Observations and Inferences

Last night, I found myself scrolling through Pretty Decent's Instagram feed. If there had been a microphone in my head at the time, I'm certain it would've picked up the rumblings of...

...well, to be frank, a hater.

"This looks like shit," I thought bitingly to myself.

Naturally, I then went and looked for all of the Instagram accounts in my industry who were clearly doing a much better job than me at branding. Their perfectly kerned text and color-coordinated feeds sneered at me from the other side of my phone.

I felt my body tense. I'm sure if I had done a scan at that moment, I would've noticed clenched shoulders, a tightened chest. One thing I know for certain: It didn't feel good.

Luckily, I caught myself before I archived my entire feed and decided to quit social media and give up on all of my hopes and dreams. As I decided to be intentional about my reaction, a single thought popped into my head:

"No, it's not as good as it could be. But it's good enough for now — and tha...

Guess what I did last Monday?

Absolutely nothing.

OK, that’s a lie. I woke up at 7 a.m. and was out the door with a grocery list by 8 a.m. I took my sweet ass time in Whole Foods, inspecting bags of clementines like the feds. Once I got home, I diiiid send a few emails and answer a calendar invite. But I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I had nothing to do.

Winter is a slow season for many of us, especially people with small businesses like mine that primarily work with other solo entrepreneurs. Winter is a hibernation season, a time where, as the brilliant Kate Northrup put it at this year’s Business By Design Live, “the Earth dedicates an entire season to rest.”

Maybe you’re like me at the moment, in-between big clients and restructuring the way you do business. Maybe you own or operate a brick-and-mortar location and know the chillier weather keeps customers bundled up at home. Maybe you work in an office or agency and are feeling the end-of-Q4 blues.

Or maybe you’re bug-ey...