Ep. 09: Why Planning for Low Capacity is a Momentum Must
Last episode, we talked about understanding your own energy patterns and building rest or buffer time into your days, weeks, and general plans.
I’d love to be able to tell you that that solves all your capacity problems, but I still get knocked on my ass. We all do. We get the flu, and our kid brings a bug home from school. We have busy periods, which can lead to exhaustion or worse, burnout.
Because I didn’t heed the lesson from the last episode, I now realize that by resisting the needed rest and buffer time, I myself was in a cycle of burnout for the two years after that initial collapse and the severe flare that came afterward.
Let’s face it, though — the longer you walk away from creating or working on your business, the harder it can be to return. I felt like there had to be a way to weave in and out, depending on how I felt.
Preparing for and Managing a Low-Capacity Period
I regret to inform you that some of this will depend on you being in a more “up” phase energy-wise. Future you will thank you for the things you do now.
Going back to the flagship concept, I feel like that is a major way that you can set yourself up for dipping energy levels. It’s more substantial and has a longer life cycle than social media. This is the slow and steady system-building piece of my capacity-building marketing processes.
Like in previous episodes, we’re not expecting to have all of these little pieces all set up and put together at once. We’re building a roadmap that helps us pick back up when we’re in the creation and higher-capacity part of the cycle.
I’ve always found the word “systems” an icky word to my neurodivergent brain, but I’ve started to come to peace with the necessity of them with a reframe. Systems are just me making decisions about things ahead of time. I have to remind myself that it’s not an external structure I need to rebel against. It’s compiling the ways I know my brain works and giving it breaks, so I’m not worried that I have forgotten something.
I’ve lost my keys and wallet more times than I dare count. I’ve had to have IDs replaced and called locksmiths to let me back into my car. To avoid losing my keys, I gave a backup to 1-2 trusted friends and installed hooks by my front door to keep them at all times when not using them. I also utilize carabiners for my bag or pants when I’m outside of the house, so I can physically feel them on my person.
These are systems, and they work because I don’t have to physically think about them anymore.
If you’re a service provider or you engage in creative work of any kind, the less brainpower you can devote on what to work on or how to work on it, the more you’ll be able to devote to creating itself.
When I start to feel like I’m going to feel bad or have extended myself further than I normally would, I know that starting later and rearranging my work environment help me to rest, but tasks that I do often change as well.
How Minimum Viable Promotion Dispels an “All or Nothing” Mindset
I call it minimum viable promotion.
How do I show signs of life when I don’t feel like it? Do I post or repost to my Instagram stories? Comment on my friends’ posts/stories? Or do I give myself permission to completely unplug? Depending on your situation, all are valid. But if anything, it’s being a bit more granular helps.
Marketing often lends itself to an “all or nothing” mindset that if you didn’t create a reel, send a newsletter, or hit record this week, then there’s no point in posting. But just because you don’t have the spoons to create a longer, more in-depth piece doesn’t mean you can’t post a picture to your stories or respond to others’ content.
There are levels, and if we don’t hit the high standard for ourselves, we often get paralyzed or decide not to try. But then on the flip side, if we don’t do anything, we use it to beat ourselves up. I’ve been here when recovering from my flare, and it felt like I couldn’t win either way.
If you’re recovering from deep burnout, the best thing you can do is to give yourself permission to go on a pause. Minimum Viable Promotion can be nothing. But acknowledging that’s where you’re at right now can feel freeing. I eventually want to do a live event on coming back from a marketing pause, so if that interests you, get on my email list.
ACTION STEP
This feels self-evident, but give yourself a couple of options for what’s the minimum promotion you can get away with when you’re not feeling productive. Being present in your community counts. Reposting others’ content counts. Completing client work counts. Going back to what I said, nothing also counts because you’re respecting what part of the cycle you’re in.
Building & Organizing Your Content Library
One thing that’s low-lift and you can do to help yourself is build what I call my content asset library. I say you can do it during lower energy periods because it doesn’t take much in the way of active, creative thinking power.
It can be as simple and copy pasting content snippets from your Notes app into Google Doc or your project management system. It can be creating folders in Canva to categorize your stock and uploaded photos. Or you can save inspiration to create a moodboard. Some people call it productive procrastination, but it’s just using your capacity wisely.
You are giving the future you the tools to keep the momentum going without pushing yourself.
I keep a Google Drive with many folders. If you want to see how I organize it, let me know, and I can make a video. To give you an idea, my library includes my email sequences, testimonials, website copy, opt-ins, slide decks from workshops, landing page copy, and client deliverable templates among other things.
This does need regular cleanup and maintenance as you start a creation cycle to keep it up to date. What’s nice is this can be a part of your minimum viable promotion plan. Go through your notes app or content library for work that may be good but either hasn’t been seen for a while or got left in your drafts.
Let’s say you’re not in deep burnout or depletion but are coming back from that. Hopefully, this series is giving you an idea of where to get started, but if not, I’m going to discuss the Storyspark Roadmap and how to prioritize your next few steps in the next episode.
