864: My Easy 4-Step Process to Spring Clean Your Business & Life

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2:01What if we got rid of all of the things that are unnecessarily burdening us or taunting us or reminding us of where we're not yet or where we used to be? And what if we can make space to move forward with a lighter load? It just makes sense. I'm Jenna Kutcher, your host of the Gold Digger podcast. I escaped the corporate world at the age of 23 with nothing more than a$300 camera from Craigslist and a dream. Now I'm running a seven-figure online business that feels even better than it looks, all from my house in small town Minnesota with my family. Here, we value time as our currency. We mix the woo and the work, and we are in the pursuit of building businesses that give us the freedom to live lives that we love.

2:51I've always loved turning big goals into reality, and I'm here to help you do the same. This isn't just a peek behind the curtain. Come along with me and my guests as we tear the whole curtain down. Every week we tackle practical, no-fluff marketing strategies and host honest discussions on what works and what doesn't. Join me and my expert guests for actionable insights to help you grow your dream business with confidence. Pull up a seat and get ready to be challenged, inspired, and empowered. This is the Gold Digger Podcast. Spring isn't just about deep cleaning your home. It's about clearing mental and emotional clutter too.

3:30Research actually shows that spring cleaning can boost your mood, increase your productivity, and even reduce stress levels. There is something about longer days and fresh air that makes us crave a reset. So let's take advantage of that energy. In this episode, I'm walking you through my ADHD-friendly, no BS approach to spring cleaning, and not just your space, but your business and your life too. But here's the twist. This isn't about organizing more. It's about questioning everything. What if the real reason you feel stuck isn't clutter, but the way you're spending your time? What if cutting one thing from your schedule could give you back hours every week?

4:08And what if the best way to move forward isn't adding something new, but letting go of something that's weighing you down. I'll share this surprising shift that helped me work less and get more done, why I stopped saying yes to every exciting idea, even the good ones, and the mindset shift that lets me pivot without guilt. If you're ready for a fresh start without the overwhelm, well, let's dive on in. So last night I was getting ready to put the girls to bed and Quinny looks outside and points out the window and she's like, mom, mom, it's not time for bed. The sun is still out. And oh my gosh, I just took a minute and took a deep breath.

4:44And I was like, we made it. We made it through another winter. And there is something so beautiful after coming out of what feels like a cave, where it is dark at 8am and it is dark at 3pm, where you just feel like you survived. And if you don't live in a very cold, very dark climate, you might not know the feeling that a lot of us are experiencing. But it is this feeling of survival, a feeling of awe, a feeling of delight. And man, I'm going to take this energy as far as I can. But I just really believe that after winter, there is just this revival in such a beautiful way. And if we can learn how to harness that power in our lives, in our businesses, in our priorities, I feel like we can have that January 1st feeling anytime we want it, but especially during the spring season.

5:48And so today I am going through a four-step process. This is like a no BS, somewhat hot take, ADHD-friendly process of what I think you should do if you have this renewed sense of energy to really harness its power and to continue carrying you forward. Because I can't believe how fast this year is flying. I was just texting with two of my best friends and one of them was just saying like, wow, I've been feeling so much better lately. And I was like, have you paused to think about like the difference of energy and light and weather between winter and spring? And all of a sudden we were all just like, wow, this is big.

6:30and how can we take this energy? And so that is what helped inspire today's show. Okay. So step number one is this, delete before you declutter. And this is why I think we all need a burn list. Here's my hot take. We focus so much, spring cleaning is like so generalized around this idea of like cleaning and decluttering and organizing. And I'm like, okay, I love all of this. But like, what if we just delete? Like we waste so much time trying to organize things in our lives that should be donated or trashed or just like out of our lives. And what's interesting is this thought that is a unique take on what clutter is.

7:14Clutter isn't just stuff. It's unmade decisions. It's things that are sitting around in your life or in your business that you have not had the opportunity to decide, is this important? Is this useful? Is this worth keeping? And so what happens is, is that we move through our days and we move through our lives with all of this clutter around and all that it's doing is signaling to our brains that you haven't made a decision yet. And one thing I've been unpacking a lot in therapy and with friends is with my ADHD, I really experienced decision fatigue. I used to kind of laugh thinking like, is that a thing?

7:54It's a thing. It's a thing. And at the end of the day, if I've used all my decision-making skills up throughout the day, like I am done. The other night, Drew asked me something about making Coco's lunch. And I was just like, I can't, I just, I literally can't. And so when we start to look at clutter, not just as like stuff around our house, but if we look at it as unmade decisions, we start to see how clutter can add unnecessary weight to our mental load. It can add unnecessary weight to our lives and moving through our life with all of this clutter is actually a burden. If your desktop looks like a crime scene, like you are embarrassed like I am, or your closet has clothes that maybe might fit you someday, or you're looking at like that dress that you bought for, you don't even know what event you were planning on going to.

8:50And it's just hanging in your closet, reminding you that you haven't wore it yet. Or maybe your business tools are like this Frankenstein mashup of unused subscriptions and project management software that you don't even know how to use. Here's what I think. I think it is time for a burn list. I want for you to literally make a burn list. This is step number one in your spring cleaning. Make a list of things that you are holding onto or you are keeping out of guilt, out of habit, or out of FOMO. Guilt, habit, or FOMO. This is what is probably accountable for most of the clutter in your home. And then once you have a list or a pile, however you want to do it, here's what I want you to do.

9:37delete, donate, or delegate. So guilt, habit, and FOMO can turn into delete, donate, or delegate. There is this rule that I learned in terms of spring cleaning. I think I saw it online and it is the, would I buy this today rule? If I wouldn't spend money on this thing right now, then I need to let it go. And I think this is really huge. And I have something, this tendency within myself, and I'm about to just throw myself under the bus here, that I have a really hard time letting go of things that I have previously invested in. So I, for example, this is embarrassing, in a tote in our basement, I still have a pair of jeans that I remember buying that were very expensive for me at the time.

10:29And I can't let them go. I just remember saving my pennies to buy that pair of jeans. And so the, would I buy this today rule would suggest that I should absolutely let go of those jeans that are two decades old and clear up space for something that I would enjoy today. And so what I love about this first step is that instead of just moving things around in your life, in your mind, in your business, what if we got rid of all of the things that are unnecessarily burdening us or taunting us or reminding us of where we're not yet or where we used to be? And what if we can make space to move forward with a lighter load?

11:14It just makes sense. So I have this really weird tendency. And if anyone else has this, can you reach out to me and just let me know this because I feel like I'm the only person. I hoard packaging. If somebody sends me something and it comes in a beautiful box, I tell myself, I'm going to use this box for something. This box is so beautiful. Somebody spent a lot of time designing this box. And so I am someone who, I swear to God, I hoard packaging like a squirrel preparing for winter. And most of the time, it ends up just being a stack of like beautiful boxes that I never use again. I will literally tell Drew sometimes, like if you just see empty boxes and there's nothing in them, can you just throw them away?

12:00Don't even tell me about them because I'm going to try to think of a reason that I can use them. And it comes from a beautiful place, right? Like I want to reduce, reuse, recycle any chance I can get. But oftentimes it just adds to clutter or it just serves as a reminder of like, I haven't done that yet. Another example of me needing to delete is I was speaking at a workshop and I had to hand the tech guys my laptop and my speech was on there. And they plugged in my laptop and up popped my desktop with probably 500 screenshots and files and documents sitting on my desktop. Like I can't even minimize my Google Chrome window because it gives me so much anxiety.

12:41And I saw this thing the other day where it was like for the people that have ADHD and have 10 ,000 screenshots, but then the screenshots become the burden because they know there are so many waiting for them and they never go back to visit them. And then they just pile up. That is me. And so what I am in need of, and I'm claiming this for myself this spring is before I go to declutter anything, I need to delete and take my burn list and get rid of the stuff that is holding me back. And for me, this is like very significant. Like I feel like when my life and when my home is cluttered, I feel the weight of it.

13:22Like it mentally weighs on me because the fact that it is unmade decisions exhaust me. And so this is step number one of our process, delete before we declutter. So again, the three things you need to look for are things you are holding onto, whether it's in your life or your business, out of guilt, out of habits, or out of FOMO, and then delete, donate, or delegate. And I will say too, when you can find amazing places to donate to in your local community, and you know that those donations make a difference, it makes donating so much more fun. And so I actually brought in a bag of stuff to my favorite place in Duluth, Damiano Center, when I was volunteering the other day.

14:09Every single month, I try to just bring in a bag of useful things. I brought in a bunch of mugs that the soup kitchen can use, and it makes getting rid of stuff a lot more joyful. So find a place in your local community that can use quality donations and spring cleaning just got a lot more joyful and you just made an impact in your local community. This podcast is brought to you by Mercury, banking that helps entrepreneurs do more with their money. Okay. I remember in the early days of my entrepreneurship journey, clients would literally mail me checks and then I would have to drive all the way to the bank to deposit them.

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15:22Visit mercury.com to apply in minutes. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. For important details, check the show notes. When we were young, we dreamed of castles and fairy tales. And as we grow up, those dreams might shift into building something real, like starting a business. You need a website, payment systems, a logo, and a way to reach customers. It can all be overwhelming and confusing, but thankfully that's where today's sponsor Shopify comes in. Shopify powers millions of businesses around the world and 10 % of all U.S. e-commerce from big brands to folks just getting started.

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16:44Now, this is not going to shock you. I love this principle so much. I made an entire episode about it, but I want to flip it. So the principle is Pareto's principle. I talk about it often because I think it shows up in every area of our life, but especially in our business. And so step number two is the 80-20 time audit. And basically what I want us to do is to fire half of our to-do list. So here's my hot take here. You don't need more time. You need to quit half of what you're doing. most of us waste 80 % of our time on things that bring 20 % of results. Again, I'm going to link to the episode that I did about this principle and the places it might be showing up in your business.

17:26But I truly believe that we are spending so much time on things that aren't actually providing us results. Things like answering emails, overthinking instead of executing, waiting for perfection. There's so many tasks that feel urgent and important, but when we really dial it back, it's likely not actually giving us any sort of result. And so what I would argue here is that the problem isn't a lack of time. It's that we're working on the wrong stuff. And so this part of your spring cleaning process is doing an 80-20 work audit. And so if you have not tracked your time recently. And for a lot of people, I would argue that most entrepreneurs probably haven't impeccably tracked their time in years.

18:17I'm throwing that out there. What I think you and I need to do is list everything we do in a week. And then at the end of the week, highlight what actually drives results and look for ways to cut out the rest. When you can actually look in an audit and honestly assess and see where your time is going. One, I think you're going to be shocked at some tasks that in your brain, you're thinking, oh, that only takes 20 minutes or 30 minutes. And you're going to see that it takes you hours, but you're also going to start to connect the dots of where your efforts are actually leading to real results. And so when you can highlight and trace your effort to a tangible result, whether that is a sale or a subscriber or a new client or a new connection, you're going to find opportunities to cut out the rest, whether that is through offloading and delegating to someone else in your life or just fully eliminating.

19:16So one way to effectively start to see where you can get more time out of your days is called the time cap method. And this works so well, whether you have ADHD or not, but this works especially well if you are someone who has ADHD or might be suspecting that you do. So the time cap method is this. You look at your tasks of what you need to get done for the day and you give every task a very strict time cap. So you say, I'm going to give myself 15 minutes for emails or two hours of deep work. Now Parkinson's law is essentially the idea that your projects will expand to the amount of time that you give them.

19:59And so Parkinson's law is going to jump in in your favor and force you to get things done faster. Now I do this in both business and life, especially around tasks that I am absolutely dreading. Because one thing I've realized is that when I am dreading something or I'm putting something off and I'm not actually getting it done, the mental weight of that is so heavy that it keeps me from being productive in the areas that I want to be productive in. Again, it's kind of like that clutter, but showing up in a more mental way. And so the time cap method is so good. I actually have these timers and it's so funny because we've had to order more of them because my daughters have stolen them that are really beautiful, colorful from Amazon.

20:43And I will set the timer and I will set it for 15 minutes or 20 minutes or an hour. And then I will put my phone in another room, literally remove it, open up one tab on Google Chrome and force myself to work in that tab until that task is done. And so the time cap method can be super effective, especially for things that you're putting off, whether it's making your doctor's appointment or canceling that subscription or sitting down and responding to that email that you've been thinking about for five days. And so time cap method, try it out. I think that it's going to help you to stop overthinking and actually get into a place of action.

21:23And one thing that I found is that when I do this and I get into a state of action, it is a lot easier for me to stay in action. Oftentimes it kind of breaks a seal on that feeling of like, I can't get this done and I'm not executing and gets you into that place of execution and gets you away from overthinking. The final tool for this take is the two hour challenge. So I recently did this unintentionally and it was so helpful for me. It also reminded me so much of my postpartum days after having my daughters. So the two hour challenge is thinking through what if you only had two hours to work each day?

22:02And the thought is, is that you want to stack your most important tasks in those two hours. And I recently did this because we went on a winter break and we went to Florida and I really, really, really focused on being super present with my kids. And so it was a standard week in my business. And so what I was doing is once the kids were occupied and playing with each other, which they do really well these days, blessed, I love these ages, they're ages three and six. Once they started playing with each other and kind of got lost in their own little world, I would crack open my laptop and I would get to work.

22:41And I would work very quickly and very effectively because I didn't know how much time I had. And so each day I was essentially working about two hours a day because my daughters do a one hour quiet time. So I got one hour and then whatever time I could sneak. And I got so much work done and I didn't feel like I was falling behind, like nothing burned down. And so the two hour challenge is this. And honestly, this is smart for many different reasons, but thinking through if I only had two hours to work today, what am I going to do first? And I would argue to set a timer and block that time for your deep work because there are different studies done that say that you only can get a few hours of deep work done each day.

23:26Like the human being is not meant to try to do like deep, deep work for hours upon hours upon hours. And this makes sense. And I learned this years ago in Marie Forleo's time genius program, where she was just talking about this and it totally freed me up to recognize like, Hey, if I stack my day with just a few hours of like deep impactful work, it's okay. If the rest of the day has some of the lighter tasks and things in it, but I want to block and plan for just a few hours. And so the two hour challenge is just a really good challenge to make sure that you're setting your priorities. Well, to get that deep work done, to start with what is most important first, and then use whatever remaining time you have for the other tasks.

24:09So I would challenge you 80-20 time audit, fire half of your to-do list or figure out ways to eliminate or delegate, and then make sure that we are focusing the time that we do have, whether it's limited or unlimited, on the things that are actually moving the needle the most. And I think that you're going to actually see that you have more time than you've been thinking. It's going to feel really freeing when you do this. Okay. Step number three for spring cleaning, according to me, is stop saying yes. Okay. So I have been looking at business with an MVB approach, which is the minimum viable business approach.

24:56I am not a maximalist, especially when it comes to business. Okay. We've all seen those like TJ Maxx commercials, maximalists, not me. I have been riding this minimum viable business approach for the last six years and it has changed my life. It has unlocked freedom and it has given me the type of business that allows me to do the things that I want to do most. Like last night I was going to bed and I was thinking my business right now is the least interesting thing about me. Like my life is so full and free that my business, it kind of feels like an afterthought. And I say that in the best way possible.

25:36So my hot take around this is if you have too many ideas, you do not need more inspiration or more information. You need bigger blinders. Like I want to turn up your blinders even bigger to block out all of the things that are pulling your attention in a million different ways. The best business owners do not chase every idea. What they do is they focus on building their minimum viable business. This means stripping it down to the essentials and then doubling down on what works. I recently did an episode about how you can create an incredible business without constantly creating new things, new ideas, new content, going deeper on what you already have instead of going wider.

26:28And I truly believe that that is behind my success. It's also behind the reason why I'm not constantly burnt out or feeling like a hamster on a wheel. And for me, this happened both by choice and chance is how I say it. So when I finally became a mom six years ago, I had already set up different systems in my business and I already had offers that were working. And so each year of motherhood, I would look at my calendar and I would basically just put those offers and drop them into my calendar. And for the last six years, I've essentially run my business by doing one launch each quarter. So four launches a year.

27:10And what's crazy to me and probably to you is that I haven't created a new offer in nearly six years. So the business that I had six years ago when I first became a mom is still the business I have today. Now, what does this mean? It doesn't mean that my courses are the same courses they were six years ago. In fact, I'm rerecording a course as we speak, but my offers keep getting better and stronger and the marketing around them and the systems around them keep getting better. And so I have been able to go so deep on the things that I know work instead of getting scattered on a million different ideas.

27:51And trust me when I say, if you're listening to this and you're like, Jenna, you don't know me. I'm so multi-passionate. I can't be put into a box. I have all of these ideas, I'm just oozing with ideas. I get it. I am the same way, but I have taught myself and trained myself to look at how to get the biggest impact out of what is already existing. I have basically trained myself how to dig for gold in a business as it is. And what's beautiful about that is that I am never reinventing the wheel. I am always working from what has already worked and making it better. And so in the last six years, the evolution of my products and my business has been beautiful.