Podcast EP44: A Season of Hibernation in Business

Welcome to Podcast Episode 44: A Season of Hibernation in Business

Reflections on a Year of Transformation and Simplification

In this welcome-back episode of the 3 Day Workweeks Podcast, I’m excited to catch up with you after a bit of a break. I chat about selling my organizing business, Orchid Organizing, and all the positive changes that came with it. I also share some personal highlights, like getting married in Italy and my COVID-19 journey. Plus, I dive into my role in my husband’s safety business, Heartbeat Safety. Throughout, I talk about why it’s so important to simplify life, stay present, and roll with the changes.

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Welcome Back to the Podcast!

01:06 Reflecting on a Year of Change

01:45 Selling My Business: An Emotional Journey

04:35 A Whirlwind Wedding in Italy

06:09 Battling COVID and Long Recovery

08:09 Exploring New Business Ventures

10:34 Embracing Change and Simplification

13:37 Connecting with You: Listener Engagement

RELATED LINKS

• Smarter Not Harder: 3-Day Workweeks for Millennial Entrepreneurs©
• Pro Organizer Success Kit
• Take the free Business Health Check Quiz!

Talk to you soon!

XOXO,

Kate

Owner + Founder, Kate Waldo + Co. 

Creator of the Smarter Not Harder: 3-Day Workweeks for Millennial Entrepreneurs©  Program

P.S. Curious how you can grow your 6-figure business while slashing your workweek in half? Click here to learn about the Smarter Not Harder© program!

Some of our content contains affiliate links which provide us with a commission at no cost to you. Kate Waldo + Co. only recommends affiliates that we know, use, and love. 

FULL TRANSCRIPT

 Hey, and welcome back to another episode of the three day work weeks podcast. I'm your host, Kate Waldo. And I am so glad to be back. It's been too long. And I'm been missing being in this chair and chatting with you guys. If you're watching on YouTube, you'll see that we kind of have a new set of set up. I'm trying something new and wanted it to be a little more fun and casual, but also have something for you to look at that is a little bit better than a corner of my office. So let me know in the comments what you think of the setup that we have.

I'd love to hear your feedback. I am definitely not a professional YouTuber, so. Any suggestions are welcome, but I'm so happy to be here and it has been quite a year. I know I've had some episodes come out, definitely. Like the latest was the beginning of 2024, but in the last year, a lot has happened and it's been a big year of growth and change.

I think more than I thought that it would be, but it's, It's all been good things and I've had to learn a lot of patience. That was my word of the year last year and God the universe definitely gave me plenty of opportunity for that. So It's been nearly a year almost to the day of selling my professional organizing business, Orchid Organizing, and I could not be happier that all of that happened.

I am so thrilled with how Lindsay has taken over the business and she's opened new locations. She's done all sorts of really cool collabs and amazing things that I'm so happy that I passed the torch to her. And She's just taken it to new heights and it really it's been kind of life changing for her, too So I hope to have her on the podcast soon to talk to you guys about her journey With buying a business because selling a business is quite a thing it is During the process, it was very emotional, even though it was something that I really wanted to do.

I was very excited about doing. Lindsay was on board. She was so excited about it. It was still, like, emotional. My, my baby, like moving over to somebody else, moving on, being like, okay, you're a teenager. Now it's time to go to college and move on with your life. I'm always here for you, but it's really cool to see you out in the world.

It's funny. It's like a child. So that has been a really cool experience and since like, oh my gosh, I've just been thrilled about the whole thing. process and so happy that it's getting to live on and it also is making a difference in Lindsay's life and everyone that she has on her team and all of her clients.

So that's been really cool, but it definitely, when I, I talked about this a little bit last year, but when I sold the business, it was, At a time that I, it finally clicked for me, okay, I can chill for a second. I can stop trying to achieve and just continue on with like accolades and just putting another, I have a whole.

Pinboard on my wall like I don't have to put things up there right now. It's okay I could take a pause for a little bit. So for the first time in my life, really I Had the wherewithal to say okay I can chill out a little bit. I don't have to just move on to the next thing. I can really enjoy this while I have it.

This, this is a really big deal, selling your business, having it move on to the next kind of generation, I guess, and just getting to sit in that. And then, you know, John and I got engaged July 1st of last year and then within that time planned an elopement and we got married on August 31st of last year.

So we had a really fun time. It was a whirlwind, but a very cool experience. I took a month off from my business and we went to Italy. So we eloped, it was just John and I. We did, before we left, you have to legally, it's way easier to legally get married in the United States before you go, so we let our parents come to that, and then we went off to Italy, and got married at this amazing resort.

It was so cool. It was this medieval village that the Ferragamo family, the people who have the shoe company, little fashion company, they took over this medieval village. They renovated it. Every building had a different purpose, different restaurants, spas, rooms, a villa, all sorts of things. And we got married on the property.

It was literally like a fairy tale. It was It's me, John, our photographer and our videographer, and the whole day was a fairy tale. It was unreal. And then we did an entire month in Italy, and that was such a cool experience. I'll talk about in another episode why we chose Italy, why we chose to do a month there what our kind of thought process was, because it was more than just getting married.

We had some ideas behind it. But anyway, when we got back, I got COVID like almost immediately. And so did John and it was really rough. We've had it once before like the year prior and it was, it was rough. It really knocked us on our butts and it lasted what felt like forever. And then I think I got long COVID.

I really don't know what exactly it was, if it really was like that or if it was more psychosomatic. I don't know, but I've been in a hibernation era. So since getting back from the wedding pretty much until like March of 2024, I've been kind of hibernating. My body was like, we need a break. We're not doing anything.

And it was honestly frustrating because I love working out, I love being active, going outside, and I just, like, couldn't even do that for a really long time. Could barely even walk around the block, which was tough. And, I think that part of it was I did like 12 weeks of acupuncture. That was a really cool experience.

And I took some traditional Chinese medicine herbs. I had this traditional Chinese medicine doctor who helped me. And that was a really cool experience. I still go from time to time. And then I got some blood work done, found out I was low in vitamin D, which, chicken or the egg, because you know, hadn't been outside in a while.

So that was, that has been, now we're like on the up and up. It was really challenging. It was really hard to show up on social media for my business, any of those things, but it was also a really transitional year. So after selling the business, I was sort of like, okay, let's breathe for a second. Gather my thoughts.

What are we gonna do? What does it look like from here? Because I knew I didn't want to be done working That and I knew that I didn't I didn't think like oh, I want to pivot and change my career to do something like go back to Working a corporate job or anything like that. So, I was trying to figure out what to do.

We have, John and I have a safety business called Heartbeat Safety. And I worked a lot with him. We're still kind of figuring out, like, what my role is. So, we share ownership of that company. And I do a lot of the operations. I set up, like, all the invoicing, all the calendar invites. It's a service based business, largely.

For We do CPR first aid and AED training and then also figuring out like government contracting. So we have a few government contracts for both safety products and for training. And that was a really interesting experience. Like you kind of think at least, I don't know, I sort of thought that because I had gotten to the point of having a business that I could sell that like, no, I don't know everything, but I know a lot of things about business.

That's really funny because I definitely didn't. There's, there's been a lot, a lot to learn. And I. Especially the part about like government contracting and then learning how to do wholesale and invoicing and all those kind of things for products is new to me because up until that point, I've had my And professional organizing business, which was service based, and then Kate Waldo and Co.,

which all of my products and services are digital or online coaching. So that, that's been a learning curve, but we're figuring out like what my role is within that business, but I've missed that. podcasting and talking to you guys so much and just geeking out about systems, talking about getting organized in the business, just optimizing things to really live the best life possible.

So I'm really happy to be back. And let's see, I made some notes so that I wouldn't forget. But yeah, I, have been simplifying things a lot. I'll be sharing more and more about that of like, just kind of bringing it back down to brass tacks, figuring out what is really necessary, what works for me right now.

I've always been a really big believer in change and being okay with flexibility and change that I kind of had a feeling From the get go of becoming an entrepreneur that I knew I wouldn't always want it to be one particular way for the rest of my life. Like, you know, maybe you start a family business and you're like, we're going to do construction till the end of time.

Like my, My family on my mom's side. They have a construction business and it's just had its hundredth year anniversary Which is really really impressive very cool But I I don't know. I didn't have the vision to see that far. I'm gonna do the same thing forever I like to try new things. I like to learn new things.

I've always set things up to be able to change and grow with me, and that's the phase that I'm in right now, growing, changing in all sorts of cool ways, but really simplifying to be able to enjoy life and be fully present. I think that was a lot of what this season of hibernation was for me, was being really fully present and here and not just go, go, go to, you know, keep adding things, it was time to pause, reconsider, strip some things away.

And it's been really good. I just wanted to share, I don't really have any takeaways for you. I, what my hope is, is that I want to share things with you that you might resonate with, or if you come across it, you're like, okay, I'm not the only one. One of my mentors, she recently shared a podcast episode where she talked about something really specific that happened in her life that something very similar happened to me several years ago.

And it was so nice hearing her talk about it. I didn't need to. like advice, I didn't need guidance, I didn't really need a like, it's okay, you're okay, kind of thing. It was just genuinely nice to know that someone else went through that, I wasn't crazy, and I'm not alone. So I hope that the things that I'm going to be sharing with you guys are just helping you feel like you're not alone.

Maybe we can geek out on some system stuff together, because that's my favorite. I've got some cool stuff coming, but at the same time, I'm not gonna force myself to stick to a particular schedule or cadence of things. My goal really is consistency, but I'm figuring out what that means right now.

So I'm glad that you're here. I'm glad that you're listening to this. If you are listening to it on your phone, screenshot, the episode and post it on your stories and tag me and let me know that you're listening. If you're watching on YouTube, drop a comment and let me know what you think of the setup because I think it's fun.

You get to see my plants. I'm very proud of them. And it's a little more casual, like we're actually just hanging out. So thank you for tuning in and we'll see you on the next episode of the three day work weeks podcast.