Permission to be Unavailable

time as if it's infinite like sands. And whether you are partnered with or without children, or in a career where you want more boundaries, this is the place for you for all family structures. We're here to take a time out to learn, get inspired, and most importantly, reclaim our time. High d D High Eve, It's good to see your face and hear your voice. It's great to see you. As always, we're in our little unicorn space together,

so thank you for that. You know, we're thinking and talking about boundary setting right this idea of what is it take to actually set a true boundary in one's life, and if you're a marginalized population. If you're a woman, it is harder to say no. I was thinking of my friend when I said to her, you deserve a permission to be unavailable from your roles as a parent and our partner and our professional and by professional I mean anybody who works her pay or works in the home.

And she said to me, but Eve, who would I be if I wasn't available? That's how she defines herself. And so I was thinking a lot about this time in the early pandemic. I want to read you a little bit about what I wrote about it in Unicorn Space,

my second book. I say that during that challenging time when we just started to lock down, boundary setting became a fast necessity and the interests of self preservation, and I applauded many of my friends who boldly instituted clear lines of their own and an effort to juggle jobs, partners, kids, pets, and their sanity all under one roof. I relish their videos of hiding out in their kitchen pantries or escaping

to their bedroom closets double locked the door. My friend Blessing said, as I was having a hard time with re establishing boundaries when we went to a work from home or home from work blended life, where the boundaries seemed to be so fluid, and they're not as easy to set, at least not for me. I laughed at the caution tape that leave me alone, boxes, the impossible to confuse, do not enter, and mommy's on the time

out signs my friends posted. But I wanted to talk about my struggle because I had converted a corner of our guest room adity into a writing nook, and I really hope to write uninterrupted for two hours over each weekend. It seemed feasible, right. We had done fair play that way, but now it was a different time again. Boundaries are moving moving during the pandemic. So at breakfast one Sunday morning, I announced to Seth and Zach and Benanana, after we finish up, I'm going to go work on my book

for two hours. I'll be home, but pretend I'm not home, right, So they nodded in vague agreement, and once the table was cleared, I retreated to the guest room. Well guess what happened. It's not rocket science, you'll people, I guess. Five minutes, there's a knock on the door. It was seth, Hey, I know you're busy, but I just want to let you know that I'm gonna need your car later to go pick up the groceries. Okay, cool, cool, okay. By a few minutes later, Ben comes in, Um, mom, when

you're gonna read my homework assignment? Later later, I say, I just you know, shut that door. Thirty seconds later, Anna person with her loving passy. I want my mommy. I want my mommy. So I kept thinking, you know, good God, these walls are really freaking thin. So the next week I tried again to communicate my boundary. I explained I was taking two hours to write and I was unavailable to answer questions, make snacks if you need something,

asked daddy, and to have her home. The point I started to put an unavailable post it on my breast, like on my boob, on top of my breasts, right where they could see it at eye level, and I said I am unavailable, showing Anna because she's a media With the post it meant okay. So I go into my office five minutes later, knock on the door. It was seth again, Hey, I know you're unavailable, but no butts I'm working, started screaming. Shut the door. A few

minutes later and it comes in again. She sucking a lollipop. She comes up in my chair. She points at my post it and then she whispers, I love you and sort of licks my ear. Is very cute, but really disruptive, and so I figured since she's not reading, she didn't really understand, and she meant, okay, Well, interruptions are okay as long as I lick your ear and they're delivered with love if I interrupt you. So I had ten minutes of solitude when finally Ben barges in. What is it?

I asked, and I'm starting to get really agitated, and he looks at me, and he stands there and we're staring, sort of an eye to eye contest, and he says, hey, mom, your post it's falling off, and that was it. I looked at him. I took the post it off my chest. I crumble it up into a damn ball. I throw it at him, and I say, get the funk out, Ben, get out, get out, get out. I'm unavailable. I started throwing stuff. I throw all the books off my death.

I drove my pens on the floor. I started smashing things, stomping around, and then you know what, that two hours I was unavailable. But all the guilt and shame of having that rage blow up at my kids and cursing it then and screaming and having to lock the door, I just sat there and I just started to cry. And it was too much. It was too much, I thought. You know, I'm the person who's supposed to be an expert at setting boundaries and I couldn't even set boundaries

of my own. You know, I laughed at many points because it was just so relatable, But there's such deep sadness there. You know what's so interesting about the story and so many others during the pandemic is that saying no and having that sense of I need my time is something that's biologic within us. But the actual saying that, doing the orchestrating is very difficult because saying no is

also a socialized response. So basically you're saying, biologically, we are programs to say no, of course, when something is uncomfortable, or something is disturbing our inner peace or inner sanctity, when we are high stressed, as you say, high stress, low cognition, right in those moments when you just are focused. During high stress mode, you need those two hours to

do your work and to focus. And during the pandemic, when there is no time for yourself because your children and partner and everyone is at home, those two hours on the weekend we're very precious to you. So it is a natural inclination during those periods of stress to feel no. I need this space. That difficulty is translating those feelings into words and actions, because saying no and taking that step, there's a wide divide because that's all

the socialization process. So that's the discrepancy, and I think that's always the conflict. There's a wide gap between feeling no and saying no, and we need to figure out ways to close the gap. But to be able to say it and give ourselves permission requires a lot of education, research, guidance systems, aligning external forces, and that allows us to actually work on the doing of no rather than just the feeling of no. I love that the doing of no,

So I think that's what we're talking about today. We're talking about the doing of no, the feeling of no. When you don't have a doing of no, a deity is in my research, extreme rage and that is where we're stuck a lot of the time. That the crumbling up of the post it for me and throwing it at Ben's head was a I feel like you said, Adity, it's such a good way to look at this. I'm feeling the no. It's bubbling up inside of me. It's

becoming a toxic bile inside of me. But I literally feel like I have no control over the doing of no. And this is the hard part. When I did do the no through rage, it meant I couldn't actually do the yes. I couldn't do the thing that I wanted to do that day, which was right because instead, because I had such a hard time with the doing of no,

it impeded those two hours. It wasn't a free two hours of uninterrupted attention because my attention and my insides were stuck in the past hour of feeling that complete regret. So I think it's this rage, resentment and regret cycle that we stop when we actually can do no in a productive way. And again people laugh. You have two chapters on communication in a book about creativity. Find your unicorn space, yes, because the doing of no is that hard.

So let's learn to say no. Today. I'm really excited to explore these themes further with our guests today. He's a good friend of mine, Greg McEwen. He's a public speaker, a leadership and a business strategist. He's a New York Times bestselling author of two of my favorite books. The first one is Essentialism, The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, and his new book Effortless, Making it Easier to Do what matters.

Most are books I think are must read. So he's going to be joining us after the break to discuss setting boundaries and how to say no. Here to discuss setting boundaries and how to say No is Greg McEwen. Hi, Greg, it's so nice to be with you. Thank you both for having me. Well, we love your work and can't you couldn't be more important now, I think as we think about a return to our values, a return to

things that are important. So what is your work? How would you describe your work for those who may not know it? Can you describe Essentialism for us? Yes? My name is Greg mckewen, and I am the author of two New York Times bestsellers. Essential is um The Discipline Pursuit of Less, which is all about figuring out what what is essential, eliminating everything that's not, so that you can make it as effortless as possible to do what

is essential. And that's what my most recent book is specifically about, is how to make it more effortless if you have to combine both of them in a simple idea. I think it's healthy productivity. And that doesn't sound that profound, perhaps, but in a time of so much unhealthy productivity, it seems to have struck a nerve. And it's really a shame that these things are as relevant as they are, because we want to find a better way, a different

way to do life. What I love about your work so much is I always try to bring it into the work of the home being the most important organization, or as this one man said to me that I think I told you about where he said, I mean like the opposite of my home, where we wait to decide who's taking the dog out right when it's about to take a piss on the rug. And I said, exactly, whatever that is. I want the opposite for you, just

that that thing, but the opposite. And I think where your work intersects with adity in my work, and we're burnout in wellness is I always like to say, you know, I wish burnout now is as easy as taking a walk around the block. Like you'll hear some of these productivity experts say or carving out five minutes a day for your meditation practice. But I really truly believe that the antidote to burnout is being interested in your own life. And when you are on a treadmill of milestones, you

can't be that way. So you you teach us how to start thinking about what it is that we're truly interested in. What does it mean to me an essentialist? How do you return to that state if you're somebody who is like my friend who's dying in decision fatigue and waiting to take the dog out right when he's about to take a piss on the road. Yeah, look, I mean there there's a big clear difference between non essentialists and essentialists. Non Essentialists think, do, and get very

different things. So what do they think? They think everything is essential, everything is important, and so what that produces is what Jim Collins is called the undisciplined pursuit of more, where you're reacting to everything, you're living in your inbox

you're in a zoom, eat, sleep, repeat lifestyle. You're just dealing with things when you cannot not deal with them, and so this is a way to survive, but you're not thriving in that, and it really is exhausting for everyone involved to just be in a sort of slightly panicked mode all the time. And so what you get is unsatisfying results because you're not even sure if the right things are getting done or not, and they're probably not. Your to do list is longer at the end of

the day that it was at the beginning. You're stretched too thin at work or at home or both, you feel busy but not productive. Then then these things can even get worse over time. And that's really what they've been addressing more recently, is that people really are teaching right on the edge of exhaustion. They want to get to another level, but they lack the energy because this has gone on for quite a while, and then eventually everything feels like it's just harder than it needs to be. Right,

that's the non essential list story. The essentialist is different to all of that. The essentialist thinks, does and gets really different things. They think almost everything is non essential and a few things only are essential. So it's almost the opposite mindset. And so as soon as you believe that that there's just a few things that are vital and almost everything is trivial. As Maxwell put it, it's

difficult to overstate the unimportance of practically everything. Once you adopt that idea, then your behavior naturally shifts because you start to say, well, I've got to explore what's essential. Then I have to find out what really matters and discern between all of these things coming at me. I need to eliminate the non essential things, even if they feel like it's all just pressure or the fomo because of the people are doing it, and I have to get rid of that stuff as much as I possibly can.

And then I need build systems. I know that's one of your favorite words, and I love that word. To make it as easy as possible to do what's essential, so that in the best case scenario, these things happen even if we aren't thinking about them. I mean, that's the ultimate situation. That the systems and rituals of our lives work. So whether you're sleeping, these things happen, whether

you're consciously thinking about them or not. They are happening, and the result of that is a life that satisfied, a life that really means something, and a sense of like they're the right things are getting done and so that you can have more joy in the journey. Now that's the contrast. You know, in full disclosure, I've spent plenty of my life in the first column, and even on a day to day basis, I find myself jumping

between these things. So I struggle with this. I'm in the wrestle with everybody else, but it's still helpful to me to think of this contrast, to notice when I'm in the first so that I can make decisions by designed to get into the second. Make decisions by design. Can I just say that three times? I think if we had to distill what this podcast is about for the home, it's making decisions by design so that you're

not reactive. So I'm going to turn it over to a d d who's also an expert in wellness from a medical field, and she has a couple of questions for you. Greg. So you've kind of laid out the difference between non essentialism and essentialism. So in eaves work, it's this idea of giving ourselves permission. So for those of us who might be living in the non essential mindset, to get to that essential is m that's a big leap. But we have to almost like give ourselves permission to

get there, to stay there. Can you talk to us a little bit more about that? How do we do that? How do we take that first step? First of all, you know, read Eve's book. That seems like a good stunt. This is non trivial right to to find kind of

unicorn space in our lives. I know from personal experience, and Anna, my wife, is one of the most discerning people in my life, but still struggles with this because the responsibilities are so high, because she has so many important things that she's taking seriously that carving out space two formally work on something for her, something that she

wants to pursue and create, doesn't just happen. That is never going to happen anymore in the world, as noisy as it is, if you just take the path of least resistance, if you just go with the cultural norms, it is not going to happen. It will be consumed with social media, with running children, places, with any number of other activities, and so where do we start on this here. Here are a few tactics I think people should start with. One is to immediately look at the

next month of your life and blocking out time. Anything that's not already blocked, you block it. You make an appointment, a meeting with yourself. We managed to make two meetings of all sorts of things. We managed to be on zoom appointments all sorts of times. So this is scheduling time for yourself. You have to create this space because it won't just exist. And maybe a few years ago

it would have just existed. You're late for a plane, or you're or you're waiting to pick someone up and they're not quite there and you just have to wait. And the upside of that is that the space to think. But now the moment that you could have thought or imagined or explored your life, you just check your phone and you're into all of these other habits. So I think blocking out time ahead is one thing that you can do. I think a second thing that people can do,

and this is like a microburst. So you say ten minutes, I am going to set time for ten minutes. That's fine, and I'm going to make my done for the day list that is a thoughtful list that the criteria has done for the day, meaning whence I'm done with this list, I'm really done. I'm not going to do any sneaky work after that. This is the work of my day, and then I'm going to move into relaxation recuperation activities.

And so the done for the day list is a prioritized list, but it's one that has a boundary to it. And I will say I think I've done it, maybe four out of the last five days, and the day I didn't, you have a different experience. You feel more

in control, more deliberate, more thoughtful. To use the essentialist language, it's a disciplined pursuit of less and you get to the end of the day and you feel more sure as you're lying there in bed that the most important things did get done, and you also didn't just keep going as if you're a machine. Where biological creatures we work in rhythms, and we shouldn't be treating ourselves like

compusers or like factories. I have a followed quite into that, which is your second book is so important because it's really about figuring out what to fill with if we actually do claim this permission in this space, and I had someone asked me a question that I thought i'd pass on to which I think is important a distinction

to make life is not easy, right. The good things we do, like writing books, you know, our unicorn space, or like you said, what Anna was going to do creating the world, these things are not all cupcakes and rainbows. There is a flow state experience, like this hour or this thirty minutes with you is going to go in a blink of an eye for me because I'm so into listening to you and the flow state of it.

But there is rigor. And so tell me about how effortlessness is different than saying, well, everything in my life has to be easy, because I think that's a really important distinction. Well, first of all, it's the number one risk in writing a book called effortless is to be misunderstood in that precise way. You don't write a book called effortless because you think life is easy. You write a book called effortless because seriously, it is so so

hard for so many people. I wrote it in part because of the most difficult experience of my whole life, which was when my daughter suddenly went from the picture of health to an undiagnosed and massive discombobulative neurological disease that looked on the surface behaviorally something like her getting Parkinson's disease and out in the midst of that quite let's say, agonizing time. What I discovered, and was very surprised to discover, was that there were two paths to

any challenging situation. One is that you can make it harder and heavier and more challenging. And the second is that there is a lighter, easier, more effortless, better, simpler way to do life. And it really matters that you discover the second path because if you don't discover them, if we take the wrong path, will burn out ourselves. Our relationships are family culture. Before we can help her, we don't know how long the journey is for us.

It was more than two years in all before she was able to at least be treated for a diagnosis. None of the tests ever actually showed a proper diagnosis, but she was treated for enseparitis information of the brain and aggressively treated and eventually that seemed to completely work. So she is back now. But if you burn out before you achieve your mission, then you haven't achieved your mission.

And so when you don't how long something will take, you've got to find this different pace, this different approach. And that's what gives me fire for the deed for this because I see so many people, so many people in their homes. They're doing the most important work of their life, right, They're doing important work, but they're doing it in a way that leads to over exertion, overthinking, perfectionism, exhaustion, burnout, isolation in their burnout, and so all of this ends

up stripping away the deeper reserves they have. And what kind of state are you in when you're trying to build a home, when you're trying to build a family, when you're trying to build a contribution in the community, And what do you have to give if that's your approach to life? And I'm afraid that there's that there's there's very very many people who I think can relate to what I'm describing. There are seemed to be able to.

And so so that's the reason that's why to write this book, that's why it's worth doing, not because life is easy, but because it's so hard. You have to find an easier path to be able to survive or have a prayer of driving through it. Part of your work that I love is how you teach people how to say no. And you say that saying no is like a skill and it's something that we can practice. You start small, you build it up over time, and it may be one of the most useful skills you

ever developed. By saying no to things that aren't really meaningful, we actually have the space and energy to concentrate on

the things that are. And you lay out three steps really beautifully about how to say no. And one of my favorite pieces of writing by you is a piece called if you don't prioritize your life, someone else will talk to us a little bit more about this idea of consciously making a change and designing your life, and how we can learn to say no to then be better to say yes to all the things we want to say yes to. Let's begin with a bold number one rule non essentials and has premised on a lie.

There's here's what the lie is. It says if you can do it or you can have it all m hm. And here's the problem with that. In a world where choices and options have gone up and continue to go exponentially right ever since the internet existed. The options are beyond comprehension. So, in a state of endless possibilities, can you do it all? If it is such a nonsense, it's it's it's it doesn't mean anything. And then let's say you could do it all, or you could try

to do it all? Will it lead you to getting it all? Is that what happens to people? If this doesn't live up to what it says on the packaging, it's a bill of goods. We've been conned, and so our job is to get out of the con is to not participate in the lie. You don't have to tell everybody else off, you just have to not participate in the lie yourself. The world is a world of trade offs. Every single time you say yes to something,

every yes is no to a thousand things. You're saying no to every other possible thing you could be doing. So actually we are all saying no all the time, which is not using that word. So what we're really talking about here is not starting to say no to everyone and everything without really thinking about it, but it is to say yes cautiously and carefully and in a disciplined way. So that we can be sure that when we say yes, we can really do it without resentment,

that we can do it and feel good about it afterwards. Well, thank you for sharing your vulnerability with the world. You're one of my most profound teachers. But I appreciate your vulnerability and your wisdom and Effortless is really a vulnerable book. You know, you you do talk about your personal experiences, and so that sort of takes us full circle. That is unicorns base, right, that curiosity about something, that connection with your listeners or readers, and then the completion. You

actually had to complete the book. So thank you. Thank you for completing it and putting on in the world. And usually we like to end with just where can people find more of you as you iterate and continue to create. There's only one thing I'd suggest with people on that, and it's just a free news letter. It's called the One Minute Wednesday. It's very simple thing. It's not profound. Some of the say's profound, it's just microadjustments

people can make in one minute or less. So you just go to Greg McEwen dot com and you can sign up for that's the best. I always look forward to it. I am subscribing today. I love it, I love it. I love one minute Wednesday. I look forward to it. Marvelous. What a pleasure to be with you both. Thank you so much for having me. Hi, It's me Eve.

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towards more equity, more fairness, and greater connectivity. Visit fair Play method dot com. So, as you may know, now, every episode of this podcast ends with an action item for you are listeners that we call a time out. This is really a time for you to focus on

yourself and reflect on what you're hearing today. You know, So, Eve, as we've been talking about all of this, I think and reflect upon my own journey in learning how to say no, moving from the feeling of no to the doing of no. And for many of us and many of our listeners, learning to say no is scary and hard and foreign because it is ultimately a skill and something that we have to practice over and over again. When it comes to the brain. The more we use

certain neural pathways, the stronger they become. We know that saying no is a practice, and so for this week, I would love for you to share with our listeners how to start saying no using all of the tools we've learned from prior episodes. I'll circle back to the

story that we began with. I remember the next Sunday d D after those two disastrous Sundays where my time kept getting erased by all those interruptions, Because I do think the biggest superpower that all of us can have when we set a boundary is attention that we get attention back. Attention is our weapon, and so if we look at protecting and saying no as a boundary to

guard our attention, that's very, very powerful. So I remember the next Sunday, I went to my family around sort of the breakfast area they're grabbing cereal, and said, I want to try something new today that helps us get what we all want without the yelling and the tears. So I paused and I locked eyes with each of them. I was calm adity, emotion was low, cognition was high, and I said, I'd written this down. I love you. I want you to feel seen and hurt in this house.

I want to feel heard and respected to So you see how this is a communication skill. Before we can the doing of no is a communication practice. I'm asking all of you for two full hours this morning to write in my office. This time is very important to me. It allows me to use my voice for what I value. That goes to our y and our value setting, which means that I have so much more to give you when I'm done. While I'm writing, Daddy's here to help

you with whatever you need. Seth of course, affirmed that, and then I resumed and said, look, in a couple of hours, I'm going to be a available to you all, but until then, please respect my time and space. Okay. So they all mumbled okay, and then I said, okay, let me even go a little deeper into my communication style, and I said, to the kids, think of it this way. If we reserved a private room at a trampoline park

for your birthday party. And just as we were cutting the cake, another group of kids burst through the door, demanding cake and proclaiming it was their party room. You'd be upset right because it wasn't their turn yet. Anna of course said that's not fair, and she was pounding her A small little baby adds on the table and I said, you know what, that's my point. It's not fair,

so don't crash my party. And it was this thank you for respecting my space and time firmness that I was able to start to practice because communication, as we said, is our most important practice. So when you think about being able to get there to a place where you want to protect your boundaries so much, we have a

time out exercise as a reframe for you today. So while mine starting with fair Play through my second book was this writing time, I want all of you out there to picture your week, and one day a week, at least one day a week, when you answer the question that Greg McHugh and likes to ask, what is the most important thing you will do that day? Let's put a time out spin on it. What is the most important thing you do that day? You have to answer that question once a week outside of your roles

as a partner and our parent and our professional. So what do I mean by that that Sunday? Don't crash my party Sunday. The most important thing I did that day was right a chapter in my book. Doesn't mean I don't love hanging out my kids or being with Seth, but that was the most important thing I had done that day. Today, the most important thing I'll do today

is be with you. Add So that's this week's time Out and next week we're going to help you stop feeling guilty Permission to burn guilt and shame with Dr Cheryl Gonzale Ziegler. It's a great conversation, so tune in to learn from Cheryl, who's taught me so much about how to reframe guilt and shame. Thank you for listening to Time Out, a production of I Heart Podcasts and Hello Sunshine. I'm Ev Rodsky, author of the New York

Times bestseller fair Play and find your Unicorn Space. Follow me on social media at Eve Rodsky and learn more about our work at fair Play Life. And I'm Dr Addi Narukar, a Harvard physician with a specialty and stress resilience, burnout in mental health. Follow me on social media at dr add Narucar and find out more about my work at dr add dot com. That's d R A d I t I dot com. Our Hell of Sunshine team

is Amanda Farren, Aaron Stover, and Jennifer Yonker. Our I Heart Media team is Ali Perry, Jennifer Bassett, and Jessica Krinschitch. We hope you all love taking a much needed time out with us today. Listen and subscribe to Time Out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your favorite show