Practicing work-life balance with Kyla Clarke

Mohammed: So, let’s get started.

Kyla: Okay.

Mohammed: I think I’d love to get a better understanding of what an NLP practitioner is.

Kyla: Yeah. So, I learned about NLP through a friend who’s also a yoga instructor and — I mean, I’m really into the law of attraction and sort of hacking your mind or reframing your mindset to just improve in your life in general. So NLP stands for neurolinguistic programming.

It basically means like learning how to hack your brain kind of, to like reprogram things that you may have learned through your childhood or through education or through the media and just stuff that we’re fed and it’s kind of like learning how to reverse those beliefs to make you more productive, more successful, more empowered, more competent, all of those things.

And it ties in like hypnosis and some other techniques too. Yeah, it’s all about your subconscious mind and reframing those things.

Mohammed: So, you’re saying you could hypnotize me?

Kyla: I could. I’m certified. 

Mohammed: What?

Kyla: Maybe you’ll actually be getting hypnotized through this session which you —

Mohammed: Wait, can you vocally hypnotize people?

Kyla: Yeah. It’s all vocal. But, I mean, I’m not going — like, no, we’re obviously not gonna hypnotize you. I’m not gonna hypnotize you through a podcast, it wouldn’t work like that, and you have to want to be hypnotized, but — yeah, you can even just, if you wanna like try it out, you can go on YouTube and find sleep hypnosis and listen to them as you fall asleep.

Mohammed: So, what happens in a sleep hypnosis?

Kyla: I mean, the idea is that your unconscious mind would be receiving these messages as you’re sleeping and programming them into your conscious mind, so I don’t think one time would be enough to really make a change but if you listen to — say you want to feel more confident and like your body more, you listen to a sleep hypnosis that’s targeted to those things.

It’s gonna give you messaging that’s like telling you “you are confident, you are beautiful, you love your body,” whatever, and then so once you listen to it enough times and you’re open to it, you’re going to start to feel those messages through your conscious mind too so you’re gonna wake up feeling more confident and more empowered and loving your body. You ever watch Friends?

Mohammed: Yes, I have watched Friends. Not all of them, please don’t judge me.

Kyla: No, that’s okay. There’s an episode where Chandler is trying to quit smoking and somebody gives him a tape that is like a quit smoking tape but it’s for women. And so the whole joke is like Chandler is listening to this really feminine tape that's all about like loving yourself and like “You’re a strong, confident woman, you don’t need to smoke.”

And then he starts acting very feminine and like gets out of shower and wraps a towel around his waist and a towel around his head and, you know, puts on lip balm like a woman would put on lipstick and like — it’s just kind of funny. But that’s what sleep hypnosis could do.

It was more for me just to sort of reverse some of my old bad habits and help myself to feel more confident and inspired and empowered as a self-employed person, a freelancer.

Mohammed: So, I think with somebody who has the ability to hypnotize people, what exactly is the application of being an NLP practitioner and applying that to your services and business as a freelance writer, content marketer, even a coach?

Kyla: Yeah, so, I will say like I did this certification more for myself than anything else, like I’m not planning on booking hypnosis clients anytime soon. I just thought it was really interesting and I wanted to learn more about it and that’s what I did and I just liked the person who was leading it.

She does — like you can do the certification just to learn it and then you can also do the certification to be a coach and so the woman who was running it, her name is Reese Evans, she’s from Toronto as well, really inspiring person, but she runs it for coaches. So, yeah, I did take the coach’s certification. I’m not sure if I’ll do anything with it.

It was more for me just to sort of reverse some of my old bad habits and help myself to feel more confident and inspired and empowered as a self-employed person, a freelancer.

Mohammed: Right.

Kyla: But I did find, when I started freelancing a year and a half ago, I had so many people all of a sudden coming to me, asking me for tips and advice and, “How did you do this? How do you find clients? I wanna start freelancing.” And the number one thing that I noticed with all of these people asking me questions was just this confidence issue.

They really didn’t believe that they could do it, and neither did I before I started it, so that was one of the draws with the NLP and the coaching certification, I was like, oh, maybe I can actually help these people and, you know, become a coach as I’m doing it and sort of become like a freelancer’s coach, so that was the thinking along the way.

Mohammed: Perhaps you can maybe tell our listeners what it is that you do as a freelancer.

Kyla: Yeah, so, circling back, I got like my career — I’m a writer by trade and like that’s kind of what I’ve always just loved to do was to write, but I got my start in marketing and like social media really quickly, I just kind of fell into it and stuck with it for a while ’cause I enjoyed it so much, and I have been laid off four times in my career, like the fourth time now thanks to COVID but before that it was three times.

So, I’ve never really had a lot of faith in businesses or companies or had that like a huge amount of trust just because of that, and I’ve always kind of felt like I wanted to be my own boss and do my own thing but really didn’t have that confidence that I could do it. I didn’t really have a role model to show me how or anything like that and I didn’t really know — like the idea of being self-employed seemed so out of scope for me.

I was like, “I don’t know, I’m bad with money, I don’t really like math, like how can I do that?” which sounds so silly now. Like I don’t like math, so I don’t know how to have a business makes no sense but that was just sort of what I believed. And then after I got laid off the last time, which was like the last time pre-COVID, I was just like “Screw it. That’s three times in a row now that I’ve been laid off and I can’t trust another company.”

And one of the big reasons that I was hesitant to start working for myself was because of the lack of stability but then I realized none of these jobs are giving me stability either so that’s kind of a moot point, so I just started freelancing to kind of bridge the gap, thinking I would keep looking and find something else and then I had a friend throw me a little bit of work and then my friend’s dad threw me a little bit of work and then his wife threw me a little bit of work and the next thing I knew, I had a full client roster, and I was like, “Oh, I guess I’m doing this now.”

So, that was kind of the story of how I got started and, yeah, mostly I do content writing, so I’ll do blog content for brands who need help with that or I will do social media management, but I’m trying to lean more towards just the writing stuff.

Sometimes I still think about getting a job, like it’s not off the table, but especially right now with everything being so unstable, I’m actually pretty grateful.

Mohammed: And what has been your experience now that you’ve had some time to do this on a full-time basis a bit?

Kyla: It’s like it’s easier than I thought it would be and it’s also so much harder than I thought it would be, like I don’t know how to make sense of that, like I really — I think I just thought that it would be so impossible and it hasn’t been, like it’s been so much easier to find clients than I ever thought, and then — but I think the challenges that have come up are like different than I expected, like being so isolated from people, like I live alone and now I work alone all day long too and — so that was like a challenge. Yeah, figuring out finance and stuff like that.

I was lucky to have — I’ve actually formed a lot of friends who are also freelancers which was kind of like the blessing that came out of it. It’s like I kind of fell into this community of like amazing women in Toronto who freelanced and I’ve had a lot of people help me out in that sense. Got a good accountant who’s been really helpful, and just kind of learning as I go. Every day is a little bit different but, yeah. Sometimes I still think about getting a job, like it’s not off the table, but especially right now with everything being so unstable, I’m actually pretty grateful.

’Cause I did have a part-time job as well. I ended up getting a part-time remote job, and then they laid me off because of COVID, but then I was like, “Thank God I still have some freelance clients to keep me going.” So, it’s been like a blessing throughout this experience too, just to — and to now know that I can do it, like no matter what happens with like the future of the workforce or where I decide to go, it’s like, oh, I know that like I can do this so no matter what happens, I have that in my back pocket.

Mohammed: I find it so interesting that you said it’s been so easy to find clients when a lot of times, I think for most people that are thinking about starting freelancing, it’s just like, “How will I find people? How will I find customers —

Kyla: It’s the scariest thing to everyone and I — it’s not that scary.

Mohammed: Yes. I’d love to get a better understanding of how did you get those customers or how did you get your clients?

Kyla: Yeah. So, I mean, my biggest source of clients other than word of mouth has been Facebook groups which are like my little secret sauce, I guess. I tell everyone to join the — depending on what your industry is, everyone’s gonna have a different one but — and I don’t even like using Facebook anymore, like I’m trying to not be on Facebook and actually the groups are the only thing that keep me there. 

Mohammed: Great.

Kyla: So, I’m — yeah, I’m in lots of like different creative women’s ones or just like women in Toronto, there’s actually a group called “Women who Freelance TO” run by this amazing girl Anna which has been a really helpful one, and then, yeah, you can find like writers groups or graphic designer groups, whatever it is that you do, I guarantee there’s a group for it, and so those people are super supportive, and they’re always handing out like, “Hey, my client needs this,” or, “I’m looking for so-and-so to help with this,” and you can also share if you’re looking for clients, just pitch yourself.

I’ve also tried cold pitching and I have been successful with that. A lot of people like don’t even know that was an option. I remember teaching that in a workshop one time and one of the people there was like, “Wait, you can just e-mail people and just offer them your services?” I’m like, yeah, and it’s definitely a lot more challenging to do it that way but, yeah, like I’ve gotten clients out of it, you get bites, so it’s about just like being really confident and like knowing what you offer and giving them a solution to a problem that they may or may not have even known that they had.

I’m really good at staying on top of emails just ’cause I feel like I have to or I’ll go crazy, so I always try to be at like inbox 0 by the end of the day.

Mohammed: I guess now with you taking on clients more and more and you’ve mentioned you were even working on a part-time job prior to that, how has it been that you’re managing part-time work, freelance work, and then I suppose maybe pre-COVID some form of a normal social, personal life?

Kyla: Yeah. I mean, I was very tired, so definitely tired all the time, but it’s a lot of organization. Like I use the Google Suite for everything so that my Google Calendar and I actually — it’s called time blocking where you just like literally schedule out every hour of your day of what you’re supposed to be working on.

And then I use Asana which is my other organizational tool and I colour code everything so all of my different clients have a different colour and I schedule out my to-do list for each day and that’s kind of what keeps me on track. I also just use a good old pen to paper to keep lists going. I’m really good at staying on top of emails just ’cause I feel like I have to or I’ll go crazy, so I always try to be at like inbox 0 by the end of the day. Yeah, but mostly time blocking is the way to do it.

Mohammed: I mean, as somebody who has tried time blocking, at least for me, maybe I’m yet to develop discipline to do it but I’ve always found that it’s like I’m doing something and then I have something that I’ve time blocked but it’s like another thing has come up.

Kyla: Yeah, then just move it down, rearrange.

Mohammed: So just —

Kyla: I even — yeah, I even time block like social events now. Like my friends know if you’re hanging out with me, you’re getting a Calendar invite.

Mohammed: Yes. Yes. Yes. I think that’s a good segue ’cause at least our goal was to talk about work-life balance and I know I definitely went on a tangent trying to understand hypnosis. So, with friends and, you know, even blocking them into the calendar which is something I do ’cause if it’s not on my calendar, I completely forget about it. But what has been — what is the definition of work-life balance for you?

Kyla: Work-life balance I think is really different for everybody and that’s the thing about it which I think especially with workplaces, you can’t really define it, like when people, you know, a workplace is boasting about a flexible environment and it’s like, well, flexible means different things for different people and work-life balance means different things for different people.

Like I don’t have kids, so I’m not, you know, running around worrying about taking the kids to school or bringing them to appointments or anything like that whereas like a lot of working parents, that would probably be something that’s really important to them, to be able to sneak out to take their kid to an appointment or if their kid is sick, they have to stay home or whatever.

For me, I have issues with like — like I have chronic pain in my arms and my hands which is probably just from years of like being bent over a computer and a cellphone which is a constant work in progress for me to monitor that and to work on it but I’ve learned that like being able to stretch and like work out is really important, like not just to stay fit but because I need to do it, like it’s the only thing that really helps with my pain.

And so just being able to like schedule in a yoga class every other day is really important to me and dealing with anxiety. Some days, maybe you just don’t wanna be in an office full of people so it’s nice to be at home. And as a freelancer, at least we have those perks of choosing when you wanna be at home or like — also just for women like things like getting your period, for some women, that can be really debilitating and I don’t think it’s fair that we should have to take a sick day once a month because of something like that whereas sometimes even if it’s not debilitating.

Maybe you just would feel more comfortable to be in sweats working from your bed that day. It doesn’t mean you can’t be productive, it doesn’t mean you can’t get everything done, but, you know, you don’t always wanna go sit in an office full of people when you’d rather just be comfy at home and doing your thing. So stuff like that. I don’t know, just having the flexibility to choose. I also think with how everything has been lately with people working from home all the time.

You know, there’s a lot of conversation about “Is work from home the new normal?” and like “Work from home forever” and I feel like absolutely not. That’s not what I want. I don’t think I wanna work in an office every day either, so it’s about finding that middle ground and finding that flexibility, like maybe you just wanna go to the office two or three times a week, like I miss going to a co-working space, I used to have a co-working space and like to be able to go in and just be in an office environment and be around people a couple [of] days a week is really nice but to have the choice I think is the key to the work-life balance.

I just remember the stress of there’s a huge snowstorm, the subway’s a mess, it’s backed up, and we can’t get into the office and you’re rushing to get downtown to make it for 9 AM, like grabbing a cab that costs $30 to get you to work.

Mohammed: And how did you go about determining what is important to you to then craft what work-life balance means for you?

Kyla: I guess working for years at different offices. I mean, I definitely worked in a lot of really toxic workplaces too, so I think once — after you’ve been through that enough times, it’s like not worth it anymore.

Like I don’t wanna go into a workplace where I feel like crap every day because of the people that, you know, are on the leadership team or that I have to work with, so that was one of them and that’s like one of the beautiful things about freelancing is like I’m really my own boss and if I don’t wanna work with someone, I just don’t have to, so that’s really nice.

What else? You know, commuting sometimes just sucks. This is Canada, like we live — you know, we have terrible weather sometimes in the winter and like I just remember the stress of being like, okay, you know, there’s a huge snowstorm, the subway’s a mess, it’s backed up, and we can’t get into the office and you’re like rushing down to get downtown to make it there for 9 AM, like grabbing a cab that costs $30 to get you to work. For what reason?

Like it would be — like that’s so much stress and so much unnecessary energy going towards getting into an office when you could just as easily have started your workday at 9 AM from home, from your bed, in your flannel PJs on a cold winter’s day, like just stuff like that. And then being able to pick and choose your own work too. I don’t know if we — if I’m getting off on a tangent now but just picking projects that you care about, and then, yeah, fitting in time just for like wellbeing

Oh, and another thing is I worked in a lot of workplaces too where people would just eat lunch while they worked or sit at their desk and like stare at their screens while they ate and like I just always found that to be really strange and I didn’t find it to ever be really healthy and especially when I was having all this chronic pain, I was like becoming so much more aware of how much time I was spending in front of a computer and it’s really important to me to do a 30-minute walk in a day which is not that much and not that crazy and I certainly still don’t do it every day but just to like take a proper lunch break, get some sun, get some fresh air, stuff like that is really important to me.

Mohammed: You’ve gone ahead and started identifying things that you feel are a value and important to you and how you would like to craft what you deem to be work-life balance for you, right?

I also think that a lot of times, people have this belief that work-life balance means things have to be equal, that they have to be in balance. And I think it would be great to get your thoughts on has it been equal for you or have you prioritized one over the other or is it like that duck that goes up and down where it fluctuates?

Kyla: I definitely think it fluctuates and I do think that it’s one of those things like going back to just how everyone has a different definition of what that means, like I think there are a lot of people that would rather, you know, answer a few emails and hop on a few calls while they’re on vacation in Mexico if that means that they can have more balance or it’s like for me, I would not wanna do that. If I’m in Mexico, I’m not doing work ideally.

Mohammed: Right.

Kyla: So, yeah, I do think it’s kind of like, you know, especially freelancing working for yourself, everything is up and down. It is a lot harder to take vacation ’cause you’re like, “Why would I take a day off or like say no to work when I know that it’s coming?” like — and having that flexibility of being able to work from anywhere makes it difficult to say no.

Even last summer, for example, my mom was having a surgery, she’s fine, but she was out west, so I went out west just to help out and be there with her and like I remember like she was in the hospital going in for her surgery, and I was like, “Okay, well, I got a couple [of] hours to kill,” and just went to the coffee shop near the hospital and worked for 3 hours and like I actually really enjoyed that.

It was a way to be home with my mom and able to help out and take care of her and not have to take any time away from my work. Maybe some people would find that to be too much, or maybe a bit draining but, for me, that worked, so I guess that’s an example of finding balance. Or also another example of finding balance is just like, “I have really bad anxiety today and I can’t really take any calls and I’m just not gonna do any work today and I’m just gonna be okay with it and I’m gonna pick it up again tomorrow.”

Mohammed: Right.

Kyla: And that’s another way to find balance, I think.

Everybody else is like freaking out ’cause they’ve never spent so much time on their own before, but I was like, “This is my Olympics, like this is what I’ve been training for this whole time, like I’m prepared.”

Mohammed: And as you started creating or at least investing more in crafting and defining what work-life balance is for you, what have been perhaps some benefits or maybe even some issues you’ve come across or found yourself to learn as a result of it?

Kyla: I mean, benefits definitely. Before — in the days before COVID, I was getting so good with having a really good morning routine, I was like hitting a yoga class three days a week like feeling really good. Physically, I felt amazing and I do think like any sort of anxiety that I had was really low. I felt like mentally really healthy, physically really healthy. I had such a good routine. Eating healthy.

Like all of that stuff was just on point and as soon as COVID hit, of course, it all went to crap but that was a good — I was just like in such a good groove and I felt really good about that which I think is just so important ’cause I think when you’re going into an office every day, that can be really challenging, or even working for yourself just to get into a good routine, it takes a long time and like a lot of discipline and a lot of work.

Yeah, and then the same thing, some of those challenges, like finding that discipline can be hard if we just don’t feel motivated. It’s so easy to just say no. I think for me, like knowing it was my livelihood and my business and my only source of income, I was like, “Hey, well, I have to do this and I don’t really have a choice ’cause it’s this or living in a box on the side of the road” and it is more exciting when it’s your own thing.

You’re like, “Okay, I’m really excited to take this on and do it rather than working for somebody else.” I think one of the biggest challenges that I’ve come across though is the isolation. I’ve always been an independent person and liked having alone time but I didn’t realize just how much alone time I would have like living alone and working for myself and working independently.

So that’s why I would start going to like a coffee shop to work every now and again or like ended up going with a co-working space because that was just a good way to interact with people and kind of simulate that team environment even if you’re working independently, and I kind of have a joke like with COVID, I was like everybody else is like freaking out ’cause they’ve never spent so much time on their own before, so much time at home, but I was like, “This is my Olympics, like this is what I’ve been training for this whole time, like I’m prepared.”

Mohammed: At the same time, with that preparation or at least being comfortable in being alone or living alone, how has that impacted — you talked about the freelance company, you talked about going to co-working spaces, like even dating, how has it been?

Kyla: Well, dating is just off the table right now. It’s like we’ll try again in 2021. Whatever. Yes. I don’t know, I feel like I definitely have been pretty disconnected from some of those like freelancing friends that I have.

I think like — I don’t know about you or if other people feel this way but when the pandemic happened, it was just like all of a sudden I was like calling my family all the time and reconnecting with old friends and staying in touch with the people that I’m like super close with them and have known for a long time, and then I think maybe some of my more casual or like newer friends, I sort of lost a bit of touch with, not in a bad way but just in a desperate times kind of way.

So, that’s definitely something, I wanna reconnect with those people and it’s hard because when the thing that brought us together was work and now we’re not working together so, I don’t know, maybe we should do a Zoom call or something to get the old — I think everyone is sick of Zoom calls so who am I kidding? Maybe do a picnic or something with some of the girls just to like reconnect ’cause it has been a while. I do miss that, I will say, that sense of community.

Mohammed: And what was it about that community that you enjoyed or felt that or at least part of it that you seem to miss most?

Kyla: It’s just nice to be a part of a group that was really supportive of each other and like — yeah, to feel like you’re, even though you’re working independently, you’re working with other people so it kinda feels like, you know, you’re actually going to an office or part of a community and not totally on your own.

Yeah, and, of course, we’d help each other out with [things] like finding clients or negotiating rates. Just having somebody to bounce ideas off of or collaborate with, like we would collaborate sometimes on projects just — honestly, just to sit next to someone and work on your own thing is just a nice feeling which I miss.

Mohammed: So, now that you have had a chance to work a bit more on your own on freelance work specifically, got a chance to I guess make sense of what’s happening in the world with COVID and getting a bit of a groove and trying to figure out what the new work-life balance perhaps means to you now, so what part of work-life balance do you feel hasn’t worked out or is no longer applicable with this change in how we’re working?

Kyla: Well, this is the thing. It’s like is there work-life balance anymore when your work — you work at home and you live at work, so I heard someone phrase it like that and I thought that was funny and also sad. I do live at work. So, yeah, I think this is something I’m gonna talk to with my therapist. It’s like how can we distinguish the two?

It's really hard to break them up, so I think just like setting — if you have the place to set up like a separate workspace in a different room, do that. I don’t have that luxury. I live in a really small studio apartment, so I’m sitting in my kitchen right now which is actually a change of pace ’cause I usually am in my bed side of the building, bed side of my room.

But, yeah, so I think trying to just like create boundaries for yourself of like, you know, like working set hours and then like not looking at work outside of it, take a walk to maybe symbolize the end of the day or something like that, and I think like having morning routines and morning rituals are really good.

I am the first to admit, I’ve had a really crap morning ritual this entire time and I would say the last 2 weeks, like it only took 4 months, but the last 2 weeks, I’ve gotten into a really good groove again and getting back into my yoga and kind of have this nice little morning making coffee and, I don’t know, just getting into a bit of a groove before I start my workday.

So that’s been good, or even just like going for a walk in the morning to get a coffee instead of making it at home I think has been like a really just a nice way to start the day. Get your body moving a little bit, like see some birds chirping or some fresh air. So, yeah, but I think boundaries are a big part of it.

The other day, I was done with my work, but I was still checking email. Refreshing my email and checking social and just feeling really buzzy. I couldn’t wind down, and I was like, “You know what I’m gonna do, like it’s time to get into like evening mode. I wanna watch a movie.”

Mohammed: I suppose at least from the sound of that is that creating some form a routine now that you are home has — at least, you’ve seen benefits of that for your not just I would say productivity but overall state of mind.

Kyla: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I think routines are really important. Like, even the other day actually, it was probably around like 8:30 and like I was done with my work, but I was still just like checking email, like refreshing my email and like checking social and just feeling like really buzzy, like I couldn’t wind down, and I was like, “You know what I’m gonna do, like it’s time to get into like evening mode. I wanna watch a movie.”

So I just like had a warm shower and like remade my bed and put on pyjamas and like — kinda like just put myself into bedtime mode, I was like, “Okay, now I’m gonna wind down and watch a movie,” and it really helped just to make me feel — like just to shift away. It’s like, “No, we’re done with work, we’re not looking at it anymore.” Yeah, something as simple as that to just sort of shift your mode and forget — yeah, I was like made a little popcorn — 

Mohammed: Popcorn?

Kyla: Yeah. Popcorn is like — this is like a COVID thing too. I never used to make popcorn at home ever, ’cause I don’t have a microwave. Just for no reason, I just never bought one, but, yeah, so I started buying popcorn kernels, making it on the stove, like, a, it’s so cheap, like it’s like $2 for like this huge bag of kernels that lasts you forever, and it’s healthier than like chips or any other like kind of junk food, and it’s just like a really good snack, so there’s a little life hack for you, stove top popcorn —

Mohammed: Those little luxuries.

Kyla: Yeah. Great, easy, cheap snack, like I don’t know why I haven’t been doing that my whole life.

Mohammed: Right. So, I really appreciate all the time, and I was going on a tangent ’cause as you can see, I could probably keep going.

Kyla: Yeah.

Mohammed: But I’d love to know what advice you have for Canadian freelancers as they start to reflect on what work-life balance means for them and, you know, how they can get into a practice of building a work-life balance that works for them?

Kyla: I would definitely just say like you can do it, like — ’cause I think a lot of people just have these confidence issues and that’s probably like more the root of anything else. It’s just, you know, trusting yourself and knowing that you can do it, that’s the number 1 piece of advice that I have is just trust yourself. Don’t give up, like be willing to be vulnerable.

You know, cold pitching is a really vulnerable thing to do and I acknowledge that and that’s like — you know, or asking for help or just putting yourself out there, like I think you have to be really vulnerable to find clients and to promote yourself so be willing to do that, be willing to be open, and be disciplined so — which is a work in progress but anyone can do it. I’m the least disciplined person ever and I’ve somehow managed to make it work, so, for almost 2 years now I’ve managed to make it work.

Mohammed: Right.

Kyla: You can do it.

Mohammed: And where can people find out more about you and your work online?

Kyla: You can find me on Instagram @thekylaclarke or kylaclarke.co.

Mohammed: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for taking this time to chat with me, Kyla. I’ve really appreciated this and enjoyed our conversations and laughs.

Kyla: It was fun.