“I think uncertainty is a wonderful soil for dreams.”
READ FULL TRANSCRIPTHi everyone. Its Brian Walker. This is another special episode of The Brand Lab Series™ podcast. Today, we’re gonna focus on health and wellness, with a special emphasis on mindfulness and meditation, as well as yoga in the home. I’m super excited to have a long-time friend and a former yoga coach herself, for me, Allison English. She’s half yogi, half entrepreneur. And she’s got a great life story, and herself has been pivoting her business and her approach to helping her current and future clients. So I’m super glad to have Allison English on today’s podcast. Allison, welcome.
Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here.
I’m just glad our schedules could align. We’ve stayed in touch across social over the years, even when I haven’t been in your yoga studios. You’re quite a source of inspiration and calm for me, and seeing everything that you do online, so I super appreciate that.
I’m very happy to be here and talk about it, and I’m glad that those resources help you.
As we were talking right before we hit record, I think, the thing that is really hard about the current situation we’re in is that I think there’s so much uncertainty. We don’t really know how long things will last, from the shelter in place, to going back to work, to being able to travel, to how long we’ll be at risk for coronavirus. The only thing that seems to be certain is this uncertainty. I think that causes a lot of anxiety. I know it certainly does, even in myself. And one of the big reasons why I wanted to have you on is to be able to talk about a lot of these things from a wellness perspective. What are some of the habits that you think people can start implementing and some of their day-to-day, to kinda help strengthen our mental health during this uncertain time?
I feel like you hit the nail on the head and that the number one thing people have been asking about is, what do I do with my extraordinarily high level of anxiety? And there are a couple of techniques that I’ve been recommending to a lot of my clients and that I do myself. And one of those is to have something regular that you do every day, whether it’s taking a walk outside on a similar pathway, whether it’s doing a short yoga practice, or a meditation on something, like Insight Timer or Headspace, having something that you do regularly, every day, that is a touch base for you is a reminder of normalcy in times of uncertainty. And it’s kind of funny, but I love putting make-up on, and that’s something I absolutely don’t have to do right now, because I’m at home, but I do it every day because it reminds me of my workday. It sets me up for the day in the morning, makes me feel great. It’s fun. Even little things like that, that you might not codify as something that is mental health-related could be really useful.
And the other thing that I recommend is making a list of things you wanna do on a specific day of the week. Because I feel like when you’re at home, you can lose time. And when you lose time, then suddenly, it feels like either the day went by too quickly and nothing got done, or the day is dragging on and you’re not sure what to do, so you end up mindlessly watching TV or eating or worrying, watching CNN. Making a list of things that you want to do each day, is really helpful just for maintaining focus. And I even I pad my to-do list, I’ll put “eat lunch” and a time. And I’ll remind myself like, “Oh it’s time to go have my lunch break.” Because otherwise, again, you might lose your day in tasks or you might lose your day and something that’s completely not healthy for you. Like staring at the news headlines for hours at a time.
I like that advice. And I think one of the things that everyone is grappling with a little bit is this whole adjustment to actually being at home and working at home, and while it’s not technically mental health-related, it ultimately affects it. And that’s what I would call boundaries, and I hadn’t thought about the lunch schedule. What I had been doing are some warming meditation and some other things, and I know if I don’t do that, and admittedly, when this first started, there were a couple of days where I’m like… Yeah, I can take calls in my sweatpants, but then I did start to realize, no, I gotta get back to thinking how I would, if I were going into my office, but what I found sometimes is hard is the boundary between where does work end and life begin when you’re always in your own home. And I have found that I’m missing meals, at least during the workdays, and every day seems like a workday any more. I find myself missing meals more than I ever did when I was at my office. So that’s interesting that you even put that in your own schedule.
Yeah, to make sure that you eat at regular times.
Well, I think self-care is so important, whether it is food, whether it is make-up, whether it’s staying hydrated. The other thing I realized is that, I moved more and I drank way more water in my office than I first did the couple of weeks that I was home. And now I’m realizing now, you have to kind of offset that as well.
Absolutely. Yeah, I noticed the water thing when we transitioned to working at home ’cause normally, I would carry a water bottle with me. And then, transitioning to being on a screen, I’m not drinking water during my classes, because I’m teaching in front of a screen as opposed to in person. So yeah, I have to drink a ton more water. That’s an interesting one.
Yeah. I know another topic we wanted to talk a little bit about… Well, a lot of topics, actually, but one of them is also obviously meditation. It’s something that I just recently have found and had consistently practiced just this year, and it’s really helped me. And I believe, and in some of your background, a lot of people may not know before you were a yogi and an entrepreneur, that you were actually a competitive skater. And I think it was around that time that you said that you kind of found meditation. Talk a little bit about that and maybe some advice for people starting to think about how that type of approach could help.
Yeah, so I did find meditation as a teenager, as an athlete, and it kind of came in because competitive figure skating is a high anxiety sport. It demands perfection and that’s exhausting. And so, the recommendation came from one of my coaches that perhaps to deal with some of the competition anxiety that I was feeling, that I start a simple meditation practice based on just mindful following of the breath. And so, she would have me sit and breathe deeply before practice, and then building that habit into also before a competition to help my focus levels, and also to decrease anxiety levels. And it fascinated me how it worked, and so I ended up… It was very hilarious thinking back on it. I grew, was raised Catholic, and there was a Buddhist temple that offered meditation classes and my parents didn’t want me to go. And so I would say I was going to the library and I would hop on my bicycle and ride two suburbs over, which was a long bike ride, to get to a meditation class.
And that was kind of my first introduction was breath-based mindfulness meditation with a little bit of Buddhist background, and then over the years, I feel like I dabbled in everything. And I think that the key is to find a type of meditation that resonates with you because they all work. They just work in different ways. And when you’re first starting out, I think it’s good to begin with something like mindful breathing because you always have breath with you. You can do breathing for a short amount of time. You don’t have to have half an hour. There’s no special training that’s required to sit down and feel your own breath. And so I think that that’s a great beginner meditation for everyone. Start with feeling your own breathing and just recognizing everything that passes through you when you breathe.
I think that’s a great tip, because I, like a lot of people, are wired to just go, go, go. I call it a perpetual treadmill that I seem to be on, as a business owner, as a dad, and as so many other things. And I know that at first the thinking of, “Oh meditation seems foreign to me. I can’t downshift very well.” But it’s funny that you mentioned breathing is a jumping-off point because I always have a lot of fondness for our memories. And I know you were up until this transition to work from home as well. One of the many hats you wear is at Equinox Fitness, and I remember a lot of your yoga practices really started with the breathing.
And that’s definitely something that I can do and feel like, then you can see, am I breathing rapidly? Is it in my diaphragm, is it trapped up here? Where is my breath right now? And that, to me, is something, of all the busyness and all the anxiety, that’s something that you can kind of wrap around. And then I think it’s that next thing to realize that, and I love what you said about how there’s a lot of ways to do it because I think the perception is like I’ve gotta be in a room, it’s gotta be dead silent. I can have no other thoughts ever to come into my head. And I think that just intimidates a lot of people.
Yeah. There was a wonderful study. I’ll have to find it and send it to you. But it was about long-time meditators and how long they could hold their focus. And people who’ve meditated a ridiculous amount of time, like 50,000 hours can hold their attention for four minutes. For the rest of us, we’re good if we get 30 seconds of focus and then a distraction, and then like another 30 seconds. It’s not about eliminating distractions. It’s about learning what’s the best way to respond to every single thing that comes your way. And if you can start by responding to your breath, you can gradually learn to respond to a thought. You can gradually learn to respond to an emotion or an anxiety or a memory, or a judgment, or whatever else is arising in your experience. Yeah.
Well, I know you talked about finding meditation and I love the story, by the way, about riding a bike, a couple of suburbs to the Buddhist temple, ’cause I was also raised Catholic. And this past week, being Easter, my parents still don’t let me forget that I was raised Catholic. But I love how you brought it, though, into relation to the sport that you were in, and the physical aspect of it as well because if there’s one thing I know you know really well, and I’m sure a lot of our listeners know, is that there’s clearly a direct correlation also between mental health and physical health. I think that’s really part of the challenge that a lot of people are facing right now is, especially where we are in Chicago. Up until last week or two, the weather has been miserable, so a lot of the times have been sheltering in place it’s been very dark, it’s been very cold. The isolation can get to people. So you’re seeing mental health really try to rear its ugly head on people’s physical health, as well. I talked to a lot of people that I work with, a lot of peers, friends. Every time someone gets a sore throat, they have a panic. Every time someone has a headache, they have a panic. So mental health is clearly manifesting itself a little bit on the physical health side of things.
So kinda like you talked a little bit about the upfront of mental health. What are just some basic things that maybe people could think about as it relates to their physical health, where they no longer can go to Equinox or go across town or whatever type of fitness gym they might be able to go to? What would be some tips for physical health at home?
So the interesting thing is that this whole crisis has created a proliferation of online options. Teachers are going on to Facebook Live and Instagram Live and doing 15-minute at-home bodyweight workouts. People are posting training plans for brand new beginners, people who’ve never done any sort of working out in their lives, and also for people who are really active. I think there’s a lot of resources out there and my recommendation would be to find your favorite teachers online because they all need you. They need you to do their workouts, they need you to check in with them because they miss you as much as you miss them. And so I think that’s the best option right now for people who were already working out in a gym situation.
Now, if you didn’t necessarily have a gym or a place that you like to work out at, I think it’s great to incorporate just general activity into your day. And here are some of the ways that I’ve done it. We have stairs in our building. I never took them. I now religiously take the stairs no matter what I’m carrying, up and down five flights. And that’s really good exercise. And when I feel like I’m stagnating, I’ll go and just run up and down the stairs a little bit. So if you have stairs, I would say take them, use them, walk around your neighborhood. Keep your social distance from anyone you see, but go outside, go for walks. Load on the clothing when it’s cold out, and still go out because it’s amazingly refreshing to be out even in bad weather. I think that’s been really helpful for me.
And the last one that I’ve been trying is gardening, which you would never believe how intense it is, to dig through a container of dirt or crouch down and try and plant things. That’s also a really great way to stay mindful, to stay active, and to get a little bit of that movement in your day.
Yeah, I love the stair climb. That’s impressive. Are you seeing that more people in your building are actually using the stairs or is that kind of a place that you’re able to kind of use at your leisure?
Interestingly, I feel like no one lives in my building anymore. I hardly ever see anyone so I have run into almost no one on the stairs.
That’s a great, then, little built-in workout. And it is one of those just subtle things that you can kinda do to stay active. And I also like the gardening thing, even if it’s trying to do some stuff inside with plants and stuff like that, even if you don’t have the ability to maybe be out as much or have a yard. Because I think, as you said, that there’s been this proliferation of the way that gyms and instructors and students and fitness people can all reconnect. I think the other thing that, as I talked about in my own mental health, I’ve always been someone that’s going… I do feel like this is this unique opportunity to downshift a bit or to say, “What’s something I don’t know that I can learn?” And this is a unique period where I can try to learn and do something and learn from it.
I know everyone has to pass their time in their own ways and to each their own. I’m surprised and not surprised by how many people seem to be binge-watching anything and everything you can get on streaming television. For me, this year was all about reading and I’ve become even more of a ferocious reader.
I’m reading books and things that I never thought I would read right now. And I love that time. So I do think that’s, again, part of the mental physical health, bringing it all back to learning.
Yeah. I started a class called Sunday Sangha, and Sangha is a Buddhist word that means a group of practitioners that gather and learn together. So every Sunday, I teach a class that’s part meditation, part yoga, and part inspirational reading, because I’m the same way in that, I love to read and I draw great peace and inspiration from books and texts, and things that poetry, things that I haven’t had a chance to read for years. And now, I have a little bit more space to do that, so I’ve been trying to weave that into my teaching as well, ’cause I think it helps other people who maybe don’t know about those avenues for inspiration.
Well, it’s amazing ’cause I have the opportunity to know you a little bit better than maybe some of the audience, it’s amazing that you even have time to build in because you do wear a lot of hats. You’re not just a yoga instructor. You are a business owner, you’re an entrepreneur. Over the last couple of years, you’ve been building more and more to providing these amazing experiences of yoga, not just here on a local basis, but at retreats and other events around the country, even going internationally. So talk a little bit about how you’ve had to, in a very short period of time, again, I know we were joking right before we recorded, how March seemed like the longest month in most people’s lives, but talk about how just in a really short period of time, you’ve been able, as best as you can, just like we all are, trying to think about pivoting your business, what have been some things that you’ve learned, good, bad, or ugly, thus far?
Yeah, so March at the beginning seemed relatively normal for me. And then, Thursday, March 13th or something, or March 12th rolled around, and I was given a four-day notice to essentially set up a remote business for one of my corporate clients. And they said, “We’re closing our offices. You can teach today, and that’s it. And if you can get up and running remotely, we’ll keep going.” And I thought, “Oh my gosh. How am I gonna teach them remotely? What am I gonna use?” And I just hit the ground running. I researched all the platforms. I decided that Zoom was the best option for a large group in terms of teaching, and being able to interact with people, and I just tried it. And I thought, “What’s the worst that could happen?” The worst that could happen is it doesn’t turn out well or the recording is a bit bumpy or maybe the video is not great.
And I thought the worst thing that could happen is better than nothing. And so, what has kind of guided my extraordinary pivot is just do something, because even if it isn’t polished and perfect, and exactly how I would want it to be, it’s gonna help a lot of people to stay practicing, it’s gonna help keep my business afloat to be working remotely, and something is better than nothing. And so, that was kind of the impetus, was that first corporate group, ’cause I didn’t wanna lose that client. And then, three days later, my primary place of work, Equinox, had to close because of the Stay At Home order, and I was like, “Okay. Well, here we go.”
I’m just gonna try out a whole schedule online and see what happens. And I fully anticipated no one to come. [chuckle] I put out a survey, I asked people what times they wanted, I took the times that people said and I threw it together into a weekly schedule. And people came and it turned out to be an amazing way to keep a connection with people all over the world. I have students in Australia, the United Kingdom, continental Europe, Asia, who’ve all been taking my classes, in addition to my students in the US. So it’s actually been a way of broadening my business beyond what it used to be, and people are really enjoying it, and having good experiences online that are unexpected for them as well. I would say the most difficult piece for me though, has been retreats because there’s no travel happening right now, there is no travel happening for the foreseeable future. And the feeling that I’m getting from most clients is fear. A fear of travel, a fear of being in contact with one another in a setting like a retreat, and I don’t know what that will do with my business.
And so I’m sitting here, just with that uncertainty. And hoping that at some point things will shift again and people will want to work together in person. But the honest answer is I don’t know how that line of business will grow. And so, in its space, I’ve made room for other things. I’ve been teaching more corporate yoga. I’ve been working more one-to-one and also with yoga teachers. I have a sliding scale for people, who are like me, but need help developing their business, and so I’ve been doing one-to-one sessions to help other teachers, yoga teachers, meditation teachers get their online business up and running. And so that’s become a new mentoring business for me that I never had before. So I think it’s all about being creative and figuring out, like, what’s the new corner you can shift into, and if you have to leave some of your business for a while, that’s okay. You can pick it up again when the environment changes outside of us.
Well, there was a lot there. And I wanna unpack some of what you said because you talked about fear, which I think a lot of people have no matter if you’re running a business, if you’re an employee, if you’re a retiree, there’s just a lot of fear. But you said something a minute or two back that I think is really great and inspiring and not surprising because I know you but you kinda talked about how you knew that you could not… I’m paraphrasing so forgive me if I don’t say it as eloquently as you did, but you kinda basically said, “Doing nothing was not acceptable.” And I kinda feel like when people started to initially back around mid-March, and you mentioned the 12th, then that was right around the times where, again, where we are, in Chicago, and these schools are starting to be talked about being shut down, businesses were being started to be shut down.
There was this fear and I think a lot of people hit the brakes. And they were trying to think about what does this mean? Does it really mean anything, does it not mean anything, whatever? I’m not gonna do anything until I can figure out what this means. Well, here we are, what, five, six weeks later. And nobody still really knows what it means. So the people that have pumped the brakes too much are at a disadvantage because we do have to try things, we do have to do it in a way where maybe we don’t know for sure what the outcome might be, but we’re willing to try to learn from it. And you also mentioned something through the end and I think it’s kind of interesting that was talked a little bit about in our episode 95 around how to think about strategic planning because you really can’t do that now.
And in that episode, Bob Moesta talked about how, if you can find new ways to serve your community, your customers, maybe new customers. Overtime is scary as it might be. Now, you might realize that there are things in your business, that just needed to die, and other areas of your business might evolve and grow. And I really empathize with you though, with this fear around travel. Because I think at some point, whether it’s weeks, months, God forbid years, you’ll have some people that will run right back out in the world. You have some people that will want a slow walk. And then you’ll have others that will crawl. And we just don’t really know when that’s gonna be. But the fact that you thought about, “Okay I can still provide value to my corporate clients, just in a different format.”
“I can take my private session clients and I can create a virtual experience for them.” I love that you’re thinking about, how can I help other people that haven’t quite figured it out that are teachers like me and maybe there’s a mentorship play there for you as well. So I applaud you for trying everything and then trying to learn and see what works. Because I think the alternative is at some point you kinda get ran over. As blunt as that is.
Yeah. And the other thing is, I think uncertainty is a wonderful soil for dreams, like when we are in uncertain times, I think if we give ourselves a little space to dream about things. We’re willing to try brand new ideas, so I think uncertainty can also breed some interesting kind of ideas or brainstorms that we might not have had if everything was just kind of chugging along, you know?
Oh, for sure. And I think it’s, as I said earlier, you’re on this perpetual treadmill in life, and sometimes you just don’t see what you can’t see, until you step off it or slow it down. So I really like that. Talk about just the adjustment though, from either being in the studio, being on location, being in some of these amazing settings that you hosted yoga retreats into having to be in your apartment or your customers being in their apartments. Talk about what does that transition been like?
Yeah, so the hardest part of, the first thing I lost was hands-on corrections. So when I was still allowed to teach in person, I was restricted from touching people for obvious reasons. Because close contact was associated with community transmission of coronavirus. So losing that was really hard because I like to be around humans and I really like to interact with them in that way in my practice and my teaching practice. And then we had to space ourselves out, so then I couldn’t even go near people. I could just stand at the front of the room, and then I lost the studio entirely and teaching from a screen. I wanna reach through it, [chuckle] with my own physical hand because I can see things and I can talk about it, but there is no replacement for touch. And I think that has been one of the hardest adaptations. And the other thing I found really difficult about virtual teaching is you can’t see everyone at once.
So even on a Zoom class, I’m on the mat, I’m demonstrating a pose, if there are 40 people, I can’t look at all of them and how they’re doing the pose and still demonstrate at the same time. And I miss that, I miss that level of interaction. So I think those are some of the issues that have been a little bit hard and teaching people how to place their laptops so I can see them, [chuckle] for private sessions, ’cause sometimes people will put their phone on the ground. And so I see a foot for an hour. And so that’s been a little bit interesting as well and kind of fun to be like, “Here, you can prop your phone up on a couch and turn it down towards your mat, and then I can see all of you while we’re doing our private session.” Those sorts of things have been humorous and fun at a time when I actually really need that humor and fun.
That is funny because we talked about the whole mindfulness and having a little grace and having a little bit of some consistent patterns. I love that you’re kinda giggling and laughing because it seems like it’s very hard for people to also find their silver linings in all of this, or bring some humor into all of this. And as you were talking about how to position people’s laptops instead of how to position people’s shoulders during a yoga move. I was thinking about my parents. So my parents are 80. And I’m old enough that they’re not like, say, someone who’s maybe 65, where their kids probably only knew some forms of mobile devices or texting and all of that. So at 80, my parents have always been a little bit tech-averse and so trying to do things now like Zoom family chats. It’s funny because I think it was the first time we did it, my sister said, “What’s going on? Does your camera and not show color?” And they’re like, “No, it works fine.” And then we realize they had no lights on where they were. They were literally sitting in the dark.
My father is very tall, my mother is not. So you would see just barely, the top of my mom’s head and my dad’s and I bring that up just to kinda build on what you’re talking about though with trying to help create a better overall experience. But one of the things that probably people wouldn’t know is that a fair amount of your clients are also in that 65-75 or even older range.
And I know there’s a lot of businesses right now that are struggling with how do we change and service our customers in a world that will be more virtual, will be more remote, will be more social distance for a while. And I think there’s a big perception that older Americans just don’t really understand technology fairly or not. So talk a little bit about some of the other things along with that that you’ve seen with some of your customers or how… I believe you hinted at even some of your corporate practices have shifted to a broader online offering as well.
Yeah, so with my older clientele, I find that it’s not that their tech-averse, it’s they just don’t know how to use it. And so, a part of this new build-out of my business has been on maybe a little bit of hand-holding. A little bit more concrete clear descriptions of like, “Here’s what you need to do before our private session you need to go online in this browser, click this button, go to this website, download this.” Really step-by-step so that they have the tool. And then once they have the tool, I buffer, every session by 15 minutes, in the beginning, 15 minutes at the end. So that we have time to set it up to figure it out, to troubleshoot if the mic isn’t working, or they can’t hear me. And then also to have social time because I find that many of my older clients are feeling much more isolated than my younger clients.
I think they’re a little bit more fearful of COVID-19. And so they are doing even less than those of us who are staying at home. They might not be going out for walks, they might be having every grocery delivered as opposed to maybe venturing out once a week, like I’m doing to get groceries. And so I feel like incorporating some social time has been really important in helping them learn technology. Just chatting for a few minutes before yoga. And then they feel a little more comfortable with it. And in terms of corporate experiences, what’s really interesting is more people come when it’s remote because they can log on to Zoom, they can turn their camera off and no one ever needs to see them or even know they were there because they could put an initial, they don’t even put their whole name.
So if I’m teaching a corporate class I’ve found that more people attend than when I have taught in person. And that makes me happy that they’re getting yoga. And it also is really interesting that maybe in an office environment, it’s hard for people to do yoga or meditation in front of their co-workers just because… Maybe they don’t feel comfortable. So online, there’s a level of comfort for some people that I also find really interesting. That was unexpected.
Well, I think as you talked earlier about pivoting your business, I know it’s a bit of an overused or not necessary overused, but misused word sometimes is innovation, and I think in order to make pivots or think innovatively you kinda have to look for some of the anomalies or try to again, try to test things for learning purposes, not to try to shoehorn an outcome of “If I do this, I will expect to get that.” So it’s interesting that you observed both those things through two really different audiences, right? So, with the older population… And we just had a similar conversation with one of our customers, the other day where we said, “Okay, a big customer segment of yours are older Americans. Before you even start thinking about your products and services, is there an opportunity for you to help get them more comfortable with the use of technology? And if you can do that, you’re helping them. And ultimately, that might help you, but if nothing else, you’re helping them first.”
And again in a way when you pause and think about your corporate example, you would think, “Well, duh, that kinda makes sense,” but as we’ve talked a lot about what you’re just going, you don’t stop and think like, “Yeah, maybe people don’t wanna be working out or doing yoga with co-workers, maybe people are a little bit more advanced and can take the practice to another level than someone who wouldn’t.” I know back in our Equinox days you had all ranges of advanced class and basic classes. And the fact that at least people can see you and as we’ve talked about, create some opportunity for physical or mental health activity in their day is really what matters most.
Yeah. And also I’ve been recording sessions, so then people can go back later and repeat them, which I’ve never done much of that. And it’s been really interesting to explore that as well. Putting out small clips on social media for free, recording content, and I’m gonna be launching a subscription service. So that my recorded content could be accessible in the library for anyone who wants yoga but maybe can’t make the regular class times that I’ve got right now, or who just feels more comfortable doing their practices at their own pace at a different time so…
I wanna come back to that in a minute as we start to wind down. But I think throughout our conversation, you’ve talked a lot about obviously mental health wellness, being physically active at home, you’ve talked a lot about pivoting your business. And you provided some great color commentary about how you’ve been doing that some successfully, some not, some not knowing for sure what’s gonna happen still a month or two or a year down the line. But what advice would you have though, whether you’re a yoga entrepreneur like yourself but just really any business right now that is at a really tough situation of not knowing what the future is gonna look like. What would be some advice you might have for how they could maybe think about pivoting their business?
I would say, “Look at who you serve, who are your clients?” And then I would ask you to think about people who could use your service that doesn’t because I think that for many businesses, they’re used to reaching the same segment of people and if they can just consider… Oh, maybe I need to reach yoga teachers in addition to yoga students or “Oh, maybe I need to reach senior citizens who’ve never done yoga and who need to sit in a chair.” That expands your possibilities. And I think sometimes we get really limited and this is who I serve, this is my only niche market and now I think is a time where we need to be a little more creative with the people we’re reaching. And then also, I would just reiterate, try some things and don’t worry about failing. Just try it. The worst thing that could happen if you try something is that it doesn’t work and you have to try something else.
And really, in this kind of environment, that’s not so bad. There are much worse things happening than trying a project, putting a little bit of your effort into it and then having it not come to fruition. You can then try something else. But I think not trying causes businesses to freeze as you said earlier. And I think that that is a little bit more detrimental than trying and failing. [chuckle]
Yeah, well, one other question I wanted to make sure we hit on is there’s another term besides entrepreneur that’s called solo entrepreneur which you seem to be kind of in that category somewhat where you’re the business, you’re the product, you’re the star or the instructor. So, I’m curious for people that also are in that role as well, how do you separate now work and life when you’re still in an environment where you’re… For the foreseeable future, your home is your office? Where do you draw the boundaries? How do you balance that?
In my calendar, I have basically work hours, so I block off my classes, I block off my meditation time, my personal practice time for my body, my exercise time, my meals, I block off where my sleep will happen, so for me and where I’m gonna do things like… I’m currently watching The Office, so where am I gonna take some time to watch The Office?
I am too.
That’s funny. It’s hilarious.
Yeah, it’s the one guilty pleasure I have. Like I said earlier, I’ve been reading like crazy, but there’s one thing that I said… I’m very particular about trying to binge-watch shows that I’ve never seen before because I feel like it’s too much of an undertaking. And I’m like, “Let me go back and watch The Office. It’s been really good.” I’m up to season four now.
I think that’s where we are as well. So we put the time in our day, my husband and I, for entertainment, for walking, for taking care of our animals, cooking is a big one for us. So we set aside time to cook and all of those things, then compartmentalize the workday. I’ll tell myself, I have two hours to edit these videos and I have to be done in two hours or I have to come back to it in my next chunk of time. I think if you don’t do that, it is really easy to lose track. And some days, I’m not good at it, and I do lose track and I end up working until midnight but other days I try hard to keep my schedule. Yeah.
Well, that’s good advice. And I’m sorry to interrupt, but when you said The Office I thought “Oh, that’s really funny.”
That is funny.
So how can our audience learn a little bit more about you? Obviously, I have the good fortune of knowing you. You are my entry into yoga, so thank you for all of that. But how can people learn more about you and your business? You talked a little bit about some of your content online, what are some ways people can find you?
So my website is yogabyallison.com, and you can find everything there and my blog. My virtual classes are all on there, and they are all levels from beginner to advanced so anyone can take them even if you’ve never done yoga before. And also, on my social channels, Yoga by Allison, I release a meditation that’s free every Monday, called Monday Meditation. I release a short video clip every Tuesday, called Tuesday Tutorial and I have a YouTube channel as well. That’s Yoga by Allison where you can get short classes and full-length classes that are coming out on a rolling basis for free, so lots of opportunities to check-in and try out some practice.
Well, Allison, I knew this would be great. It’s always good to see your face, you’re a great source of inspiration for me. I’m glad that we could share your wisdom and your experiences with our audience and I know that this is a time as we talk about uncertainty and fear for us all. But it’s also, an opportunity to kind of really see things that we otherwise wouldn’t see. Try and test new things, grow, learn, and hopefully, all adapt. So I wish you all the success in the days, weeks, and months ahead. And if there’s anything I can ever do for you, just let me know. And again, I would encourage everyone who’s listening or watching, to check out Yoga by Allison and use it as an opportunity to think about your mental and physical health during this season. So, thank you, everyone.
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