Ep 25 - 5 Minutes = 5000x Better: Featuring Tami Hackbarth

 

This week we’re bringing Tami Hackbarth back to the podcast, to talk to us about self-care! We’re running down her top 5 tips of things you can do in 5 minutes to feel 5000x less like sh*t - and be sure to catch part II of this episode, airing on the 100% Guilt-Free Self-Care Podcast on Thursday!

You can listen right here, on Apple, Amazon, Spotify or you can read the transcription below. Enjoy!

 
 
 
 

Carly: Hi, Tami.

Tami: Hi Carly!

Carly: I'm so excited that we're doing this. Thank you. Oh, okay. So we are doing twinsy episodes on our shows, and yours is going to be released the day after mine. So if you listen to this, the day this comes out, tomorrow will be the second half on Tami's podcast. And we are talking about things that take five minutes that make us feel 5,000 times better.

And I'm so excited. And we're going to share five each. So even if you do all of them, it will be less than half an hour, and you'll feel five times, or even 5,000 times better. Yeah. I mean it’s just, it's breaking it down to little, we're getting into the little things you can do to help you feel less like shit, which is what we are both all about.

Tami: Absolutely.

Carly:  And I just want to just throw this out here because we are the “Tidy Revival” podcast. It is really, to tidy slash declutter slash get your shit in order — when you yourself feel like shit. Hundred percent. Look, if you're somebody who is right now going, “I'm listening to this podcast because I want to learn all the things,” take this little nugget with you.

Tami: When you feel better, you have more energy and more time to make your home feel better. Yeah. And look better.

Carly: So yeah. And I will also say that on a related note, I hear a lot people send me a lot of struggle care posts on online. They're really into struggle care as a concept, but then also specifically Domestic Blisters on TikTok, who’s amazing.

Tami: I love KC Davis. Everyone does. I love her.

Carly: How could you not love her? She's great. Yes. But I think one of the things to remember is that when you are not feeling optimal, these are things that you can do. And even if it's not about organizing or decluttering per se, but you do one of the other ones that just helps you feel better, that’s all that matters.

Tami: Yeah. Also, can't we like, declutter our brain and declutter the inside of our body and like tidy up our physical appearance and how our mental health, like it's all related. And, one of the reasons I think so many people, really connect to what KC is saying over there on her podcast and on her TikToks and all the things that she puts out and in her book, keeping house while drowning.

It’s the moral neutrality of the situation, right? Like, you're not a better person because you house is tidy. And you're also not a garbage person if your house is more cluttered than you wish it would be. Those things are not actually related. Yep.

Or, but I will say in, in this generation, I will say in earlier generations it was straight up, it was a hundred percent, you were judged on that stuff. So for me, there's a lot of unlearning also. We aren't going for aesthetics on our organizing or even our self-care, we're going for like, getting down to what makes this functional, what takes care of future me, what makes this moment filled more with ease rather than like strife and anxiety and suffer.

Yeah. Like we're just, we're here to remove some suffering from your self-care and from your tidying.

Carly: Yes. A hundred percent — and to know that you are not alone. So these are just going to be some simple tips that any of us can do, but we have all been there. If you're on the struggle bus right now. We have all been there.

And I know that you and I have a similar journey in that we started learning about the things that we coach and teach and help other people with because it came from a place of, this is important in my life too, and it's drastically changed my life, and now I really, really want to share it with you.

Tami: Oh, absolutely. I mean, I am a self-care evangelist because no one needs self-care more than me. Yeah, I wish I could bring my 20 years ago self out, like, like drag her out of a closet. Like I just have her hanging in a closet. I could take her out when I need her, like a prof and be like, okay, see this, see she's a little rough around the edges. And she's really critical and she's really mean mostly to herself. Also, she doesn't take good care of herself. She's hungry, she's tired. She perhaps still poisonous with the nicotine and the alcohol circulating at all times. All times. And she's funny, but she's suffering.

Carly: We have very similar 20 years in the past versions of ourselves. Okay, so before we dive into it, for anyone who for some reason didn't listen to your last episode, who are you?

Tami: Tami Hackbarth.

Carly: And what do you do in the world?

Tami: Well, Carly Adams. I am a keynote speaker. An author, what? Of a brand new book. I am a podcast host and a life and work coach. Specifically working with tired women who want to get their time and energy back so that they can create the world they want to live in.

My podcast that you'll be listening to tomorrow, friends, come on over and join The party is 100% guilt-free self-care. My book is called The Essential Guide To 100% Guilt-Free Self-Care — Get Your Time and Energy Back To Create The World You Want To Live In. Just released here in January and I work with women specifically. I do have a few, I have had male clients before, but predominantly I work with women, and the reason is women are tasked with so much more invisible labor, so much more mental load in their homes. Drudgery and what Eve Rodsky in Fair Play calls, what does she call it? “The daily grind.”

You know — the feeding people, the laundry, the decluttering, the never-ending dishes, the tasks, the keeping of the birthday party lists and the sizes of the clothes that kids are in and where you're saving the baby clothes for your sister-in-law. Women are tired and they are, as I'm finding out, the more people I talk to, they're kind of seething with rage under the surface.

Yeah, because they're like, I can't do the thing I want to need to do because I'm too busy doing for everybody else. So my “why” of what gets me up in the morning is I want to help women say, “You know what? I'm going to need a minute. Going to need a minute for myself so I can get my own shit together so I can go out and do the things I was born to do.”

Whether that be a really responsive parent who shows up at stuff and sees each kid in their family as a separate individual and that has special needs and that you can show up as the parent you want to be, or the person who's like, I just want to give my all to my job. Guess what? Friends, we can't do that without taking deep care of ourselves and getting our shit together. Yeah, we can't do it. It just is kind of ugly and it doesn't feel good, but things don't have to feel the way that they do for most people.

Carly: And, having worked extensively with you and been in your programs and done one-on-one coaching with you, I started working with you and I didn't really know you very well. Now I know you much better, but I have to say the biggest change that has happened in my life is that I now have this toolkit that I can draw from — so that when things inevitably get a little off track as they do, and that's a part of nature, just like with our systems, they might get off track, but because we have the systems, we know how to quickly reset things and that's the toolkit that I have now for self-care.

When I feel like things are getting unruly, I can say. Okay. Okay. Okay. Let's take a reset, but we know what we need to do to get there versus starting from scratch. I just had a lot of medical issues that were definitely related to stress, but I didn't have a toolkit and so I talk about it a lot. But I just want to say again, thank you, Tami. I appreciate you!

Tami: Well, Carly, I can say the same thing for working with you. The, I mean, everyone should know that our relationship business-wise and friendship is a hundred percent reciprocated. Yes. And you have helped me really make peace in my home. In a way that I'm like, I didn't even know that was possible. Yes. Dang girl. Now I feel good at home. This works out great.

Carly: We've, I've had so much fun with you in your home and you're doing amazing. Yeah. It's just, it's all, it's all good stuff and I love how much our work coincides. I think it's really, really fun.

Tami: Yeah. Our work definitely holds hands. Yeah.

Carly: It holds hands. It skips down the street. It does big hugs, and it just like throws daisies around to strangers.

Tami: Absolutely. I was thinking confett, but daisies are our thing. Ooh.

Carly: And they'll be biodegradable. Totally. Okay, so let's dive into the five things to help you feel 5,000 times better, and help you feel less like shit. And Tami's going to give her five things on my podcast and then I am going to do the same on hers. So I'm just going to hand over the mic. Let's talk about number 1.

Tami: Okay. I sent these to you ahead of time, but I'll just say I changed the order because I'm just going to rip the bandaid off for everyone who's listening, are you ready? If you want to feel five, let's say 5 million times better, the number one thing you need to do is move your fucking body. I know everyone wants the answer to every goddamn question that they ask to not be exercise. But the answer is exercise, and I'm not talking about putting on your Jane Fonda workout tape from 1982, or your leggings or your leg warmers.

I'm talking about getting up from wherever you are and walking around your house, putting on your jacket and your shoes, and walking outside. Moving your body is the answer to so many of life's questions that I hate that that's the answer, but I've been testing this for a very long time and I read, as you know, Carly, I'm a voracious reader and it doesn't matter what I'm reading about — the answer to the question of how can I feel better? The answer 100% of the time? Move your fucking body. Yeah.

Carly: It's a very, it's an inconvenient truth there.

Tami: It's an Al Gore reference, people, we just shoved in there. Another inconvenient truth is exercise is a goddamn answer. Yeah. Global warming, exercise. Boom. Yeah. And you know, this could be related too. Like if everybody got out of their car and the buses and all that, there might be, oh wait. We know that there was a difference — remember the beginning of the pandemic when like the earth healed itself when everybody stopped.

Carly: Oh my gosh. Stopped when I was taking legit four workouts, not workout workouts, but like four sessions of working out a day. Because I just had the time.

Tami: Well, yeah, the time. What else am I doing?

Carly: And I need to feel better. I need to endorphins.

Tami: Exactly. We're like, you know what always makes me feel better — working out. And here's the thing, like I know a lot of people have resistance to this, and a lot of people just went, I hate you. Yeah, me too. Guess what?

Carly: You're not alone.

Tami: For the answer. Right. But this is the thing like I've never said, “Oh, I feel terrible,” after I worked out, never. I can tell you I feel terrible before., sometimes I feel terrible during, but I do not exercise for the before and the middle. This is an end goal that I'm working out for. Yes. Clears my head. Makes me, I sometimes feel like I'm a rusty bucket of bolts because, P.S. as you get older, your body's like, oh, now you're a rusty robot unless you move your body.

Carly: Oh my gosh. Yeah. I hate that. I have to tell you something really funny. I was listening to a podcast of somebody that I love and they had a guest on, and happen to know that they're both in their mid-twenties and they said something about stretching and they're like, ‘oh, I always, I always forget to stretch. I should stretch. I need to stretch, but I don’t." And they laugh and it was cute. And I was like, just give it time. Just give it time. Because it's not optional anymore.

Tami: The stretch. Well, I'm, as I like to say, “25 backwards”, meaning I am 52 friends. And I will tell you in my twenties, I thought about exercising and I felt better. Yeah. But it went really downhill with every decade.

And it's not downhill as in like, oh, I feel worse. But no, I kind of feel the same. I don't want to do it while I'm doing it. I'm like, okay, I'm doing the thing. But really what I'm going for is that feeling after, which is, “Oh, thank God that's done.” And I feel so much. And I feel like these are things that, I mean, again, it doesn't have to be a long period of time.

Carly: This is like five minutes — will do you a little dabble.

Tami: Absolutely. I'm a big proponent of using the Pomodoro method, and for those of you that don't know this method, this productivity tip was invented by this guy in Italy and he used a tomato timer. So that's why the “Pomodoro.” I live and die by this. I've set my timer for 25 minutes, pretty much to do everything in my life. The timer goes off and I'm super focused because I'm like, oh my God, I'm racing the clock. I'm writing a newsletter. I am like cleaning the bath. It doesn't matter what I'm doing. Suddenly, suddenly, 25 minutes, we gotta go — timer and suddenly I'm focused.

And then I set a timer again for five minutes and I always get up and move my body. Sometimes I will do like a little sun salutation. Sometimes I will do a little, I was going to say downward dog. I don't do downward dog because I got a jacked-up shoulder and don't do stuff that hurts. But I will do a downward dog on a table.

I you can picture just at like, the top of me is on the table and my feet are on the floor, and you get a really good stretch that way. Yes. Right. I have a desk bike, so I will hop on the desk bike and do five minutes while I am pleasure scrolling on Instagram. The point is, every single half-hour block, I have a five-minute movement break in there.

Sometimes I'll just get up, use the restroom, come back through the kitchen, grab some water and the five minutes is up. But I've done a lap or two around the house. But this is the thing, if I didn't do that, I may never move my body. Yeah. Right. So I just build it into my day.

Carly: I’ve been doing a lot of, if I have a call with somebody, but it's more of a catch-up, then we'll just do, and Tami and I have done this, we'll just do an actual call and then just both are in our neighborhood walking around, which is really nice.

Tami: I know, and I remember during the pandemic, we even did a Zoom call and I hung my phone on a tree branch, obviously a low one, and I just, I jumped rope while we were on the call and obviously you can't do that with everyone. Like, I don't do my client calls while I'm moving. Except sometimes I do, like if, if I'm on a phone call with a client, I will pace or I have a tiny trampoline and I'll walk on that or I'll hop on it while someone else is talking.

If you can't tell, at least one of the people talking in your ears right now may have a little touch of the ADHD in them. And some movement helps them actually think. So if you want to feel better, a lot better, build a five-minute movement of any sort. Any sort, any sort, and by the way, I am not changing my clothes or my shoes. Sometimes I'm riding this bike in my pajamas. Sometimes I'm like, right now I'm wearing jeans and a sweater and a shirt. I got my hair like I had lipstick on and yet, right before this call I was walking around my house. I always am picturing myself as a senior citizen, just like straight-up mall walking in my house. But I tell you what, I am going to be a healthy senior citizen that is flexible and mobile and independent. Because I am moving.

Carly: Yeah. And mobility is really, really everything. Totally. Okay. What is your second, your second tip?

Tami: Okay. Because we are on the, “Fuck you, I don't want to do that” train. Let's go with meditate. That's right. People I just said it. And then sit down and do nothing. Okay, so here's what I'm going to say about meditation. So many people resist meditation, and this is what I hear. Let's see, 100% of the times when I bring this up, people go, I'm bad at meditation. Yeah, everyone is bad at meditation. Everyone. But that guy who meditates for a living he's good at it? No, he is not. He is still practicing. Yeah, it's called a practice. Practice. So if you have never sat quietly watching your breath for five minutes, you do not know how long eternity is. So if you are somebody who is like, “I am so overwhelmed, I have so many things to do, I am in such a hurry.”

I challenge you to sit for five minutes. Doing nothing but watching your breath. And you're like, how can I watch my breath? Well, if you're fancy and it's winter, go outside. Sit in a chair, and literally watch that puff of cold or warm air come out of your mouth and like, “Ha.” Or you could sit in front of a candle and you could watch the flame flicker by watching your breath.

You could lay down. Set an alarm. Friends, you will fall asleep. You could lay down on your bed, put one hand on your heart and one hand on your belly, and then you could focus on just noticing. You're like, oh shit. Where do I breathe? When I breathe? Does my belly hand go up first or does my chest hand go up first? Oh my God, do my hands move at all? Am I dead? These are thoughts I literally had when I'm meditating — “Am I dead? I don’t know. There's nothing going on here. What's happening?” Right?

So again, a lot of people have this idea that meditation has to be perfect. You need an outfit. You need a special pillow. You need a special pillow, and you definitely need to hire a monk to come to your house. When really, when we get stuck in perfectionism, it's just procrastination, and procrastination is just your brain saying, you are terrible at this. You should avoid doing things you're terrible at. And that's bullshit.

Carly: A hack that I have found to be really helpful is I remember when you and I first started talking about meditation and you gave the permission slip to do it in a position that felt best to me and that lying in my bed counted. So even if I did it at the end of the day before I go to sleep, or if I did it first thing when I woke up before I got out of bed, that also counted.

And I remember that being like a light bulb moment. And then the hack that I use all the time, even now, because I don't even know if I've ever gone past like maybe 15 minutes from meditating. Like that's the farthest, but usually it's a five or a 10 minute, sometimes a three depending on my day. But you can find a lot of free guided meditations on YouTube, so you don't even have to download another app. And they're guided and they will help you through it. And it just kind of takes the pressure off. All you have to do is listen to them and do what they say.

Tami: Yes, and I will, I will make a plug here for my two favorite meditation apps, which are Headspace, because I'm OG user, love them, and also Calm. Here's the thing, I'm going to tell you. A lot of health providers will pay for your meditation app. Ask at work. Ask your healthcare provider. If you are somebody that's curious about using an app, Headspace has a lot of either low-cost or free meditations available for certain professions, and check with your employer because a lot of times they will pay for things like meditation apps because these wellness things, these wellness things, these wellness practices? They reduce stress so much in the workplace that it actually increases the bottom line for businesses. Yeah. Because people are healthier and happier.

And by the way, if you have a workplace that has wellness days. Why don't you hit up me and Carly? Because we could come in and teach your business.

Carly: Yes, absolutely. These are things that are important to bring to the workplace for that reason. They do increase productivity, they increase employee satisfaction, and just wellness in general.

Tami: Absolutely. And just one more little asterisk on what Carly said about that permission for doing meditation in a way that's comfortable for your body. I just have to say, friends, you are the boss of your own body. There's no meditation police. You can lie down or sit up. Do it in your car. Do it in your bed. It doesn't matter. Don't let perfect be the enemy of the good in this situation. Really, it's — shut up and sit wherever you are, and don't forget to set a timer — and you will be astonished at how long five minutes is. Absolutely astonished.

Carly: If you happen to have a Fitbit or some sort of technology device, that device that tracks things. When I was using Fitbit Pro, something I like to do is do their meditations because it would track your session, but it would also track your heart rate during the session.

So you could see how it decreased when you did it. And no matter how short the session was, my, my heart rate always decreased and I just found that to be promising. Like, okay, if I do this, then I know my body is literally relaxing and that's why I continue to do it.

Tami: Okay. And just, I want to do, again, another little asterisk on this and that is, the latest research on movement is you need 10-minute spurts three times a day. The latest research on meditation, if you meditate for 10 minutes a day, it literally changes the architecture of your brain. 10 minutes, by the way. Yeah. Five minutes is halfway to 10. Right. This is a big deal. Like it doesn't take a huge amount of time to really change your physiology.

That's bonkers. It's amazing. Yeah. Also, I'm just, I'm laughing because I don't know if I would mention this on any other podcast, but since this is the Tidy Revival podcast, did you know that? And I don't know how many hours people spend a week looking for their keys. No, but a lot, right? And you're like, no, they have a key or they have a hook.

Well, guess what? A lot of people don't. So for those of you that now have a key or a key place where you always put your keys, you can use the time you would've been looking for your keys to sit down and you probably just elongated your life because you're not all mad about losing your keys again.

Carly: Yeah, I mean it really is like all of this intertwines and it all really is literally life-changing stuff. You can lengthen your life by doing some of these things,

Tami: And it's not just lengthen your life so you can live longer because who wants to feel like shit longer? Yeah. Facts, right? You can live longer and also not want to end things sooner. Miserable. Like you actually feel better. Yeah. Are you waiting for number three?

Carly: Absolutely.

Tami: Go outside. Doesn't matter where you are and it doesn't matter what the weather is unless it's like a hurricane or some crazy thing. But going outside helps your mental health.

Everything that helps your mental health — I’m like, we should do this more. Right? And if you can't get outside, you can look out a window. And if you can't look out a window, you can look at your indoor plants. And if you can't look at your indoor plants, because you don't have any, you can go online and you can look at pictures of plants because all of this outdoor nonsense, it lowers, decreases your cortisol. It basically calms your brain into being like, cool, cool. The outdoors is soothing my anxious soul. And I have to say Carly, when I was in my late twenties, I wish this is a quotable slash tweetable. I said out loud, to a friend — I'm going to let you finish drinking whatever you're drinking so you don’t spit it out.

Yeah. I said, day drinking in a bar in Portland, Oregon, on a sunny day in my late twenties, and I quote, “I don't really get the outdoors.” Dear listener, I was so fucking depressed when I lived in Portland. Gee, I wonder why. And also Portland is one of the most beautiful, places outside that I’ve ever been in my entire life.

Carly: It's one of the most beautiful places outside ever.

Tami: Yeah. It didn't really do it for me. And now I'm like, I go outside every day, all day. I work outside. If I'm in a bad mood, I go outside. If I'm in a good mood, I go outside. If I need a break, I go outside. Also, I've done a lot of reading. The ridiculous amount of benefits that you get from being outside. So I'm like, okay, I guess we're doing this.

Carly: Yeah, I have taken to, I do twice weekly generally unless it's been really, really rainy. But generally twice weekly walks with a friend outside along the river and right around dawn, we end up seeing a lot of wildlife. The other day we saw two bucks that were in their little thicket and they were just looking at us and they were just relaxed. And it's a beautiful way to start my day.

Tami: I'm over here shaking my head like a bobblehead, like I know friend. I know. Yeah, I would like, it does wonders for my mental health, right? And I know a lot of people are sunset people. I'm a sunrise person. But the point is, the only place you see them is if you, they happen every day and you'll miss them if you don't go looking.

Carly: Yeah. They only happen outside. That's actually a little-known fact. Yeah.

Tami: Little known fact about the sunrise. Sunset.

Carly: Not inside.

Tami: You know? But here's the thing, getting outside, like just open a window. Go. Whatever. Yeah. Beautiful. It's a thing. It's a thing. Okay. Are you ready for number four?

Okay. Massage your own body. What? I know, maybe it sounds nutty, but you can in under five minutes. Get some blood flow going. Get yourself a nice oil, get yourself a nice, really thick lotion. At this point, we're all needing a little moisture here in the winter. Do your hands, do your feet, do your lower legs, just like there's this idea so we all know about fight and flight.

Our nervous system is up and we're ready to either fight our enemy or run away from the enemy. The other one is freeze. There's another response, friend, and that is fun. So you can also chill out your nervous system by tending and befriending yourself, so you can like give yourself a hug. You can rub nice oil and lotion, like I said, on your hands. But don't forget your wrists, which go up to your forearms. Don't forget your elbows, and now you're looking fine and moisturized, and you have tended and befriended yourself and really calmed your nervous system.

Carly: Spending even five minutes with a foam roller or as someone who's prone to headaches, I do pretty much every day, I'll take a tennis ball along my shoulder blades on my back. So it's a tennis ball, the wall, and me just having a grand old time getting the knots out in the places that I can't reach. It's just absolutely beautiful, but five minutes can make a world of difference.

Tami: By the way, Carly's putting loose in our hands right now. I know I got jealous. What I would love to say right now is I want something, a product from us called “A wall, a tennis ball, and me” — because also if you take that same tennis ball and your same back, but instead of putting the tennis ball on your spine or next to your shoulder blades, you tuck it behind your tush. And you kinda roll around there. Yeah. And then you'll find out how tense your butt is. Yeah.

Carly: And you'll find out that you're like, wow, I hold a lot of tension in my butt, in my hips, and oh my God, when I roll on the ball, do not do this on the floor because it will feel like someone is stabbing you with a knife. In your butt, unless you have a really, really tough spot. Then you can kind of lay on the floor and then just kind of lay on that spot. Let gravity do it, don't move it. Just lay and then you can kind of like shake a little bit and move it a little bit, it will help.

Tami: Yes. But I will say for beginners, and everyone's beginner until you do it. If you're not experienced with this, laying on the floor is advanced yoga, it is going on there because you can't control the pressure. Yes. When you're holding it against a wall, you can get to a point of noticing the smaller the ball, the more intense this is.

Carly: I had never done that before until I did this amazing workshop that, quite honestly, I wish she still does, but she's moved on to a different phase in her career. But my good friend Lindsay Levi did this workshop, I want to say it was called “Do Anything Better." And it was basically a workshop that taught you all about stretching. And I still use some of these stretches regularly, but I'd never done them before this workshop. It was amazing. And one of them we had, oh gosh, this little ball, I guess it'd be a, is it a racquetball? Like the little, there is a pink, or it's gray…

Tami: Yeah, either gray or pink. Yeah.

Carly: Yeah. Okay. So a racquetball. Can you tell I'm not a wasp? I truly have never seen one in my life. Anyway, so you take that and then you put it under the ball of your foot. I guess you could say the arch, so you kind of go from like the ball to the arch and like along your toes and stuff, and it just really improves the circulation and the flexibility and just help. It helps your feet immensely. I'd never done it before that and it is just such a baller move.

Tami: Well, so I learned all this weird self-massage stuff from my girl Michelle Marle. Oh, Michelle will have you like bear pawing your whole body and at the end you're like, I feel like just got worked over in the best possible way.

Carly: Yeah, because massage — I mean, I love it and I do get a massage regularly, again for the headaches. But it really can add up. So, I have one of those self-massagers.

Tami: I do too. This is what I want to say. We are saying five minutes every day, and here's why. Five minutes every day will get you further than 60 minutes once a year. And it will get you further than 60 minutes once a week. So this idea is like nobody has 60 minutes to do stuff. Like I don't have time. Guess what you got? Everyone has five minutes. I know this because you're listening to a podcast. You could be massaging your feet right now. Exactly.

You could be using that tennis ball on your back while you are doing this. You could go outside and go on a walk. You could do anything for five minutes. We don't, we don't want to wait to let somebody else take care of our bodies. And our mental health, nor do we want to be like, oh, I’ll wait until when I can do it right. When I can do it perfectly. Yeah. And we can schedule that massage with the massage therapist, and we both don't have Covid, and I've got parking. I got a babysitter, da, da da. No. Go to your bathroom or your cupboard, or wherever you keep the lotion that you are saving for a good occasion, and just use it.

Carly: Get that lotion before you have to declutter it in the garbage because it got rancid. Because you didn't use it. Yeah, let’s grab that one. The expensive one. The one you're like, I'm not even going to put this out because I don't want my family to use it. Yep. That's the one. Get that real, your favorite scent and just put it on your hands and just massage and maybe spend a little time on your cuticles and massage that little space in between your thumb and your first finger. That little pad right there.

Tami: Just massage that — that right there will save you hundreds in massage as well as headache maneuvers, because if you get in there real good, that will help you get rid of a headache.

Carly: Oh yeah. My mom would do that for me. When I had a headache as a kid, it was like the sweetest act of love. That will never leave my memory.

Tami: Also, P.S. You know who's really good at this? A spouse, you're like, can you rub this like three-inch area five minutes for me? Yeah. I will do yours in a second.

Carly: Yeah, absolutely. I love this. I've also gotten really into shower oils. Yes. To put on while I'm in the shower before I get out, kind of shake off. Then add lotion all over my arms and my legs, and then I pat dry.

Tami: You're locking in the moisture, locking in the moisture.

Carly: And then I just feel honestly just like a rich bitch, you know?

Tami: Yes. I do know. Because you're like, did I just change how I feel on the inside of my clothes? Weird. Just feeling good. It's good stuff. It's good stuff. Okay. And then I have one last thing that I do. Every day. Are you ready? I do a “toda” list. You're like, what the fuck is a “toda list”? Well, I know everybody listening to this has a to-do list.

I would like to just remind you, your to-do list is a list you haven't done yet. Your to-do list is a bunch of open tabs on a bunch of shit that eventually you will feel bad about. A toda list is the opposite. A toda list is a list of shit you've already done that you, it's like, it's like a to-do list with all checked marks. Every single day I ask myself, what did I do? Well, what is something I did well today? And I have to sometimes think, because I'll think everything sucked today. And then I'll go, no, actually I handled that interaction with my preteen like a champ. That should be noted. That's number one.

Number two: I put on a cute outfit even though no one could see me because I am important too, and I went outside. Right? If you have a list of your accomplishments, you'll be like, damn, girl. Your brain is a liar. You did get stuff done today. Yeah. And remember, remember recently we were on a Clutter-Free Home Process call — P.S. Live calls with Carly are awesome — and I was sitting in my office. I've been redoing my office since my family went back to school after Covid. COVID is not over, just going to put that asterisk in there. But they did go back to school. I have my office back and I was telling Carly like, it's not done.

I can't believe it. La la la, la. And then we went back and we looked at my to-do list. And I had forgotten to go back to my to-do list to make it a toda list. And by the time we went through my to-do list and turned it in to a toda list, what I ended up saying was, oh my God, I didn't give myself enough credit for all the things I have done.

Carly: And that really goes back to something that we talk about in the community a lot. And that is to celebrate every win because every win is a big deal.

Tami: Right. And you also only notice those if you actually pay attention because our brains are hardwired to be like, I just need to know what is going to kill me, or what is going to eat me, or what is going to try to mate with me? That is really like, biologically, that's it. That's it. Right? And so your good hair day will be forgotten unless you write it down — “Put effort into hair, was totally worth it. Did not yell at preteen. Congrats. Totally worth it. Congratulations. You are a great mom.” 

Because I'm sure at some other point, and you can think of a dozen parts where you're like, you're the worst. Right? So, but this really trains your brain to be like, oh my God, I'm not a complete garbage person. Yes, I did. I did work on that project. No, it is not finished yet, but neither am I. I'm not, so therefore I'm not done yet. 

Carly: Absolutely. I love it. I think that one is, yeah. I'm really excited to talk about it and I know again, if you listen to this, the day it comes out, then tomorrow, this will be coming out on Tami's podcast, so you can hear my list on hers and Tami before we get into final — since you are here, I'm going to take advantage of the fact that you are a current Clutter-Free Home Process student, and for anyone at home, because it gets mentioned here and there, but if anyone at home is considering it, I just want to ask you one question. What is your favorite part about the community?

Tami: Well, that was a long pause because I have so many favorite parts. I will start with the thing I always come back to, and that is I'm not alone. Before I started working with Carly, I had so much shame around the parts of my house that I just couldn't figure out how to declutter by myself. Because I was comparing my messy insides to everybody else's curated outsides. And when you came, we were — so we worked together in person, we worked together one-on-one. I'm part of the community. You were just straight up, “Everyone has piles,” and I was like, no. No, because remember before Covid, we would go to people's houses. I never saw their piles.

Carly: Oh yeah. Because everyone is throwing 'em in a bin and shoving it in the closet or in the do not disturb room.

Tami: And I realized I'm not alone, and there's nothing wrong with me because everybody else is like, “Oh yeah, I have this thing. I don't know how to get rid of it. We're just going to let it be over there. It's going to be in flux for a while. I'm working on this other thing,” and it helps me come back to my ongoing projects. So my house is an ongoing project.

And you're in my Deferred Maintenance crew, Carly, what's, I'll ask you on my pod too, but what's the thing that helps you by being in that community?

Carly: It's totally the toolkit. Toolkit and resetting. I'm so excited to be part of the Deferred Maintenance Immersion alumni this year because it's going, I know that it is going to be all about resetting, and my word this year is about habits, and on a larger scale, it's about tapping into the self-care habits that I want to do. But the real actual like goal that I'm working on is just to make sure that I'm looking at my self-care tracker every day. Like that's the actual goal. Because if If I even glance at the tracker, I can see one more little habit from the day that I am like, oh yeah, I can make sure to do that before the end of the day. Right. Also, because you're like, I have data in my head. I've done that before and I did feel better. Yes. Yep, exactly right there in black and white.

Tami: It's right there.

Carly: Yeah. Right. And so, yeah, so it's digging into the habit building and it is that same thing of knowing you're not alone and that other people are working on these things. Perfection is a myth. We're not striving for it because it doesn’t exist.

Tami: We're never done.

Carly: We're never done. We are, we're never done. We're beautiful works in progress, and it's fine. It's fine to be a work in progress. We, we all are. You're never going to be done, If you're done, you've, you've passed on.

Tami: Yeah. Rest in peace, my friend. Rest in peace. Otherwise, we're just going to get up and declutter tomorrow. Yeah. And then we're going to do some self-care. We're going to hundred percent go outside and move our bodies.

Carly: Tam, do you have any final thoughts to share?

Tami: I love you.

Carly: I love you too!

Tami: Very much. I'm so glad that you had me on. You guys, we already had this conversation a little bit on a — that’s right. A walk and talk. A walk and talk. And we thought, oh my God, this would be a great podcast. I mean, I hope everybody likes this. It's, it is more refined if you can believe it. But my final thoughts are that there's nothing wrong with you, listener. You just need to keep going. Yeah, yeah. Small, small steps taken, often get you where you want to be, whether it is to declutter your home and to create systems, or to get your time and energy back so you can create the bigger world that you want to live in. It's all done in these tiny increments of time.

Carly: Love. And I'm going to have all the links in our show notes as well. I'll have it to the Headspace and Calm app that we talked about, but then also everywhere that people can find you. But where can folks find you?

Tami: I'm glad you asked Carly. You can find me on the internet at Tamihackbarth.com. You can find me on Instagram at Tami Hackbarth. You can find me on LinkedIn at Tami Hackbarth, and you can also find me on Facebook. I have a group there called 100% Guilt-Free Self-Care with Tami Hackbarth.

And you could also listen to my podcast where all podcasts are found, and my show is called 100% Guilt-Free Self-Care. And if you want to get to know me a little bit better and you want to read my book, it is called The Essential Guide to 100% Guilt-Free Self-Care.

Carly: Awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much for being here today, Tami.

Tami: Thanks for having me!

Carly: Thank you for tuning in today. If you want to learn more about how I can help you, head to Tidy Revival dot com to learn more about how I work with people one-on-one or in the Clutter-Free Home Process course community.

If you enjoyed this episode, please be sure to subscribe so you'll always have access to the latest episode. We would also love to hear your takeaways. Feel free to tag us at Tidy Revival on Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok. The Tidy Revival podcast is written and hosted by me, Carly Adams, edited by Brittany McLean, and the title Song Maverick is by Dresden The Flamingo.

Until next time, remember that…


 
 
 

Links mentioned in this episode

 
 
Tidy Revival Podcast, Decluttering, MindsetCarly AdamsTidy RevivalDecluttering, self-care