A Motherhood Manifesto
We’re Laura and Clare, and in this episode of With Both Hands we open up about what it really means to be a mum and run a business. Motherhood is so often painted as an all-consuming role, one that leaves little space for your own dreams, creativity or career. We don’t believe it has to be that way.
Through honest, down-to-earth conversation, we share our own experiences of juggling parenting with building businesses, and the lessons we’ve learnt along the way. We talk about the messy bits, the surprising bits, and the moments of joy that keep us going.
Our hope is to create a space where you feel seen, supported, and encouraged to explore the many sides of yourself because you’re more than “just” a mum, and you can embrace both your family and your ambitions.
Transcript
Welcome.
Speaker B:Hello.
Speaker A:Episode one, Episode one, With Both Hands.
Speaker A:I'm Laura.
Speaker A:And I'm Claire.
Speaker A:And we are two mums that met on the Internet.
Speaker B:Not unhinged.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:What was it?
Speaker A:In fact?
Speaker A:It was a closed Internet circle.
Speaker A:In circle.
Speaker B:But yeah, it was a creative container.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Anyway, that's it about us.
Speaker A:Shall we move into the.
Speaker A:What we're doing?
Speaker B:So, yeah.
Speaker B:Shall we talk about why this exists or why we're trying to make it exist?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Why we're trying to birth something else after we've birthed six children between us?
Speaker A:Yeah, that's a lot.
Speaker A:And a lot of businesses.
Speaker A:Because.
Speaker B:Why not?
Speaker A:Why not?
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:Hello, everybody.
Speaker A:Yeah, this is With Both Hands.
Speaker A:It's our podcast.
Speaker A:It is a container for mothers, mothers who want to be mothers, mothers who may not be mothers yet.
Speaker A:And we're trying to deconstruct this narrative of what it is to be a mother in the modern world where we hold everything with both hands.
Speaker B:We wanted to create a space where we could talk about motherhood outside of the stereotypical narratives that we both feel we run into all the time, which neither of us feel that we resonate with, and to tie that together with the creative and business led spaces in which we both inhabit as well, and that we think a lot of women inhabit simultaneously or want to inhabit simultaneously.
Speaker B:The conversation about the podcast started with Laura's experience at a retreat that she went on.
Speaker B:Do you want to say a bit about that?
Speaker A:I didn't realise that's where it was born from.
Speaker B:That was what planted the seed in my brain.
Speaker B:Well, it's what solidified it.
Speaker B:I already had the idea in my brain from the conversations we were having.
Speaker B:But when you told me about your experience at the retreat with the women who were in their late 20s and early 30s, that's what turned the light on and made me go.
Speaker B:That's what this is.
Speaker B:That's what's needed.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I went to Sri Lanka earlier this year, very.
Speaker A:On a whim as well.
Speaker A:I wasn't meant to be went to Sri Lanka, but yeah, anyway, I went to Sri Lanka to a yoga retreat.
Speaker A:I felt the call to go to see the sea in the jungle.
Speaker A:And I was in community with, I want to say 10, but that might be the wrong number.
Speaker A:But a small group, but big enough that common threads could be pulled from it.
Speaker A:And I was the only mother.
Speaker A:And that isn't unusual for me in lots of ways.
Speaker A:In my career, in my friendships, I am quite often the only mother.
Speaker A:And I'm usually the only mother of four.
Speaker A:Like there's not many people who have four children as well.
Speaker A:But whilst I was there, it made me reconnect with who I am as a mother, I suppose.
Speaker A:And it made me realize that I'd hidden the fact that I'm a mother in lots of aspects of my life.
Speaker A:Again, in my career, to get to where I have done in business, I kind of had to squash it down.
Speaker A:And actually, at the retreat, these women were so curious.
Speaker A:They wanted to know my birth story, they wanted to know what it is to be a mother.
Speaker A:They wanted to know how I afforded four.
Speaker A:They wanted to know how you've had four children at home, how the hell was I in Sri Lanka?
Speaker A:Like, they.
Speaker A:They couldn't understand how you could be at all.
Speaker A:And, yeah, we had many, many hours of conversation, some over breakfast, some in the sea, so some other dinner, about what it is and what it isn't and how every woman's experience with motherhood is different.
Speaker A:Yet we're always fed the same story.
Speaker A:We're fed the story of to be a mother is.
Speaker A:Is hard.
Speaker A:To be a mother is to be nothing else.
Speaker A:To be a mother is to be a martyr, where you have to give everything to these children and have nothing left for yourself.
Speaker A:And these women were in awe, I'd say, that they had this person in front of them that actually was a mother and was still a human being and was still having these deep conversations about being a woman outside of being a mother.
Speaker A:But actually by being a mother, it deepened what it was to be a woman.
Speaker A:And yeah, having those conversations in Sri Lanka really, I suppose, brought me back to myself and also made me realise that these conversations need to be heard, that it's not fair that only 10 women got to hear that.
Speaker A:And I came back and I spoke to you about it.
Speaker A:And like, women need to see that women can be mothers and build businesses, women can be mothers and live a really big life.
Speaker A:So, yeah, we got our heads together to work out how we could have that conversation in public whilst protecting our children.
Speaker A:So that is the harder bit, I think, is how we.
Speaker A:We wanted to have these conversations in.
Speaker A:In public, but also it be about our motherhood, not about our children.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And now we're here.
Speaker B:So that was the seed.
Speaker B:And I think that as we continued discussing it and as we continue having these conversations, the different threads that.
Speaker B:I feel like this is at the heart of a pull together because, like you say, these conversations aren't had enough.
Speaker B:I feel like we're presented with certain versions of motherhood which are presented and Often performed, I think.
Speaker B:And that, for me, doesn't match up with my experience of motherhood.
Speaker B:And it doesn't match up with the conversations or the experiences I have of other women who are in motherhood and doing other things, none of whom resonate with a lot of the popular portrayals of motherhood that seem to exist.
Speaker B:And I think that at the moment, with social media, things can feel quite tribal.
Speaker B:You know, you are.
Speaker B:Either you're a trad wife or you're a boss bitch, or you're a crunchy mum, or you're.
Speaker B:Do you know what I mean?
Speaker B:There's all these different.
Speaker B:And it's like, well, no, that's not how it looks.
Speaker B:I don't think in real life, like, you're multitudes of things all at the same time.
Speaker B:And then, so you're kind of expected to be this certain version of motherhood.
Speaker B:But also women feel like they have to do everything and be everything for everyone else all at the same time.
Speaker B:And like you say, there's nothing left for you, which we also want to challenge, because I don't think that.
Speaker B:Well, in our experience, I think you cannot do everything all at the same time.
Speaker B:You cannot be everything to everyone at the same time.
Speaker B:But what you can do is embrace the season that you're in and thrive within the chaos and find your own path through motherhood that allows you to retain who you are and what you want to do and be a mum to your kids.
Speaker B:And that might look different every single day, but it's possible to find a way through that.
Speaker B:And it might look different than you think it might look, but it's possible to do.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker B:I think those are conversations that we wanted to have and to present an alternative version of what motherhood can look like, what running a business can look like, like, what following creative passions can look like, what going to Sri Lanka on a whim and swimming in the sea can look like whilst you have children.
Speaker B:For women who are already in that world and aren't seeing themselves represented and aren't hearing their voices heard.
Speaker B:And also for the women who aren't yet mothers but want to be mothers and cannot for the life of them, see or figure out how they're supposed to do that and everything else at the same time.
Speaker A:Yeah, I think what we want you as listeners to be able to take away or have is two women who seemingly look like they have it all, particularly if you look at our Instagrams.
Speaker A:But we want this to be raw and honest, and we're going to turn up Raw and honest here for you.
Speaker A:So you do see what it is.
Speaker A:The messy middle in between the decisions we're trying to make for our kids, for ourselves, for our husbands, for.
Speaker A:Yeah, we're gonna try and bring some of that in.
Speaker A:We're gonna try and bring some topics that we're seeing in the media, try and dissect that and work out how we think about that.
Speaker A:We want to bring you along for that ride while we try and work out some of these things for ourselves.
Speaker A:This is a space it's not going to be full of she said, he said.
Speaker A:It's not a space where we want anyone to feel that they don't belong.
Speaker A:This is a space where we're literally gonna examine what we think, what we feel and how we want to portray in the world in respect to motherhood and what it is to be a woman and a mother.
Speaker A:And yeah, we want to really look into some of those topics as we move through this next series and wherever this little project takes us next.
Speaker B:The name with Both Hands came from her conversations around our ideas of balance, which is a really commonly thrown around term when we're talking about motherhood and business and being a woman in general.
Speaker B:There's this very strong narrative around this idea of achieving balance.
Speaker B:And it's put forward as though one day you will achieve balance or find it or find it or understand what it really is, and things will fall into place and you'll have a schedule that runs your days, and you will be balanced.
Speaker B:And your schedule will include time with your children, time with your husband, time on your business, time for your yourself, run in the morning, healthy food, everyone's happy, lots of activities for the kids, everyone goes to bed when they're supposed to, and it'll be a lovely, balanced working schedule for life.
Speaker B:I reject that idea wholeheartedly, don't believe it's possible.
Speaker B:I don't think that we should try and make it possible.
Speaker B:I think it's too much for any one human to hold.
Speaker B:I think rather than balance, in my experience, what can be achievable is surrender and finding a rhythm or a flow to your days that allows you to hold more than one thing imperfectly.
Speaker B:And I think that's the important thing.
Speaker B:Striving to hold everything perfectly all at the same time, I think is a really key reason why a lot of women are experiencing burnout, why the narrative that motherhood is such a hard slog is probably so prominent right now.
Speaker B:I think that it's reasonable to expect that if you are raising tiny People and trying to build a business at the same time.
Speaker B:It's going to look fairly imperfect.
Speaker B:You are not going to be able to achieve some of the work days that you might see put forward on Instagram.
Speaker B:You're probably not going to be waking up at 5am to Journal and do yoga and drink Matcha in the sunshine before your day starts.
Speaker B:Probably not.
Speaker B:Realistic if you've got children.
Speaker B:I mean, children under 18.
Speaker B:I was going to say children under five, but actually any children at all.
Speaker B:However, that doesn't mean that you can't find a rhythm to your day that will allow you to do the things that you want to do, the things that you need to do, and the things that fulfil you as an individual and as a mother.
Speaker B:It's just about embracing the messy middle and finding a way to thrive in the chaos.
Speaker B:And I think that we're both in the messy middle very much and find.
Speaker B:Trying to find that rhythm for ourselves and hoping to share any tips we might learn along the way.
Speaker A:Don't die.
Speaker B:As long as everyone makes it to bedtime alive.
Speaker B:It's a weird.
Speaker A:That has literally been a mantra of my entire life, like motherhood.
Speaker A:In fact, I think it might have been.
Speaker A:I think it came to us.
Speaker A:Third child.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:The mantra was everyone fed, no one dead.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And that was the sign of a good day.
Speaker A:Like, oh yeah, if everyone was fed, no one was dead.
Speaker A:We had made it to bedtime.
Speaker A:We'd made it.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Like life is good.
Speaker A:And I also reject this whole idea of balance.
Speaker A:I think it's.
Speaker A:I don't know.
Speaker A:I could blame the patriarchy.
Speaker A:It's usually them.
Speaker A:But I don't know.
Speaker A:I don't know who to blame.
Speaker A:But ultimately I think it's absolute nonsense.
Speaker A:But I do think there's this flow state.
Speaker A:I think flow is better.
Speaker A:And sometimes it's white water rapids and sometimes it's a nice gentle stream and sometimes a gentle stream that turns into whitewater rapids pretty quickly, usually in the middle of Tesco when a toddler decides that actually they don't want to be in Tesco anymore.
Speaker A:So, yeah, I think the idea of balance and the fact that we hold so much and I think women in general hold a lot and we need both hands to.
Speaker A:To hold it all.
Speaker A:I think it's a real big symbolism of what we are and also what we want this space to be.
Speaker A:So we want this space for you to feel like we're holding you with both hands, that we're helping you towards whatever it is, whether you're a mum wanting another.
Speaker A:Whether you're a woman thinking maybe you do want children or maybe you don't, we want you to feel supported and like we're here holding your hand.
Speaker A:We're in community together.
Speaker A:It just felt very fitting when it came to us, didn't we, when we were ideating, it felt like.
Speaker B:It felt like meant to be brought into.
Speaker B:To be burst.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Into the world.
Speaker A:It really did.
Speaker A:So we're here to hold hands with you, hands with each other whilst we try and work out how we bring up the next generation.
Speaker A:And I think that's something I struggle with a lot.
Speaker A:So my children are older than Claire's and yeah, my eldest literally just turned 15 and then I also have a 12 year old and those two in particular are the two that I spend a lot of brain space on these days.
Speaker A:It's working out.
Speaker A:Am I putting things in their brains that are helpful or unhelpful?
Speaker A:Am I bringing up kind and brave children that are going to be kind and brave adults?
Speaker A:And that weighs heavy because the world's a show and I don't want to add more to an already shitty world.
Speaker A:I want to add more kindness and compassion whilst also not being too soft that they don't have boundaries and therefore become little brats.
Speaker A:So, yeah, that's something that I struggle with a lot at the minute.
Speaker A:So what takes up a lot of my brain space as well as building businesses and creative projects like this, Going to Sri Lanka.
Speaker A:So yeah, that is where.
Speaker A:With both hands.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:It's a step, isn't it?
Speaker B:The step in the journey, I guess, that you're in is you start to think about things like legacy, you start to think what kind of humans you're building.
Speaker B:Whereas my kids, My oldest is 5 and my youngest is 18 months.
Speaker B:So I am still very much in the sleep deprivation.
Speaker B:Sleep deprivation.
Speaker B:Like let's just all survive till the end of the day.
Speaker A:I mean, spoiler still sleep very chill.
Speaker A:With teenagers, I sleep out in the middle of the night.
Speaker B:I don't want to know.
Speaker B:In my head, literally, once they're all above the age of six, I'm just going to have like uninterrupted nine hours sleep.
Speaker A:Six till ten is the dream.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Cherish those years, everybody.
Speaker A:Everybody cherish six till ten.
Speaker A:They're stunning years.
Speaker A:That's what I heard.
Speaker B:I mean, my five year old's pretty great when it comes to the sleep.
Speaker B:My 18 month old is yet to sleep through the night.
Speaker A:It's coming.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:One day.
Speaker A:One day it'll be Fine, one day.
Speaker B:So, yeah, there's, there's lots of different.
Speaker B:We're both at different stages.
Speaker A:I think that brings us really nicely into what it is to be a mother, in our opinion.
Speaker A:So for me, as I've already said, I am 15 years into motherhood and if we count the pregnancy, it's closer to 16.
Speaker A:And I was a young mum and I think that has its downsides, but also its upsides.
Speaker A:One great thing about having your children young is you don't have any idea of what it is to have a life that isn't motherhood.
Speaker A:So I didn't lose part of me.
Speaker A:I went from being a child to a young adult to a mother very quickly.
Speaker A:So, yeah, I never knew what it was to be able to fly to Paris for the weekend with my new fancy or, yeah, I didn't know that kind of life.
Speaker A:So, yeah, I had him pretty young.
Speaker A:But also what it has taught me is I've never had control of my life.
Speaker A:And actually that's a really nice place to be because to mother is to let go, to mother is not to control.
Speaker A:And I think a lot of people think, oh, I need to parent my children.
Speaker A:I need to make sure they don't make any bad decisions.
Speaker A:I need to make sure that they all have matching outfits on for their social media posts.
Speaker A:I need to make sure that when we're out in public, they have beautiful table manners and they're not seen on screens and they're not doing xyz.
Speaker A:And I'm being this perfect parent because everyone is judging me.
Speaker A:And that is true.
Speaker A:Everyone is judging you.
Speaker A:And I learned to accept that everything, everyone's judging me whether I do it their way or not.
Speaker A:So it's probably better for me to just do it my way anyway.
Speaker A:And I learned that pretty early, probably because I was younger, naive.
Speaker A:So I didn't have time for that judgment to lay on my shoulders for too long.
Speaker A:And it has meant that I have lived a big life whilst being a mother and I didn't think that was unusual until I was in Sri Lanka 15 years later and everyone's like, well, why?
Speaker A:Why are you here if you're a mum?
Speaker A:So, yeah, I think my biggest lesson of being a mother is to be a mother is to let go, to surrender, to flow from being pregnant.
Speaker A:Like that is a miracle in itself.
Speaker A:Like that whole process to the birth to every part of you that rebirths throughout your whole parenting journey.
Speaker A:Because I don't think it's a one and done thing.
Speaker A:I think you continually transform as your children go into different stages of their development, too.
Speaker A:So, yeah, what about you?
Speaker B:I think that's so true.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I think Renee Brown always asks the same question to her guests on her podcast.
Speaker B:She always asks, what is the lesson that the universe keeps smacking you over the head with until you get it?
Speaker B:And for me, that lesson is always surrender.
Speaker B:Always.
Speaker B:And nothing has smacked me around the face with that lesson more than motherhood.
Speaker B:It literally burns you down and tears you apart, and then you emerge as a new human, in my experience.
Speaker B:And most things are out of your control.
Speaker B:Other people's opinions more so than I think anything else.
Speaker B:And yeah, I agree, that's a lesson that I learned very early on.
Speaker B:I'm only five and a half yet.
Speaker B:Six if you include the pregnancy into my journey with motherhood.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So I started it much later in life than you.
Speaker B:And I did have my entire 20s to do what I wanted, and I did.
Speaker B:I spent most of my twenties traveling in Southeast Asia and going to university and, you know, doing all sorts of different things.
Speaker B:But of all of my seeking in my 20s for transformative experiences, motherhood.
Speaker B:Entering motherhood at 32 definitely, I think, takes the cake.
Speaker B:And in terms of the lesson of surrender, yeah, everything is out of your control.
Speaker B:They're not.
Speaker B:Children are not props.
Speaker B:It doesn't matter what you dress them in for the social media post, they're not.
Speaker B:They are human beings.
Speaker B:They are tiny souls that you have been given to take care of and to shepherd.
Speaker B:And there's only so much control you can exert in that role.
Speaker B:And you learn that very early on, they don't behave how you want them to behave.
Speaker B:They don't do what you want them to do.
Speaker B:The day does not run how you want it to run.
Speaker B:And you can fight that constantly, or you can surrender to it and let it go.
Speaker B:And for me, the only way that I can, and I'm still very much learning this, this is not a lesson that I have mastered by any means, but it manifests all through every day.
Speaker B:So, for example, when my daughter won't sleep because it's 34 degrees outside and she's 18 months old and she's in a sleep regression, I could stay in the dark in the bedroom with her for four hours, fighting her, or I could put her in the pram and go and walk around the park and listen to a podcast for an hour and a half and then go back and try again.
Speaker B:And that, for me, is the lesson in surrender.
Speaker A:It's.
Speaker B:It's not going to look how you want it to look, it's not how you thought it would look, but you can find the surrender in those everyday moments and that's what makes it beautiful.
Speaker B:And that is the journey.
Speaker B:That is the journey for you and for them.
Speaker B:I'm not sure if that makes sense.
Speaker B:Anyway, I'm done.
Speaker A:Anyway, I'm done now.
Speaker A:I have finished.
Speaker A:It is so true, though.
Speaker A:I got full body singles.
Speaker A:When you were saying how you sought.
Speaker A:Sought?
Speaker A:Is that a word?
Speaker A:How you were seeking.
Speaker A:Seeking.
Speaker A:I don't know how you were seeking in your 20s and for transformation, for an experience that would transform you and then you got it at 30 by being a mother.
Speaker A:Like, I got full body.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I find it strange, this idea, which I think is popular at the moment, that entering motherhood is not an adventure like that.
Speaker B:Being a mother is something that's going to keep you from experiences and adventure and exploration and seeking things and curiosity and finding things out about yourself.
Speaker B:Because for me, the opposite is true.
Speaker B:It's an embodiment of that.
Speaker B:So this idea that, you know, you live your life and you have all these experiences and then you become a mother and that stops and it's a hard line, in my experience, that's just completely inaccurate.
Speaker B:And I think that what you experienced in Sri Lanka is a really good example of that, is of women being told or led to believe that motherhood is the end of something, when actually it's the beginning.
Speaker A:Yeah, same, honestly, just reminded me.
Speaker A:So I was young and pregnant, as we've already discussed, and one of my close friends from school, who I'm not going to name, but I hope she's listening, was also pregnant around about the same time, and she had her baby six or seven months before my baby was due and he was early and he was in NICU and he was.
Speaker A:It was a lot.
Speaker A:And I remember speaking to her not long after and she was like, oh, the birth was amazing.
Speaker A:You're going to be amazing, you're going to love it.
Speaker A:And she was the first person that had ever said, you're going to love birth to me.
Speaker A:So that was number one.
Speaker A:I was excited from that point.
Speaker A:Number two, her mum.
Speaker A:And I'm not close to my mum, but her mum held my hands at some point and looked me dead in the eye and she was like, just because you have a baby doesn't mean you can't travel the world.
Speaker A:They can be put on your back, they can be put in a sling, you can pack a suitcase.
Speaker A:Just because you're having a baby does not mean Your life stops.
Speaker A:And again, she was the first person that ever said that to me.
Speaker A:And it plays in my brain.
Speaker A:I see her staring dead in my eyes so often when I'm being called to Sri Lanka, when I go to Costa Rica, when I do these big things in my life, I see my friend's mum telling me that my life doesn't have to stop.
Speaker A:And she's so right.
Speaker A:It has been the complete opposite.
Speaker A:And my children are the mirrors.
Speaker A:They're the ones who call me out when I'm not behaving well.
Speaker A:They're the ones that make me think, am I acting from integrity?
Speaker A:Will I be proud if they look me up in the future?
Speaker A:Will I be okay?
Speaker A:Am I happy for them to see what I'm doing?
Speaker A:Is the business I'm building ethical?
Speaker A:Are they going to be happy with what I've built?
Speaker A:All plays in my brain, all makes me make better decisions because I have four pairs of eyes watching my every move.
Speaker B:Oh yeah, they hold you accountable 100% more than anyone.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I said to my five year old the other day, I can't remember the specifics, but it was something like, no, we're not going to do that now, but we will do it later.
Speaker B:And he went, you say that, but it won't happen.
Speaker B:And I was like, what do you mean?
Speaker B:I said, no, it will happen, I promise.
Speaker B:And he went, well, you said we were going to go to the toy shop three weeks ago and we haven't been yet.
Speaker A:They will hold you accountable.
Speaker B:Accountable.
Speaker B:You have to look at yourself through their eyes and imagine what.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:What will they think and how will they see you and is that something that you want?
Speaker B:How will they talk about you when you're older?
Speaker B:When they're older?
Speaker B:I think that's really, it's a powerful way to hold you true, hold you to your intuition, your integrity, for sure.
Speaker A:Such a gift.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Laura and I both inhabit two spaces simultaneously and we both work a lot online.
Speaker B:And so a lot of what we talk about is around narratives, narratives surrounding motherhood, but also narratives surrounding business.
Speaker B:So simultaneously, there are lots of portrayals online of way mothers should be, different versions of motherhood and how those look or should look.
Speaker B:There's also, I think the same can be said for business.
Speaker B:There's lots of ways that being a woman in business in particular is portrayed and different stereotypes online.
Speaker B:Are you a boss bitch?
Speaker B:Are you a slow morning kind of business owner?
Speaker B:And one thing that we both have found challenging, I think in our business journeys is the kind of comparison game that can come in when you're looking at content from business owners that you admire.
Speaker B:Women in business who are posting advice based on having a lot more available time in the day in particular, versus the reality of parenting small children and finding a way to overcome that and be able to focus on what you're doing without falling into that comparison trap.
Speaker B:We call it time slippage.
Speaker B:There's a significant amount of time slippage that you experience in motherhood.
Speaker B:Things that should take five minutes, take two hours.
Speaker B:And whatever you have planned for your day requires a certain amount of flexibility.
Speaker B:So a lot of the time advice that you might see online in terms of building a business, things like that might feel like that doesn't fit for you when you're also in the trenches of motherhood because they rely on being able to have a fairly reliable routine and a workday that isn't cut off at 3pm with the school run.
Speaker B:So again, we're interested in conversations around how that can look for women who are in motherhood.
Speaker B:At the same time, where is the business building advice for women who only have, say, a few hours in the day, or who have a hard cut off at 3pm or whose mornings are taken up with changing nappies and making breakfasts rather than journaling and getting themselves into a mindset for a work day?
Speaker B:So there's two kind of competing narratives there, which we would like to dissect and challenge.
Speaker A:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker A:I think the comparison thing is such a thing.
Speaker A:I follow a couple of female business influencers, more than a couple, actually, a lot, because they inspire me like they really do.
Speaker A:I absolutely adore their aesthetic.
Speaker A:I love watching their content because it is really engaging.
Speaker A:It really soothes the autism in me because they're usually very structured and just love it.
Speaker A:But I have to remind myself that isn't achievable for me.
Speaker A:I cannot vlog my days and then edit all my children's faces out because I refuse to have them online and build my business and deliver to my clients and be really present with my children.
Speaker A:I can't do all that.
Speaker A:So what goes is the vlogging and the putting it out.
Speaker A:And then I feel this weight that no one's seeing what it is to to be a mother.
Speaker A:And then this narrative of to be a mother is hard can continue because you're not seeing the other side of it.
Speaker A:And I would love to get to a place where I can start to take people behind the scenes to see what it is in real life.
Speaker A:I just haven't quite worked out how to do that yet.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:But I think this time slippage thing is huge.
Speaker A:I'm out of the sleep deprivation as a whole.
Speaker A:I have episodes where someone's ill or my teenager is making not great decisions, which means that I lose sleep again.
Speaker A:But on the whole, I'm getting eight hours every night.
Speaker B:Oh, my God.
Speaker A:And my brain can work because it can't work very well.
Speaker B:No.
Speaker A:When you're not.
Speaker A:However, I am potentially perimenopausal, which is a whole new hormonal thing that we also have to then go through, which also affects your brain.
Speaker B:That's great.
Speaker A:And I think there's this.
Speaker A:That time slippage and the comparison on business.
Speaker A:I mean, I've got an mba.
Speaker A:I studied for nearly two years with a red brick uni.
Speaker A:I traveled the world as part of that.
Speaker A:And the narratives even in that are still really male oriented.
Speaker A:We had to pull them up constantly.
Speaker A:There was a few of us that kept saying, uni, do better.
Speaker A:Like, this isn't just how you build businesses.
Speaker A:What about this?
Speaker A:Have you thought about that?
Speaker A:I did a full course on private equity.
Speaker A:Every example had a male in it and no females.
Speaker A:And I was like, but how do females negotiate?
Speaker A:How do females get a deal over the line?
Speaker A:Because it will be different.
Speaker B:Yeah, Completely different.
Speaker A:I need to know how I can negotiate with a baby on my hip.
Speaker A:I need to know how to be taken seriously when my child might interrupt a zoom call.
Speaker A:And that just wasn't.
Speaker A:It just wasn't covered.
Speaker A:Like, basically, you can't.
Speaker A:You can't negotiate for business if you have any of that.
Speaker A:Which is why I hid it for so long of my career.
Speaker A:It's why I went to work and kind of pretended I didn't have children.
Speaker A:But that comparison online is tricky, and we want to really create some space where we actually show you it can be done.
Speaker A:It's just done differently.
Speaker A:I don't time block.
Speaker A:I can't time block.
Speaker A:If I time block and then someone interrupts that time block, it derails the rest of my day.
Speaker A:I just can't have that amount of structure because if someone then unstructures it.
Speaker A:It's like when kids build the towers with all the blocks and then someone comes over and knocks it over and it's send you into a rage for days.
Speaker B:That's me.
Speaker A:If I time block and someone interrupts it, I'm done.
Speaker A:So I prefer to just have.
Speaker A:The way I work is I have, like, three things I want to get done today.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I make sure they're done whenever they're done.
Speaker A:It might be 9 o' clock tonight, it might be first thing in the morning.
Speaker A:But three things, three highest priority things get done and then we move on.
Speaker A:Anything extra is a bonus.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:My natural urge is to write a to do list which has approximately 86 items on it.
Speaker B:And then my hyper perfectionism says that I can get probably 25% of that done in a single day, which is obviously impossible.
Speaker B:So I set myself up to fail immediately.
Speaker B:So I am having to try really hard.
Speaker B:And again, this is another lesson in surrender from motherhood.
Speaker B:Three things is a great number.
Speaker B:I usually give myself six and then if I drop one ball I can just about manage to be like, well you can't tried your best.
Speaker B:We'll knock that one onto the next day and that's all right.
Speaker B:But I do, I'm trying to get better at it.
Speaker B:But yeah, for sure you have to lower your, not lower your expectations.
Speaker B:You're still doing great work but it's like, you know, you're not, you're not going to be things.
Speaker B:The timeline is slower.
Speaker B:I think that's what it is.
Speaker B:The timeline is going to be slower.
Speaker B:You probably aren't going to be able to, you know, swing 12 hour work days which is what I did in my mid-20s when I was first setting up my own business.
Speaker B:I was working a full day job and then I was coming home and working 6 till 1 2am in the morning on my business call.
Speaker B:That's a great season of Hustle.
Speaker B:If that's what you are able to do, it's not going to be achievable.
Speaker B:So if you're looking at influencers online who are building businesses on that basis of having that amount of available time who are in a season of hustle in their life, which I think is fine.
Speaker B:I'm not anti hustle.
Speaker B:If you're in a season of that, I think throw yourself into your work, I think that's perfectly fine.
Speaker B:But you're not going to be in that season whilst you're in motherhood.
Speaker B:So it's an acceptance of that and it's finding a way through that and finding the flow and the rhythm that can work alongside motherhood and running a business simultaneously.
Speaker A:And I would also counter that because I did the season of hustle whilst being a mother because I was in my 20s and I honestly think that if I started my.
Speaker A:I think something happens in our brains and I've not got science and I don't know if true and maybe it's not Even been studied because women aren't studied, are we?
Speaker A:But in my 20s I had the energy.
Speaker A:I could hustle and be a mother.
Speaker A:I can't now.
Speaker A:I can't.
Speaker A:I don't know that's.
Speaker A:I don't know if they have.
Speaker B:That's exponentially true.
Speaker B:Like that is.
Speaker A:So in my 20s that I did the hustle like I was.
Speaker A:I had two young children, I was working full time in my corporate career, I was doing my chartered management accounting like qualification at nights and I was climbing that career ladder.
Speaker A:Was I a great mum?
Speaker A:Probably not.
Speaker A:I use child care, heavily used child care.
Speaker A:That was the right decision for me at that point in my life.
Speaker A:Now I know that three of my children have diagnosis of autism and one has a generic diagnosis of neurodivergent.
Speaker A:I think they've said without labeling him anything.
Speaker A:So I have four neurodivergent children.
Speaker A:Childcare isn't an option for me anymore because they need more than what is available.
Speaker A:So my life has had to change.
Speaker A:I've had to change the way I work.
Speaker A:I've had to change.
Speaker A:Not just me either.
Speaker A:We, me and my husband have both had to change the way we work is why we're kind of here in this space now is making sure that we can support the children the way they need supporting and build the business and be a family unit.
Speaker A:And that is where with both hands comes from.
Speaker A:Like we hold so much.
Speaker A:But I don't think, I think you can be in Hustle and be a mother.
Speaker A:I think you can do those two things at once if you want to.
Speaker A:I don't think it should be normal.
Speaker A:I don't think that should be the narrative that we're provided with.
Speaker A:That is what it is to be a mother that you have to do both things.
Speaker A:I think we should have a choice and I also know that that comes from a place of privilege now because I've worked so hard to get to where I am because I've done the hustle.
Speaker A:And I think that's something that's missing sometimes in this narrative is that you can just quit school and have a multi million pound business and be a mum at the same time.
Speaker A:And it's like actually no, we've.
Speaker A:You have to work and put some hustle hours in to get to really profitable, really sustainable businesses.
Speaker A:Particularly if you want them to be ethical.
Speaker A:Which I do.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because I have my kids watching me.
Speaker A:This is where it all likes.
Speaker A:Yeah, it all comes back.
Speaker B:Yes, yes.
Speaker B:And that's an important piece, isn't it?
Speaker B:So I'd rephrase.
Speaker B:It's not that you can't do the Hustle whilst you're in motherhood, it's can you do it sustainably and how you want to do it, Is that going to be something that you can.
Speaker B:That you can.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:That you can do sustainably and in a way that's not going to make you face total burnout.
Speaker B:And I think that what a lot of it seems to be, that what a lot of families are experiencing now is the expectation that they work as if they don't have children.
Speaker B:The childcare sector is what it is and people are really struggling to put the pieces together.
Speaker B:People who are like you say, we're relatively privileged in the sense that we are self employed.
Speaker B:So there's a degree of flexibility there that I think a lot of people don't have.
Speaker B:So sometimes the Hustle is non optional.
Speaker B:If you're expected to be in an office from 8am to 5pm every day and you've got a commute and your children are in childcare, then you don't really have an option with the Hustle.
Speaker A:Which is where I was for years.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:It's where I had to beg for time off, take kids to hospital appointments, then feel guilty, then be logging in my phone.
Speaker A:I remember waiting for scans and like in the hospital near me, there's no.
Speaker A:There's literally no signal.
Speaker A:You cannot get signal.
Speaker A:You can't.
Speaker A:There was no wi fi and me being anxious.
Speaker A:I'm waiting to see this baby on this screen.
Speaker A:Which is anxiety inducing in itself.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:But I was anxious because I was missing work and that's just probably a whole episode on its own.
Speaker A:Definitely is, but it's definitely there like that.
Speaker B:That's an experience shared by, I think, so many people.
Speaker B:The majority probably.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I'm feeling like I want to enjoy this transformative process of having a baby, but also I need to be in that meeting that's happening about budgets.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And when I say out loud, it sounds absolutely ridiculous, but in the moment it is so, so real.
Speaker A:So real.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:That's the duality of it and that's what people are pulled in between.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I'm excited to get into all these.
Speaker B:Yeah, me too.
Speaker A:Yeah, me too.
Speaker A:We'll be here for the next 10 hours.
Speaker A:That's us.
Speaker A:Thank you for listening.
Speaker A:We'll be back soon.
Speaker A:I'm not going to give you a timeline because we're mothers and who knows?
Speaker A:We will.
Speaker A:We'll get back to you when we can get back to you.
Speaker A:We're hoping to get into some in depth.
Speaker A:Like this was an overarching.
Speaker A:Wanted to give you a bit of a here, this is who we are.
Speaker A:But we'll be back with deeper topics.
Speaker A:We're going to try and understand the myth of balance in a deeper context.
Speaker A:Mothering without a map, because children do not come with instruction manuals, unfortunately, we're going to look at how we're building businesses.
Speaker A:So we're going to take you behind the scenes on how me and Claire balance our days and how we actually do that.
Speaker A:Maybe one day we'll get on a vlog, but for now, you can just listen to us while you're doing your laundry and any other topics.
Speaker A:If you have anything that you really want us to dissect, please do contact us and we'll see what we can do.
Speaker A:Until next time, I've been Laura and I've been Claire.
Speaker B:Sam.
