Feminine productivity: Being productive without burning out in business
After having experienced burnout myself, I know how the word ‘productivity’ can feel intimidating and even traumatizing to a lot of women in business.
It can feel like we’re being treated as machines whose value/worth is being measured by our output. It can feel like we are being forced to fit the standards of a capitalist society that is hustle-obsessed for the sake of flexing in front of an instagram crowd.
And so at one point, I relinquished all “doing” and surrendered to a state of being— swinging far onto the other extreme that glorifies making money through ‘effortlessness.’ Perhaps, you may have seen this ‘effortless’ lifestyle: wellness coaches and influencers on social media showing off how easy it gets to be to make money through only working for 3 hours each day while sipping champagne in bathtubs, yet bringing in millions of dollars.
However, what I’ve learned is that when we are glamorizing ‘doing nothing/effortlessness’ in our business, it can feel unfulfilling and unsatisfying. For we are resenting an aspect of our soul expression through our work.
Because work really is meant to be a pathway of experiencing joy, aliveness, and fullness. Work is meant be to a place of fulfillment for our hearts, our client’s hearts, and to God.
And so I want to share with you, how I have been able to integrate productivity back into my life, in ways that are fulfilling to my heart and my business, without hustle and burnout. Through that, I have gotten to experience flow-state almost everyday of my life as well, which feels way more rewarding than back when I was in paralysis-mode, avoiding work. Not only that, it creates momentum within my business because I’m actively creating structure and content within my business instead of constantly worrying and overthinking without doing anything.
Make ample space to focus
Back when I was in college, I remember trying to be good at everything: get a 4.0 GPA, be involved in sororities, get involved in leadership roles, work a part-time job, workout— basically running on adrenaline to achieve everything because I was afraid of missing out. And paradoxically, that made me miss out on what mattered the most: like being with my dad who is no longer here, or getting started as an entrepreneur.
Just like that, we can be running our businesses from adrenaline trying to achieving multiple things all at once: like creating content on multiple channels, having multiple offers, trying to sell everyone, the list goes on. The fomo is made worse especially when we see people on social media achieving, making us feel like we have to add on whatever they are doing.
This is how burnout happens. Because when we don’t have focus, we lose our effectiveness to master one thing. At the same time, we lose our creative momentum, our joy, our flow.
For me, this is the reason why after graduating from grad school, I decided to live on savings for a full year and focus on one-thing: writing blogs. I decided that my writing comes first everyday (from 6.30am-noon) before anything. Because if I just focus on this one thing, everything else unfolds easily— as in having ample content for social media, podcast, offers etc.
So ask yourself: What is the one core focus (the meat and bone) in your business?
Make ample time for it while saying no to the rest. And you will see how much more productive you are in moving things forward.
2. Listen to your body (and emotions)
The major difference I have learned between toxic productivity and blissful productivity is the aspect of how much we listen to our bodies.
With the hustle-driven productivity culture, we are expected to achieve things constantly in an upward linear pattern. We are expected to work non-stop and achieve things obsessively, without checking in to see how we feel at all. We are pressured to strive for “success” at the expense of our feelings and well-being.
For a feminine being, this way of success is neither enjoyable nor sustainable.
Because at the core of the feminine heart, being able to enjoy (and fall in love) with what we do is of prime importance. Since when we don’t enjoy what we do, no amount of pushing nor forcing can get things done. Getting clients/customers can feel like a struggle. And even if you do achieve, your mind will continue telling you how you could have done “more.” Overall the process will become like a relentless rat race that exhausts you out.
For what we really desire deep down is not just to enjoy the wins but also the process. Our souls desire to feel so good in the process itself that the outcome just unfolds naturally itself.
And this can only happen through connecting to our spirit within— through our bodies, our feelings, our hearts, our intuition. Our souls have to thrive first for our minds to take on the tasks.
You will realize that when you do connect to your heart, she will tell you how exactly she wants to express. And it will feel easier than ever because your intuition directs you to where you creative ideas are most potent…
So rather than pushing yourself for “more”, when you listen to your body/your intuition and trust her, you will experience flow— i.e. getting things done faster in a way more enjoyable and smoother fashion. Because now, you aren’t working against your creative life force, you are now working with your creative life force.
3. Adopt an attitude of Play
No matter how much you work hard at something, you won’t be able to stick to it for long if your inner child doesn’t feel amused and fun… as if she Cinderella playing with her favorite disco ball
The same applies to business, if you don’t genuinely enjoy the creative process within the business, you won’t be able to stick to any one strategy long-term and let it compound to results. Instead, you will find yourself chasing for one shiny objects from one business coach to another, because you are only seeking for quick-rich results (that aren’t sustainable nor rooted in your truth).
Which is why play is such a key piece for the feminine to make business work. Because the energy of play, curiosity, and aliveness is what keeps us going, even when there are low-periods in business. It is what keeps us being confident in what we provide without needing the outside world to validate us.
4. Having Intuitive Systems & Structure
I know the worlds ‘systems’ and ‘structure’ can feel robotic and boring, especially if you are a flowy feminine soul like me. It can feel like systems and structure repress our inspiration and excitement because we feel like we “have to” do something rather than being “called” to do something.
However, what I have learned is when we are avoiding structure on the other extreme, it can feel like chaos because life/business feels unpredictable. And even though we may be trying to ‘flow with the rhythm’, it can feel like mental restlessness and anxiety about the future deep inside.
And so what I have found to be a happy medium is to incorporate intuition when it comes to structure my days in terms of working for my business. That means, structuring my days in a more flexible yet more in tune with the subtle shifts in energy throughout the day.
Personally, I have found that when we design our days in this intuitive approach, we are more able to receive more of our feminine flow (such as creative ideas and hunches), without being ‘trapped’ by the systems. I talked more about intuitive systems in this blog post here.
5. Define what productivity means to you
Lastly, I want you to know that productivity does not mean that it has to be hard.
Yes, building a business can entail putting in long stretches of work for days, weeks, and months on end. However, if you are not enjoying the process but instead are trying to earn your self-worth through hard work, you may be making work harder than it’s supposed to be.
Such as making work harder than it’s supposed to through lots of over-thinking, over-analyzing, and over-perfecting.
Making work harder than it’s supposed to because you’re trying to make multiple things work at once due to the fear of missing out, rather than trusting your process and your methods.
Making work harder than it’s supposed to because you believe that you don’t deserve clients if you don’t earn them through lots of work. I know all this because during my time in grad school, I had a dear friend who was severely burnt out from a similar belief– that she won’t be worthy enough to be a good phd student if she isn’t burning herself out with work.
Thus, to truly be productive in a way that nourishes us, comes down to having a sense of worthiness that stems from who we are, as infinite souls, rather than what we do.
Only then, we can become moved by our hearts to do work that is most meaningful to us, rather than our minds that are addicted to “torturing” ourselves through hard work. And only then, we can become channels of the Divine, where work flows through us rather than piling against us, in peace, harmony, and fulfillment.
