Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning. This is Laura, Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's episode is going to be a longer one part of the series where I interview fascinating people about how they take their days from great to awesome and any advice they have for the rest of us.
So today, I.
Am delighted to welcome Erin Port to the show. Erin is the author of the brand new book Tiny Tweaks, Happy Life. She's also the brains behind the popular Simple Purposeful Living platform on social media. So Erin, welcome to the show.
Thanks Laura for having me. I'm delighted to be here with you. Great.
Well, why don't you tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself.
Well, sure, I'm a mom to four biological and adoptive mom. We live in central Iowa in a tiny little town. I've been married to my husband for nineteen years, former educator turned ontorepreneur, and I fill my days trying to help people simplify their lives so they can make the most of what matters.
Absolutely So, how did Simple Purposeful Living start?
That's a great question. Well, I was a first grade teacher, decided to stay home and wanted to have a bit of a passion project. So I started blogging back in the dark days when it was a blog spot in two thousand and nine, back when most people wrote about recipes and fashion, but I didn't really have that interest,
and so I kind of thought about my knack. What is my knack and everything that I do, I always am looking to make it as simple as possible, and now, as a mom of four, I'm really looking for that. And it was when our son came home via adoption in twenty nineteen. He was nonverbal, malnourished, weighing just nineteen pounds at twenty five months, and every feeding session took an hour, and I realized that I couldn't get a
life overhaul right. My life felt very full. I'm sure many of your listeners feel that way and maybe some facet of their life. But I could make a tiny change. And that's kind of where tiny Tweaks was born. That I couldn't change my circumstances, but I could do tiny little things to make my circumstances feel less hard and embrace the season. And while my circumstances didn't change, Quincy didn't heal overnight. My perspective did, and that helped me
get through that season. And now that's part of what I share.
Absolutely, Well, why don't you tell us a little bit about what the business mix is of simple, purposeful of ving. I mean, I know a lot of people are like, well, that's exciting to have a blog that becomes a business, but what do you actually do as the different components of this?
Sure? Yes, So we have a weekly podcast where I share tiny tweaks that simplify life. We also have a social media platform where I'm sharing that, and we have a full line of paper products that aim to help people simplify their life. I'm a planner just like you, Laura, So anything I can do to make people think about what they're doing with a little bit more intention, and we sell those on Amazon and on our website course an author as well. Different facets, all aimed with the same.
Focus, absolutely, And one of those focuses is this idea of tweaks. I mean, how would you define a tweak? What makes something a tweak in your life?
Right? It's so simple, so easy that it's almost imperceptible at the moment, Right, Like our brain craves big solutions. It thinks that if I have a big solution to this problem, it's going to take every care of everything. And what I've found is the tiniest weak has the big impact. Right. So the other day I was in my podcasting studio and I was sitting on the floor recording, and I thought, what is a tiny tweak I could
make right now? And I could go out and buy a chair, And then somebody said, actually, you could just roll your office chair into your office, right, the tiniest little change. But then I was more comfortable and I
could record my podcast. So it's these tiny little things and it builds evidence that we can be successful, because a lot of times people start to believe they can't make a change because they've tried and they've failed, and so they're just stuff where tiny tweaks build evidence in our mind that we can be successful and the tiny tweak, by tiny tweak, we can change our life. And that's what I love about it, because the light bulb goes off in people's minds and they say, oh, yeah, that
did work. I'm going to try that again. And then I'm going to try it again, and I'm going to try it again and we iterate our life to fall more back in love with it, which is what I love.
I am all about falling in love with our lives. But let's go back to when you were first starting this this business and this blog and simple purposeful living, and you said you have a new son at home who has complex medical issues. This is obviously a moment I know some of my listeners have experienced. This is really really tough. I mean, what are tweaks doing in
that moment? What kind of tweaks were you actually trying in that moment to get out of this very sort of overwhelmed in a little bit dark place.
Yeah, so I think one of the first things I'd let go of and caring for him was caring for myself. And so one day, after particularly harding feeding, I collapsed in the dark hallway and I started to cry and I just thought, oh my goodness, this is not working. What do I need right now? And that was kind of the first week I said, like, what do I need? And so often I think as caregivers, as a busy mom,
that we kind of forget what we need. And so in that moment, I went downstairs and I brewed myself a cup of coffee, and I walked on the back deck and I let the sunshine hit my face. And we think it's so small that it's not going to help, but it gave me a bit of peace and calm in that moment. And then I started to pick up
walking around the block. I'd pack him up in his stroller and I'd walk him around the block, getting that fresh air, and it just revitalized me, and it started to make me realize these tiny little changes could help me not only survive my days, but enjoy those moments and those those opportunities.
Yeah, that there can always be little moments we can enjoy even if life itself feels overwhelming. Well, we're going to take a quick ad break and then we'll be back with some more specific tweaks that maybe people can try today. Well, I am back. I am talking with Aaron Port, who is the author of the book Tiny Tweaks,
Happy Life. She's also the founder of the business Simple Purposeful Living, with a very large following on social media, which is amazing that you've built that up over time, Aaron, So let's talk about somebody's listening to this and they're like, my house is a disaster. What are some tiny tweaks we can try to make ourselves feel more like it's organized, or that it's livable or anything like that.
I always tell people there's two types of clutter. Clutter that you need and use that just doesn't have a home, and clutter that no longer is needed. So I have two tweaks. Number one, the clutter that you need. Right So, for a long time, my kids would come home from school and place their papers on the counter, but we had no system or home for that. So those papers were just stack up on the counter. And if you've
ever noticed, this clutter is like a magnet. Once one thing's on the counter, then suddenly there's forty five things on the counter. So we started this system where we'd talk about what they did with these papers, and then after that we decide is it going in the recycling bin or is it going on the bulletin board. And by and large, most of it would go in the recycling bin. But it took care of the clutter needs.
So I always tell people, if you have clutter that needs to find a home, because you need it, find a home and a simple system to solve that. Now with the clutter that you no longer need. What often happens as my kids come upstairs, they have a shirt that no longer fits and they stick it on the kitchen table and there it sits. Or worse yet, I think it's dirty, and I put it in the laundry bin,
repeating the cycle, which is horrible. So I tell people this is so simple, but grab a bin, a box, something that comes to your door, put it somewhere out of sight but not out of mind so you know where it is, and then put those items in that bin, and then when it gets full, take it to the donation center. But it's just giving clutter a place to go. I really think is helpful. And the last week I'd
say is I'm very motivated by timers. Fifteen minutes can make a huge difference, and a little bit every day adds up over time. So if you're not feeling motivated, set a fifteen ten minute timer, turn on some good tunes. Man music can make a huge difference, and get to work. You'll be surprised how much you can get accomplished.
Absolutely well, you'll be proud of me. I threw out a pair of socks this morning that had a large hole in them. I believe those socks had probably gone through the wash several times, been put back in the drawer where they were then put on and cast off because they had a hole in them. So now they are gone out of our life. We will not encounter
those socks again. Well, what are the things I think people struggle with when they are in the busy years And a lot of my listeners are where they are building careers, they're raising families, not feeling like they have time for connection with people outside their immediate families. So if somebody's feeling that way, what are some tweaks you could do in your schedule to make time for people who aren't necessarily sharing it with you.
Every morning, on the way home from dropping my kids off, I have about five minutes and I started texting somebody in my life whoever comes to mind that morning, Hey, I thought of you. And sometimes it results in things, but a lot of times it results in a little text conversation back and forth. So that's one way I would say, just intentionally every day texting somebody that you care about. If you have a pocket of time, if you're in the car, I love voice texting.
Say she's not texting by texting with her thumbs here while she's driving people.
Yes, yes, I'm sorry, thank you for clarifying. Yes, voice texting, but just I have that five minutes. And oftentimes, as busy individuals, when we give our brain space to think, things come to mind. And so that's when I'm thinking of people. The other thing that I do in my schedule that I think you'd be proud of, Laura, it might have been inspired by you, is that I schedule connection in my week. So every Thursday is my connection day.
I have to eat lunch anyway, and so I schedule a lunch date and it's a different person every week, but I just say, hey, do you want to get together for lunch? And I plan it out and it's about forty five to an hour of time with friends, and that works really well in this season of my life. And then we also have a couple's group we meet with weekly. I find that if it's just in our schedule and we're in the habit of it, it makes all of the difference. So those would be my three ideas.
Yeah, anything you can set up that's a recurring sort of get together, I think people have too many recurring meetings in their professional lives and too few recurring get togethers in their personal lives. How about some self care tweaks I mean you mentioned earlier, you know, just brewing yourself a cup of coffee and sitting on the porch and feeling the sunshine. What are some other little tweaks we can put in our schedules to take care of ourselves.
Well, one of my favorite ways to figure this out is to write in a gratitude journal. And I tell people there's multi facets for doing this, but one of the things is when you start to write down in your gratitude journal what you're grateful for, it's the breadcrumbs of what brings you happiness. And so I always tell people, spend a week write down all the things that you're grateful for, and you're going to start to see what are those things that you enjoy doing that bring you happiness,
that bring you rest, that recharge you. One of my friends was not loving her job and then she took up floral bouquet making recently, and she said, it's the craziest thing. She said, I started that habit, and now going to work isn't such a chore. It's when we start to find those little bits of happiness in our days, they've become more enjoyable overall. So I love to get outside and go on a morning commute walk. It's don't I work from home. I don't have a normal commute,
So I walk twenty minutes in silence every day. It's a chance for my brain to noodle around some of the things I'm thinking about, get out and get in touch with nature, feel the fresh air, the sun on my face. So I would say it's never as fancy as self care is made out to be online. But look in your gratitude journal, pay attention. I always like the red car theory, right where you never noticed the red cars until you bought a red car, and then
all of a sudden, everybody owns a red car. Our brain is wired to filter out things that aren't deemed important. So when we start to focus on and notice the things that do bring us joy, that do bring us happiness, that do bring us rest and recharge, our awareness is our superpower, and then we can do those things more intentionally. And it's never like I said, it doesn't have to be more than five minutes, but it can make all the difference in making our days more enjoyable.
And you mentioned getting out into nature, and I know that is the whole section of your book on nature related tweaks to have a little bit more fresh air and outdoor life in our lives and schedules. Is there anything else we should try other than a brisk walk outside, good as that may be.
Yeah, I think even setting up your office near a window, or even putting your backdrop of your computer a beautiful nature scene, putting a plant now to your desk, listening to nature sounds. I mean, some of these things are so simple, but they can make a huge difference. It doesn't mean we all have to go to a hike or all of those sorts of things, but I think just stepping outside, breathing in the fresh air is so grounding for us.
Absolutely. And another angle for those tweaks you mentioned, kind of confronting your fears, flexing your fear muscles. And I love this idea of having tiny tweaks in our lives that allow us to take small risks. I wonder what are some tweaks we can do to introduce some small risks into our lives.
Well. For a lot of people. Texting a person like I mentioned earlier, feels a little risky, right, connecting with people, inviting somebody to lunch. I always tell my kids though, that's the philosophy in our house is to flex your fear muscle, because, just like any other muscle, the more that you take small risks, the more likely you are
to be brave enough to take the big risks. So just think about, you know something scares you a little bit, to just step into that, right, Like this interview today scared me a little bit, but I'm flexing my fear muscle, right. Or maybe you want to write a novel, but the first step is to write an Instagram caption thinking about little risks that you can take that are going to build up your evidence that you can take the risk and eventually take the bigger risk.
Yeah, we can change the stories that we tell about ourselves and whether we're the kind of people who can take risks. I hope I'm not too scary. I'm trying not to be.
No, No, I love this. It was always different when you're on the other side of the on the other side of the interview.
For sure. We're going to take one more quick ad break and then I will be back with more from Airinport. Well, I am back talking with Aaronport, who is the brains behind the popular simple, purposeful living platform on social media. You should go follow her Instagram for instance, she'll see her talking about her life and her philosophy, all those wonderful things. So let's talk about how we can celebrate tiny wins in our lives. So let's say some of
these tweaks have been successful. What should we do to acknowledge that?
I think, even pausing, we are so busy in our daily lives that we don't slow down long enough to acknowledge the progress that we're making. And when we adopted our youngest, his progress was slow, but it forced me to be excited for every little milestone. So, like I said, he was nonverbal in the beginning, and when we could get him to answer yes no questions, that was monumental.
And he really taught me this lesson of celebrating tiny wins, because if we just wait for the big wins, the big moments in our life, there aren't that many, right, We're just waiting for the marriage and the kids and the promotion. Really, if we look back, there's not that many, but there is so much to be celebrated. So getting outside and going on a walk, you prove to yourself that you could you showed up. Celebrate that, be proud of yourself. Did you do something that you had a
goal for and you showed up. Celebrate that, and also acknowledging other people's celebrations. I think when we start to acknowledge when our kids win, when our friends win, when our significant other wins, then they internally get that too, and then they can celebrate you as well. But I think just really focusing on hey, did I show up today? Did I do something that I'm proud of? Getting into
the habit again of writing in your gratitude journal. Those things, the more we find them, the more we're going to see them in our daily life. Yeah.
Well, we've been getting snippets about your daily life as you've been sharing some of your tweaks. I wonder if you could talk us through what a day tends to look like in your household. People always love to hear people's routines from this show.
I do too, So I usually get up at six am. That's about thirty minutes before my kids, and they're all sleeping through the night. So there's that. I go to bed at nine point thirty. So I get up at six and I go out myself a cup of coffee, and I spend some time in the quiet just I love just right now, sitting in front of the fireplace.
I have a gratitude journal, I do some devotions, I do some meditations in prayer, and then from there, my kids get up at six thirty and I kind of am the coach on the sidelines as they're going through their morning routine they have, getting breakfast and getting their lunches, getting dressed, and then I take the kids and we get out the door for school around seven thirty. I come home, I do my morning walking commute, get dressed, get ready, and spend the rest of the school day working.
I always take a lunch break. I think it's really important to take that time away from work, eat, be quiet, and be intentional. And then the kids get home around three o'clock. I do the mom duties of taking them to all the places right getting dinner around the table that always varies based on when everybody's going to be home. I always try to capture the most amount of people around the dinner table, so that varies. It's about six o'clock and then, like I said, we spend some family time,
maybe playing games, watching a show. We get the little two down to bed around eight to eight thirty, and then I go to my room, wash my face, put on my pajamas, and I like to read my big two. I have two teenagers. They come in and tuck mom in at the end of the day, and normally it's lights out between nine thirty and ten.
For me, absolutely well. And I'm curious during the workday. I mean, you're sort of like after the morning commute to eight ish eight thirty and the until three. How do you structure your work days? I imagine with running a business, that could be different every single day.
Yeah, so I have certain tasks for certain days. That's worked really well for me. So on Mondays, I do a lot of my goal checking, emails, correspondence, prepping for my podcast. Tuesday it's all about recording for my podcast. Wednesday it's all about the shop so I'm working on Amazon Ads, I'm working on Shopify inventory, all of those
sorts of things. Thursdays are all about social media planning, writing my captions, preparing for next week, and then I, like you, like to plan for my next week with my to do list, so I can go into the weekend knowing what's ahead. But having kind of a set thing on each day really helps me. Now, next week we're leaving for a vacation, so what I normally do on Friday, I spread out on the other day so
I'm flexible. But knowing that each task is going to be taken care of on a specific day frees up a lot of that mind clutter that otherwise I'd be thinking when should I do that this week? Or when should I do this? Just knowing, and I have a little word doc on my desktop that has those tasks, so they just open it up when I'm planning for the next week and I can plug those items in.
Okay, got it, got it. So we have like some people do something like marketing Monday or you know, that kind of thing, and that helps you structure your business. So I always ask my guests erin, what's something you've done recently to take a day from great to awesome.
Now we've been sharing lots of little tweaks over the course of this episode of things that you probably do that make your days more awesome, but what's What's something maybe you've done in the last day or two that really really made life feel a lot better for you.
I love going to the library and picking up a great stack of books because one of my favorite rituals is reading at the end of the day. I started a couple of years ago putting my phone to bed with my little too. Like I just put it to bed. I try to keep it out of my hands, actually in my bathroom from the time we're cooking dinner till the kids go to bed. And then because it's in my bathroom, I don't scroll at night and I read instead. And so I just find a tremendous joy going and
picking up library books looking around. There's just I don't know, maybe it's the author in me, but just having a real live book and then reading before bed right now with a hot cup of tea, it just makes my whole day awesome.
The library is an amazing resource, and even if you don't read all the books that you pick up from them, you know now you know for the future that that might be a book you want to check out again. So, Aaron, what are you looking forward to right now?
You know something that I've really been redefining is what does success look like for you? For many years, I never defined it for myself, and so I let the world define success for me. And I think something I'm just really excited about now is being in this season
with my kids. I've got a sixteen, fourteen, ten, and eight year old and a job that allows me the flexibility to do what I love to help people, but also be there for my family and my kids, and so I'm really just excited about leaning into this season sharing about tiny tweaks, happy life, but also being present for my family. And I feel like in my forties, I'm finally starting to figure out how to do that well.
So when we come into our own for sure, So erin. Where can people find you?
Yes, you can find me at Simple Purposeful Living. I'm mostly on Instagram, but then Facebook, TikTok and YouTube as well. We have a weekly podcast, Simple Purposeful Living Podcast, and our website is also Simple Purposeful Living. You can find and all of our products by searching that on Amazon or at shop dot simplepurposeful living dot com.
Awesome, Well, Aaron, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you to everyone for listening. If you have feedback on this or any other episode. You can always reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast
is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.