Michelle Glogovac is a top rated podcast producer, the host of My Simplified Life podcast and now a really good friend of mine. Today’s episode is actually an interview I did on her podcast and she is letting me share it on The Purpose Show with you guys! The conversation we had was about defining minimalism, being a life minimalist and how that ties into business, home and life. It was so good I had to share it with you. So, let’s dive in!

In This Episode Allie and Michelle Discuss:

• How I turned my blog into a business

• What minimalism is 

• Why Allie’s way of minimalism is life-giving

• Becoming a “life-minimalist” 

• How to start a business

Mentioned in this Episode:

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My Simplified Life Podcast

Mom life. We’re surrounded by the message that it’s the tired life. The no-time-for-myself life. The hard life. We’re supposed to get through it. Survive. Cling on by the last little thread. And at the same time, Carpe Diem—enjoy every moment because it’s going to go by so fast. The typical mom culture that sends us all kinds of mixed, typically negative messages. We shouldn’t take care of ourselves; it’s selfish. The more ragged you run yourself, the bigger your badge of honor. But also, ditch your mom bod and work out. Don’t yell. Make more money. Show up. Be better, but not at the expense of time with your kids. I am putting a hard stop to all of this. While being a mom, running a business, and whatever else you might have going on is hard, it is a lot and there’s lots of giving of yourself, the idea that motherhood means living a joyless, nonstop-hustle-with-zero-balance kind of life, where you give and give and give and never take, needs to stop. 

I’m on a mission to help you stop counting down the minutes till bedtime (at least most days). Stop the mom guilt and shame game. Stop cleaning up after your kids’ childhood and start being present for it. I want to help you thrive in work, home and life. I believe in John 10:10 that we are called to living an abundant life and I know moms are not excluded from that promise. Join me in conversations about simplicity, some business and life hacks, spirituality and lots of other good stuff that leads to a life of less for the sake of enjoying more in your motherhood. I’m Allie Casazza and this is The Purpose Show.

Hi, sweet friends! Welcome back to The Purpose Show! I’m so extra excited to have you here today. This is such a good episode! 

Every once in a while I will do an interview for somebody else’s podcast and the person is just such a great host and brings such a powerful conversation to the table that I walk away from the interview feeling like I not only have a new friend (because the host was just so incredible) but that I also really want to share the conversation with my audience because it was so good.  

I usually do share the interviews that I do on social media, but only 4% of my following is going to be on Instagram following what I’m sharing. I really want to go beyond that sometimes. So, this is actually an interview that I did on My Simplified Life podcast. 

The host is now a good friend of mine and we’re actually creating a course together. We really connected. We’re creating a course about podcasting together. 

Michelle Glogovac is a top rated podcast producer. She’s the producer on six top 50 shows. She’s just incredible. She and I connected and we’re going to be creating together for sure. 

This episode was about defining minimalism, simplicity, and being a life minimalist. How does that tie into business? How does that tie into your home, your life? I really loved all of her questions. The conversation she invited me into was just so good that I had to share it with you. 

This does not happen often. I rarely ask to borrow an interview from another show to put on my show. I have high standards. I really want to create the best content for you guys here on The Purpose Show. And this is one of those conversations. I’m really excited for you to hear this. 

When you hear the other voice, it is Michelle because she was hosting us on her show and she kindly allowed me to take the audio and put it on my show. So, listen to this interview that I did for My Simplified Life Podcast that’s now here on The Purpose Show with my sweet friend, Michelle Glogovac. Enjoy you guys! 

MICHELLE: Hi, Allie!

ALLIE: Hi! 

MICHELLE: I am so excited to have you on today and to introduce you to my guests, although I think a large majority of them already know who you are. But for those who don’t, can you please introduce yourself to everyone? 

ALLIE: Wow, of course. I’m so happy to be here. Thank you so much for making space for me on your show. I’m super, super grateful. 

I’m Allie. I have four kids. My oldest is 11. She’s my only girl. And then I’ve got three boys that are 9, 7,and 5. 

I run an online business I like to call my empire where I help overwhelmed women, mostly moms, but some not, come in and simplify everything from home to business, calendar and schedule, mental stuff and spiritual stuff. 

I really love to come in and remove the burden. They call me the life minimalist because I can breathe simplicity and less over basically anything. 

MICHELLE: I love that! That was beautiful. I love that you’re on My Simplified Life. I want to simplify life when it comes to the podcasting world. 

You’re truly simplifying lives and I love it. You were a blogger to begin with, so how did it switch to having an empire? I think every blogger out there wishes that they could turn it into a six/seven figure business. And you have truly done that. 

ALLIE: Yeah. And I would also like to say that I did it with low cost products. I feel like so much in the business world is telling you that you have to have a high-end offer and you have to charge $5,000 to $20,000 for your packages. 

My most expensive product is usually $197. It’s $297 on my website, but I do a lot of promos for it where it’s $197. That’s just unheard of in the online space. 

I feel like whatever feels good to you in your business, in your online space—blog-based, podcast-based, YouTube-based, whatever it is—whatever feels right for you gets to be right for you.

Don’t follow some strategist’s tips on “This is the one page funnel that made me $5 billion.” Learn and be open, but if something doesn’t feel good to you then don’t do it.

High priced things like that for moms never felt good to me. I didn’t want to get paid $10,000 to declutter someone’s home. That sounds terrible. I wanted to reach the masses and sell a ton of lower-cost courses so that’s what I did.

I had multiple people and high-end coaches tell me that was a mistake and I needed to have something high cost. But I just didn’t want to, so I didn’t and here I am. 

There’s a lot of pieces to the way I did that, but mainly I created a movement not a business. I feel like I’ve created a party that nobody wants to leave. There’s all these fun challenges. We do silly things like taking photos holding trash bags up and rallying everybody together saying, “Let’s get all the crap out of our house so we can clean less!” 

It’s fun. There’s energy behind it. I think that your energy in your business is contagious. I really have rallied people behind this idea that I’m passionate about and now they’re passionate about it too. They don’t want to leave me. 

They want to buy from me. They want to hang out with me. They want to be where I am because I’ve made them feel like anything is possible. I’ve told them, “This doesn’t need to be this way; let’s go counterculture in this together.”

MICHELLE: Your message to me, personally, comes at the most perfect time because I’m in this spot in my business where I’m figuring out what to do next. Do I offer a course in addition to having my business and my services? And what do I charge? 

I’ve heard that I need to have this video on my website; I need to have a webinar. I’ve heard all of these things. 

I said to a girlfriend that some of it just feels icky to me and it’s not who I am. It’s not what I want to do, so I’m not going to do it. I think I need to do it my way. Whatever my way is, that’s how I want to do it because that’s how I want to run my business. I love hearing that you did the same thing.

ALLIE: Yeah. I know somebody that makes $450,000 a month and she hates webinars. She’s never done a webinar a day in her life. I love webinars, so I do them all the time. 

There are no rules. The only rule, the only ceiling that exists is the one that you set for yourself. So, continue to raise it and do whatever you want to expand.

MICHELLE: There are going to be so many quotes I’m pulling from you. You are incredible. I love it.

You’ve done this to the point that your husband works with you now, right?

ALLIE: Yeah. He quit. Oh my gosh, he quit too early. 

We weren’t making any money, but I was just like, “Look, I know where I’m going. It will happen. You have to trust me. I know that nothing’s happening yet, but I can’t do this with the kids and still be a good mom, and I think it’s unacceptable to be a terrible mom for six months while I build this. So either you quit or I do.” 

We took two weeks and prayed about it, waited on it. One day he called me and he was like, “I’m on my way home. And I’ve got donuts. We need to celebrate.” 

And that was it. He quit, and we’ve been working together ever since.

MICHELLE: Oh, that’s awesome. My husband and I don’t work together but we both work from home and have for five years now. And people are amazed that we haven’t killed each other. It’s a testament to your marriage and that you have a friendship, a foundation, that was built before you got married that allows you to be able to do this. 

ALLIE: Oh, for sure. Before this business, he worked all the time. I mean, he was working 14 hour days, six days a week most weeks. Sometimes he would have a two-day weekend, but most of the time not. 

We barely made it. We were never together and we were suffering. We were struggling. 

He has always been a really hands-on dad. He would rather be the stay-at-home parent, which is kind of more the role he’s in now if you are going to paint it that way. That’s more of where he is. I’m the one who runs the business. 

But we do everything together. I do the kids’ school with them. I help with the laundry. He helps with the laundry. 

We both do the dishes. He mostly cooks. I mostly make money. 

We talk about the business. We stay up all night brainstorming on my giant whiteboard together. It’s teamwork. We wanted this for so long. 

He would always talk about how he could be here more. It just felt impossible. We didn’t know how it was ever going to happen when he was stuck in this blue collar job and I was staying at home. 

And to be honest, and people get upset when I say this, as a stay at home mom I was a little miserable. I wanted things to change. I wanted to do something. And he was like, “I miss you guys. I’m missing everything.” 

He thought that the baby hadn’t walked yet. He didn’t know; he forgot. And he said, “That’s it. I’m done. This is our last baby and I didn’t even remember that he’s already taken his first steps because I missed it.” 

And so, there were things like that. We were praying, “How can we create this abundant life? How can we do life together?” 

That’s what we always wanted, and now that we have it, yeah there’s hard stuff. I get frustrated. I’ll pull the boss card and be like, “Well, you don’t know anything about funnels, so I have to figure this out. Just leave me alone.” 

We have our moments for sure. But I always remember that I used to not see him for weeks at a time when he would travel and it was so hard. He didn’t even know what words our daughter knew how to say. 

He was so heartbroken all the time. And so now we’ll work through whatever comes up, whatever feels difficult, we’ll work through that any day over how it used to be.

MICHELLE: What was the pivotal moment or that switch where it all just kind of fell into place?

ALLIE: In terms of the business going well?

MICHELLE: Yeah. You decided you wanted to do this. He up and quit his job. What was that kind of defining moment of like, “Oh my gosh, we made it. This is it.”

ALLIE: Well, before he even quit there was a long road of me putting in place a lot of building blocks in the fringe hours. I set my alarm for 10 minutes till 4:00 AM every day for a year. I would get up at 10 till 4:00, and I always joked that God wasn’t even awake yet, I would get out my little, janky laptop that I got for $50 from some skeevy guy on Craigslist and I’d work on my business for four hours before he left for work. There was a lot of that at first.

And then it got to that point where it was like, “Hey, I’ll quit or you quit. Pick one.” I feel like I’m saying that like, “Hey, I’m giving you an ultimatum.” But it was more like, “Hey, I’m desperate. What should we do? What do you think? Which one of us should quit? What do you think about this? I know I can do this, but how are you feeling?” 

We had that conversation. And then when he quit, I had a lot of guilt about working as a mom and I had to really work through that. So much about business is internal and strategy.

I always like to say that it’s a balance of strategy and spirit. You cannot ignore the spiritual, emotional, and mental aspects of business and you cannot ignore the strategy side of things. I had to work through all of that and basically started working full-time days on my business.

I don’t do that anymore. I really only work 2-3 hours a day, four days a week on my business. But back then I was working 8, 10, 12, 14 hour days just at my laptop.

It would overheat and I’d have to give it a break. Then I’d come back and plan a webinar. I was doing webinars where nobody came. All this stuff is hustle. 

From that point, it was about four months from when he quit to when we really saw some money. And then another six months to where there was a tilting point and it was literally overnight we had gone viral. 

I worked very hard on a post that I intentionally wrote to go viral, but it took two months to go viral. When it did, it was trending over the first Hilary/Trump debate of 2016 on Twitter and Facebook. We had news people at our door wanting to interview me and talk to me about my story of getting rid of all of our stuff, the kids’ toys, and simplifying.

That was when everything really took off. But there was a lot of building before that.

MICHELLE: I love hearing you say how much hustle it takes. I am right there with you. I get up, not before 4:00, but before 5:00 and it is dark and quiet. 

I’m the only one on the court. I can see that everyone’s lights are turned off. I’m putting in the hours because you gotta do what you gotta do in the beginning to really make it work. 

I do know what you’re talking about with the viral post of getting rid of all of your kids’ toys. I was explaining to my husband who you are and how you’re coming on the show and I said, “You know, she got rid of all of her kids’ toys except for the train set and then they spent hours in their playroom, so maybe we need to do that.”

ALLIE: Yeah, that’s what happened for me. And that’s what happens with so many women in my community. I got extreme because of our situation. My kids were the first grandkids on both sides, so they were overwhelmed by stuff. 

There were multiple, multiple, multiple bins, all overflowing with toys. The kids would come in, dump it out, look for the one little plastic pony they wanted and come out and say they’re bored. I had reached a point where I had just had enough. 

That wasn’t serving my kids. It was distracting them. It’s not the kind of childhood I wanted them to have. 

I guess the best way to say it is that I wanted my kids to be deeply connected to their purpose at a very young age and I think that comes from a lack of overstimulation. So, why would I have all the billions of toys that light up, take all the imagination out of playing, and make it impossible to ever be a little bored and use your imagination? 

I got extreme just to see what happened. You know when you get to those points as a mom where you’re like, “F this! We’re done! I’m going to try this opposite of what I’ve been doing.” 

I wouldn’t do that again because that’s just not how we live anymore—it’s simple, but it’s not nothing—but that was so good for my kids. Oh my gosh, it was so good for them. And that started me learning about simplicity.

MICHELLE: Tell me more about the minimalist life. I told you before we started this that I’m not a minimalist. I did kind of go drastic before the quarantine started with my clothes. It was really because I needed extra space in my closet to record in, so I got rid of a bunch of clothes. 

That’s the extent of my minimalism. I work from home, so there’s no point in having 15 different suits from the corporate world. So, what does the minimalism life look like?

ALLIE: Actually, I’ve been saying so much lately whenever I do interviews like this, “Spoiler alert! If you’re going to look at what minimalism actually is, I don’t really think I’m one either because I don’t care about counting my socks and counting my jeans.”  I don’t say, “Oh, this is too many shoes. I just exited minimalist territory.” 

Who gives a crap? I don’t care about that. What I do care about is not having to maintain my stuff in my house constantly. 

I don’t want to have so much stuff that it’s spilling out of every drawer, every cabinet, and I have to get this huge house. I love our house. It’s beautiful. It’s cute. It’s happy. But it’s small. 

It’s three bedrooms. And we work at home. We school at home. I’ve got six people living here. 

The size of your house is equal to the storage that you get in that house. So technically, we shouldn’t be able to live here. We should be needing a lot more space. 

We should have a lot of stuff coming out of the closet, the cupboards in the pantry, in the kitchen. But we actually have empty drawers, empty shelves in the closet, and empty space. I don’t want to fill it to the brim. 

I don’t want to have so much stuff I don’t need because what takes up your space takes up your time. And I have a lot more purpose in me than to have a full day dedicated to doing the laundry because that’s how much laundry I have. I’d rather set it in a rhythm every morning where I do a small load in the morning, and then it’s just done and I don’t have to worry about it anymore. 

I have a business to run, an empire to build, lives to change, and an impact to make. I don’t want to clean up all the time. So, I don’t really care about minimalism per se. 

That’s just the word that people use to describe getting rid of stuff. On Google, that’s the word that people use, so that’s the word that I say. But I think that minimalism so often can be less for the sake of having less and being like, “Oh, I’m a minimalist. I’m only going to have one succulent on the counter.” 

You know what I mean? It’s stereotypical. It’s empty. 

Mine is not less for the sake of having less. It’s less for the sake of having more of what matters.

MICHELLE: Oh, that’s brilliant. I just love it. Everything that comes out of your mouth is great. 

I like having my stuff, but it’s the clutter, it’s the things that pile up that I don’t like. It gives me anxiety to see clothes piled up or the mail stacked up, so we don’t let that happen. 

My dream is to always have my kitchen counters clear. I want it to look like a model home, even though it’s not a model home and I’ve got a 4 & 5 five year old living here. That’s what I want. 

Okay. So remember on Monday when I told you I can get your housework down to 30 minutes a day or less. 

Did you hear me?

Today is the last day to get Your Uncluttered Home for $197 instead of the normal $300. People wait for this price point. It’s amazing. This course is worth so much more than that, but I’m happy to offer a discount if it’s going to get you to say, “Yes,” to less stuff, less crap in your way, less stress. More joy and more time, energy, and space focused on what really matters to you.

Your housework should be mundane. It’s a mundane task, it should be in a mundane priority slot in your life.

So, go to alliecasazza.com/course. Let me walk you through simplifying and getting into perspective every single physical thing in your home so that when you walk in, you know, “I am the owner here. I own my stuff. My stuff doesn’t own me. I am in charge. I feel so good and so proud. I am only spending the bare minimum amount of time on my things. I am not owned by this stuff. I am in control. I am able to relax and breathe and cook dinner for my family and show up for them and get my work done and run my errands and come home to peace.”

Yes, our homes are still lived in. Yes, there are still messes. But it is so much lighter and way easier to get back to normal after a day with the kids. After a day of messes and cooking and playing and toys being out because there’s just less. 

It’s simple math. That’s just how it works. Less stuff equals less maintenance, and that’s the point I want you to get to so that you can focus on what really really matters to you. Because I know that at the end of the day, the amount of time you’re spending on housework—if you’re listening to my episodes—may not be really what you want. If that’s you, Your Uncluttered Home will change your life. It will help you. I promise. 

alliecasazza.com/course. Today’s the last day to get the incredible discount. Go sign up! I can’t wait to see you in the student community sharing your before and afters. I’m proud of you already. See you over there, guys!

ALLIE: Yeah, for sure. It does cause you anxiety. Studies are coming out every year now, which I’m so grateful for because it’s something to point to, showing that your stuff is literally raising your cortisol, which is the stress hormone. Side note: Cortisol is terrible for your libido, terrible for your skin, terrible for your gut health, your physical midsection in terms of weight and health. 

It’s terrible for your relationships because, when you have spiked cortisol, you’re stressed out all the time. If all you’re doing is maintaining stuff and cleaning up after other people, how are you to be around? Terrible. You’re not fun. You’re stressed out. 

When I first started this, I did the toys. I moved through the rest of the house and the most shocking result of purging my house was my marriage. We were never seeing each other. It was very tense. 

I have shared before that I really think we might not have made it. We probably would have split up if we could have afforded to. That’s sad, but that’s where we were. 

We had these three babies and my marriage… Now, it’s a stark night and day difference. It bloomed because I was less stressed. I didn’t realize how much I was nagging and yelling, “Can’t you help? I worked all day too. This is a mess and this is a mess.” 

All of that stuff that you’re doing all day, all of that rushing around, cleaning up, and putting away, what if it just didn’t exist? What if it was just gone? Wouldn’t you be a little bit happier? Wouldn’t you have more space, time, and energy? That’s going to affect your relationships. 

MICHELLE: I think that’s why I’m obsessed with tiny homes. It would be amazing and it wouldn’t because I don’t know if I would want all four of us on top of each other in a tiny home. But I love the idea that you have what you need. 

And everything else? Do you really need it? Probably not.

ALLIE: I have what I love too. I always use my closet as an example. My closet is very full. I love clothes. 

I have always loved putting together outfits. It’s also a part of my job. I’m constantly doing photo shoots, video shoots, speaking events, meeting people, and doing all this fun stuff so I want to have options. 

When I had a minimalist closet for two years, I was miserable. But I felt like I had to because of who I am. 

I did this big video where I was just like, “I’m done, I’m miserable. I enjoy shopping with my daughter. I enjoy having options. I am so proud of my body, what it’s done, the babies it’s given me and how strong it is. I want options for dressing by mood. I’m done with this.”

It was this viral video that everyone was resonating with because minimalism for the sake of minimalism is so empty. It needs to be relative to you and reflect you. 

An example of what that looks like for me is my full closet. I’ve got lots of jeans, lots of t-shirts, lots of dresses. Free People is my favorite store. 

I have lots of cute kimonos and little summer things because I live in California. I’ve got lots of stuff that I love. It’s beautiful. I love my closet. 

But my kitchen is so minimal because I don’t care. I just want to get in there, get the job done and be done. I don’t like to cook. My husband does, but he doesn’t have a billion tools. 

We have what we need and that’s it. The kitchen is sparse. It’s very simple. 

And that reflects who we are as a family. This is what I love. This is a part of who I am and this is not. 

Do you see that relativity and how life-giving that is versus a book of rules? If it doesn’t make you feel like this, get it out of your house. You’re done. 

What about who I am as a person? What about if this does make me happy, but I’m also sick of cleaning it up all the time? Where’s the choice?

There’s no set, written rules. If there is, it’s legalism and legalism applied to anything—relationships, being a person, religion—always leads to bad things. Why would you want me to write you a set of rules and say, “Hey, Michelle, this is the way that I do this. And if you don’t do it this way, you’re not a minimalist. You’re not doing it right.” 

That’s the message that’s out there in mainstream minimalist communities and it’s such BS. I hate it. You have to make this relative for you or you’re going to be stuck in a joyless existence, which is why you were purging your stuff in the first place. 

MICHELLE: This is why you’re so popular. You’re amazing. It all makes sense. I was never part of that phenomenon that you’re alluding to that caught on because it’s just not my thing. 

One of the things that I hate doing is laundry. I don’t mind putting it in the washer and moving it to the dryer, but I can’t stand folding it. And I do it for four people every single week! 

I can’t stand it. And to fold things in this other kind of way… No. It’s not going to happen because that alone does not spark joy in me whatsoever. 

I agree that you need to do what you know is best for you, what you love. As in all things of life, whether it’s a career, relationship, your home, you have to figure out what you love, what makes you happy and go with it.

ALLIE: Right. And also, what are you willing to do? If what takes up your space takes up your time, then by me having options in my closet like I’ve been talking about I know I’m going to spend more time hanging things up. When I try things on and I don’t want to wear it, I have to hang it back up. 

I have more things to wash. I’m willing to do that. That’s fine. 

Because when I was not doing that and I had a super “capsule wardrobe” as it’s called, I hated it. I was so miserable. I would rather have more laundry to do for myself, have more things to put away, and more things to organize in that area. 

But with other things—books, my kitchen, my kids’ stuff (because they don’t care. They’re like we want to play outside because they’ve been raised in this), in all the other areas it’s as minimal as it can be. With my bathroom stuff, my beauty stuff, it’s all simple. 

We don’t have a million towels. We don’t have a ton of extra sheets. We just don’t do it. It’s that simple. 

I’m willing to take the hit in my closet, but I’m not willing to in other areas. That is that relativity we talked about. That’s life-giving and that’s what feels good for me.

MICHELLE: I love it. And we’re the same way with sheets. I’ve got two sets for each bed, so that way I can change them while one is in the wash and not have to wait for the wash to be done to put them back on. 

That’s it. Two sets for every bed and that’s all there is. The linen closet is not overflowing.

ALLIE: And did you know that the average person has four sets of sheets for each bed and they don’t even know that? It’s just that they’ve accumulated them over time and never got rid of anything because it feels wasteful.

MICHELLE: I do believe it because when my mother-in-law passed away and we went through the house, there were sets and sets of sheets. Some not even opened; random colors. I don’t even know what to do with this stuff.

ALLIE: Yeah, exactly. Dishes are the same. The average is three sets of dishes per household. And it’s like, aren’t you only eating off of one?

MICHELLE: Yeah. We have two sets. The nice set that we got for our wedding. I can probably count on one hand in seven years how many times we’ve eaten off of them.

ALLIE: Right. And if that’s not serving you, either use it, put it somewhere that it’s not taking up your time, or let it go. People have so many extra things and they’re just holding onto it mostly out of obligation or sentimentality. 

If it’s sentimental, but it’s not serving you at all and you won’t use it, is it really getting what it deserves sitting in a box in the attic? There are so many things that are accumulated and most people don’t move too often unless you’re in the military or you rent and you switch every lease, so we don’t realize how much we’ve accumulated.

I always talk about the garage because that is square footage you’re paying for. And for most people the bulk of their expenses is their house, whether it’s rent or a mortgage. You’re paying for that square footage. And it’s literally, almost always, like a storage house of junk. 

Our house is not big. We should need way more space and we just don’t. We have two large bins with a couple of storage things like Christmas decorations in our garage and the rest of the garage we transformed into an extra office and a gym. So, we’re using that square footage. 

Same with our backyard. Our backyard is this happy little oasis that we spend time in every single night. We made the most of it. 

Why are we happily paying extra for this square footage for it to be a storage of crap we don’t even want, use, or need? And most people are paying for a storage facility as well.

MICHELLE: Yeah. About two years ago, we did the same with our garage. We didn’t put in an office office, but I wanted to put a treadmill and elliptical in there. My husband bought a World War II Jeep, and I said, “Clear it out.” 

He’s a big World War II buff, so this for him was the ultimate thing that he could buy other than a tank. He thought it was kind of crazy, but I said, “Throw it out, throw it out, throw it out, donate, throw.” 

And he said, “All of this?” And I said, “Yeah, we don’t need it. If we haven’t used it in so long, there’s no point.” 

I am happily not attached to stuff. He is more so. But I said, “Let’s make room to utilize this space.” I love the idea of doing an office, but I think the next step would be getting another car in there.

ALLIE: Yeah, our garage is weird. It’s got this pushed back room with a window, so it’s like an L-shape. And so we put like one of those DIY barn doors that slide in there to kind of divide it. So, that’s just an extra space. 

If I’m not at my actual office (because I do rent an office down the street from my house) and I need it, we need it, or one of the kids has a video call for schooling or whatever, that’s there. And then the rest is a gym.

I’ve got my Peloton out there. We have a treadmill. My husband does CrossFit, so he’s got his stuff and it’s awesome. 

That actually saved us money because we canceled all our gym memberships and extra payments and we have our own gym. There’s no excuse for not taking care of our bodies because your physical health is directly related to what the health of your business and your family will look like. 

It’s so important. And we’re able to prioritize that. And our square footage allowed us to do that. 

Make your house work for you. It’s either working with you or against you. And it’s your choice.

MICHELLE: I totally agree with everything you’re saying. It’s so refreshing to hear it. I know that people are going to resonate with this because it’s what we all need to hear. 

It’s almost like we need permission sometimes to do these things and to get those reminders to go out in your garage and just clean it up. Just get rid of the crap. Just do it. In all aspects of life, just get rid of the crap.

ALLIE: Oh absolutely. It’s life minimalism. I love that people call me the “life minimalist” now because it spills over into everything. 

You did that in your home and you see how much better you feel? Let’s look at your calendar. Where are you saying, “Yes,” to obligations and it’s just draining you? 

You only get so much time in the day. You only get so much space. What are you going to do with it? 

How can this rise up to support you? Because when you are supported by your space, when your calendar is serving you and your home is serving you, you are the best for your family, you are the best version of yourself for the world. And we need that.

The world needs you to wake up, get rid of the BS that’s clouding your house, clouding your calendar, clouding your life, and start living intentionally.

MICHELLE: That’s beautiful. I want to go downstairs, clear off the calendar and go do more things.

I think as a newer business owner, because I’ve only really been at this for about a year, it’s being able to say, “No,” to things. You really have to learn that as a business owner because I didn’t say, “No,” before. 

Saying, “No,” to the client that just doesn’t do for you what you need them to do. Being okay with saying, “No,” if it’s not the right fit. No, this isn’t what I want to spend my time doing. 

This is where I want my business to go. This doesn’t serve my family. Booking 15 calls a day does not work for me. 

I’ve actually put on my calendar that I only take phone calls three days a week and I don’t take any more than two or three a day. You have to say, “No.’ And that’s something that’s hard to learn.

ALLIE: Yeah. You’ve got to flex that muscle. It’s trial and error. 

Figure out what works for you. I didn’t just know innately that I need Mondays off. I need to start my week slow. I didn’t know that. 

I had to go through tons and tons of weeks of being stressed out and overwhelmed and inundated with to-do’s to learn, “Oh, I’m going to turn my work week into a four day thing and start Monday slow. I’m going to meditate. I’m going to work out. I’m going to spend time with my family and then maybe knock out a few work tasks. Then Tuesday can be fuller because I’m more prepared.” 

That took trial and error. It’s all about just diving in, jumping in. Don’t be perfectionistic. Start and then notice how you feel.

And that’s where I always say is the balance of strategy and spirit and business. The spirit side is asking, “How is my soul feeling right now? How do I feel in this work week? How did doing six podcast recordings back-to-back-to back feel? Do I feel like I could do that once a week and that’s my schedule and the rest of the days I don’t do it? Or do I feel like I want to throw myself off a bridge because that was terrible?”

Everybody’s different. Just dive in and start with anything—decluttering, business, marriage stuff, whatever—dive in and start having the conversation. Start doing the action and then notice how you feel. 

What feels good and aligned for you? That gets to be the right way for you. You don’t have to listen to what someone else is telling you that you should do.

MICHELLE: Yes!

What would you tell someone who wants to start out their business? In the sense that you started with your blog, it grew, and you’ve created courses? Where does a person start? 

I think that we all have these purposes and these things that we’re experts on. And I think some people just don’t know where to start.

I’ll go back to before we started this, we talked about my mom’s club. And one of the things I do is the monthly newsletter and I spotlight a mom every month and I ask them, “If you could do anything, what would you want to do as a career?” 

And the answers are amazing. I don’t understand why these women aren’t just like, “Let’s go do it. Let’s start it today!” Because in five years your kids are going to go to school and you will have this extra time. 

I’ve asked this question before to other guests but from your point of view, where do you start? How do you start this? And just do it? I think you can scale things, you can educate yourself, but what kind of advice would you give someone?

ALLIE: What’s coming up for me right now for your listeners is to say that I think you need to look at your life as a whole. Don’t just look at your business. Don’t look at strategy. 

Don’t look at my business model. Don’t look at Michelle’s. Don’t look at anything else. Look at your life from this kind of aerial view and ask yourself what kind of life you want to design.

For me, I do a lot of courses because that’s passive. I create it once and then I can sell it, sell it, sell it, sell it. I can sell it live. I can sell it passively. 

I make money from something that I did years ago. I freshen it up sometimes for sure, but pretty much it’s one and done. That lines up with the lifestyle that I wanted to design for myself and my family.

I want to be able to get PayPal alerts that money’s coming in while we’re on our way to Legoland with the kids. That’s important to me. I did not want to exchange time for money, so I didn’t start by taking clients. 

I didn’t start by doing programs where I had to be live and everyone was paying for access to me. Paying for access to me is something that really just turns me off. I don’t want to do that. 

It doesn’t make me feel good. It makes me feel obligated. It really pulls my creative energy. 

I feel very drained. I want to be able to cancel the workday and go do what feels good that day if I need to do that for my family. There’s too many people here. 

What if somebody is sick? What if somebody has a bad day and needs me to comfort them and I need to cancel? 

I don’t want to be stuck. So, courses were great for me. I chose courses because that’s how I wanted to design my life. 

So ask yourself, do you want really high ticket offers where you are showing up because you love showing up? Then do that. But that’s not what I wanted. 

Even in my high level membership for business that I’m building now, I’m prerecording everything and batching it so that these women can be learning and growing their businesses while I’m doing other things on the backend or with my family. I think it’s about asking about the kind of life you want to design and then creating a business model and starting with that out of that place. 

Then just do the dang thing. Start creating the course. Start brain dumping what’s in you out onto a Google doc, a piece of paper, whatever. 

Get it all out and start working on it. Just hit record on the lesson. Just get it done. 

You don’t need to wait. Don’t put it on your to-do list. When you’re in it and you’re thinking of it, just get it out on paper. Hit record, record the intro lesson. Just do it. 

MICHELLE: That’s awesome advice. It’s a totally new aspect from any answer I’ve gotten before. It’s fabulous. I love it. 

This is good advice for me and I’m already in the thick of it. 

ALLIE: Yeah, you can always change. I always tell people, “You’re not a tree.” Your roots are not embedded into the fiber of the earth underneath you and you cannot change anything. 

If you have a business and it’s not really fulfilling you or there’s pieces of it that you dread, maybe this is a little fluffy, but I don’t think that there’s anything in your business that you need to be doing that you don’t want to throw the covers off yourself in the morning, get in the shower, and get to it because you’re so lit up. I don’t have any part of my business that’s not like that. 

You’re not a tree. You can get up and move. You can change. You can throw that out. 

You can go a different way or try something different. You can close that program and start courses instead. You can do whatever you want. 

MICHELLE: I love it. Absolutely love it.

Thanks so much for hanging out with me! In case you didn’t know, there’s actually an exclusive community that’s been created solely for the purpose of continuing discussions around The Purpose Show episodes. It’s designed to get you to actually take action and make the positive changes that we talk about here. I want you to go and be a part of it. To do that, go to alliecasazza.com/facebookgroup. 

Thank you so much for tuning in! If you’d like to learn more about me, how I can help you, how you can implement all these things and more into your life to make it simpler, better, and more abundant, head to alliecasazza.com. There are free downloads, online courses, programs, and other resources to help you create the life you really want. 

I am always rooting for you, friend! See you next time! I’m Allie Casazza and this is The Purpose Show.

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