Okay, folks. We had intended this episode to be more of a “finality”. It was supposed to be more of a “farewell” episode and post. But the truth is, we’re having trouble with this because Simple Life Together is such a big part of our life. If it sounds like we’re waffling a bit, that’s because…well, we are!

So I guess you could say that we’re simplifying Simple Life Together. We should just jump right into the dirty work and break it all down for you…  Read More…

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Note: Get a copy of Supermom vs Super Mom for yourself or gift it to a Mom who needs a little “less” in her life. It’s less than $5 and will save you countless hours and effort!

Buy Supermom vs Supermom

Topic:  Simplifying Simple Life Together

It Hasn’t Been an Easy Decision to Simplify Simple Life Together!

On the last episode and up until we went to SimpleREV in Minneapolis we intended for this episode to be our last for quite a while. Here’s why:

• What started off as us documenting our journey to simplify our lives, turned into something more…something better than we expected!
• We unexpectedly built an amazing community of supporters and like-minded people in 154 countries.
• We’ve gotten and continue to receive such heart felt support from that community…especially when we shared some of our toughest challenges.
• We’ve also made some amazing friends along the way.
• We were blessed with opportunities to speak about our life and our podcast at different conferences and on different podcasts.
• We’ve been blessed with the opportunity to meet many of the people who inspired us both personally and professionally on our journey. Folks like Leo Babauta, Joshua Becker, Patrick Rohne, Mohammed Tohami, The Minimalists, Joel Zaslofsky, Dan Miller…just to name a few. Some of them have become good friends.
• Even better…we’ve gotten to meet some of our loyal listeners and supporters…how cool is that? And, we’ve helped others in the community who are just starting out and making a real impact; folks like Dave & Sheryl Balthrop, Chris & Sarah Wehkamp, JF and Cheryl Moreau, Lara Blair, and others.
• We were blown away by the amount of positive feedback about the show and how we influenced others to simplify their lives too. Feedback that brought us to tears. We never thought we could impact people the way that we did…and be impacted by them, as well.
• The podcast helped us to really focus on what was important to us…and solidified our passion for simplicity and to live more deliberate and meaningful lives

But Producing the Show Isn’t All Sunshine

Although we love sharing and teaching others, over time, the success of our podcast led to the feeling of obligation of having to produce awesome content ALL the time. And let’s face it…our lives just aren’t THAT interesting that we have some type of major topic to talk about for 40 minutes each week. Still, we started realizing that the show was shifting from documenting our journey to “having” to produce good educational content each and every week, then every two weeks. Some of which took a lot of time to either research or compile coherent thoughts.

And we started to feel the pressures of the podcast from:

• Coming up with content
• Arranging our week to fit in research, recording and editing
• Dealing with tension between the two of us...running out of content, waiting until the last minute to produce, the time obligation, defining roles and expectations, mistaken assumptions of who should do what, etc.

We get along really well and, for the most part, what you hear on the show is what you get with us. But every once in a while, working together on the show stretched things a little bit. Not too often, but definitely more so when we started feeling like we HAD to do a show as opposed to the times when we just couldn’t wait to share something. Hopefully, those tougher times were transparent on your end and you weren’t any the wiser. They weren’t often, but hey, we’re human, you know?

But that’s not all…we’ve also reached a part of journey where it made sense for us to pause the podcast a bit and shift from regularly scheduled content to “targets of opportunity-type” content…at least for now.

We’re Coming Into a Time of Refocus

The cool thing is that we’ve reached an important waypoint on this part of our journey, and now it’s time for us to refocus and work toward that end. But just like in any journey, when it comes to careers there are breaks along the way…if you’re lucky that is.

Back in our military days…during patrolling, we would occasionally take breaks on our mission called “SLLS Halts” (pronounced ‘sils’) that’s an acronym for Stop, Look, Listen, and Smell. Those halts would let you take things in and sense what was going on at that point in the operation. A time to just focus. I think we need to do that with life, too, and I feel like this SLLS halt I’ve taken has really refocused me on what I love and what I excel at. And that’s being in a leadership position with a team.

Wrap Up:

So this is what we’ve decided: Keeping in mind our original goal of the podcast and in light of our new focus in life….it’s not the end the end of Simple Life Together! As we have things to share, we will. That’s what we started out to do and that’s what we want to continue to do. Just not on a regular scheduled basis. So we’re simplifying a bit. But the sharing will continue. And I think it will be a better quality because it’s not rushed, forced, or done out of a sense of obligation…but from a point of sharing and community.

Many many thanks to you! We can’t thank the community enough for your constant support of SLT and hope you continue to support us when we do decide to pop in from time to time!

We are blown away at the community on Edit & Forget It Facebook Page and plan on keeping it going and participating as long as the group is active. We’ll pop in from time to time, but the really cool thing is that it’s really at a point where it’s a bunch of great folks that have a ton of advice and support to offer.

Question:

So does simplifying the show sound okay to you? A little less of us…a little less predictability…but still here to share our journey? We’d love to know.  Let us know what you think in the comments below. 

Announcements:

SimpleREV!

• SimpleREV was amazing!  We’ll have more about it soon, but I just have to say…it really exceeded expectations. So much so that I actually tweeted this out:

Project 333

If you have questions or just want to learn more about Project 333 or Courtney Carver’s Dress With Less microcourse. You can learn more about that at SimpleLifeTogether.com/dress.

Edit & Forget It Challenge

Finally, sign up for the Edit & Forget It Challenge! If you’re already on our Edit & Forget It Challenge email list, that’s great. If not, you can sign up here.

Shownotes:

You can download a PDF of our show prep, too.

Resources and Links:

• You can help support SimpleLifeTogether.com by using our Amazon Affiliate Link for any purchases you must make. Thanks!
• Supermom vs Super Mom
• Comprehensive list of past SLT Episodes

Photo Credit: Modified Photo From Ken Conley