Hello, everybody, and welcome to this week's episode of relationships rule. I am interviewing today a wonderful woman that I actually interviewed in the first year of my podcast, which seems like many, many moons ago, it because it is now it's over three years, and I'm pretty excited about it. And it's always good to revisit with people who have made changes grown in their businesses as well as things that have happened for me. So my guest today is MJ shells be welcome to the show, first of all,
thank you. It's great to be here.
Thank you. And NJ is a productivity powerhouse. As a wife and mother who once worked in an intense corporate environment, and J experienced firsthand the damaging effects of long hours and stress. She developed an autoimmune disease and was forced to start working smarter, not harder. Now she takes what she's learned and helps other helps business owners and professionals gain control of their time, eliminate distractions, and focus on what really matters. So they can
achieve a new level of success while working fewer hours. And honestly, I need some of that, I'll tell you, because sometimes, sometimes it's okay to just say, enough is enough and walk away for the day. But sometimes, things hang over your head, and it's like, Oh, my goodness, I didn't get it all done today. And it's frustrating. And being a solopreneur pretty much. That happens a lot. And I'm sure you hear that kind of complaint often. So first of all, let's
back up and and come back to that. But I want to know what happened to you. And how long ago was this? And and what did that like? That changed a lot for you?
It did, because I was a workaholic. I mean that I worked 24 hours straight, literally no exaggeration. I was so caught up into you know, the BS story of this is important. You know, I've got to do it. If I don't do it, it won't get done. Right. You know, all that kind of thing.
Were you climbing the corporate ladder? Yes, I
was climbing the corporate ladder. And, you know, a couple of things happened. My, my dad died, I got a note that my son left on the table. You know, Mom, how come I barely ever see you anymore, you know, and being and then being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, which when when I got the diagnosis, they thought it was lung cancer. And through the weekend, you know, that's what I was dealing with. And then I got the biopsy on Monday. And it was like, the good news is you don't
have cancer. The bad news is you have an autoimmune disease. And so it really kind of woke me up to what was really important in life. And I can see now that I didn't have too much to do, right, I could have gotten it all done in less hours, I had a focus problem. I wasn't I wasn't honoring my biology, you know, I wasn't sleeping wasn't eating right. Well, you know, wasn't doing those things. I wasn't honoring the biology of how the
brain works, right? We are hardwired for distraction. If you imagine 1000s of years ago, you're collecting berries to feed the family and you hear a rustling off in the bushes, right, your alert system is going to go on guard because it's probably something that's going to eat you. And so you had to just be distracted by things like that. And so we still have the same hard wiring. And today, it's you know, some software company trying to get you to look at their screen, so that
they can make more money. But our biological systems don't know the difference. And so, you know, we have to put in place those kinds of things. And I didn't realize that back at the time, you know, back in the day. And so the result was I was working way too many hours and just burnt myself out to the point that I got the autoimmune disease,
and a son who was crying for help and needed Exactly, yeah. And thanks for sharing that. I I think though, that if that had happened today, do you think that you might have had maybe more of a nervous breakdown around it too or something because there's so much today so much information overload that back then, you know, you I don't think it was as I mean, it was definitely bad because it got you ill but you know what I'm saying right there. Right.
Well Well, it's interesting you say that because one of the things that I didn't mention that, you know, one of the triggering points is, I was driving to my doctor's office for some appointment. And I had been there, like six or seven times, and I couldn't remember how to get there. Now, this isn't like, Oh, give me like a minute to figure it out. This is 10 or 15 minutes later, I still couldn't remember I had to call my coworker who I carpooled with some times, and ask him how to
get there. And my doctor was very alarmed when I told him what happened. And just with this, you know, and he was like, one of these jolly, you know, good, you know, doctors who were always smiling and laughing, and he had this just look on his face of just total seriousness, and he said, You have to immediately decrease your stress level. And so I hate to think what today that would be like, exactly,
yeah, oh, my goodness. Well, one of the things that will so now go fast forwarding to today, and what I just said about, you know, just feeling at the end of the day, that it's never going to end, I just have always got more and more things to do. What What's your comment to me around that?
Yeah. So see, a lot of that, though, is an illusion. Yeah. And all these companies are, have gotten so good at persuasive marketing, like, back in the day, you had a couple of companies who were good at that, and you get these, you know, letters in the mail, that you would open up and be like, Whoa, and they'd suck you in? Yes, companies didn't know how to do that kind of marketing today, you know, millions and millions of companies do and they end up in your inbox. And so they're
convincing you that you have to do all of the things. And it's a lie. Like, we were talking before you hit record, you know, as solopreneurs, there's all of these things that you can do to market your business. There's, you know, LinkedIn, and Facebook and Instagram and YouTube and podcasts and, you know, right, exactly. And every person who sells how to do that, they're sending you emails, convincing you that business can't grow without without that. And the reality is, you don't, you only
need to do one consistently. And then once you master that you have the bandwidth, and it's all systematized, you can add another one. But we get sucked into believing that we have to do it all.
It's true. It's really true. And it's funny, because when I'm training my clients around LinkedIn, sometimes on a first conversation, I'll hear them say, Well, I gotta get all my all my social media organized, I got to do my LinkedIn, and my Facebook and my Instagram, like, Wait, stop, I do. What do you do now? None of it will pick one. Let's start there, right? Even if it's not LinkedIn, I don't care you do, what feels right, and where your audience is,
right? Because we I know it, I'm good when I'm telling other people, but I get caught in that trap, as well. And it's. So that brings me to actually so slowing down in different ways and accepting what maybe, I have decided is important for me. It's, I don't feel it's about convincing other people. It's about finding people who are like minded, and like that, that platform or that's where their audience is, and so I can help
them. But one of the things that in my notes here from you, actually, is a comment about talk, let's talk about how even when, you know, it's essential to put in time to build relationships. It's difficult to find that time. So one of my things on LinkedIn is, I feel that that tool is underutilized in terms of creating and building relationships, because it's a goldmine. And I have said time and time again on my podcast. Here's a guest, guess what? I met them on LinkedIn.
Here's another guest, guess what? I met them on LinkedIn. And so for me, I'm doing what very few people are doing is building those relationships. So that's what I like to do. Therefore, I find time to do it. Yes,
yes, exactly. And I think that today, we have all of these things, fracturing our attention and focus Right, yeah, you know, there's so many things that you could be spending your time and so many things that are distracting you. And so what happens is, your brain starts spinning, right? And going from, you know, you go to work on one thing and you're like, oh, you know, I almost forgot I have to do this. And oh, I have to
remote reply to that email. I'm guilty of that, right. And when you're in that state of mind, unless you are like you and an expert at using it, your brain is going to shut down, your brain can't like, oh, let's do something new that we don't know what to do. It's just going to keep saying, Okay, we're going to do that later. We're going to do that later. Because it's looking for what is urgent, and you know, the crisis to solve, but it's deluding you as to what is really urgent and important.
And so it'll be responding to a test a text message that you don't need to respond to or something. And so really, the first step is to get your mind to settle down and stop spinning. And to do that, you have to get out of your head, all of the things that you have to do. And a lot of the mistake, the mistake that I see a lot of people make is they just make one long list. And that's a great starting point. But that's
overwhelming, like, and you can start with a mind dump. But if you leave it there, you're more overwhelmed, because you have this long list. Okay, so, you know, then you have to go through it. And you know, what can I what is really not important that I can cross off, somebody tried to convince me, here's what I need to do, you know, I have to work on Instagram, no, no, I've committed, I'm only going to work one one platform at a time LinkedIn it is so I can cross
off the Instagram for right now. And then look at you know, what can wait until, you know, next month, what can wait till next week, and then take those things off of that, you know, kind of like I normally like indicate, like, you know, M for next month, you know, W for next week, until you really get down to this limited number that Oh, my God, these are urgent have to be done today, take another sheet of paper, and then just today and just write those things down. So they got those
other things out of mind. And when you do that, then your brain can kind of settle down, and it's not spinning constantly, because it doesn't know where to start what to work on. Because your brain doesn't know timewise it can't tell the difference between, you know, an urgent thing that needs to be done today. And an important thing that needs to be done in a week, and just smashes it all together and tries to do them all now.
Yeah, I was having this conversation yesterday with a friend of mine who does some tech back and stuff for me. And I was saying that even with, you know, just looking at the three parts of my business, when it comes to just my podcast, I listed all these things that have to be done every week. And I don't want to be doing them. But they're taking up time that I am doing them. So, but But I I have this push me pull you thing around. If I don't do them? I'm not.
Maybe it's not having not found the right person. I don't know. But I don't feel the trust of having someone else do these things. To my level of satisfaction. Right?
Right. And that's a common thing, I think that we go through is that we, you know, we're afraid that people are going to make us look bad. And I used to have that. Now, it's so funny that, you know, I won't eat sometimes. You know, I've had like my husband who is amazing with word sometimes he's written emails for me, I don't even read them. I'm just like, Okay, send it out. Like if I like, I just have to let it go. Like I just don't even worry about that stuff anymore.
But you have to train yourself to do that. I
did. I actually it's this kind of weird little thing that we store emotions in our body. And that, you know, the way that we're made is that you know the neurons fire they release neuro peptides and were made to feel it and just feel it fully and let it go right. When we're young things happen to us that are very, you know, traumatic, you know, someone on the playground bullying you or you know your sibling laughing and you whatever it is right that but for us as kids, it's
traumatic and we don't feel the emotions fully. We are just kind of push them down. And what it does is it kind of creates this connection chip from the neuron firing to the neuro peptides being released. And so unconsciously, we don't even realize it, we have these feelings that kind of come up. And then our unconscious mind is like, Oh, I don't want to feel that. So therefore, I'm going to change behavior in order to
avoid that. So let's say something happened, when you were in, you know, third grade, and you stood up to do a presentation in class, and somebody made a joke, and everybody laughed, right? You don't want to look stupid. So therefore, when you think about outsourcing and having someone else do something, unconsciously, you're not even aware. It triggers, you know, the neurons fire these neuro
peptides are released. And there's a subtle feeling in the body, that your unconscious mind is like, Yep, let's divert her attention away from that. So basically, I, you know, had to go through and release all of that, so that there wasn't that connection. You know, it's kind of like Pavlov's dog. Right? Yeah. Where, you know, by flooding the neurons so that it, it breaks that connection, and then it's just gone. So did you do that yourself?
Yeah. Oh, wow. Okay, so that takes some dedication and work to, to do that, for
sure. I love personal development work. I love to grow. So it's kind of for me, that's my fun. My husband makes fun of me. You know, to him. It's like pulling teeth. Yeah.
Like, yeah, we have the same the same issue there. So I saw something that you had responded to, or someone was talking about? What were they talking about? Just a second. They were talking about? Oh, about unsubscribing to different emails. And and you said it's easy to hit delete, without realizing all those emails, eat away at your decision bandwidth. This is me, okay. Like, if you knew how many
emails were in my inbox, he would die. By midday, many people are in decision fatigue and end up putting off important decisions. When we unsubscribe, we're blocking out future decisions from eating away our focus and our ability to make decisions. That was your comment, and I love that. But excuse me, it takes time to go and do all that. unsubscribing actually,
it doesn't. Okay, talk to me, there is a program on Maelstrom m a i l s t r o m. And I can't. It's some nominal fee. You know, it used to be, you know, like, 499, I think it might be up to 899 a month, but you don't need more than one month, right. And what it does is it loads your inbox, and you can like bulk unsubscribe. And I've had clients who've had like 4000 emails in their inbox and clear them out, including unsubscribing in and our
about 37,000. Okay,
so you know, but think about it, if you've got 1000 emails from a person, it doesn't take any longer to unsubscribe and delete using Maelstrom benefits 100 from that person. So, you know, so it's just a matter of how long you've, you know, it's not like you've got 10 emails from, you know, 3700 people, you got, you know, probably 50 Different people who are sending you hundreds of emails.
I know. It's unbelievable. Anyway, so. So more and more today, people aren't able to focus, right, we say that we have to grab someone's attention in the first few seconds, or it's never going to happen, right? It's even less than seven seconds anymore. Right? So. So what's your advice to people? Do we worry about that when we're marketing? Or do we just do what makes us feel more Zim?
I feel like it's a combination. I don't feel like you need to use a marketing strategy that's in alignment with you. If you like doing video, do video if you like writing, do writing. You have to do what's in alignment. And I
think we have to not be boring. You know, like we have to be kind of strategic about what we're saying and make sure that we're taking our point of view so that it's about us that we're not just, you know, putting out more and more content that's the same as what everybody else also saying, but we need a unique point of view that we're putting out there. You know, and we need to be a little bit strategic about putting it out in a way that might capture people's attention, but don't waste their
time saying stuff that they already know. Okay, so that's a really interesting point. Because for me, and this is where I'm trying to develop better right now is
it's about it's about telling stories, from your perspective, so people get a glimpse of you, as well as it's more interesting. You know, they say they want facts, tell stories, sell facts, tell stories, sell,
or hard wired for stories, right? Yeah.
And and so in doing that in a better way, in telling a story about an experience that you've had around whatever it is that you're talking about, you're building relationship with people without realizing it, right? Yes,
yes. And people read those. It's funny. We're all so busy, we don't have time to read things. But when someone is telling a story, you slow down your scroll, and you actually don't read it. So yeah,
I've noticed that in like my newsletter, when I do my introduction, and, you know, I had, well, I was forced to slow down because I sprained my ankle two weeks ago tomorrow. And, and I said this in my newsletter, and it was amazing how many people reached out and said, oh, sorry, speedy recovery, do your exercises, all that stuff. So then your your, and they were people I didn't expect. Right, right. So that's when you think, Oh, I do have people out there that are
reading my newsletter. Thank you, you know, appreciate that. And those are relationships that they're going on that are building without you realizing it. Yes, yeah, I like that. I like that a lot. You say that. It's so much easier now to reach people and to start new connections and relationships, but if not managed, it can steal our time. And leave us disconnected. Tell me what you mean by that?
Well, I think that social media, it's so easy to spend time during the scroll, you know, and not really connecting, zoning out. And so it's easier to connect to people like I have a friend in Florida, who I graduated high school with. And the only way we connect is, you know, stay in touch is through social media. But yet, when my husband and I go to Florida to visit his parents, I drive an hour, and we go spend a couple of hours and I visit with her. But if I didn't
have social media as a as a way to stay connected, I wouldn't. I would never, you know, have that are awkward, right? It would be, I just, I wouldn't reach out to her I wouldn't, you know, and so
I feel like it gives us an opportunity. And it gives us a way in I mean, you hear all these stories of people who have been able to connect with, you know, CEOs or you know, somebody through responding to a post that they made on LinkedIn or something I saw on LinkedIn that Richard Branson had posted something about dyslexia, and somebody commented, and he commented back, like, how many people could say that they had a
correspondence with Richard Branson. So social media gives us all these opportunities, but you have to be on guard and put it into you have to have rules. And you know, kind of like, remember when you were learning to bowl as a kid and they put the little gutters, things, the guards in the gutters to keep you from the gutter balls, like, we need guardrails in place like
that. Otherwise, it can totally steal your attention. And have you disconnected and you're just you're just in that zombie mode where you're just scrolling and not really connecting.
Yeah, and and today, I suppose that's what keeps people going 24/7 as well, you know? Yeah, it's, it can be it can be educational, and it can be really interesting, but it can also suck your time like you cannot yeah, there's it's impossible
to keep up. I mean, you and I are about the same age. You remember, you know back when you know when you and I or joining the workforce, business owners executives. They had, you know, a telephone, they had a day planner, and they had a secretary who open their mail and then put stuff in their inbox. Yeah, really the important stuff. And you contrast that to today, where nobody's opening your mail. And and you have these, this gateway of all of this stuff to come at
you. Yeah. And there's just absolutely no way to have enough time to do it all. So we have to know like, what are our priorities and say, okay, LinkedIn is the marketing, you know, method that I'm going to use for the next year. And that's it. And either unsubscribe or automatically filter anything that is these other things away, so that you're not even having it come into your awareness?
Yeah, so that's hard to do for people who are curious people like me, right? See,
that's just it. Yeah, you are curious. And because you're curious, and the fact that these people are so good at grabbing your attention, if it hits your inbox, you're gonna want to read it. Yeah. And the reality is, you don't have the time to read it all. So you will either let who's the best person at making headlines or writing headlines for their email to get your attention? Or you let it be what's important to you to get your attention? You have to decide?
Yes. And then, as I also mentioned, before we went on air, I had, between a two hours between my interview this morning and this interview, oh, I had one more call before this one that I was going to run out, actually, and get some Christmas stuff I still had to get. But my daughter texted me and said, What are you busy? Do you need help? Or, you know, whatever. I said, I'm actually available between 11. And one, because I
gave up that time if she needed me. And sure enough, off, you know, my granddaughter stayed with me for an hour and a half while she went to do what she needed to do. And then they left because she respected that my time was needed elsewhere. But I did drop everything. Yeah, because that was
more important. Exactly. And see, here's the thing. Not everybody can even do that. No, I was just gonna say that. Yeah, but the more clarity we have, and the more order that we have, that we can do that, you know, like, I had to do a call this morning, with my husband's cardiologist a virtual call that I mean, I didn't know until yesterday that it was
going to be and it was easy to just put that in there. You know, because I have enough control and enough, you know, knowledge of what's important and waiting out and, and knowing like, I mean, my brain gets overwhelmed just like everybody else is, but I know, it's not reality. It's not that I have too much to do. It's that my brain is not was not built for modern society. And so I just have to go through these steps to calm it down and get things into perspective. Plug, my focus
leaks up. And then everything settles down, and I can focus. Well, sometimes I feel that by doing what I did earlier today, I'm going to suffer for it later. Because I have to get that piece done that I didn't get done. Right. But yeah, it is what it is. So how do you, you know?
So how do you manage it all? Just how to Yes. And
here's the thing, it's not about managing it. All right, you're never going to get it all done. But one of the things, the secrets that I think is critical is knowing what is most important as at the end of your day, you need to be very clear on what is the most important things that you have to do tomorrow, and then have focused time in the morning, that that's what you get done. First thing in the morning before you get on your computer before you look at your phone
before you do anything. You put time into that critical time. And then no matter what happens in your day, you're golden, because you got those critical things done.
And they and you're referring that they might be work related or they might not be
right. Yeah, okay. Okay. Yeah, that's great. It's you know, and I generally have clients have buckets of time of, you know, focus time in the morning. That's like your Deep Work. And then in the afternoon, it's, you know, more one client likes to call them quick tasks, right? That it's not things that
require, like that deep focus. And then you have those a bucket of time in the afternoon, where your mind isn't as fresh and they don't take as long don't require the same amount of focus, so that when you get interrupted, it doesn't really derail something. But if you're working on something that requires deep focus, and you're interrupted, Oh, forget it kind of wasted that time. Yes, I agree, pulls you out. And then you know, it takes you 15 minutes to get back in it. You were quoting earlier?
What I recall to be Stephen Covey's seven habits that the grid that he uses about important and urgent and important and all of that, do you do? Is that part of what you do and how you teach?
Yeah, I, I mean, I followed Stephen Covey back in the day, and it's also referred to as the Eisenhower matrix, some people right, you're right. Yeah, that way. I've never heard that. But until Yeah, I think he, I think he took took that and then just, you know, for his business on it. But I, I don't actually do it that way anymore. Because I find that it's about, you know, understanding what is important to me, right? And, and then from there, minimizing the number of active projects that
I'm working on. And, and so that means putting stuff on the backburner and snowing like these are coming up, because what we tend to do is spread ourselves really thin. And we do a little bit of this, a little bit of this, a little bit of this a little bit of but nothing can get done, because we're spreading our time and focus out amongst so many different projects. And then we're overwhelmed, because we've got too many things that we're trying to juggle all at once.
Yeah, sure, I found that if instead, instead of doing things, you know, all at the same time trying to get things done, if instead, you limit it to like four to seven, depending upon the complexity, and that includes work in personal Yeah, right, all at one time, and then you wait until you get something done. And then you can move something over, or maybe something in your active project, it's in a waiting period. So then you can move it off, like you submitted a
proposal for or for a job, and you're waiting to hear back. So now that can go into the waiting bucket. But doing that it tends to settle things down. So in the mornings, it's usually focused on those projects, and then all the like, the little administrative things and that kind of thing. That's more in the afternoon.
So let's in wrapping up, let's talk about just give me three top things, then that one should be aware of to be able to focus more, and get rid of those focus leaks.
Doing the stop your head from spinning, I think that is step one. Step two, doing your morning routine such that you have focused time in the morning. And I think that having routines, as opposed to just all of these tasks that you can, it can be so overwhelming to think of, you know, a million tasks when some of them can be kind of rolled up into a routine that's scheduled for once a week. And I think another thing is we lose a lot of time spinning because we're procrastinating because
we're not exactly sure what to do. Like we might have an item on our list to you know, connect with Lisa, what what does that mean? You know, that's not actionable, but instead something like you know, send a LinkedIn message to Lisa or, you know, send a card to Lisa or something. Yeah, but having it be you know, a verb that is something that you're going to do that's very clear.
And do you make lists?
I do. I do make lists. I have to I have an idea generator. People who have worked closely with me, then they laugh and make fun of me because I mean, it's an idea minute, and so I have to get them out of my head. And so that I'm not thinking about them, but the reality is there's not enough time or people to get them all done. And so then I have to really be ruthless and going through them. And okay, this just isn't realistic. This isn't on brand this, you know,
and just get rid of them. So and then I do I, I have a pad that I have that has a list down the right hand side, and then it's like a grid paper for notes during the day. And so I'll take from my lists, and then say, Okay, here's what I need to get done today, um, handwrite it out. And then I've got a place to write notes during the day. Awesome.
I'm at the point at the end of this year now where I have to re organize my office again, because that will make me feel like I can have a fresh start in the year. I know, it's just one of those things. This is delightful. I could ask you a million questions. How can people find you? And what are you working on that? They might be that my audience might be interested in people like me, right? So you do this? Is it a morning webinar? What is it that I
saw? Yeah, so I've got a workshop coming up two dates in in January, I'm not sure when this will air, but there's one January 5, and one January 19, that are all about getting your setting your morning up to be able to focus. And so we'll be dealing with the being able to not look at your phone first thing in the morning. So we'll do some of that processing those stored emotions that we talked about, to make it easy to ignore your phone in the morning. And so all
the things so it's, it's an all day workshop, but it's not. It's like we'll take breaks for you to work and get done what's critical, so that you feel like at the end of the day, you've had your most productive day other ever. So my website is and j shows b.com. And there's something on the homepage to link to that. And also, when I was talking about the first step
of being able to focus is to get your head to stop spinning. If you go to n j shells b.com/overwhelm There is a video that will step you through a process to be able to get your brain to
focus. Yes. Okay, so if this doesn't Aaron time, remind me send me something and I'll post on LinkedIn about your workshop because it sounds like something I should probably do. And I love the idea. So thank you so much for being here today. I think we overstayed our welcome. I seem to be doing that a lot lately. fascinated with my guests, but it's my show. So there you go. I just hope that I have people listened. So there
you go. Thank you again for being here and for your brilliance because it does make people think like me think about what's important and what isn't. Well, thank
you for having me. As always, it's a pleasure talking with you. You're very welcome.
And remember, thank you for listening to my audience and remember to stay connected and be remembered