[LISA LEWIS] The Am I Ok? Podcast is part of the Practice of the Practice network, a network of podcasts seeking to help you market and grow your business and yourself. To hear other podcasts like Faith Fringes, the Holistic Counseling Podcast, and Beta Male Revolution, go to the website, www.practiceofthepractice.com/network. Welcome to the Am I Ok? Podcast, where you will discover that being highly sensitive is something to embrace and it’s actually a gift you bring to the world. We will learn together how to take ownership of your high sensitivity, so you can make positive changes in your life, in the lives of others, and it’s totally okay to feel this way. I’m your host, Lisa Lewis. I’m so glad you’re here for the journey. Welcome to today’s episode of the Am I Ok? Podcast. This is Lisa Lewis, your host. Thank you so much for tuning in. I would like to remind my listeners that I offer a free eight-week email course titled Highly Sensitive People. My email course provides weekly tools that help you feel more whole in a world isn’t exactly made for us and I show you how your sensitivity can be seen as a unique gift and how many others are just like you. To find out more about my email course, please go to my website, amiokpodcast.com. So school is back in session now that September is here and if you are a working mom or a stay-at-home mom, this means more time for yourself to do something creative, to go to the gym, to work out, meet up with friends for coffee, or perhaps just work more hours at your job. Today’s guest is going to talk to us about work-life balance, the endless to-do list, and how to make a next level life for yourself at home. Woo, can’t wait to talk to her. Sasha Morosov is a former executive who holds a Master’s Degree in Social Work and is the founder of Sasha X Home. When Sasha isn’t chasing after her two sons, she now utilizes her clinical skills to coach women who are killing it at work, but feel like they are failing at home to have more time, less clutter and habits for a peaceful life. Sasha believes that working moms are exceptional humans who are skilled, devoted, and unstoppable. Sasha has spent almost 15 years working in the nonprofit field to help individuals and families create better futures. Sasha is an avid minimalist, productivity master and obsessed with organizing and designing people’s lives. Sasha has now developed a four-step method that focuses on self, home, relationships and habits to help moms hit start on the life that they put on pause. Welcome to the show, Sasha. [SASHA MOROSOV] Thanks so much for having me on. Lisa, I’m excited to be here. [LISA] I’m excited to have you on too. Just reading your bio there, it’s like, woo, woo. Wow, this is very powerful and I can’t wait to hear about your program and also how you got where you are today. [SASHA] Absolutely. [LISA] Before we get started on that, I just, I like to ask all my guests if you consider yourself a highly sensitive person or not. [SASHA] I think I consider myself a sensitive person, but through my research of learning more about highly sensitive folks, I consider my son very much in that category while I’m more on the outskirts of it. Reading more and learning more has really enabled me to be able to adjust the way that I parent with him, be able to see what life looks like from his point of view as well. [LISA] Yes, I love that. I love that. I’ve also learned that along the way in my parenting about sensitivity for myself and for my children who are now grown. I just want to just acknowledge you being a social worker and spending 15 years in the nonprofit field. I just want to thank you for committing yourself to that time and how much that is needed. So as a licensed clinical psychotherapist, I just want to acknowledge you for that as a service that you’ve provided to the nonprofit field. [SASHA] Oh my gosh, you’re too kind. I would say I’m one of the fortunate ones that I feel like my adult career life, I’ve really embarked where I’m passionate about. Now that I’ve transitioned, because I love nonprofits, I love nonprofits, but guess what, I was still coming home and I was still looking around and thinking like, okay I have the degree, I have, thank God, a healthy family, all of that, I have a wonderful partner, all of this stuff but at the end of the day, I was still exhausted. At the end of the day, my to-do list is still a mile long. That’s really where it hit me is that even though from the outside, everything is good. Don’t get me wrong, it’s good but I knew deep down that it’s not that, oh, something’s missing. It’s just if I’m not living this fulfilled life with everything that I have at my fingertips, who is? And when I look around and when I ask friends about it, they also were in the same boat. They also were like, well, yes, we have a million birthday parties. I drive my kids to soccer and then I do this and dah, dah, dah. I was just like, wait, we did not work all this way, we did not achieve all of the things we’ve achieved in our careers, in our personal lives to just sit back and let life happen instead of being the one that’s really in control of it. [LISA] So what was the turning point in your life that maybe, I guess made you stop and say, hey, I need to do something different, or this isn’t working? Or was it like a slow transition that does organically transition into where you are today? [SASHA] I would say there’s been two really large factors in this. One I am, and I’m sure many can attest to this, which is Covid, when everything stopped and you come out and you’re like, wait, this is my life and this was my life, where do I want my life, I think a lot of people had those conversations. But aside from that a really big turning point was my son. I spoke about him earlier. I have two boys, but my older one, I think it got to a point of where it was not, I did not have the relationship I wanted to have and I couldn’t figure out why. It was really like every, everything else was good, fine, sure, like kicking butt at work all of this but I was coming home and I was just depleted. He really had taken over the family, hijacked the family in a way with his needs and all of the stuff that we just all weren’t on the same page. Then finally when we saw outside help, that’s when it really dawned on me of that, we can’t just fix everything sometimes ourselves. Even if I have the clinical degree, even all of that, we need outside help. So what is it that I need for myself? That’s when I started to really work with someone and that I saw, wow there’s so much progress that you can make when you have somebody outside of you taking a look because we’re so in it, we’re so in it’s our lives. No matter how educated we are about it and how much we meditated or read books, I think for me it was really powerful to have somebody look at it from the outside and then be able to help me see through the fog, which is what now I love doing for others. [LISA] Wow, that is powerful. Just hearing you tell your story and I get, I hear like a lot of trust, a lot of trust in putting, I’m a licensed professional and I maybe there can be a lot of judgment or like I should know this stuff. I know how to fix it. Also just like giving that away or giving into that and saying, no, like, I need help. I need outside help. I’m going to have someone else help me along the way just like we hold our clients like this. I always look at it as holding like the person’s hand through the whatever they’re going through. You don’t have to go through this alone. I don’t think we’re meant to go through hard things alone. [SASHA] Yes, and one of the things, I usually I work up primarily with more of like a higher achiever woman who career’s a really big part of who she is, which is exactly who I am. A part of my career, I’m not just a mom. I don’t think anybody’s just a mom either. But I work with women that are just like, I’ve worked, I’ve worked, I’ve worked, I’ve been able to figure it out. I’m saying, but you don’t have to hit rock bottom in order to then start working with someone in order to then be like, okay, maybe I should actually reach out. Maybe I do need a little bit of coaching in this area. One of the things I usually say to people is that you don’t wait till you’re like 200 pounds overweight to go to the gym. Why do we go to the gym? We go to the gym to stay healthy and going to the gym, you can get a workout done by yourself, but if you had a personal trainer, you probably get to your goal faster. I think where a lot of us are at in our lives, being mothers, being older, all of this is that we’re at a point in our lives of where we’ve been intaking, intaking, intaking all of this information, trying to make sense of it, but having that personal training or having that coach can really help us get to that goal so much faster. [LISA] Why do so many working moms feel like they are failing at home? [SASHA] Oh, beautiful question. I mean, I can’t generalize, but from what I’ve seen, a lot of it is the pressure we put on ourselves. Honestly, that’s the number one, because when I really get down to it and I work with women and we go through like all the different aspects of their life, there’s nothing that “wrong.” There’s nothing that “they’ve messed up so big.” It’s really about the self-judgment, self-worth at the end of the day and the pressure of the society. I really believe that in society we’re viewed as like we were viewed like 30 years ago that maybe somebody had a part-time job, but primarily they stayed at home, they cooked, they did this 30, 50 years ago, 60 probably years ago now, way, way longer. But versus how things are today, we are educated. Whether you’re working inside or outside the home, you’re doing so much at the same time. Honestly, one of the biggest things I see is the fact that I believe we have way too many choices, too many choices. So it’s like you can literally as simple as like if you want a banana. You go to the store and you buy a banana and you go to someone and say, “Hey, where are the bananas?” They say, “Well, do you want an organic banana? Do you want banana slices? Do you want dried banana? Do you want a banana shake? Do you want this?” There’s just, and everything we have, there’s so many choices, which leads us to then think, okay, am I making the right choice and the doubt? That’s where I come in and clear and talk about, well, what is it that you’re really wanting from your life? Let’s get you grounded because the reason you’re having hard time picking out if you should spend an extra hour doing Johnny’s science project or leave work early to catch the soccer game or any of these is to me, is that where your values and what is it that you are okay with letting go? We don’t take the time to think about this is something like, I’ll tell you me, I’m not going to be the mom that spends like five hours on a science project. That’s just not me. That’s ok. That’s something I can let go of, but that also means when I see somebody with the five-hour science project, because Johnny’s mom did that instead of this, like, why didn’t I do that, I can say, look, that’s great for Johnny’s mom. Maybe that’s her thing. That’s just not my thing and bee able to let go. [LISA] I hear a lot of like self-criticism and judgment, like as moms judging ourselves or feel like you’re being judged or I have to measure up to other people or to other moms or to what that person’s doing, what that family’s doing, and — [SASHA] Yes, and I get it, social media and all of this, there’s so much coming at us. That’s what I mean. There’s just so much coming at us, so many opportunities, so many choices, so many, even trying to plan like a family vacation. There’s so many choices. Even if you’re like, okay, I want to go to Mexico to an all-inclusive, okay, do you know how many all-inclusive places there are in Mexico? So many. Then you get down the research and then it takes like five hours and then you’re like, I need to talk to my partner at all, dah, dah, dah, dah. It just becomes so much more. All of our decisions that I’m seeing when I’m coaching is that these decisions that don’t need to be the so much more just end up because we’re just so used to having so many things in front of us that we’re trying to figure out what’s the “best one.” [LISA] Even as you’re talking about that I can feel my stomach just like churning and spinning going, oh my gosh, like this is not, I don’t feel grounded, or I’m not, I can just feel myself getting caught up in, on all of that that you’re talking about. How do you create habits and routines or systems that work? [SASHA] Oh, what a great question. Yes, I love, I love a good system. I love a good routine because I think it enables us to stay on track. And what I was talking about before with this too many options. When you have a healthy routine, it keeps you on track and it doesn’t let you get distracted. One thing about routines is, I’m not talking about a routine of like 6:00 AM you do this, 7:00 AM you do this, 8:00 AM you do this, 9:00 AM you do this. No, that also, I think, again, it may work for some, but for majority of the clients they need, they need more flexibility in their day. It’s maybe too much to take from somebody that has a semi routine like, okay, I drop the kids off, I start work and then I pick them up and I cook dinner, has like a semi routine. It’s too much, it’s too far, it’s too far down the road of this, like, more of like rigid, like 6, 7, 8, I need to do this. Because that also sets people up for failure, which is one of my biggest things of why I feel habits don’t stick is because we make these grand plans and we aren’t grounded in why it’s important and what our life could look like when it’s achieved. We’re just like, ok, I’m going to lose 10 pounds, I’m going to start going to the gym. That’s not good enough for me. It’s not good enough when I coach either, because I’m here to make sure what is it behind that? Why is it so important for you to be healthy? If it’s so important for you to be healthy because you want to be around for your kids when they’re older, you want to be a good role model for your children, you want to live a healthy lifestyle to be able to do a marathon, all of this stuff, it becomes media. When it becomes media, then we can really create the habit so that way you stick to it. The way that I really talk about sticking to habits, it’s to keep it simple. Keep it as simple as possible. So again, I’m not going to start with three times at the gym, five times at the gym. I’m going to start with is pick out a time, okay, this is like one of my favorite tips, pick out a time during the week. It could be one time a week. If you want to be bold, do two times a week and just pick an hour within that time, within that day. So let’s say it’s like Wednesdays at two. That way you know that every Wednesday at two you’re going to do something healthy during that time. It may be going to the gym, it may be doing a yoga class at home, it may be walking around the block, but whatever it may be, what you know is that during that time, it’s time set aside to be healthy and do something and create, be conscious to be creating more of that healthy lifestyle. So instead of just saying, I’m going to do yoga every single Wednesday at two, that may work for some, but most of the time, one Wednesday it’s great, but the next Wednesday we’re tired. We don’t really want to do yoga. So instead of boxing us, it’s really about how do we create just the groundwork of this is what I want, this is the time I’ve set aside to it, and when that time comes, I’m going to do something that feels good. [LISA] I love that. I’m wondering, especially for working moms and working moms, if they have to work or they have a choice that they want to work and they may, I’m wondering, I’m just thinking about myself if I was working, if I was looking at myself on this, because there’s so many things that I love to do and I want to do and it’s just like, I don’t have enough time in the day to do all those things realistically. So is it more about maybe cutting out some things to do, like do less is better instead of doing more? Or is there a way to find time for all those things? Or like, how do I even let go of something that I’m really passionate about? Or do I have to let it go? Or how do I find a way that I can do that thing that I want to do? [SASHA] Well, I would say if you have something that really, you’re passionate about, really that gets your creative juices going, this is the way I like to ask that question is if you should let go or not let go in, all of that is, number one, what’s your why? Number two, what’s your energy like after? Because if it’s something that you’re feeling just drained after, if it’s not something you’re looking forward to, then how can we change that around a little bit? But if it’s something where after like let’s say you love that yoga class and after you’re like, I feel great for the rest of the day, I just can’t find the time to do yoga and I want to keep doing yoga, then I’ll coach somebody through where can we find the time? Because they feel great after. That’s, isn’t that the living life fulfilled feeling great doing activities that we enjoy doing great? At the same time, I would say, okay, and I love that you feel great with yoga. Let’s think what’s realistic three times, five times, two times, maybe even one time. Because at the end of the day, I also want the people to understand we only, we only have so many hours. So my question to you is that one hour, if you’re feeling great, is that one hour worth more than maybe taking that one hour to just rest and sometimes have quiet, quiet space? For some people they need both and that’s great. Maybe that’s why there’s three days away it’s yoga and two days away it’s quiet time. So there’s this balance but everybody works a little bit differently. For some people it may be, I love the quiet and I love the, I could only get the quiet if I get up earlier in the day. So then it’s great, that’s what works for you and you feel energized and enables you to start your morning peacefully and enables you to really get up and going, how do we incorporate that? But if it’s something that’s draining, if it’s something you’re not looking forward to, even simple things like, I’ll give you an example from my life, I am not someone, I don’t know why, I’m just not someone that enjoys shopping. So back to school clothes shopping or food shopping, all of this, I’m like, oh, I got to go shopping. Once in a while. Like once like a quarter, I’m like, oh, maybe I’ll go shopping. So what do I do instead? We still need food. That’s not something that is going to change. But guess what, I’m thankful that I have a partner and we had a conversation and you know what, he has no problem going food shopping. My mother-in-law loves to buy kids’ stuff. She loves to shop, so she does the back-to-school shopping and I just pay for it. There’s just different ways to think about what is taking up your time, what’s draining you? Is there a way? It’s not just, oh, pay for it and outsource it, but also who do you have in your life that you can share the load with? Like, I love to organize. I would trade somebody to cook me a meal to organize their kitchen or something like that, any day of the week. [LISA] Yes, it is. I love organizing too. It is really relaxing for me. My next question is, can working moms have it all? I’m wondering that word “all,” is that the same, all that we had before the pandemic 10 years ago, 20 years ago? Is that evolving into something else? Can we have it all? [SASHA] One of my favorite things to say is you can have it all. It just will look different than you imagine because when you get down to it, what does all mean to you? When you start with that, there’s so many things that are flying at you and there’s so many things, a lot of times what I see and here is the fact that women talk about, well the last time I got to really relax, I was like in my twenties, it was before kids. I remember Saturdays I would just walk by the lake or whatever. They have this pre-mom version of themselves that they’re constantly trying to get to. That’s where I come in and say, well, who’s the version of yourself you want to get to today? What does it really look like to have it all today for you? Because maybe before it was, I’ll give you an example, like in my twenties, of course I loved to go out. I’d love to go out at night and like all of this. Now if someone’s like, let’s have a 9:00 PM dinner, I’m like, oh my gosh, a 9:00 PM dinner? Come on, people, like 7:00 PM. So it’s just what does all look like for you and what does it look like for you today? Knowing that, okay, if all is, to be A-list star and a perfect singer and a perfect parent and a perfect dah, dah, dah, dah, then no, you’re not going to have it all. But that’s okay too because that’s not what the world needs. The world needs us to be our imperfect self. The world needs us to be able to have it all and feel comfortable in our skin. I would even say that’s having it all when you truly feel at peace with who you are. [LISA] Oh, you just made some really good points about being a highly sensitive person and that is being comfortable in your own skin. As highly sensitive people, a lot of the time don’t feel like they’re in their skin. They feel like they’re very exposed and it’s being comfortable in your own skin, just coming back to one of the key points I heard you say earlier about really starting with getting grounded. [SASHA] Absolutely. Being comfortable in your own skin again, also looks very different for everybody. For somebody, maybe I will feel comfortable when I’m able to speak in front of a crowd. Or for somebody else, it’s just, I’m going to feel comfortable and able to just tell my partner when I don’t like something because that’s a tough conversation. So that is what I would say for people to work on rather than how do I get a manicure? I want to get a massage. Like I was just coaching somebody yesterday, a mom that was like I never have time for myself. I’m doing all of this stuff. She mentioned she was working on like a higher education part right now and I said, well, why isn’t that, why aren’t you looking at that as self-care? That’s something that is really your long-term self-care because you’re getting this higher education so that way, you’re able to open more doors. It’s just about looking at things in a different way. [LISA] Yes, that different lens, shifting the lens of the way you are looking at things. I want to switch gears a little bit here because I know this is something that you do too. That’s part of your program, you work with people. What can you do right now to declutter your home? [SASHA] Oh my gosh, I love a good organization and I heard you say you love it too. So many of us think about it, I feel in the sense that we need to throw, it’s like the Marie Condo method, which again, works great for some, maybe not for all, which is throw everything in the middle and go through it. But for some of us, and even that thought is just too much. So a couple of different things. What I would say is, I’m going to give you two different ideas. First is do a timer and just pick a drawer. Just do a timer for like, again, if it’s a small drawer, do a timer for like five minutes, 10 minutes and just see what needs to go, what needs to stay. That way it’s time limited and you have to make the decision right away and start with something easy. Start with a kitchen drawer, start with something. Because one of the things is like, okay, we’re going to tackle our closet, but if you are somebody that’s really attached to clothing, tackling your closet as the first thing might be, again, too high of a bar. So starting simple, doing timers because it makes you make those decisions, I think has been really, really helpful. Guess what, you can do it, like, okay, I’m going to do one, I have 20 minutes, I’m going to do one drawer right now. It doesn’t take a lot of prep, it doesn’t take a lot of time. So that’s one method. The second one is, one of my favorites, is basically put yourself in a 30-day challenge. The 30-day challenge is to get rid of one thing a day. Again, it could be anything you want. It could be like the broken stapler, it can be the socks that have a hole in it. It could be a kid’s toy that they, it’s still lying around, they haven’t played with it, all of that good stuff, one thing a day. Because even that will slowly get you in the habit. You start slowly seeing things in a different way of, do I need it? Do I not? At the end of the day, it doesn’t feel that heavy because that’s what I’m about is how do we not feel that life is so heavy? How do we not feel that these things that we want to get done are like these big things that we need to cut, like do a whole day around it and things like that? [LISA] So what I’m hearing, and I was going to ask you this question as you’re actually just saying it is what effect that you will receive after decluttering your home is not heaviness, is more lightness. Would you say that’s what you’ll receive or is there something else there? [SASHA] Yes. Again, for me, I would say like my word I always go back to is just a peace and serenity and isn’t that something we all want? Studies have found that having a clear space, having less clutter really leads your mind to be in a better place. So you’ll be able to walk in the door and feel light. You’ll be able to walk into the door and be able to scan the room. You’ll be able to walk in the door and know where things are. It alleviates stress, it lowers your blood pressure, it allows you to save time as well because how much time do we take to figure out where something is or where another part is and things like that? Oh, the batteries are broken, this toy, we need new batteries, we need to go over there and all of that stuff. But when we just simplify our life, we have less decisions we have to make, less stuff and more joy. [LISA] Oh, that’s such a beautiful message, Sasha. That leads me to my next question. What would you like listeners to take away from our conversation today? [SASHA] I would love listeners, especially highly sensitive listeners to number one, know that you’re good enough as you are, just like I talked about in the beginning, that we just put so much pressure on ourselves that you are worth it. You’re good enough, you’re kicking work, are you kicking work, kicking butt? Like you’re doing it? Give yourself the extra like pat on the back today for me. Be like, “Sasha told me I need to pat myself on the back because again, if I can make somebody smile and know that they are on the right track, that to me already is what I want to be doing. [LISA] Thank you for that. Have a big smile on my face. Do you have a free gift that you would like to share with my audience? [SASHA] Absolutely. If you are working mom, head on over to sashaxhome.com and you can download the five steps to Coming Home Happy after work today so that way you already are able to walk into that door as we talked about feeling a little bit lighter and a little bit brighter because you’ll be in the right mindset. [LISA] Oh, thank you for offering that. That’s a wonderful gift. Wow, very, very handy and useful. [SASHA] Yes, because I feel like by the time we come home we’re still like, we still have the thoughts about work or we still have, oh, I now we need to do this, dah, dah, dah. But again, download it. I’ll walk you through the few steps so that way when you’re walking in, you are ready for the evening and you don’t feel as heavy. You don’t feel as heavy. [LISA] Yay. Where can listeners get in touch with you? [SASHA] Absolutely. I would love for you to join my community. I have a Facebook group where I do lives. I chat with women all the time and the Facebook group is called Mom’s Taking Their Lives to the Next Level at Home. You’re always welcome to message me. I’m on LinkedIn as well and I’d love to stay connected. [LISA] Ah, thank you. I just hear you’re so personable and I can just hear that you’ve probably, you hold a beautiful space for others and just allowing others, especially moms working moms to share what’s been going on for them and what they’re going through. [SASHA] Oh, I so appreciate that. And Lisa, what I’m hearing from you is really this calmness, and I’m sure you bring a lot of that to your clients as well, just the sense of calm and slow down. Like I’m much more like, let’s go, let’s do this. I can tell you’re a good balance to me of that. You are very much like, I can see your work in the calm, slow down, let’s talk about this and be able to problem solve together. [LISA] Thank you. Thank you for coming on the show today, Sasha, it’s been wonderful to have you here. [SASHA] Absolutely. It’s been a pleasure. Thank you so much for having me. [LISA] Thanks for listening today. Please let me know what you thought of the episode. Send me an email to lisa@amiokpodcast.com. Remember to subscribe, rate and review wherever you get your podcast. To find out more about Highly Sensitive Persons, please visit my website at amiokpodcast.com and subscribe to my free eight-week email course to help you navigate your own sensitivities and to show you that it’s okay not to take on everyone else’s problems. This is Lisa Lewis reminding each and every one of you that you are okay. Until next time, be well. Thank you for listening today at Am I Ok? Podcast. If you are loving the show, please rate, review and subscribe to it on your favorite podcast platform. Also, if you’d like to learn how to manage situations as a highly sensitive person, discover your unique gift as a highly sensitive person, and learn how to be comfortable in your own skin, I offer a free eight-week email course called Highly Sensitive People. Just go to amiokpodcast.com to sign up. In addition, I love hearing from my listeners, drop me an email to let me know what is on your mind. You can reach me at lisa@amiokpodcast.com. This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regards to the subject matter covered. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the publisher, or the guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical, or any other professional information. If you want to professional, you should find one.