle thing." We still sort of search the motivational world, the mindset world for solutions. Like, "I'm just gonna get more motivated. I'll get more self discipline. I'll get more willpower if I just like follow these people's stuff."

Katrina Widener: Mm-hmm.

Jenna Hellberg: And when it doesn't work, it gets really frustrating. What I think is positive is we do need a type of mindset to do this business thing, we do need motivation. But there are other things we need too. Having good systems and practices in place that help us sort of focus on the work that actually makes an impact. But the trouble there is also that we easily go, "I'm gonna get that new planner." I got the Get Shit Done planner, cuz I was like, "Yeah this is my year!"

And when that doesn't work either, when just putting in place systems doesn't work either, things again get frustrating. Then for me at this point it started being like, "I just need a break. I'm so exhausted. I'm gonna watch Netflix for a day or I'm gonna go for a vacation or like, I'll go for a pedicure, I'm doing self-care today."

Katrina Widener: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jenna Hellberg: And then you know, trying to get back to the hustle again. Like basically I just did self care so that I could hustle again.

Katrina Widener: Yeah. Yeah I think that so many people listening are gonna be like, "I completely feel that exact same way." And even as you were talking, I was just like, "Oh my gosh." It fits in so well with that idea of, true self care isn't taking a vacation from your day to day life, or escaping from your day to day life. It's making a life you don't feel the need to escape from. Our society is just not set up to support that idea though. Our society and really capitalism as a whole is like, "Buy this Four Hour Work Week book," or "Miracle Morning," or "The High Performance Planner." We talk about all of these things, and I think what's important is finding out what works best for you individually and not just trying to adapt what someone else is doing.

I'm really glad that you mentioned there's systems you can put in place, there's tasks that you can do that make things easier so that then you don't have to just be like, "All right, this person does the miracle morning. I'm gonna go do the miracle morning too, cuz that's gonna be the thing that makes me super motivated or that's gonna be the thing that gives me willpower." when it's just another thing you're actually adding on your to-do list in a sense. It's another way of hustling. Like it makes me think of the get rich quick programs where it's like, "Get motivation quick!" So I'm glad that you brought all of that up.

When it comes to these ideas of how to really take a look at finding solutions that are supportive instead of really helping that narrative of "I should be doing more," where would you recommend people get started? Or what kind of tangible ideas would you give for them?

Jenna Hellberg: Yes. So I'd love to start out by talking about my framework, cuz I think that that helps kind of frame these solutions. That can be helpful. So there are a few things that are at play when it comes to like getting things done, getting ourself motivated to do a thing. One of them is just across the board for everybody, which is how our brain is built.

So there are things in our brains that just kind of stop us from getting the things done or trying new things, all these mechanisms. Cuz our brain is all about instant gratification or avoiding urgent pain. So it's really hard to motivate ourselves to update the copy on my website, cuz there's no sort of instant pain. Maybe some of us can get an instant gratification from doing it, but it's not the same as seeing money in your bank account right away or getting that client project done. So the brain is like one thing where everyone has these challenges, but then I've identified this kind of ecosystem that can help us not bypass the brain, but it can help us. It makes it easier for us to do the things despite of how our brain is built.

The first part of it is wholeness. So our physical, emotional, mental wellbeing plays such a huge part in our ability to be productive. When we feel well, we do better. When we don't do so well, our brain tries to protect us and tries to get us to do even less. Cuz it's like, "You are stressed out. So I'm gonna save you from updating your course."

Katrina Widener: Yeah!

Jenna Hellberg: Or whatever it is that you have planned. And then the second piece of this ecosystem is design. So it is the systems and the routines and that stuff that we talked about before. But it's important that those things are the ones that fit us. Like you just earlier said that we try all these things that don't necessarily fit us. And that might be that we have a bunch of tasks that we do in our business, and maybe we as part of our design give them off to VA. But if there are tasks that don't even bring us results, there's no point in handing them off when we could just stop doing them. And then the third piece is sisu which is a Finnish word that basically means resilience, determination, having grit. You have a determined way of approaching challenges even when they're hard.

So when I talk about these three things it may sound like the pushing through and the self-discipline, but it's kind of a healthier version of that. And it's the same with the design piece and then the wholeness piece, which is what we often just ignore as business owners.

Katrina Widener: Mm-hmm.

Jenna Hellberg: So when we have like a kind of even amount, when we strengthen all of these pieces of the ecosystem, it becomes easier to do the things despite how we're built.

Katrina Widener: Yeah. That makes so much sense. We as human beings oftentimes make things harder on ourselves in a lot of ways.

Jenna Hellberg: Mm.

Katrina Widener: But I'm thinking of there's this book called Business Brilliant, where it compares the mindsets and the ways that self-made millionaires in America answer questions, versus how the middle class in America answers the exact same question.

Jenna Hellberg: Ooh!

Katrina Widener: It was a very interesting book, but the one that has always stuck in my mind is this idea that when the question was "What is the next action to take when something doesn't work or if you've tried something and it doesn't work?" Middle America was saying, "You stop doing that thing and you go do something else" and self-made millionaires were saying, "You just slightly tweak it and move forward. And then you tweak it and you move forward, and you tweak it and you move forward." That's how you find success. And I think that that's like a very similar idea to what you're saying about this more healthy, more holistic way of viewing grit and determination.

It's not forcing yourself or pushing past your limits or creating this life that feels so stressful in the day to day, because you don't have any of these systems in place, or you haven't thought proactively, et cetera, et cetera. It's, it's being determined enough to say, "Okay this isn't working. How can I adjust things so that they are working for me instead of pushing past it? How can I adjust this so that it's a little bit easier?"

And I think that also as entrepreneurs and really as a society, we think a lot about this idea of, "When I achieve this one thing, then I'll have these feelings, or If I make X amount of money, then I can have the life that I don't need to take a vacation from. Or if I get this many new clients, then I can afford this person to come in and help me," or whatever it might look like. So yeah it completely makes sense to me of this just new way of viewing the term grit or viewing the term determination. As opposed to like a self judging and a more of a self supportive aspect. So it makes a lot of sense.

Jenna Hellberg: I love that you're saying the things that I had thought I'd say. But it's tricky cuz often when we can't get ourselves to do the things, we make it mean something about us. Or like when business isn't "a success yet" we make it mean something about us, when we could be looking for like, "Wait this is just information. If I'm feeling like this when I try to do this, what's the information I can get from here?" And then you can solve for that, you put in place the systems or take care of yourself so that you actually have the energy to keep doing the things. And I love what you said about that we think that we'll enjoy things once we achieve something. But that's kind of what this is all about, the wholeness piece especially. But also like the sisu piece, the kind of mindset slash motivation piece. If we can do business in a way that already feels good now, if we can live that life we thought we were gonna have as a business owner, if we can live that now, while we're working towards the things, it's gonna be a lot easier. It's gonna be more sustainable. It's gonna be more fun. Cuz so many give up way before they get to whatever milestone they had in mind when "That's when I'm gonna be happy and feel good and do all the things."

Katrina Widener: And the thing is if we are already trained to push or hustle our way to this goal point, when we reach that goal point, we're just gonna pick a new goal point. It's not like we're gonna be like, "Oh, gonna change the way my brain works now just magically!" Like I know for myself, I was always super resistant to the idea of hiring someone until I reached a specific pay grade, essentially.

Jenna Hellberg: Mm-hmm.

Katrina Widener: And it actually took somebody else who I was working with as a client who was like, "Oh I hired this person, and they're actually like helping me get to that next level. As opposed to "I get to that next level, and then I get them." And I was like, "Oh my God that makes so much sense. Why did I never think about that beforehand?" And now I have my business manager, Brittany. And I have my podcast editor, Carolyn who's gonna be editing this podcast. To have them on board to do these things then provides me the ability to one, not do the tasks that really drag me down that really take up my time and my energy so that I can't be focusing on the things that bring me joy and light me up and are actually the best thing I do. Which if I'm stressed about meeting with my clients because I don't feel like I have time, then that's defeating the whole purpose of my business!

But then also by having them on my team I get people who have new ideas and who are able to say, "Oh I have this person I can get you into connection with, or I know this podcast that maybe you can go on." And also for me it's like a collaborative thing so that I feel better in the moment anyway, even if I wasn't having extra work get done. And it's just like that small switch of expanding my brain to see how that could be possible for me, as opposed to stuck in my old ways of thinking that really, really made it click for me.

Okay, so we're getting close to the end of our time limit. So for the last question I wanted to ask you was for anyone who's sitting here saying like, "Okay I'm really intrigued by your framework. I really love exactly everything that you guys have been talking about, but how do I get started? What would be the first thing I can do?"

Jenna Hellberg: Okay. So what I would suggest that you start out with is maybe figuring out in which area of that ecosystem I talked about you could use a boost first. And I mean, I'm gonna say that for most business owners it's probably most likely going to be the wholeness piece. So try to identify a couple of things that you could do to add to that piece of your ecosystem. Not things that, you know, everyone else is doing. Not things that seems trendy or cool right now. But to really evaluate what would actually feel supportive for you? What would actually fit you as a person, but also fit your business, fit the goals that you have right now? Or just what fits the life that you wanna live as a business owner?

If you want a refresher on the framework, you can just find it at www.jennahellberg.com/framework so that you can see kind of what kinds of things these might include.

Katrina Widener: Yes, The link will be in the show notes so everybody can find it there!

Jenna Hellberg: Awesome. So then it's just a matter of starting to incorporate that into your life. And I gotta say, when I started investing in my wholeness piece it brought me so much mental clarity and it was so much easier to then see what would make sense in my business? What systems could I put in place? What can I stop doing? So that's probably the area where I'd recommend everybody start.

Katrina Widener: Perfect! Thank you so much for coming on this has been amazing. Before we hop off, will you let everyone know where they can find you, and if you have any freebies you'd like to offer them now is the time!

Jenna Hellberg: For sure. So any of my current resources that I have, you could find at www.jennahellberg.com/hello. I'm also a podcast host and my podcast is called Building Balance. So that might be a good place to go, if you have recognized that you're kind of trying these surface level solutions and wanna figure out what actually works for you. So there's a good chunk of thoughts and tips around that on the podcast.

Katrina Widener: Perfect. Thank you so much for coming on, I really appreciate it. If you guys have any questions on anything just come and ask us we're here for it! So thank you!

Jenna Hellberg: Thank you. Thank you so much Katrina for having me on this was so much fun!