Keeping Going When You Don’t Know What’s Next

Welcome to Make Good Things Happen, a podcast for makers in business presented to you by Angela Dalton and Renee Baker. Welcome to Make Good Things Happen. Season three, episode one, we are back and we’re really pleased to be here. I have to say I have missed podcasting a little bit.
For no other reason than but to be looking at your lovely face for a while we do it. How are you? Yeah, I’m good. How are you? I know it’s really the only time we get to talk these days. Exactly. Last week, the members of Make Good Things Happen received an email from us where we’ve outlined kind of where we’re at professionally. Renee wrote an email that I felt was really…
quite strong and real and honest i was going to ask you how you felt about writing that and sort of what was going through your mind while you were writing that email yes so for this month for our member newsletter we did things a little bit differently i guess first and foremost because it’s march and it’s the first newsletter that we’ve sent for the year and that’s somewhat uncharacteristic of us we
have always sent a monthly newsletter to our members of Make Good Things Happen, which is our online community of makers in business. And that is something that we are quite proud of, I suppose, that commitment that we’ve upheld for the last five years, sending a monthly newsletter, which always has an introduction from us, but it also includes.
all sorts of bits and pieces educational content news and so forth as to what we’re offering our members but yeah it’s march well we sent it last week so it was february at the time and we hadn’t actually been in touch and so that was weighing on my mind i know it was weighing on angela’s mind not to speak on behalf of you but it was one of many i suppose tasks that were sitting on our to-do list
undone and for two very high output people who really value value as in providing value to our to our audience to our community to our
clients it just was feeling like a pretty big weight on our shoulders and so I just opened up an email and just started writing because I thought you know what I’m going to share some of these feelings with you the members and I just wanted to to start that way that’s I guess the place that it came from and so I guess as it continues the the sentiment of that is that we’ve been operating
as a business partnership for, it’ll be 10 years in October this year, which is actually a really long time and a big milestone that we’re really proud to celebrate along with some other businesses within our community. I know the Makers and Shakers are celebrating that this year. So we’re Outer Island, another design duo, and I’m sure they’re not the only ones, they’re just the ones that come to mind. And it feels really important to us to, I guess, acknowledge that. But it also means that we’ve…
been doing this for a long time really without much of a break at all i suppose even if we are on a break we’re not really on a break because for me is even when i’m not working i’m thinking about the business or work or something to do with it i think that’s the nature of owning your own business i think that is the one of the prices you pay it’s always on your mind yes and i guess
you know financial advice you might hear or otherwise would say oh but you need to factor that in it’s really hard to factor in the switching off when it’s who you are it’s a part of your makeup i suppose i am already on a tangent but speaking of makers and shakers i remember emma who one of the founders of makers and shakers said something to me about when you know about to have a child and go into labor and working and so forth and i remember thinking okay yep make sure when i’m about to give
birth I switch off but in fact I was actually working while I was in labor at the hospital on my laptop which you know in reflection I’m not super proud of um but yeah it’s me either I feel I feel I feel responsible and it’s not a good thing you know no I’m not wearing it like a badge I’m no I know you’re not you think like should I just you know get a few emails away turn my out of office on you know like you know you’re going to be out of action for a little while
or a good while I should say a good while as it turns out and I guess that’s a segue because here we are it’s actually two and a half years since then and I’m still not back at work full time that’s I guess a circumstance that I didn’t really think I would find myself in probably because there’s a bit of a disillusion when you are pre-child that you just think that once the child’s here you do just get back to work and things work themselves out but of course it’s not always as black and white as that especially when you’re
have different needs within the family that need to be met and you can’t always be away from your child. That’s I guess just the reality and that’s certainly not a complaint either but it has meant that we’ve found ourselves in a position where I haven’t been available.
One of the things we talk about in that email is that in the past when one of us hasn’t been available, the other does sort of pick things up or carry the load or we work it out or we balance it amongst ourselves. But we sort of have reached a point where that’s just not working at the moment. Well, the thing that you mentioned in the email, which was also actually a moment of realisation for me in a way, where you mentioned that we’ve built a business.
where there are two people needed, minimum, working full-time plus full-time-ish in order to keep it going. And while you and I were both able to work full-time, that was how it was. Currently, neither of us are able to work full-time. And that reality really sunk in only recently to both of us, particularly me. Like I said, when I read that part of your email, I’m like, oh, yeah, now I’m actually seeing what you’re seeing as well.
We share this just because we want to be transparent and hopefully some of you will find it interesting, the fact that we’re…
telling the story about how hard it is to run a business with honesty. And this is part of our values. And one of the things that Renee did say in that email she wrote is that we are, not only do we value value, but we’re always really, we stick to our values. Personal and business values are very important to us and they’ve grounded the way that we operate.
not only within business but as friends in business as well as partners in business so there’s a few different sort of modes that we need to be able to be sure that we’re doing this properly well we met through business but formed a friendship very quickly and have always had a very strong relationship outside of our business partnership as well and so i mean some may say that’s a tricky complicated situation to find yourself well
it can be but only it can be but not very often for us thankfully again one of the things you pointed out which i thought was interesting was it’s non-traditional capitalism the way that we operate our business because to us the most important thing is each other and each other’s health and well-being
And we largely wanted to do this because we knew that we found a way that we could work really well together and that our output together meant we could provide something that we were really proud of and that was needed and wanted. And I think if we were to sort of do those things on our own, it wouldn’t have the same impact.
and it also wouldn’t feel the same within us as well like the enjoyment of doing this is because we get to do it together as well
And I think that’s a reasonable thing to say that we’re allowed to enjoy what we do, especially when we have our own business. I mean, it really should be. Yes, of course, it’s hard. It is hard. And you’re going to have to work hours you didn’t expect and put yourself through situations and conversations you never thought you would have to. Really, you should be feeling a sense of fulfillment and enjoyment for a big chunk of the time.
If it’s not, then it’s a good time to do some re-evaluating. And I guess that’s where we found ourselves. Both of us felt like we didn’t have the resources or the capacity to manage things after a break that we both had over Christmas. I certainly expected to be able to just get back into the rhythm of things that didn’t happen.
it didn’t happen for you either for you know different reasons but what it meant was that we were both not spending time in the business in the way that we normally would and we weren’t showing up for the business in the way that we normally would so you know rightfully we sit down and we go well hang on let’s just pause then because one of the things that we’ve always felt is if you don’t know what to do then don’t do anything until you do know
We still don’t really know, I have to say, about what’s next for us but we did identify that things needed to change. We do want to keep doing the podcast but we are going to alter things a little bit in the membership. We’ve created a lot of very helpful content. It may not all be relevant to you.
But honestly, like it’s $9 a month and you can cancel any time. If you just want to pay $9, watch everything in a week and then cancel, you can actually do that. I don’t know if you have that many hours in a week. Yeah. Well, you’d probably need the whole month just quietly. We decided we need to switch things up in any case. We’re going to keep doing the podcast, but given the level of uncertainty that we have, we’re just going to.
keep going and tell the story as we go and um join us if you will and i think that’s where we we did actually feel like we did come to that conclusion that we wanted to stick by that mantra of keep keeping going keep going which is why it felt like the best thing to do was to include firstly our members but of course you as well in that process and so you can be part of that journey sorry for the cliche with us so in any case the first priority we have is to
keep bringing you this podcast we’re obviously indulging a little bit in our story for episode one we will be back to our more structured setup we
also invested in equipment we weren’t going to not use this i know we hadn’t even used our new setup yeah we would love for you to continue to support us i think is what i feel okay saying at this point in time and one of the things that has really razzed us up is your feedback so thank you every time we hear that someone has listened or anything like that it just really is
And not saying that it’s about necessarily needing an ego boost at this point in time, but it does really help because.
That is something that jumping onto podcasting, which is so different to social media, which is something we do want to talk about in this episode as well. You have no feedback really in that you don’t know who’s viewing or clicking or seeing or liking or replying. You kind of put this out there and then you just hope for the best. So thank you so much. We’re just so happy that we have you with us on this journey. And from all around the world, I think that’s part of the thing that’s surprised me is that people are listening.
from all corners of the globe. Thank you very much. What we did want to talk about as part of this kind of assessment that we’re doing, not just about ourselves but our business and what things look like for us moving forward, we are also assessing our relationships to social media and how we feel about it at the moment rather than just getting in a rut and doing the same thing over and over again and hoping for a different result. It’s about us going,
well we’re obviously pausing for a reason let’s really look at what is meaningful to us in our lives and in our business lives but also like what drains us what’s difficult what is hard for us to show up to do and we have both had that feeling about social media for quite some time and i think it adds to our burnout i think it adds to our stress i don’t think
When I see the results over time, I don’t think it’s worth it overall anymore. I’ve used this metaphor with several people that.
I’ve talked about how I currently feel about social media and I’ve said, you know, it’s like you went to this party and the party was awesome and in the beginning you were seeing people you hadn’t seen for ages and you were having a laugh and a bit of a dance and a bit of a drink and the party, you know, hits its peak and you’re having a great time and then you’re stuck in a D&M with someone and then suddenly you wonder what the time is and then you look over and you realise that there’s just a bunch of really, really drunk people there and some of them are about to get into a fight.
and you think maybe I should have already left or maybe it’s time to go. Nothing good’s going to happen from here. Everyone’s aggro and tired. That is how I feel about social media right now. It’s that pivotal moment at a party where if you go now, you’ll miss the fights. But if you hang around, you’re probably going to see one.
I don’t think it’s good for me personally. I don’t think it’s good for you either in many ways. I don’t think it’s good for anyone in many ways. It just doesn’t serve us the way it used to. It’s using us. And I have had a few weeks where I haven’t had it on my phone. I’ve only been checking things occasionally while I’m sitting at my desk doing some work. I don’t miss it at all. I still have the habit of picking up my phone to look for it, but I’ve put some puzzles on there that I do instead.
so i’m transitioning from the dopamine of social media into a quick quiz but at least i’m not being aggravated or upset or seeing horrific stuff and seeing people treat each other really poorly online i’m not keen to go back i have to say how are you feeling about at the moment you’ve got a totally new angle to add to your assessment of things which is motherhood yes and i was curious as to how you were feeling about it
your experience with going off social media because i hadn’t really asked you like purposefully i wanted to talk to you about it on the podcast how you’re feeling
And whether you thought you wanted to put it back on. In the first few days after you told me you deleted it from your phone, I was like so close to deleting it because I very much piggyback off things when people do things. It’s like how I get motivated, kind of like a body doubling in many ways. So I did feel really strongly motivated to delete it at that point. I’ve kind of lost the wave again because I didn’t do it and I’ve stayed on. I’m not feeling like that same urgency to delete it.
instead is started a list in my phone of the content that I engage with and what I enjoy like what I feel good about and then what makes me feel a bit weird afterwards and sometimes that feeling doesn’t come straight away which is why it’s really difficult sometimes it might be that I’m sitting on the couch later or doing something out of the house and I am reminded of something I’ve seen and then I start to feel that kind of discomfort or the weirdness so it is a bit of a tricky one and of course the way
that it’s designed on that platform is it’s so rapid fire that you don’t have the time to process what you’re seeing. And I think that’s my biggest struggle, especially when I hear very well-meaning advice from friends and family who say
if I share that I’m interested in getting off the platform Instagram in particular I don’t have TikTok and I never have so that does help one less one less platform is to say oh why don’t you just
curate your content so that it’s just art stuff or just cute animals or comedy or whatever but i think no matter how much you do that there is still a way for the disruption to infiltrate and whether that’s through advertising or whether that’s through the suggested post feature which of course i do turn that off every 30 days i just don’t know if that’s enough for me i feel like i need almost like an all or nothing yeah and i think
Because what seems to happen inevitably is you are fed the same thing over and over again. And I was actually having that thought the other day, remembering the original chronological real-time feed and the whole reason it was called Insta was because there was an instant connection of your feed to the people that followed it in that.
time in that space and that’s i think where a lot of the meaning from the use of the platform came from i know they took that away and i remember at the time it was
a big deal and obviously we get used to it we have a complaint and then we get used to it we adapt and then we complain about the next change that they make i was remembering just the innocence of that you know we took a photo of something cute we put a funny filter on it that made it look really retro and then we put it on our feed to share with our friends and it was just such a
Such a straightforward, lovely thing. I think my first five or six photos, I didn’t realise it was like a public feed because I think the Insta actually originally was because the little icon was a Polaroid camera. And like you say, those retro filters, one of them had the Polaroid frame on it, I think. And so it was like taking an instant photo.
And, yeah, I think the first five or six photos I took were on a photo shoot with Jason Grant. We were at some house in the eastern suburbs doing styling for, I think, a freedom catalogue and we were just mucking around taking stupid photos of ourselves, you know, in funny faces. Look at Instagram. Isn’t this funny? Look at this cute thing. I know. Like you think about what it is now. Twitter turned into X and then that made everything else disgusting.
were less than savory in the way that they interact online just went everywhere else yeah and i know that they say the internet it’s a dead internet and that 45 of what’s happening on there is actually bots and not real it doesn’t matter it’s not a nice place to be it’s even more reason exactly
But you did say the motherhood side of things and I think that’s probably what’s holding me on at the moment. Of course, I have a beautiful network of makers and creative business owners that I consider friends in many ways and that’s really my central point of contact I have with them, a lot of them.
and how we communicate with one another. It is that kind of connection. And I often think, oh, I wish that there was like a messenger version of Instagram like Facebook where I could just have the messaging app because that would be very different. But one thing that I did notice in my experiment, if you like, was that I do find sometimes I’m motivated positively in terms of mom life content, I suppose, for want of a better word. For example, a couple of the food.
recipe-based accounts that I follow will do like on Sunday night oh I’m just you know doing some prep for lunch boxes for the week and then I’m reminded oh yeah that would be a really good idea for me to just make a batch of muffins or brownies or get some bircher made so that tomorrow is easier and those are those reminders that I do get from the platform but then I do think to myself well perhaps that’s just about setting a calendar reminder I don’t necessarily need someone else to remind me and then I think I guess
i try and put that through the business lens and our content that you and i provide and where we would sort of fit in that space like would we act as that little kind of friendly reminder which is often what we’ve referred to ourselves as and how that would be structured within a social media landscape but i think
like you said already i follow thousands of people but there are about four or five people who i see and all i do is look at their content because that’s all that gets shown to me and by the time i’ve seen everything they’ve posted you know i’m off the app for whatever reason because i’m not sitting on there for hours but in order for me to be seeing their content every time i open the app that means they’re posting all the time they’re posting multiple times a day all day and i really think
You have to be prolific on stories for the algorithm on Instagram to favor you. I think, of course, like there’s exceptions to that every time there always is. But generally speaking, what gets engagement and what gets rewarded on that platform is if you’re.
oversharing constantly and that’s i think where it struggles for us because i think i’ve made the joke to you the amount of times i text you and the photos and the commentary i provide you unnecessary mundane details about my life instead of texting those to you i could just be sharing those on social media well i i also think it’s about whether or not you’re prepared to do that that’s right and i i don’t think that just because
I own a business. I should have to create videos all day. There are so many other things that I need to do with my time. There’s just too much else going on that is much more interesting and rewarding to me that is part of my business. That if it takes that to use that platform for quote unquote free, basically I’m handing my life over to that platform.
And I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that anymore. You mentioned about it being free, but I think those five accounts that I mentioned that I follow who I see their content every single day, they all have social media managers. So yes, they’re businesses. They might run online stores or podcasts, et cetera, but they all have someone that they employ to post for them under the illusion that it’s them. So made to appear that it’s the person. Right.
that’s doing the posting okay how do you feel about that i’m actually curious to know how do you feel about that in terms of ethics well because i still know that it’s their words and photographs and images it’s just that they’re not the ones that are uploading it doing the you know doing the captions doing all the manual labor it’s still them okay so because it’s admin only you feel okay about it in that circumstance
They’re still having to video though. They’re still having to capture. They’re still documenting the minutiae of their existence. I just don’t know if I’m prepared to do that. Yeah, I don’t think I am. If I was going to do it, I would have already. And I think that Alice of Alice Nightingale talked about this recently because Alice has always been really great at creating content for her online fashion brand, you know, way back from the Etsy days. She mastered it early. Pre-social media, yeah.
And she has also adapted incredibly well, and I would say very creatively, in a way that Ashley from Uncle Funkle has as well, adapted and made it work for them in a way. And same with Jackie of Betsy Blonde. Some people have found…
a way to do it that’s unique to them that still works it was my point with alice she did a day in the life video which i guess showing a little bit about me i do love that reality that’s the kind of content that i do engage with and so i am happy to just see what someone’s had for breakfast and you know what they’re doing in their day and so i do
love a bit of a time stamped day in the life it’s very we used to do those kinds of blog posts back in etsy days i remember when they used to do them for like models in dolly magazine it’s always been a thing and i’ve always always been they on a plate all that kind of stuff but i think alice said there were a few comments on her
recent one or one of the ones that she did to say oh i love this can you do more and she’s like well yeah but do you know how much extra effort it is to film my whole day when i’m just trying to get my day done like it’s like yeah exactly yeah how are you doing that logistically for me it’s come to a crucial decision point of how am i going to use this platform or these platforms from now on because it’s a different world and i’ve decided that i need to just sort of reassess
how that all works and therefore obviously that means the same for us and in and our business so stay tuned that one excuse that we keep or that i keep oh but i need it for my business and i think i would love to find a way to not
have to say that and so yes stay tuned and also if you’re listening and you’re pondering these things along with us we also encourage you to check out tess mccabe’s book self-promotion without social media which is an encyclopedia of information about how you can operate your business without relying strictly on social media and and i think it’s going to become something that supports our messaging
in a different way as opposed to something we use as a primary channel for our campaigns moving forward and i guess on that note if you want to keep following us make sure you do sign up for the newsletter the make things happen free newsletter which again we would normally do once a month but we haven’t because um see aforementioned discussion this week i we are going to have one little regular segment in our
first podcast back for season three I have been watching the HBO sensation The Pit starring Noah Wiley and also produced by him many of you will probably already know about this show because when I do log on to social media that’s all there is is stuff about The Pit but also of course they’re always listening so they know I’m watching the show the
interesting part obviously is that noah wiley many people will know as i think it was dr john carter i want to say of er which was originally aired in the 90s and he was very much involved in what i would consider the the precursor not a prequel but a precursor in terms of style there is a lot of similarities between
this current show the pit and er er at the time was also particularly groundbreaking in its style so yeah noah wiley who was obviously a big part of that original show is
the main character in this show as well and has been heavily involved in the production side of things. And I don’t know if it’s a gimmick or if it’s a storytelling tool is that the story is told in real time. So each series, so series two is a full day. Series one is a full day and series two is a full day. And by day, I mean a shift in the emergency room. The whole season’s one day. Wow. Of a hospital in Pittsburgh. So it does have this very strong.
sense of urgency and real life feel to it what was interesting was again when i was dipping into social media the other day honestly they make videos about anything now but there was a video about how the hairstylist had to keep their hair the same
for like the whole filming season because it’s one day, but it’s, you know, months. Anyway, that was one of the many things I found interesting about it. But it is a really interesting drama. It’s very compelling to watch. It’s not for the faint-hearted. They have gone to extremes to show realistic accidents, operations. You know, sometimes it is a little bit confronting, but I do also enjoy the drama of it. And there’s some really wonderful characters in there.
ensemble cast and i think they recently won an award for the ensemble at the actor awards which is what the sag awards used to be called so that’s what i’ve been doing wow you’ve been doing well this week i well and this isn’t going to be my this week i but i do want to brag that i’ve read six books this year already fiction books that’s amazing i went from
august to december reading one book like it just took me so long turned out to be one of my most favorite books ever just that i took forever to read it that was atmosphere which was your recommendation tangent away from that to say this week i went to spotlight and bought the new paint by numbers kit by kidia pelascus and have started painting that yeah i’m loving it i’ve been doing a lot of coloring in
as well so this kind of feels like a bit of a step up from that and yeah maybe i can post a photo of that to social media i love it i think that’s lovely i think that paint by numbers is underrated i think there are a few
crafty activities that because they don’t necessarily produce something entirely original that you shouldn’t enjoy it or it’s not as worthwhile doing i just really think that’s not fair because i get a lot out of coloring in and honestly that’s what the world needs more of is us all just chilling the hell out for a bit yeah i’ve already found that the kit comes with a couple of paint brushes and all the paints that you need all the colors that you need but i also bought a few
other brushes as well just so i had a few different brushes to play with and so like yes of course you could strive for like a matte perfect you know neat and tidy thing but i’m actually just experimenting with different brushes and seeing what it looks like i mean it’s going to be the drawing that kid has done that kitty has done i think every single person who uses that kit is going to create something different well on that note i am going to go and watch the latest episode of the pin and
say thank you for listening and it’s really nice to be back on the podcast microphone we don’t have any big announcements or anything like major to share we just sharing the process and the fact that we don’t know either and and i know it probably
sounds counterintuitive as two business owners giving business owners advice to say we don’t know what’s next but that’s the sort of mentors we are is honest and real because we want to show people the reality of doing it in a sustainable way so that you are able to take care of yourself if we knew the secret formula we would have applied it by now and we would have told you all about it i can 100 guarantee that
And what we’ve discovered is there isn’t one and it really is about listening. Sorry. There isn’t one. Yeah. We’ll be back again soon and we will share what we’re doing with the business, I guess, over the course of the series. In the meantime, feel free to listen to our back catalogue of episodes if this is your first time encountering us. Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next time. Bye. Bye. Thanks for listening to Make Good Things Happen.
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