Minimalism in Business (Self Care Series) with Makeda Newton

Are you out of control when it comes to buying tools, courses, resources, and more in your business? In today’s episode, Makeda Newton joins us to discuss why impulse shopping is impacting your business, how you can incorporate minimalism into your everyday work, and restore your self control when it comes to spending money.

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Guest Bio:

Makeda is a Caribbean transplant from Trinidad living in North Carolina with her musician hubby and their three boys. Her experience with impulse shopping led her to uncover what’s really important – a contented life rooted in gratitude, her personal relationship with God, and creating memorable moments with her family. She is on a mission to help as many women curb their impulse shopping habits and restore their self-control.

Today’s episode is brought to you by my Love Your Leads private audio training! Are you providing an experience for your leads that sets an expectation on when they’ll hear from you, provides them with tools that will help them easily say yes and book you, while also making them feel seen and heard? In my private audio training, you’ll learn how to love your leads and get more booked clients through an automated booking process.

Here are the highlights…

[1:01] Meet Makeda

[3:35] Impulse Shopping

[9:11] Reducing Clutter with Minimalism

[12:00] Misconceptions about Minimalism

[13:12] Finding Purpose in Your Things

[15:34] Meal Planning in the Home

[21:02] Minimalism in Business

[23:25] Buying Based on Your Values + Intentionality

[27:47] Asking Better Questions

[31:06] Three-Day Rule

[34:10] Self Control & Self Confidence

[34:52] Biggest Fuck Up in Business

Mentioned in this Episode

Jordan Gill

Strategy Saved Me Mastermind

Impulse Spending Reduction Tracker

Impulse Shopping Rehab Course

Connect with Makeda

www.makedanewton.com
https://www.instagram.com/makedanewton/

Review the Transcript:

Colie: Hello, hello, and welcome back to the Business First Creatives podcast. I am here with my friend Makeda and she is gonna be a different kind of guest today. I mean, you guys know I have all of the creative entrepreneurs and she is someone that I know I probably need for my business life, but I really need her for my personal life.

Well Maita. Welcome to the podcast. Introduce yourself to my listening audience.

Makeda: Thank you so much, Colie. I am Makeda. I am, a Caribbean transplant living in North Carolina. I am from the beautiful island of Trinidad and Tobago and, I am married with three wonderful boys and, I am an entrepreneur. And I love what I do. I love talking about minimalism, not just talking about it, but being about it as well.

My family and I have been living as minimalists for, the last six or seven years. Because of a bit of a traumatic experience. But we’ve been able to, just really see the brighter side of that and just live completely differently where, you know, our priority is on being content with what we have, just putting each other first, our family and, our relationship with God and just creating wonderful experiences for our family.

Also, we, I I love talking about impulse shopping as well.

Colie: So guys, from that intro, you can probably imagine where this conversation is going. Makeda, let’s start with a personal, so when we met each other at Creative Educators Conference in Dallas by the awesome Laylee Emadi, I was like, oh my gosh, my husband would be so in love with me if I hired you no one can see like, The craziness in my office right now, but you guys get a view of me sitting at my desk with like this really awesome gallery wall behind me.

But the rest of my office is probably a testament to why people hire Maita. I am definitely an impulse shopper. I am definitely, you know, borderline hoarder when it comes to photography equipment, everything related to my business and. I just love when you talk about making decisions for your family, putting them first.

I think that’s what first drew me to, oh my gosh, I need to have Maita on the podcast first. Because I think that if we can make more, specific decisions in our personal life, it is naturally going to leak over into our business. But then there are also some really like strategic business decisions that we can make to make sure that we are not.

Overspending over committing impulse buying for our business when we shouldn’t be. So first, let’s talk about personal. So when someone comes to you and they are inquiring about your services, what is the problem that they are usually experiencing the most?

Makeda: Yeah, so the person’s well first begin. You have to be brave enough, right? To say that I have a problem, kinda like what you said, I have an impulse shopping problem. And it can be hard to even get to that point because sometimes what you find is some individuals, they kind of cover it up or they kind of, kind of justify their purchases.

And don’t really understand the root causes of it. So by the time someone comes to me and, they’re interested in, what I teach, by my content or whatever, they have recognized that they have a problem and they wanna change. And. The biggest problem is triggers, right? They are, it is kind of like, you know, when you become an impulse shopper, you’ve almost lost all of your self-control and, you’ve kind of given in, you’re now being led by your impulses.

So you have to consider all of your triggers. So that email that has that 50% off sale from Macy’s, you’re gonna be looking around, you’re gonna be clicking on it, you’re gonna be opening it, an influencer who’s selling something that you’re like, oh, that could probably be useful for me.

You’re gonna get it. Someone who has something, that maybe you did not think about getting before. You know, that’s a trigger for some people. So triggers are. It’s, it’s really important and I believe that when you start to become more, Aware of the things that make you, act on that urge to buy something that’s not necessary, something that you didn’t think about, before that.

When you become aware of those things, you start to. Be a little bit more intentional about your buying, habits. And you start to realize the power that you do have, in saying, Hey, you know, I, I really don’t need this. Or, I have something at home already that already does the job.

Or even, we have like products. We may buy something at the store, it will be an impulse purchase, but we justify it because, oh, it’ll get used up. Right. So I think of skincare products and hair care products and body care products, right? Some of us who are like product junkies, and we buy so many of these because these products are constantly coming out, right?

And you wanna try all these things, right? There’s nothing wrong with that. But I think it’s good for us to put up guards for ourselves and say, Hey, even though you’re at Sephora or Target or whatever, and you see this new product line and you really wanna try it, you say, Hey, let me finish up. The shampoo and conditioner I have at home first, or let me finish up this skincare product I have first and then I’ll try it.

And that has been something that has been really powerful for me, in being intentional about not having all these products stored up. But, but that’s definitely another way that you can be intentional. So by the time they’ve come to me, they’ve realized they’ve had, they have a problem. And, we try to figure out like what is the.

The underlying issue and, and, and what causes you, what drives you, to do all that spending?

Colie: So I will say one of the things that I think actually helped me was the pandemic. I am definitely one of those impulse shoppers that would go up and down the aisles at Target and just put stuff in my basket that I had no business buying. But when the pandemic hit and we weren’t allowed in the grocery stores, and I started ordering everything, you know, for pickup or for the shoppers to go get, I started becoming a lot more.

And you used the word intentional. I started becoming a lot more intentional. About what I was purchasing and what was going in. And by default, like the amount of money that I gave Target every month decreased. Now I will say, my other nemesis is subscriptions, and you didn’t mention this, but in specific for like the hair care products, there’s a particular brand that I buy for my daughter and I, and it’s on subscription.

And like, you know, we get boxes. We get boxes at the house. And my husband finally said, do you think you have enough? And it’s just, you know, it’s one king. And I’m like, yeah, but I don’t think you understand. Like we always have to have some in the house because this is not something that I can easily go to the store to get.

And when it comes to washing my daughter’s hair, like it really does have to be that shampoo. All the rest of the shampoos make it very dry, very hard to wash and comb and all that good stuff, but, I did take what he said into account, and so I extended the actual subscription and so now you know when I get that text message, instead of ignoring it, I actually go into both of our bathrooms and count how many bottles of shampoo we have.

If we have at least one in each bathroom and at least one under the shelf, I know that I can skip. That delivery and put it off for another six weeks. And so that was just like a habit that I started doing for myself to avoid having boxes and boxes and boxes of this one particular, hair care product.

Now I know it would get used, like you said, oh, it’s gonna get used, but we didn’t need to use it then. And so I had to like teach myself to cut down. And I mean, it’s another reason why I’m not a big fan of subscriptions. I do feel like subscriptions. It may not be impulse shopping, but it’s definitely going against like a minimalist lifestyle because you’re constantly getting things and because it’s on, you know, reorder every month, every two months, whatever you have it set to.

And most people ignore the reminders and they’re just like, oh, it’s fine. And then it comes and you’re like, oh, but I had an unopened box of real toilet paper. Maybe we didn’t need another box.

Makeda: Exactly, and you have to consider too, the next part of minimalism that it hits is the clutter problem, right? So you’re definitely having to find more space. And, and, and I believe that’s the, you know, if you’re looking at a Venn diagram that’s like the middle portion

between info shopping and minimalism, you have to find the space for these.

You know, these purchases, right? And so you have, some individuals who are running outta space in their homes, but they’re unable to, connect the lack of space with their buying habits, right? And, and that’s powerful too so kind of like to your point, if you, if you are intentional, you look at what you’re using and you look at what you already have in storage, it’s the, the perfect opportunity for you to say, Hey, I can skip this month,

but subscriptions and there’s a subscription for everything

today. Everything, it just don’t matter. So it just, and you know, I, I think the thing with subscriptions too is that it gives this, it’s, it’s not an illusion, but I, I think like it really like stresses it that, oh, this is convenient. Right? So you take that. Convenience, you know, benefits who are another level, you know, and, and you end up with all this extra stuff and, and, and stuff that you know, you might not even use or you know, like you’re saying, oh, we have a whole box of this that we have not used yet.

So I think that’s definitely how they get you.

Colie: Okay, Makeda, so you just brought up a really great point. So yes, the pandemic made me buy less stuff, but also we moved into a new house and this house does not have a basement like square footage wise, we have the exact same space, but we do not have the storage that we had in our townhouse, but, I still own my townhouse.

So right now it’s just like storage. But like here, I, I mean, I think you would be proud of me when I said this. So when we moved into this house, we literally brought our clothes and Chloe’s room and my office. Everything else in this house was brand new. Like we got new furniture, we got a new bed. We did that because we knew that we were moving and I wanted to make sure that I did not clutter.

My new house with things from the old house. And so, you know, I’ve tried to go over there cuz my mom stays there when she’s taking care of Chloe. So, I mean, it’s not completely empty, but the basement is just like all storage. But, so I’ve gone over there and, you know, slowly but surely I’ve gone through some of the things, donated, things I’ve gone through.

But I do think that it really helped me be intentional in this house because I did not have to bring all of my old baggage with me. Like I could start this house. Fresh, brand new food, brand new furniture, not bringing over like all of Chloe’s childhood memories and like all of those things that are in boxes in the basement that we feel like we have to hold onto that we really don’t have to hold

Makeda: No.

Colie: I mean, I highly recommend it guys.

Makeda: Yeah. Yeah, I think too, I, I think that’s beautiful what you did. Because, you know, sometimes we, there’s a misconception with minimalism that, it’s all about quantity, right? It’s not just about quantity. Yes, that is a big part, especially if you’re starting out too, before you get to that way of living.

Yes, you, you wanna get rid of a lot of stuff, but minimalism is also about quality. The type of life that you live. And the type of environment that you provide, whether it’s for your office space or whether it’s for just your family in general, your home, how you want your home to feel,

and so when you have.

A lot of things in your home that you do not use, or you know, is no longer serving a, a purpose. You realize that, you know, the quality of life at home starts to decrease, right? So I think that’s definitely something important for us to note and then remember about minimalism, it’s all about creating, this space where you can.

Thrive, like, you know, where you want this, how you want to thrive from

now on going into the future, you know?

Colie: And I feel like somewhere in there you were talking about purpose, like the things in your space, having purpose. Because I think sometimes, and we’re gonna, we’re gonna pivot to business soon, guys, I promise. But I feel like we sometimes buy things that have a purpose in the future, and we’re buying them too early.

And we’re buying them so, so early that we’re not acknowledging that things may change between now and in four months when you think you’re going to use this thing that you’ve bought. And so, I mean, I know some people are like, oh, but it was on sale and I know that I’m gonna need it this fall, but do you really know that you were gonna need it this fall?

And then when fall actually comes, did you actually use the thing or did you end up trying to sell it on Facebook or donate it at Goodwill or do one of those things like making sure. That if you are buying what I call future, you know, future products for, for another time, that you are actually using them as intended and that the thing that you bought is not actually going to get like old and lose its purpose because I’ve definitely been guilty of like buying winter clothes and then when winter comes around, yeah, those clothes don’t fit or they’re not appropriate, or

Makeda: Or something else is out.

Colie: yes, I

Makeda: products on the market. Mm-hmm.

Colie: I feel like as much as we can, and I find this in my kitchen, which I mean, that’s a whole different areas to talk about food, but I have tried very hard recently to start buying only the things that I need for that week

Makeda: Amen.

Colie: days maximum.

Because what I find myself doing is throwing away so much food that I was like, oh, okay. It’s fine. I’ll make spaghetti on Tuesday. But then on Tuesday we don’t eat spaghetti. And then I don’t end up using the meat or using the vegetables or whatever it is, and if it is something that has a shelf life, Well, I’ve just wasted it and then the next week I’m doing the same bad thing.

And so that is another thing that I got from like picking up my groceries is when I did that I could place an order for what I wanted that day or the next day, or the next day, like three days out. And then I knew that whatever it was that I got was definitely gonna be used up before the shelf life. So it, it has made me think about all things in my house in a different way.

Makeda: Yeah, that’s beautiful. And you know, I know you said we’re gonna jump to business, but because I’m a mama and I know you are, Too. We, we run our house on meal plans, you know,

so to that point, we buy what we need for the week and we, based on our meal plan, and we cook based on that meal plan so that there is no, wastage.

You know, you

gotta be careful about. How much, money we’re wasting. You know, we gotta be good stewards with, you know, whether we are employees or business owners. We have to be good stewards with, the money that we get. And, I think that’s definitely, a way to do that. There’s a lot of impulse shopping opportunities in grocery stores and a lot of times we fall prey.

We all pray to those info shopping opportunities. But definitely going to the store with a strategy in mind, a list, just a game plan, so that you are being as intentional as possible.

Colie: Absolutely. And so I feel like before we jump to business, I am gonna ask you if someone in the audience was like, oh, I’ve never thought about meal planning in that way. And they wanna try, but they don’t know where to start. Like what tips do you have? What works for you in your meal planning? Like you’ve been doing it for a long time.

So what have you found is the best tip in order to keep you on your meal plans? Because I’ll be the first to admit, I mean, I’ve probably tried everything related to meal planning. I’ve tried getting it from, you know, things like HelloFresh, I’ve tried. Planning it out online and making my very specific grocery list and then going, and I have just realized that none of those things have served me as well as deciding the next three days worth of meals and then making a plan, then making the grocery order, and either picking it up or having it delivered.

Because even if I plan out more than three days, like. Things just happen in my household. And so maybe my husband had a really late day at work, and so I’m not gonna make that meal that I thought I was going to because he’s already gonna have had dinner before he comes home. And so I’ll save that meal for the next day, and then if something happens the next day, it gets pushed off.

So what would be your tips for someone getting started in meal planning?

Makeda: Yeah, so someone getting started in meal planning. I love all the tools, right? But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized that I am at heart by nature, a simple person. I am simple. So what I do is I pay attention to what my kids like to eat, and then I plan it from there. So, you know, boys pasta, Right.

And I’m a mom. I love veggies. My

husband actually jokes that, you know, every meal we have it has to have some vegetables in it.

Colie: It does.

Makeda: Yes.

So, so I pay attention to what they like And I have, so I have like fun things, you know, we have like burgers and fries, we have pasta with vegetables. We have shepherd’s pie.

They love chili. So we have chili. And, and of course we have like a, like a takeout night, once a week, that they love. We have the same breakfast every Sunday cuz it’s something fun for them. So I pay attention to what they like, I pay attention to. And I kind of balance that with what. Is affordable to

make. So if, you know I’m cooking a meal that has Brussels sprouts and Brussels sprouts is just, you know, it’s just too costly right now or, or whatever the case is, whatever ingredient that is, I try to find ways to substitute maybe something a little bit more, cost friendly.

So I just kind of. Like I said, I just think about what they like, what we like to eat.

I’m Caribbean, you know, so I like to throw in some trendy food in there too, you know, and, and throw into American food cuz my boys and my hu husband is an American, are Americans. So just like a, a little bit of those things. But I feel sometimes if you’re just starting out and you, you try to go to the tools and you know, the blocks that you follow and all this.

Stuff. It, it can sometimes complicate a process that does not need to be complicated. And the next thing too is, I did meal plans for the month.

And so what I realized is that was too much because then the grocery list is changing every week. Right. Until the month rolls around. So we. One week, one week of meal plan that we continue to rotate until we swap it out based on the season or based on, you know, maybe, oh, the boys really like this or whatever, maybe we can swap that in with something

else. Yeah. And so what that does, on the finance side of things, it makes things predictable. I’m a family of five, we’re about to be a family of six, so we, so we’re, thank you so. We’re always concerned about that, just

making sure that, um, we’re not changing our finances too much.

And, um, it is predictable. We know that from week to week, this is what we spend, to feed our family. So,

Colie: And so, I mean, it seems like if everyone takes one thing away from that conversation, it’s don’t try to plan too far ahead. I mean, I think I said that with my

Makeda: yes.

Colie: You and I both said that with the meal planning, like start small and then if you get good grow, yeah.

Makeda: exactly. Exactly. I’m all about starting small, for sure.

Colie: And I would think that planning it out week by week, I think it also helps you with your budgeting like you mentioned, because like if you are used to spending, I don’t know, like two to $300 a week on groceries, and all of a sudden you see a $500 grocery bill, that might make you reevaluate what you cooked that week.

It might make you look a little harder and be like, well, did I, did I impulse shop? Did I buy something that wasn’t on the list? Like, you know, how does that work out? So it would really help with budgeting.

Makeda: Yes. Yeah, sure would.

Colie: All right guys, so we’ve talked a lot about minimalism in your personal life and now we are gonna get into the business because while I have tried to do things to like bring the personal down, I do feel like where I get lost in the weeds is business.

And like you mentioned, meda, I feel like I have triggers. People send an email and they’re like, you have 12 hours to

get 50% off of this. And what I realized was, I had like this threshold, if something costs less than like, let’s say two or $300 and it read like something that would help me get, you know, a when I would just buy it.

Like I didn’t even have like a criteria of specifically how am I gonna implement this? When am I gonna take the time? I mean, It’s creeped up over the years, but like essentially, I think we all have a threshold where if we see a $27 offer in our email, we don’t see anything wrong with buying it and giving it a chance.

But I think the problem comes when you don’t say no to any of the $27 offers that you think are gonna help your business, and then you end up with what I would call electronic clutter. In your business where you’ve got, I don’t know, 20, 30 of these low ticket offers that you’ve never used. You’ve bought a couple of maybe high ticket courses, you know, a couple hundred dollars up to like 1500, you’ve bought them, and while you started to go through them, you got distracted.

And then, I mean, I’m hoping none of us are buying high ticket offers and not using them, but I mean, in general. How can we apply everything that we just talked about in our personal life to our businesses?

Makeda: Yeah. So man, same thing, right? But it means something totally different with business because you know, your business is like your baby. If you have children, you know, you understand that, or plants or pets or whatever kind of mom you are. And you. You know, we become so fascinated and, and so obsessed with, success in our business, and let me say financial success, right?

We become obsessed with that and we become obsessed with, you know, where, where’s my business going? And, how much money am I making? And, you know, all that stuff. And, and so you almost throw. Everything else that you would apply minimalism to in your personal life, for the business.

I definitely think you’ve raised some good points about, continuing that intentionality, right? When am I gonna take this course? How is this course gonna help me? Is this course something that I need? Is this product something that I need right now in my business? I just bought a $39 product, and let me tell you, it took me four days to make that decision.

To spend, yes, to spend that $39. Because I had to make sure that this was something that I had the time to implement right away. I had the time to, dive into it to really learn what’s being taught here. and I was interested in it because it was, there’s a product that I dived into, and I.

Thought that this would compliment it very well. And it, it also ties in with my social media strategy.

But, you know, I find that it, it doesn’t matter at the price point. I know we say under $50 for a lot of people under $50 is a no-brainer price, right?

Anybody would spend that money quickly and, and, and not. Feel any type of way about it. But because I’ve been living this lifestyle for so long, the price really doesn’t matter. I just kind of just put that same intentionality behind a $39

product that I would if I’m making a $4,000 investment in my business. Right. so yeah, so just thinking about that, being intentional about that, and, Paying attention to your triggers too.

You know, like why are you buying it? You made a really good point and, and I was working on something, I don’t know if it’s like a social media post, and I was noting all of the, Emails that come into my inbox, and I was noting the subject lines

right. 50% off, 12 hours left. You have to get this now.

Kids shorts 60% off. Right. And I was just noting all of those subject lines and those are triggering for us because you feel like you have to do it right now. Right. And I, I, I know that’s, You know, the scarcity is something that’s big in business, to help, to drive sales, right? But it’s it shouldn’t matter.

We should still be able to apply the same minimalism concepts to our business.

Colie: I agree and one of the things that I think I need to B be more intentional about is it doesn’t matter the price point. I think that I have to get better at, if I see something I need to state, like a goal, what am I gonna get from this product, this course, this opportunity. And I need to actually put time on my calendar, not only to view it and ingest it or go through it, but also the same amount of time that it’s gonna take me to implement it.

Because I do feel like a lot of us we’re, you know, we’re buying educational product after educational product and for a lot of us, we’re actually consuming it. But then we run out of time in order to actually implement it in our business. And then we end up with like 10, 20 things that are basically teaching you the same thing, but like from a slightly different angle.

And at the end you’re like, okay, I’m finally ready to implement this, but which of these 10 methods do I implement in my business because I didn’t take the time. To fully implement the first one to see maybe what it lacked or what I’m getting from the second one that I didn’t get from the first one.

Because I mean, to me, there’s nothing wrong with buying products that attack the same thing from a different angle, especially if it’s going to help you, you know, run your business, make better decisions, all of that good jazz. But when you just hoard all of these

educational products for your business and you don’t ever implement them, You don’t actually know if it would work.

You don’t actually know what it was lacking and so then you just buy another one thinking that’s gonna fill the hole when you didn’t actually implement. Or I don’t even know, maybe if it’s about implementation. Cuz if you buy a $39 product and you figure out why it doesn’t work for you, I think that’s good knowledge.

But are you acknowledging it somewhere? Are you writing down what the hole was and what you now need to figure out that would work better for your business? Again, Maita, I think it comes all back to being intentional in your personal life and your business.

Makeda: It sure does. And you know what, to your point, if you look at a $39 product and you realize it’s not working for you, you know what that’s gonna do for the next time. It’s gonna make you ask better questions.

It’s gonna make you learn why this is not for you and to me. This is so important because it, you know, when you learn to buy things based on your values, even in your business, we have values, we have brand values,

right? And so you have to look at what are your values and, and does this product fit into my values? So if one of my values is, I don’t know, you know, not doing the most on social media or minimal marketing. For example, I’m not gonna invest in a product that wants me to create like three reels a day or something.

You know what I mean? I’m gonna invest in a product that, that helps me to be strategic. With my reels. Maybe if I put one out, you know, every two days and I see, okay, well they like this or they don’t like this, and kind of move forward with, and that’s the product I bought a shout out to Jordan Gill.

, yes, that was the product I bought. So, you know, so that’s, that spoke to my values because my priority, is my family always. And there’s a big thing

about priority.

Colie: thanks a lot. Jordan speaks a lot to your values then, and I was about to say something about Jordan and this, you know, I try to avoid talking about her in every single one of these episodes. But one of the things that I noticed before I joined strategy saved me for this quarter, that is Jordan’s, like Mastermind, if you will.

Uh, one of the things that I noticed was that the reason that I was willing to invest is because Jordan does speak to a lot of my values. What I realized was I value getting answers. Like almost immediately. And so I felt like every single podcast episode where she talks about not having to wait until the next call in your mastermind to get your answer to take action, I mean, I really did feel like she was talking to me.

I was on a plane and I started sending her messages on the plane. I was like, okay. I had no intention of joining this. But I think after listening to you like, and I have really seen the difference over the last almost two months, you know, I feel much better because I am an action taker. And so I now know not only is that one of my values that I enjoy when my students and people who listen to my podcast and all, I love action takers, but I’ve never really thought about it from the other end to make me think more and be more intentional about who I choose to work with and how.

Because if I am constantly making sure that my students have answers, that my v I P day clients have answers for their damato setup. I should expect the same when I am looking for support for myself. And so that was a big value. I mean, I don’t know that I would’ve put two and two together before recently, but now I know that when I am shopping, I am asking different questions.

Like you said, there are different things that I value now, and so that does break down whether or not I ultimately decide to invest in a product or a service. Regardless of the price tag, the values have become more important, and I don’t know when that switch happened. Like I’ve been in business for almost 11 years.

I don’t know when that happened.

Makeda: Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s so beautiful. It, it’s so, intentionality is so beautiful and you know it if you’re, if you’re able to just slow down just a little bit and just think just a little bit, you know,

I have this thing I wanna start putting out called a three day rule, right? And.

Colie: I have a 72 hour rule.

Makeda: Yes, yes. If you see something and you’re just, ah, I wanna get it, you know, I, I want you to take three days

and, and like, really like, dive in to the benefits.

Of this thing, the, what, what, what is it gonna do to your home, to your life, to your, your quality of living, your business? And, and just dive into all of it. How does it align with your values? Is this something that you can, implement now? You know, do you have. Space for it in your home, you know?

And just really think about it. Don’t just wait for the three days to pass.

But really think about it. And, and at the end of the three days, if after you’ve done some research and, and you’ve said, you know what? Yeah. I still want it, it no longer becomes an impulse purchase. Right. But if you didn’t do any of that, I mean, you, you might as well have bought it the same time, but it’s just, it’s just practicing.

It’s just you practicing a rhythm of being intentional. And, and that’s what, that’s what all of this is about. I, I think life is beautiful when we are intentional, not planning out every single thing. I, I think your audience know what I mean.

There are like moments. So where we are to be carefree and we are to just throw caution to the wind and, you know, when you’re creating experiences for your family or for your friends or whoever, right?

And, and just be unscripted. But it’s, it’s beautiful when we can just think a little bit deeper about the decisions that we’re making and, and, you know, the purchases that we’re making. And I don’t know, I, I just think it’s beautiful. I, I feel so warm and cozy when I talk about it.

Colie: I mean, I do think it gives you a lot of confidence. I feel like that

Makeda: Yes,

Colie: hour rule, because if someone presents something to you and it’s, it’s literally what I hate about scarcity in marketing. Like, I don’t want you to tell me that I have to make a decision today, cuz if I have to make a decision today, I’m, I’m just gonna tell you no,

Makeda: That

Colie: because what would be worse to me is if I took the plunge because you gave me the scarcity, you gave me the urgency, and then two days later I regret it.

Like what does that do for your confidence in making business decisions or I guess personal decisions too? What does it do about how you feel about the product or the service and how you end up implementing it inside of your business? But if you’ve taken 72 hours and you’ve weighed the pros and cons, you’ve outlined what you think you’re gonna get from it.

And I will say, I do think that the more something costs, like the more you should probably do these things. I do think there is a scale, but.

Makeda: Mm-hmm.

Colie: If you do these things, it is going to make the implementation that much more important to you, and you are gonna have confidence that you made a good decision for yourself and your business.

Makeda: Yeah, that definitely is. There’s definitely a correlation between, higher self-control and higher self-confidence

and, just. Basically to what you just said. The more you feel like you are in control of this decision that you’re making, the more confident you feel that, this purchase or this decision is, is right for you.

Colie: Yeah. Makeda, been an amazing conversation. I am so blown away. I think this, this passed my expectations when I first contacted you, so I’m gonna ask you the question that I ask everyone. And that’s what was your biggest fuck up in your business? What did you learn from it and how did you grow?

Makeda: Oh man. So I tried to make a product for in-person, events.

Colie: Okay.

Makeda: Transitioned to a product for virtual events. So this was during the time of covid and it did not work as well as I, expected it to. And I was trying to fit this thing that was not perfect for this other mold. And so what it has taught me, is to be flexible.

Be okay with pivoting,

And be okay with even starting something new. And, it was because of that, covid and, and that, you know, mess up that happened that, this. Minimalism and impulse shopping was born. And

it’s, it’s, it’s, beautiful. I love it because it really, there’s no distinction between my personal life and my business life.

It’s the way how I live.

And it just flows perfectly into how I talk to people, the passion that oozes out of me, because of that. So that was, you know, I was able to turn lemons into lemonade. But, and you know, it’s always sad having to put down a product or a business or whatever. But it was a blessing in disguise.

Colie: I mean, and you never know, it could come back around to where you find a better fit for that product because I will say, obviously I’m the host of this podcast, so I’ve never had someone on on here to ask me my biggest fuck up, but I did do an entire episode on it, and it was that I was so sure that I needed to provide a product that wasn’t Dubsado specific, like my CRM I did it to where it was talking about how to convert more of your leads into booked clients, regardless of what CRM you have.

I mean, I put thousands into it. Like hired someone to write a sales page, hired someone to write ads and emails. I took hours to research all of the automations for five different CRMs, and then I sold less than $500 of it, like.

Makeda: Wow.

Colie: I mean, I still think to myself now, I will say I made Lemonade outta lemons.

Makeda: Yes.

Colie: I mean, I took that sales page, I took little bits of it. I used it other places. I did the same thing with the emails, and I’m actually relaunching it now as a new webinar, like a redone webinar. But I have focused on Dubsado because it’s what I really believe in. And so I feel like I tried to give people what I thought they wanted or what I thought they needed, and I was wrong.

And I, I could admit that I’m wrong, and I’ve taken that thing and I’ve pivoted it into something new. And so, I mean, I feel good about that. And so maybe that will come back around for you, Maita, like maybe it just wasn’t time for that product right now. But there will come a time in the future where you can either relaunch it or you can, you know, take it for parts

Makeda: Yes,

Colie: use it somewhere else in your business.

Makeda: absolutely. I, I, I love that encouragement.

Colie: Yeah, so Makeda, if people in the listening audience wanna learn more about you, the minimalist lifestyle in general, or impulse shopping, where can they find you on the internet?

Makeda: Yeah, so I hang out on Instagram at Makeda Newton, and you can also find me on my website, Makeda newton.com, where I have a wonderful free resource. It’s called impulse Spending Reduction Tracker. It’s helping

you unlock savings hundreds and savings each month. And if you’d like to take that a step further, I have, a course impulse Shopping rehab that helps you curb your impulse shopping habits.

Colie: And I feel like, again, guys, the entire purpose of this episode was to show you how to do it in your personal life and your business. I just feel like I gotta bring that back around. Makeda, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. This was a blast.

Makeda: you for having me.

Colie: All right everyone. That’s it for this episode. See you next time.