A couple of years ago Darren Rowse made a small change that created a big impact on his life and business. He went for a walk. Listen in as Darren and I talk about keeping a balance between work and family in your lifestyle business, how exercise can help you come up with brilliant ideas and how doing something transformative can keep you motivated, even when the going gets tough. We also talk about Problogger, blogging, blog revival and overcoming performance anxiety. If you need encouragement and inspiration to create a lifestyle business that is in harmony with your family and your own wellbeing, this is the episode for you!

Highlights:

-Since I started a business I’d been putting things on hold and spending less time on exercise and less time on me. Walking made me feel better.
-It’s very easy to get distracted on and obsessed to the point where the things we know we should be focusing on, we let slip.
-I felt really guilty about taking a walk every day at first, so I just basically said, ‘I’m going to start working while I walk.’ For me that was about listening to podcasts and audiobooks and getting some inspiration and input.
-I’m at my best when I allow myself a little bit of white space to do nothing, to rest, watch television and have mind numbing time.
-I write best when I’m inspired and it just flows out of me wanting to talk and communicate. A lot of my ideas come from readers. Probably for me where I get the inspiration from, the drive to write the content is more from the live interactions I have with people, so running an event is a big source of inspiration and motivation for me.
-I definitely find the temptation is to spend time looking at the tools. There’s something in it where you just want to be involved in every conversation. I think it’s just that you fear missing out on something.
-People’s thirst for useful content needs to be front and centre of my mind as a blogger.
-The two blogs that Darren has stuck with are the ones he was most interested in.
-You do need to stick at things and I had to stick at things for a few years before I hit that tipping point. But sometimes you need to give up. There’s different reasons to give up early so there’s definitely a place for it.
-On his podcasting journey: I need to monitor my energy levels quite a bit but when you’re podcasting you’re talking into a microphone so it doesn’t take up as much energy.
-I slip into a different mode when on stage. I discovered I could do that when I was 10 years old and had to pretend to be Elvis Presley.
-I realised, as a teenager, the thing that excited me the most was when what I did changed someone’s life in some way. Those are the moments I remember about my childhood and teenage years. I wanted to make a difference to people. I wanna change people’s lives. That was my goal growing up and that has just continued in what I’ve done since.

Darren’s Making the Leap tips:
1. Do something transformative with your business. You are going to have tough times but you need to have something that motivates you to get through those tough times. If you’re changing people’s lives they will want to come back to you again and again.
2. Let that come out in everything you do. A lot of people understand their why but they don’t communicate their why.
3. I often hear people preach from the stage that you need to have big dreams and follow your dream at all cost. I’ve also heard stories of people who’ve taken irresponsible steps. I’ve seen people give up their jobs to become full time bloggers when they didn’t have an income from it yet. If you have kids and family you need to take that into account. You don’t have to do just one big leap. It could be a series of small leaps.

Twitter: @problogger
Website: problogger.net

Show notes: http://yourbrilliantuncareer.com/podcastis-your-lifestyle-business-a-problem-for-your-family-health-and-happiness-interview-with-probloggers-darren-rowse-36/