March 4, 2025 • 32 mins
In this candid episode, Ben and Carl tackle the unique time management challenges faced by music professionals - especially ones with ADHD and kids. They explore why many popular productivity techniques fall flat in the real world of constant interruptions, creative flow states, and the unpredictable chaos of family life.
Discover:
LA Wildfire Relief:
Musicares - https://donor.musicares.org/page/lafirerelief
WAMTN - https://give.wearemovingtheneedle.org/campaign/654724/donate
Learn more about StudioLand - https://www.welcometostudioland.com/a/2147995182/bmyFf8p5
Download our free guide: "The Future-Proof Mixing Engineer: 8 Essential Skills for 2024 and Beyond" - https://mpe-ebook.benwallick.com/future-proof-mixing
Connect with us:
Secret Sonics - https://www.instagram.com/secretsonics
Ben - https://www.instagram.com/benwallickmusic/
Carl - https://www.instagram.com/carlbahner/
Learn more:
https://www.benwallick.com/
https://www.carlbahner.com/
This episode with edited by Gavi Kutliroff - https://www.instagram.com/pleasant_peasant_music/
Discover:
- Why the "two-minute rule" can backfire, turning into hours of small tasks while important work gets neglected
- How the Pomodoro technique can actually destroy creative flow states for mixing engineers and producers
- The unexpected way having children might be the most effective "time management technique" for creative professionals
- Why separating your studio from your home can create healthier work-life boundaries
- Practical strategies for balancing deep creative work with the inevitable interruptions of real life
LA Wildfire Relief:
Musicares - https://donor.musicares.org/page/lafirerelief
WAMTN - https://give.wearemovingtheneedle.org/campaign/654724/donate
Learn more about StudioLand - https://www.welcometostudioland.com/a/2147995182/bmyFf8p5
Download our free guide: "The Future-Proof Mixing Engineer: 8 Essential Skills for 2024 and Beyond" - https://mpe-ebook.benwallick.com/future-proof-mixing
Connect with us:
Secret Sonics - https://www.instagram.com/secretsonics
Ben - https://www.instagram.com/benwallickmusic/
Carl - https://www.instagram.com/carlbahner/
Learn more:
https://www.benwallick.com/
https://www.carlbahner.com/
This episode with edited by Gavi Kutliroff - https://www.instagram.com/pleasant_peasant_music/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
My therapist would be very disappointed if I refer to
my children as a time management technique.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
But well, they're filling the other part of that time.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Hi, I'm Ben and I'm Carl, and you're listening to
Secret Sonics, honest conversations chock full of tactical advice to help.
Speaker 5 (00:20):
Me build your dream career in music and audio.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Whether it's skill development, mixing mindsets, personal branding, or work
life balance. We talk about ways to help set yourself
up for success in the ever changing music industry.
Speaker 5 (00:32):
Let's get started.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Hi, Ben, Hi Carl. I'm tired, and you called me
out on it.
Speaker 5 (00:41):
I just like, yeah, I saw your face and I knew,
I knew.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
So, my youngest daughter has an ear infection, so she
was up not slipping well the past couple of nights,
and then this morning she woke up super early. I
didn't get to bed till really because I was up
late cleaning up after the kids. It was a longing
for a rough couple of days. But that's why I'm
gonna go right into this episode.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
And I'm gonna say, that's why you're gonna go right
into a power nap Power.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
If only Ben, Yeah, Okay, so listeners, if you're listening,
I'm just gonna take a nap for about twenty minutes.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
So just sit here and you know, think about what
you've done.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
It'll all get shopped right, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
And we're back. I'm fully refreshed. Look at this. I'm
really great now.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
That just I just used up all of my energy reserves.
So I told Ben that I was going to surprise
him with this because this is actually you know, we
were talking this morning about some ideas for episodes, and
we both had ideas that were not this idea. And
I'm just like, I don't care, I'm sleepy. I'm gonna
(01:43):
call an audible and throw it out at you. So
what I want to talk about is as engineers, as
people in the music industry, in business, we are told
constantly all of these different time management techniques and all
of these frameworks and things that you can do right.
But if you're like Ben and I and you have children,
(02:07):
or maybe you have ADHD or or your you know,
other forms of neurospiciness, there are a lot of time
management techniques that just don't actually fucking work, or they
work for some people some of the time. And they
just seem to not work for us. So, rather than
doing an episode about time management techniques that work for
(02:31):
studio pros, I want to talk about the time management
techniques that Ben and I have tried that just do
not work for us. I was going to say, like
an anti time management technique episode.
Speaker 5 (02:45):
Wait, so we're saying the ones that do work for us,
not the ones that.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Don't know the ones that don't.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Like what are things that just like been told a
million times to try and then we tried it. But
like with the constant tornado of curveballs that children throw
at us, you know, these the techniques work well in
a vacuum, but maybe don't work in reality for a
lot of people.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
I think it'll be a good way for.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
People that maybe also feel like they have a lot
of difficulty with time management and maybe they have tried
some of these different techniques and it hasn't worked for them,
And I want to make them feel seen and hurt
and not feel like they're a failure, you know, because
it wasn't working for them, or that they're like some
things just work really, really really well in a perfectly
controlled environment, and in the real world, perfectly controlled environments
(03:31):
don't exist.
Speaker 4 (03:32):
Right, I don't know if I have stuff that i've
i can specifically maybe you should start, because I still
need to like let this percolate a little bit. But yeah,
I feel like if in a perfect world, I could
like get myself out of bed at a certain time
every day do this, like get it all together. But
every day is different. Every day shit goes out the window.
(03:54):
Like I'm here with my studio mate here and he
also has kids and he also is like every other
day it's like something goes out the window, and you know,
like we're just like always juggling random stuff. I mean,
I don't know if this is like a first thing,
but like you just kind of have to be a
little bit more like deadlines have to have a little
bit of ease to them. You can't always or you
have to be like give yourself even extra padding because
(04:17):
if you say I'm gonna get this by Tuesday, like
you can try, but it might not happen because some
shit might have gone out the window, in which case
you need till Wednesday, and then you just have to
like Usually like artists, clients are very you know, receptive
to like saying I'm so sorry. I like things as
long as you communicate that you haven't forgotten about them,
there's you know, they're usually okay with it, like an
extra day or whatever. But you have to give yourself
(04:38):
grace and not like drive yourself into the ground for deadlines.
You have to kind of figure out a way to
give yourself grace on those. I don't know if I
could say better than that, but you can't be too
much of a dickhead to yourself in terms of that stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
I think with you know, kind of going off of that,
I would say that the whole concept of under promise
and over deliver I think also could apply to yourself
in a way, you know what I mean, Like, don't promise,
you don't convince yourself and lie to yourself that you're
gonna definitely have this thing done by Tuesday when you
don't actually never can have it done by tuesday. So
(05:09):
it's not just a matter of underpromising and over delivering
to the clients, but also to your own sense of
the reality of your situation. Right, So, let me start
by giving an example of like a specific thing that
I've found works for me in certain situations but usually not,
and what I've done to try to adapt it to
(05:31):
make it work. Okay, so this is less about having kids,
and this is more about just like the ADHD right,
and just being kind of all over the place, being
a solopreneur running a business, all the things we're doing
on top of life stuff. The technique, I've heard it
called it a couple of different things, but there's essentially
the most common one is called the two minute rule.
(05:54):
And the whole idea is, you know, if there's something
that needs to get done and it's going to take
less than two minutes to do it, just do it
and get it over with, right rather than putting it off.
Like if it's something like my bowl from lunch is
still sitting on the on the counter and it's not
in the sink, like, they'll take way less than two
minutes to do, so I should just do it and
(06:15):
get it over with right now. Why does that not
work in practice for me?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
Anyway?
Speaker 1 (06:22):
What I've found is when I'm in the mood to
go for this like two minute rule thing, the good
thing is I get that little dopamine hit when I
do something like that. When it's clean off the kitchen table,
throw the socks, I've found under the couch, cushion, whatever
wherever kids put things, taking those putting them in the laundry.
(06:42):
Like that's a little dope mean hit. I feel like, oh,
I'm being productive. That's great, I'm gonna do this. The
problem that I've found for myself with ADHD is that
I like that little dopamine hit feels great, and I
start doing a bunch of them. And I start doing
a bunch of them, and the next thing you know,
I spent two hours doing little two minute things and
(07:07):
completely disregarding the actual big thing that I should have
been doing in the first place, right, or even worse,
I'm setting off to do something specific and then I
see a little two minute thing, I just do that,
and I by the time that I'm done doing a
little series of two minute things, I completely forget what
I was doing in there.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Yeah, oh my god.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
That happens to me and also happens to my wife
all the time we're cleaning up, like we just can't
we just start this wed that it's like what was
I trying to do to begin with?
Speaker 5 (07:33):
Like it's just you totally lose track of it.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
Yeah, there's phenomenal scene from Malcolm in the Middle. I
feel like some people that listening might know this this clip.
Do you know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
Ben?
Speaker 5 (07:42):
I remember when it was on the air when I
was a kid, but not so.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
There's a scene where Brian Cranston's character like the dad.
I think it's how I think it's like a start
set with like a light bulb that isn't working, so
we go to like get a new light bulb. But
as he's going to look for the new light bulb,
he notices like a screw needs to be tightened or something,
and then he goes to look for the screwdriver. When
he goes look for the screw driver, he's pulling up
open the drawer and the drawer squeaks, and then when
(08:07):
he hears a sqeaky drawer, he has to go get his
can of WT forty. Then when he goes, he realizes
it's out, so then he goes and gets his keys
to go in the car, starts up the car, the
cars making a weird noise and he's like Then the
next scene like he's a mechanic.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
The wife comes in and it's like, hey, aren't you
going to change the light? And he like rolls out
from under the like under the engine of the car,
and he's like, what do you think I'm doing?
Speaker 3 (08:31):
You know?
Speaker 1 (08:31):
And I feel like that scene is so beautifully written
first off, but also like that's how I feel. And
then I get I get frustrated with myself, and I
get distracted by all the things, and like, the unfortunate
thing of the two minute rule, in my experience, is
that if it's left unchecked, it can expand to a
gazillion different things, or even if it is just one thing,
(08:53):
And if you have a hard time remembering what you're
supposed to be doing and you're having a hard time
staying on task, that it's a very easy quick way
to distract you and pull you out of what you're
actually supposed to be doing well, also giving you that
little dupamine hit and kind of making everything not productive
and not great. So it's to me that was a
good example of a time management technique that unless I say, okay,
(09:18):
I'm going to set a thirty minute timer and then
until that alarm goes off, the only thing I have
to do right now is is a bunch of two
minute things, and then I can just go to town
and then when the alarm goes off, then it's like, Okay,
when that goes off, then I have to go back
upstairs and I have to prep the mix session for
a song or whatever it is, or send a respond
to this particular email. Then great, But unless I set
(09:41):
those guardrails, it can go haywire.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I totally resonate with that. It's also
like a great way to like these two minute things
all you think it's like it'll save you down the line,
but also at the same time, it can totally be
a great procrastinator for doing the actual thing you need
to do.
Speaker 5 (09:56):
Yeah. I definitely like.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Have periods of the day where I'll just go through
a bunch of little things, but it's it's very hard
to keep track of like when the end of that
time should be, because you just like get into a
sink of like.
Speaker 5 (10:06):
Okay, now I'm doing this and I'm doing this. No,
I have like a lot of like little little tasks
that I end up having to do, and then I
try to do them all together, but then it keeps going.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
I think it's important. I guess the counterbalance to that
is to set aside a time of your day where
you're actually making sure you're doing the focus, the most
important work that you do. You could time it off
as like, you know, you know, from nine to twelve,
I'm doing only mixing, or like I'm going to edit
these vocals from you know, nine to eleven, because otherwise
the song isn't going to get done.
Speaker 5 (10:34):
You have to like say at the beginning of the day.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
It doesn't have to be at the beginning of the day,
but you have to come up with a time period
where this is absolutely dedicated holy time for the most
important work that you do. That's the counterbalance. There are
other parts of the day where like there's more wigle
room to do these kind of like small things, take
phone calls, whatever.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
So then what happens when kids come a knock in.
Speaker 5 (10:59):
And into up that special time?
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Yeah a special time, aime, special time. Yeah, not interrupting
that special times.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
They interrupt all the special times, but yeah, the special time.
We don't talk bad enough.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Be not this kind of podcast.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
What now come on.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Everybody listening is either thinking of themselves, I don't know
what they're talking about, or they're like, yeah, I know
what they mean.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Yeah, yeah, definitely two distinct camps of listeners. So, yeah,
what happens when that special time gets interrupted? Then you
have to adjust and that can be very difficult for me.
It's very difficult. I like, if I have a plan
and things are going according to the plan, I do
very well. And then if things go off sometimes it's
(11:42):
very hard for me to adjust. Like I have friends that, like,
you know, life just throws them a wrench. Then they
do that, they pivot, it's all good, Like they can
have a good day and they have no idea where
the day's gonna end, but they'll be cool. If my
day does not go how I've planned it. I'm stressed
because I have so much anxiety of like, oh I
didn't do this, I didn't accomplish what I was supposed
accomplish today. And part of that that's just being from
New York. But also part of that.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
I don't I don't think that's an exclusively New York
thing though, yeah, that's not what you're saying under that,
but I think like.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
It's, yeah, there's like a New York hustle productivity mindset
that I feel like is very dominant where I come from.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
I mean, obviously, I think you know, if you've been
on social media in the past couple of years at all.
I feel like that kind of grew out, you know,
grew outside of the geographical region of New York and
just became kind of like the norm for how we're
kind of taught to run a business, to be.
Speaker 5 (12:35):
Entrepreneurs, the hustle culture.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Which is I think why so many time management techniques
were developed, because the goal is to get as much
stuff as you can done but as possible, and you
have to do all these things, then well, of course
you have to manage it.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
It's an animal eating its own tail, yeah or something.
So so what do you do? What does Carl do
when his day gets rocked?
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Curl up in a ball and cry?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
No, Honestly, like I'm I'm still I still struggle with
that all the time, and I hate it, Like I
am embarrassed about it, but like I'm not gonna not
say it because I want to make sure that if
anybody else feels that way, that they're not gonna I
wanted to feel like.
Speaker 4 (13:15):
There's nothing to be embarrassed about carbon. Yeah, you're just
a human being.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Yeah, And just like I get I get distracted like
the rest of the night, like it's it's so hard,
and I think this is true for most people, Like
it's doing what we do, it's really hard to turn off.
And like the whole idea of like work life balance
is like so so important, but.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
So fucking difficult.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Like it's because like when something goes great, it's easy
to switch off, but like if there are things where
it's not just keeping work stuff out of like lifetime,
it's trying to keep life out of work time. And
that's what we can't really control, especially when you have kids,
Like you can't, right, you know, like I mean, I'm
sure some people could, but like I can't, Like I don't.
(13:58):
I can't like emotionally like not have you know, if
my daughter is upset and wants to talk to me,
like I'm not gonna say, nope, come back at twelve. Yeah,
you know, Like so it works both ways, and it
it gets harder and harder with kids and with age,
I guess too, Like it's harder to you know, make
it as rigidly black and white as YouTube would like
(14:21):
us to think it can be.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
Yeah, I think I think there was a time when
I was really trying to separate the work on the
life a lot and I'm I don't know if I
could say I've fully embraced it, but I've embraced it
much more that the lines are blurred and things are messy.
It is the way it is. I have noticed since
I've moved the studio out of the house. It's only
been like a month and a half, but I do
find it easier for me to be like present with
(14:43):
my kids at night in the afternoon because like close
up shop and then I go home and then it's like,
oh cool. It's weird because like when the studio was
in my house, I was like, oh, I could do
this tonight really quickly. I just jump into the studio
and be done with it. And now even though okay,
now I have like a laptop and I can I
could do some stuff at home, but like I don't
really want to do it on my laptop. I want
to do it my desktop in the studio all the
(15:03):
way for tomorrow. Like it's easier for me to say, like,
I'll just do it tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
It's okay.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
Like I've like accepted that something else can happen tomorrow,
it doesn't have to happen today. And a lot of
that is just since I moved the studio now, which
is I'm really enjoying. I'm not enjoying everything about moving
the studio out of the house, but that's the thing
that I am enjoying the most so far, other than
the physical space, which is nicer and bigger than my
old space.
Speaker 5 (15:22):
But it is interesting.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Like if I have like a very productive day at work,
it's much easier for me to just check out of Okay,
I did my day's work and now I can be home.
It's easy to be like, okay, check we did that.
But if you have a day where things got like
sort of rocked and you didn't get everything you wanted
to do done, or you just didn't feel like you
have like maybe it's the ADHD thing like that, maybe
I'm discovering I might have when you just get like
(15:43):
thrown off a lot, and even if you did everything
you had to do, but your brain was never settled,
like you never like felt like settled like oh okay,
I did this or that in you're frazzled. Then it
also it'll like seep into my life at home. Also
when I get home, I won't be at ease like,
oh I did everything I had to do. You know
that's a very frustrating feeling. I don't know how to
how to do that either, but separating in the studio
(16:04):
from the house has helped a little bit.
Speaker 3 (16:06):
No, that's awesome. That's awesome. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
I feel like my view on work life balance like
you have to accept that it's going to be bessy.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
What do you have kids?
Speaker 1 (16:14):
I think the healthiest thing that we can really do
is to try to be conscious of it and be
aware of it. Like if we catch ourselves think it
too much about work, what we should be just like
enjoying a movie with the kids, you know, or whatever.
It is, like being conscious of it, being able to like, okay, this,
this can wait.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
I can push us back. I think the.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Idea of just like okay, well it's now six pm,
I'm going to go ooop and my brain is going
to magically switch over like that just doesn't doesn't happen.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
Yeah, it's I haven't seen it, but apparently there's an
amazing show called Severance, which is about that with Adam
Scott of Scott.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Yeah, I saw like, like I hear people talking about it,
but I haven't seen it.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
I think it's directed by Ben Stiller. Apparently that's like
the premise of the show. It's like, you check out
of work, you have no idea what happens at work
when you're home. You've no idea what happens at home
when you're at work. And like, interestingly, his Parks and
Rec character Ben Wyatt kind of came up with the
idea of the show in Parks and Rec like eleven
years earlier or something. I love Parks and Rec best show,
(17:17):
but it's not possible, And like I dig that, like
the mindfulness approach to it of like it's like the
same thing if, like you're mindful when you're parenting, you're
even if you're not a perfect parent, you could slowly
build habits that will get better over time. You know,
if you're mindful of the things you're doing, mindfulness will
slowly improve these things. It's not a perfect fix, but
it's like a it's a journey towards better.
Speaker 5 (17:38):
You know.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
One of the things I've noticed over the past twenty
years being in the industry is that audio school usually
leaves most graduates completely unprepared for answering the industry. I mean, sure,
you learn how to rewire a patch bay or sleep,
but they probably won't teach you how to stand out
and attract the kinds of artists that fuel your passion
for recording. I appreciate what you bring to the table,
let alone pay their rates you want to get and
(18:00):
YouTube university is full of people telling you that their
way is the right way, and it doesn't help you
apply things to your unique struggles, personality and ideal clients.
So I've been building studio land to fill those gaps.
We use structured learning paths. We leave live classes in
a private community of other pros to help you discover
how to turn your technical expertise into a thriving business
that attracts the right clients at the right rates.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Try it out for free the links in the show notes.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
So I wanted to talk about the Pomodoro method, which
is kind of like you set aside a certain amount
of time to do something and then you have a break.
You set timers basically on your device. I don't remember
if it's like fifteen minutes. I think there's different ways you.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Could do it. Twenty five is the one that I
hear more often.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
Yeah, I'm not sure what it is, but I do
feel like it's like a great idea in concept, and
maybe it's a great idea for the two minute rule
kind of tasks, Yeah, where you can kind of like, OK,
I'm gonna do this for twenty five minutes and then
i'll i'll, i'll check out because like the next thing
on my to do list is anyways just two minutes,
so it'll it'll wait. But for mixing engine years, for
music producers, it's just not a good method at all
(19:03):
because it literally takes you out of a flow state.
Because once you get into the flow state, that's where
you want to be. Now, it's hard to tell how
long it's gonna take someone to get into a flow state,
and everybody's different, but for me, it might take fifteen
twenty minutes for me to get into a flow state
and then I'm there for like an hour or two.
And then don't don't distract me. My phone's on silent man,
(19:23):
I don't look at my phone when I'm mixing. Don't
give me an alarm after like twenty I was like,
if you get an alarm like twenty five minutes into
your mixing session and you just got into the flow
state ten minutes ago, you totally lost your game. So
this is just not like a it's not an applicable
method for us, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Yeah, I think maybe it can work with like admin tasks.
I think it was a Walt Disney that said it
takes like thirty seven magical moments to come back from
one tragic moment. I feel like it takes thirty seven
great things inspiring things in a mix to get into
the flow state, and it takes one distraction to pull
(20:02):
you out. But obviously it's probably an exact thirty seven
to one ratio or the point that it takes you
so much longer to get into the flow state that
it doesn't take you out of it, Like it's so
easy to get knocked out of it. Yeah, Like I've
tried the Pomaduo technique on mixing before, just to kind
of see, like, Okay, I'm going to try to get
just like the drums and the bass to feel really
(20:22):
good together in these twenty five minutes. Let's just see
what it does. And like I found for myself, I
do work really well under pressure, which is probably why
I also procrastinate. But that's a whole other conversation. So
I do find like sometimes like that it does actually
really work. But I've found it's more like, rather than
doing twenty five minutes, fifty minutes, twenty minutes, whatever it is,
(20:43):
and then taking a break, it's like, Okay, if I
set myself a timer and like I have to get
this thing done in that amount of time, I'm probably
gonna get it done in that amount of time. And
then instead of it being like okay, well now it's
going to be put out of the flow state entirely
and take a break, it's like, okay, well maybe when
that time it goes off that I'm gonna just switch
and apply that flow state to the guitars and synse whatever.
(21:06):
Like I'm not going I'm not pulling much up out
of it. I'm just like cool. That is my little
signal to just redirect my focus onto another creative aspect
of the production or the mix. And for me, weirdly enough,
that seems to work pretty well when I need to
do it, and I'm usually only doing that when it's
like super tight deadlines so I don't go down rabbit holes.
(21:26):
But yeah, the actual doing the Pomodoro technique the quote
unquote like correct way, it completely destroys.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
It for me.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
I feel like we're like working towards a solution of
time based things are good for things outside of flow state,
and maybe like we could set guardrails for ourselves when
we're not doing our most important work that you know,
that's that special time holy work, when we're in our
deep mix. Like maybe it is good to set guardrails
so we don't get lost in those two minute things
or the admin work. I find I get lost in
(22:00):
admir work and then all of a sudden, like why
am I still looking at a screen?
Speaker 5 (22:02):
My eyes hurt? You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (22:03):
Like, do you do anything to like get yourself off
of the screen, like to give your eyes a break?
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Maybe just having ADHD and being distractable. I just like
I'm like, oh, I'm hungry, I need some water, or
the dogs whining, or I hear Rowan talking in the
next Roe moment, Ago play with her for a minute.
So I feel like life pulls me away from the screen,
just like a good thing. I want to talk about
one more thing with the Palmadora technique that I did
find that works kind of well for me. And this
(22:29):
is actually kind of going back to I think it
was two episodes ago when we talked about how do
we know when.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
A song's finished.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
I've found it's really helpful for me if I do
set a timer or if I have like a really
strict time limit of like, Okay, I'm giving myself thirty
minutes to make any last minute changes before I send
this to the client. Then it's like I found for
myself working under the gun, like that, I make a
lot of really good decisions, can make a lot of
quick I trust my gut in those moments because I
have to, and my gut's.
Speaker 3 (22:59):
Pretty good, you know. So I do that.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I trust it, and it forces me to only focus
on the big things because I've spent plenty of time
going down little nerdy rabbit holes, so like I know
they generally lead nowhere. So like I in those moments,
I think I have enough experience in crunch time to know, Okay,
this is important, this is not I'm gonna just do
(23:23):
the important thing too much. I get as many important
things done as quickly as possible, And I found like
that forces me to listen from a different perspective than
if I had all the time in the world, if
I had four hours to do the same amount of
work and I just go down and I'm like, ah,
do I need that one tambourine hit there?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Do I not? I don't know.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
You don't need to deliberate that shit.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah, I can just be like nope, I'm just gonna listen.
Speaker 5 (23:47):
It's a good no, not necessary mute.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
So in those cases like that actually does help a lot,
like setting a timer and forcing myself to be under
the gun for that. I was just thinking about that
and wanted to mention.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
That, Yeah, that's really interesting. I think I need to
start doing more time based things. Not like in the
beginning of a mix when you're getting in the flow
zone and you're like really setting up what the actual
like mix is going to be like, but for like
just other things in life, I feel like I should
be setting myself more timers because I do get lost
in whatever I do. So I think it's important too.
For flow state stuff, you want to get lost because
otherwise you're never going to get there. But for not
(24:20):
flow state stuff, you want to like have those guardrails
to kind of keep you in check, especially when you
know there's so much on my to do list every
single day, Like could be good if I had a
bit more vigilance.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Something that I just was thinking about too, is that
I've gotten so much more efficient with mixing since having kids.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
I feel like, before we had.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Our oldest daughter, who's going to be turning nine soon,
I would spend so much time on a song because
I had nothing but time, you know, I could do that,
especially for we had our oldest daughter. My wife was
working as a nurse, like like doing I think she
was doing like three nights a week, but from seven
(25:04):
pm to seven thirty am, And at the time, I
was primarily just either gigging at night or like teaching
lessons after school, so my work day didn't start till
three thirty pm, and I tried. I usually tried to
stay up until she got home, so like I would
be up until five, six, seven o'clock in the morning
(25:25):
because I just wanted to be able to be as
on her schedule as I could, and I had no
reason to be up. I mean, I could go to
bed at seven and get a solid seven seven and
a half hours of sleep before I have to like
get up and start getting ready to teach, which is
wo weird and very different from now, very different from
this morning.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
When the baby woke me up at five am.
Speaker 5 (25:46):
But can you imagine at that time, that's always like
a lifetime ago.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
It feels so it feels like a different person. It
feels like a book I read once. But I found
that like once we had our ownest daughter, and just
like the realities of those curveballs that kids throw at
you all the time, it made me get faster and
faster because I had less time, and not just because
I had less time total to work on things, but
(26:10):
also because I had no idea when the next melt
done was going to happen. I had no idea when
the next you know, when the next curveball was coming.
So it was just like I got to get as
much done as I can, as quickly as I can
before the inevitable interruption distraction that happens. And I found
(26:30):
that I got faster and faster and faster with it.
And then once we had our second kid, or actually
really was like once we were getting ready to have
our second kid, and when my wife was pregnant and
she wasn't able to do as much around the house,
wasn't able to really help as much with our other daughter.
The necessity of that I had to get even faster
and even more efficient, and then by the time that
(26:51):
we had our second kid, like I get most mixed
ones out the door in like an hour and a
half maybe two hours, you know, so fast, and hopefully
it's only going to get faster, you know, or at least,
like we're confident. Yeah, but it's just because like I
don't have any choice other than to make quick, instinctive
(27:13):
decisions because.
Speaker 5 (27:13):
The time get it done.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
And I think faster mixes are better mixes honestly, because
you're going with your gut and you're not overthinking these things,
and you just like you go with your gut. Like
at the end of the day, we're looking for like
a bodily response, like we want to be like grooven
shaking our butt or you know, head bobbing or whatever,
and like you get there with your gut much more
than you get there with your brain.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
In a weird way, I would say that the time
management technique that actually helps my career the most is
having children.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
It's amazing, which is a very weird.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
I don't know if if I would classify that as
a time management technique. I feel like my wife would
be very my therapist would be very disappointed if I
refer to my children as a time management technique.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
But well, they're filling the other part of that time. Yeah,
they're also like go make money techniques, like yeah, get
your shit together, bro, Yeah, yeah, kind of technique.
Speaker 5 (28:04):
I will say.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
Also, just to add to that, like the pandemic was
also a big thing in terms of like expediting things
for me also because like months on end we had
we weren't leaving. I don't remember how long it was exactly,
but there was a lot of time where at that
point we only had one kid, but he was home
and like when he would nap, it's like, oh, this
is my chance to actually get some work done, you know,
and once he woke up, it was over. It was
(28:25):
like those are crazy time crunches.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Yeah, and it's like a ticking time bomb.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
But you don't know how long the fuse is because
like some days, I feel like there are some days
when you know you're lucky if they napped for forty minutes,
and then the other days it's like they fell asleep
for three hours and you're just like, I don't I
don't know what to do with myself, Like I'm not
used to having this much time.
Speaker 5 (28:45):
I know that feeling.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
Yeah, and then you and then you look around the
house and look at the thousand different things that you
should have done before, and then you just get analysis
paralysis and.
Speaker 5 (28:53):
Uh, analysis paralysis.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
And they started scrolling through Instagram and then next thing,
you know, they would wake up and you realize that
you forgot to you know, send an invoice or finish
the mix, and you get distracted by those two minute things.
We want to call back the back to the beginning
of the episode.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
Yeah, this is inside the brain of ADHD music production
professional with kids.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Yeah, and also it's fun when the kids have ADHD two.
If you want to know why I am the way
I am, that should probably explain it.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Yeah, more on that in future episode. So life is hard,
life is distracting, and we have a certain job that
we have to do that we just need, we need
our space, and then there's other things that we do
where we need to be kept in place. And so
if you need your space, try to like clear the
(29:46):
schedule as much as you can clear yourself with distractions.
Make sure your phone's on silent, don't get distracted, and
do your mix and get into your flow state. But
then there's all these other things that you could be
doing and you kind of have to not go off
the rails and you need your guard in order to
do that. So maybe it's a good idea to experiment
with like time based timers, Pomodoro methods, stuff like that. Yeah,
(30:07):
be careful with those two minute get it off the
checklist tasks because you can lose track of time.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
And if you are trying a technique and it's just
not working for you, that's okay, you know, I think
just try to figure out, well, why is it not working?
Is it something that I can control? Is it not
working but it's something that I can control, or is
it not working because of something that is outside of
my control?
Speaker 3 (30:29):
You know?
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Is it not working because I can't stop looking at
my phone notifications and I could just put it on
focus mode and I'm just not doing that. Or is
it not working because your kid's sick or you need
to do something, or like the dog barks every time
that there's movement outside the window, you know, like whatever
it is, Like there's it's just figuring out, well, what
(30:51):
is this something that you can adjust and what are
the things that you can adjust and then figure out
why that technique isn't working and what you can do
about it.
Speaker 4 (30:59):
Yeah, and also giving your grace so you don't like
beat yourself up for things that you can't control and
trying to do that, because that's it's not so easy.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Good luck to us all, Yes, we all need it.
Speaker 5 (31:13):
Well, Carl, this has been fun.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Yeah, thanks for putting up with my sleepy ramblings.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
No problem. Thanks for coming to hang with me on
this riverside chat. I don't know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Well, if you made it this far in the episode,
I'm sorry for me and for Ben. We are sorry,
but you're awesome and we appreciate you listening and thank
you listeners. Yeah, until next time, Bye Ben.
Speaker 5 (31:41):
Bye Carl.
Speaker 4 (31:43):
We hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as we did.
If anything here resonated with you, please share this or
your favorite episode with a friend.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
And as always, we love to hear from our listeners,
so find us on social media at Secret Sonics.
Speaker 5 (31:56):
At Ben Wallace Music, and at Carl Bonner.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
Until next time, Bye Ben.
Speaker 5 (32:01):
Bye Carl. That was good. I think the outro is great.
My therapist would be very disappointed if I refer to
my children as a time management technique.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
But well, they're filling the other part of that time.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (00:12):
Hi, I'm Ben and I'm Carl, and you're listening to
Secret Sonics, honest conversations chock full of tactical advice to help.
Speaker 5 (00:20):
Me build your dream career in music and audio.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Whether it's skill development, mixing mindsets, personal branding, or work
life balance. We talk about ways to help set yourself
up for success in the ever changing music industry.
Speaker 5 (00:32):
Let's get started.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Hi, Ben, Hi Carl. I'm tired, and you called me
out on it.
Speaker 5 (00:41):
I just like, yeah, I saw your face and I knew,
I knew.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
So, my youngest daughter has an ear infection, so she
was up not slipping well the past couple of nights,
and then this morning she woke up super early. I
didn't get to bed till really because I was up
late cleaning up after the kids. It was a longing
for a rough couple of days. But that's why I'm
gonna go right into this episode.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
And I'm gonna say, that's why you're gonna go right
into a power nap Power.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
If only Ben, Yeah, Okay, so listeners, if you're listening,
I'm just gonna take a nap for about twenty minutes.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
So just sit here and you know, think about what
you've done.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
It'll all get shopped right, and we're back.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
And we're back. I'm fully refreshed. Look at this. I'm
really great now.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
That just I just used up all of my energy reserves.
So I told Ben that I was going to surprise
him with this because this is actually you know, we
were talking this morning about some ideas for episodes, and
we both had ideas that were not this idea. And
I'm just like, I don't care, I'm sleepy. I'm gonna
(01:43):
call an audible and throw it out at you. So
what I want to talk about is as engineers, as
people in the music industry, in business, we are told
constantly all of these different time management techniques and all
of these frameworks and things that you can do right.
But if you're like Ben and I and you have children,
(02:07):
or maybe you have ADHD or or your you know,
other forms of neurospiciness, there are a lot of time
management techniques that just don't actually fucking work, or they
work for some people some of the time. And they
just seem to not work for us. So, rather than
doing an episode about time management techniques that work for
(02:31):
studio pros, I want to talk about the time management
techniques that Ben and I have tried that just do
not work for us. I was going to say, like
an anti time management technique episode.
Speaker 5 (02:45):
Wait, so we're saying the ones that do work for us,
not the ones that.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Don't know the ones that don't.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Like what are things that just like been told a
million times to try and then we tried it. But
like with the constant tornado of curveballs that children throw
at us, you know, these the techniques work well in
a vacuum, but maybe don't work in reality for a
lot of people.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
I think it'll be a good way for.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
People that maybe also feel like they have a lot
of difficulty with time management and maybe they have tried
some of these different techniques and it hasn't worked for them,
And I want to make them feel seen and hurt
and not feel like they're a failure, you know, because
it wasn't working for them, or that they're like some
things just work really, really really well in a perfectly
controlled environment, and in the real world, perfectly controlled environments
(03:31):
don't exist.
Speaker 4 (03:32):
Right, I don't know if I have stuff that i've
i can specifically maybe you should start, because I still
need to like let this percolate a little bit. But yeah,
I feel like if in a perfect world, I could
like get myself out of bed at a certain time
every day do this, like get it all together. But
every day is different. Every day shit goes out the window.
(03:54):
Like I'm here with my studio mate here and he
also has kids and he also is like every other
day it's like something goes out the window, and you know,
like we're just like always juggling random stuff. I mean,
I don't know if this is like a first thing,
but like you just kind of have to be a
little bit more like deadlines have to have a little
bit of ease to them. You can't always or you
have to be like give yourself even extra padding because
(04:17):
if you say I'm gonna get this by Tuesday, like
you can try, but it might not happen because some
shit might have gone out the window, in which case
you need till Wednesday, and then you just have to
like Usually like artists, clients are very you know, receptive
to like saying I'm so sorry. I like things as
long as you communicate that you haven't forgotten about them,
there's you know, they're usually okay with it, like an
extra day or whatever. But you have to give yourself
(04:38):
grace and not like drive yourself into the ground for deadlines.
You have to kind of figure out a way to
give yourself grace on those. I don't know if I
could say better than that, but you can't be too
much of a dickhead to yourself in terms of that stuff.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
I think with you know, kind of going off of that,
I would say that the whole concept of under promise
and over deliver I think also could apply to yourself
in a way, you know what I mean, Like, don't promise,
you don't convince yourself and lie to yourself that you're
gonna definitely have this thing done by Tuesday when you
don't actually never can have it done by tuesday. So
(05:09):
it's not just a matter of underpromising and over delivering
to the clients, but also to your own sense of
the reality of your situation. Right, So, let me start
by giving an example of like a specific thing that
I've found works for me in certain situations but usually not,
and what I've done to try to adapt it to
(05:31):
make it work. Okay, so this is less about having kids,
and this is more about just like the ADHD right,
and just being kind of all over the place, being
a solopreneur running a business, all the things we're doing
on top of life stuff. The technique, I've heard it
called it a couple of different things, but there's essentially
the most common one is called the two minute rule.
(05:54):
And the whole idea is, you know, if there's something
that needs to get done and it's going to take
less than two minutes to do it, just do it
and get it over with, right rather than putting it off.
Like if it's something like my bowl from lunch is
still sitting on the on the counter and it's not
in the sink, like, they'll take way less than two
minutes to do, so I should just do it and
(06:15):
get it over with right now. Why does that not
work in practice for me?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
Anyway?
Speaker 1 (06:22):
What I've found is when I'm in the mood to
go for this like two minute rule thing, the good
thing is I get that little dopamine hit when I
do something like that. When it's clean off the kitchen table,
throw the socks, I've found under the couch, cushion, whatever
wherever kids put things, taking those putting them in the laundry.
(06:42):
Like that's a little dope mean hit. I feel like, oh,
I'm being productive. That's great, I'm gonna do this. The
problem that I've found for myself with ADHD is that
I like that little dopamine hit feels great, and I
start doing a bunch of them. And I start doing
a bunch of them, and the next thing you know,
I spent two hours doing little two minute things and
(07:07):
completely disregarding the actual big thing that I should have
been doing in the first place, right, or even worse,
I'm setting off to do something specific and then I
see a little two minute thing, I just do that,
and I by the time that I'm done doing a
little series of two minute things, I completely forget what
I was doing in there.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Yeah, oh my god.
Speaker 4 (07:24):
That happens to me and also happens to my wife
all the time we're cleaning up, like we just can't
we just start this wed that it's like what was
I trying to do to begin with?
Speaker 5 (07:33):
Like it's just you totally lose track of it.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
Yeah, there's phenomenal scene from Malcolm in the Middle. I
feel like some people that listening might know this this clip.
Do you know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
Ben?
Speaker 5 (07:42):
I remember when it was on the air when I
was a kid, but not so.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
There's a scene where Brian Cranston's character like the dad.
I think it's how I think it's like a start
set with like a light bulb that isn't working, so
we go to like get a new light bulb. But
as he's going to look for the new light bulb,
he notices like a screw needs to be tightened or something,
and then he goes to look for the screwdriver. When
he goes look for the screw driver, he's pulling up
open the drawer and the drawer squeaks, and then when
(08:07):
he hears a sqeaky drawer, he has to go get his
can of WT forty. Then when he goes, he realizes
it's out, so then he goes and gets his keys
to go in the car, starts up the car, the
cars making a weird noise and he's like Then the
next scene like he's a mechanic.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
The wife comes in and it's like, hey, aren't you
going to change the light? And he like rolls out
from under the like under the engine of the car,
and he's like, what do you think I'm doing?
Speaker 3 (08:31):
You know?
Speaker 1 (08:31):
And I feel like that scene is so beautifully written
first off, but also like that's how I feel. And
then I get I get frustrated with myself, and I
get distracted by all the things, and like, the unfortunate
thing of the two minute rule, in my experience, is
that if it's left unchecked, it can expand to a
gazillion different things, or even if it is just one thing,
(08:53):
And if you have a hard time remembering what you're
supposed to be doing and you're having a hard time
staying on task, that it's a very easy quick way
to distract you and pull you out of what you're
actually supposed to be doing well, also giving you that
little dupamine hit and kind of making everything not productive
and not great. So it's to me that was a
good example of a time management technique that unless I say, okay,
(09:18):
I'm going to set a thirty minute timer and then
until that alarm goes off, the only thing I have
to do right now is is a bunch of two
minute things, and then I can just go to town
and then when the alarm goes off, then it's like, Okay,
when that goes off, then I have to go back
upstairs and I have to prep the mix session for
a song or whatever it is, or send a respond
to this particular email. Then great, But unless I set
(09:41):
those guardrails, it can go haywire.
Speaker 4 (09:44):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I totally resonate with that. It's also
like a great way to like these two minute things
all you think it's like it'll save you down the line,
but also at the same time, it can totally be
a great procrastinator for doing the actual thing you need
to do.
Speaker 5 (09:56):
Yeah. I definitely like.
Speaker 4 (09:57):
Have periods of the day where I'll just go through
a bunch of little things, but it's it's very hard
to keep track of like when the end of that
time should be, because you just like get into a
sink of like.
Speaker 5 (10:06):
Okay, now I'm doing this and I'm doing this. No,
I have like a lot of like little little tasks
that I end up having to do, and then I
try to do them all together, but then it keeps going.
Speaker 4 (10:16):
I think it's important. I guess the counterbalance to that
is to set aside a time of your day where
you're actually making sure you're doing the focus, the most
important work that you do. You could time it off
as like, you know, you know, from nine to twelve,
I'm doing only mixing, or like I'm going to edit
these vocals from you know, nine to eleven, because otherwise
the song isn't going to get done.
Speaker 5 (10:34):
You have to like say at the beginning of the day.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
It doesn't have to be at the beginning of the day,
but you have to come up with a time period
where this is absolutely dedicated holy time for the most
important work that you do. That's the counterbalance. There are
other parts of the day where like there's more wigle
room to do these kind of like small things, take
phone calls, whatever.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
So then what happens when kids come a knock in.
Speaker 5 (10:59):
And into up that special time?
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Yeah a special time, aime, special time. Yeah, not interrupting
that special times.
Speaker 4 (11:07):
They interrupt all the special times, but yeah, the special time.
We don't talk bad enough.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Be not this kind of podcast.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
What now come on.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Everybody listening is either thinking of themselves, I don't know
what they're talking about, or they're like, yeah, I know
what they mean.
Speaker 4 (11:21):
Yeah, yeah, definitely two distinct camps of listeners. So, yeah,
what happens when that special time gets interrupted? Then you
have to adjust and that can be very difficult for me.
It's very difficult. I like, if I have a plan
and things are going according to the plan, I do
very well. And then if things go off sometimes it's
(11:42):
very hard for me to adjust. Like I have friends that, like,
you know, life just throws them a wrench. Then they
do that, they pivot, it's all good, Like they can
have a good day and they have no idea where
the day's gonna end, but they'll be cool. If my
day does not go how I've planned it. I'm stressed
because I have so much anxiety of like, oh I
didn't do this, I didn't accomplish what I was supposed
accomplish today. And part of that that's just being from
New York. But also part of that.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
I don't I don't think that's an exclusively New York
thing though, yeah, that's not what you're saying under that,
but I think like.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
It's, yeah, there's like a New York hustle productivity mindset
that I feel like is very dominant where I come from.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
I mean, obviously, I think you know, if you've been
on social media in the past couple of years at all.
I feel like that kind of grew out, you know,
grew outside of the geographical region of New York and
just became kind of like the norm for how we're
kind of taught to run a business, to be.
Speaker 5 (12:35):
Entrepreneurs, the hustle culture.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Which is I think why so many time management techniques
were developed, because the goal is to get as much
stuff as you can done but as possible, and you
have to do all these things, then well, of course
you have to manage it.
Speaker 4 (12:49):
It's an animal eating its own tail, yeah or something.
So so what do you do? What does Carl do
when his day gets rocked?
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Curl up in a ball and cry?
Speaker 1 (12:58):
No, Honestly, like I'm I'm still I still struggle with
that all the time, and I hate it, Like I
am embarrassed about it, but like I'm not gonna not
say it because I want to make sure that if
anybody else feels that way, that they're not gonna I
wanted to feel like.
Speaker 4 (13:15):
There's nothing to be embarrassed about carbon. Yeah, you're just
a human being.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Yeah, And just like I get I get distracted like
the rest of the night, like it's it's so hard,
and I think this is true for most people, Like
it's doing what we do, it's really hard to turn off.
And like the whole idea of like work life balance
is like so so important, but.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
So fucking difficult.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Like it's because like when something goes great, it's easy
to switch off, but like if there are things where
it's not just keeping work stuff out of like lifetime,
it's trying to keep life out of work time. And
that's what we can't really control, especially when you have kids,
Like you can't, right, you know, like I mean, I'm
sure some people could, but like I can't, Like I don't.
(13:58):
I can't like emotionally like not have you know, if
my daughter is upset and wants to talk to me,
like I'm not gonna say, nope, come back at twelve. Yeah,
you know, Like so it works both ways, and it
it gets harder and harder with kids and with age,
I guess too, Like it's harder to you know, make
it as rigidly black and white as YouTube would like
(14:21):
us to think it can be.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
Yeah, I think I think there was a time when
I was really trying to separate the work on the
life a lot and I'm I don't know if I
could say I've fully embraced it, but I've embraced it
much more that the lines are blurred and things are messy.
It is the way it is. I have noticed since
I've moved the studio out of the house. It's only
been like a month and a half, but I do
find it easier for me to be like present with
(14:43):
my kids at night in the afternoon because like close
up shop and then I go home and then it's like,
oh cool. It's weird because like when the studio was
in my house, I was like, oh, I could do
this tonight really quickly. I just jump into the studio
and be done with it. And now even though okay,
now I have like a laptop and I can I
could do some stuff at home, but like I don't
really want to do it on my laptop. I want
to do it my desktop in the studio all the
(15:03):
way for tomorrow. Like it's easier for me to say, like,
I'll just do it tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
It's okay.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
Like I've like accepted that something else can happen tomorrow,
it doesn't have to happen today. And a lot of
that is just since I moved the studio now, which
is I'm really enjoying. I'm not enjoying everything about moving
the studio out of the house, but that's the thing
that I am enjoying the most so far, other than
the physical space, which is nicer and bigger than my
old space.
Speaker 5 (15:22):
But it is interesting.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Like if I have like a very productive day at work,
it's much easier for me to just check out of Okay,
I did my day's work and now I can be home.
It's easy to be like, okay, check we did that.
But if you have a day where things got like
sort of rocked and you didn't get everything you wanted
to do done, or you just didn't feel like you
have like maybe it's the ADHD thing like that, maybe
I'm discovering I might have when you just get like
(15:43):
thrown off a lot, and even if you did everything
you had to do, but your brain was never settled,
like you never like felt like settled like oh okay,
I did this or that in you're frazzled. Then it
also it'll like seep into my life at home. Also
when I get home, I won't be at ease like,
oh I did everything I had to do. You know
that's a very frustrating feeling. I don't know how to
how to do that either, but separating in the studio
(16:04):
from the house has helped a little bit.
Speaker 3 (16:06):
No, that's awesome. That's awesome. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
I feel like my view on work life balance like
you have to accept that it's going to be bessy.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
What do you have kids?
Speaker 1 (16:14):
I think the healthiest thing that we can really do
is to try to be conscious of it and be
aware of it. Like if we catch ourselves think it
too much about work, what we should be just like
enjoying a movie with the kids, you know, or whatever.
It is, like being conscious of it, being able to like, okay, this,
this can wait.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
I can push us back. I think the.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
Idea of just like okay, well it's now six pm,
I'm going to go ooop and my brain is going
to magically switch over like that just doesn't doesn't happen.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
Yeah, it's I haven't seen it, but apparently there's an
amazing show called Severance, which is about that with Adam
Scott of Scott.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
Yeah, I saw like, like I hear people talking about it,
but I haven't seen it.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
I think it's directed by Ben Stiller. Apparently that's like
the premise of the show. It's like, you check out
of work, you have no idea what happens at work
when you're home. You've no idea what happens at home
when you're at work. And like, interestingly, his Parks and
Rec character Ben Wyatt kind of came up with the
idea of the show in Parks and Rec like eleven
years earlier or something. I love Parks and Rec best show,
(17:17):
but it's not possible, And like I dig that, like
the mindfulness approach to it of like it's like the
same thing if, like you're mindful when you're parenting, you're
even if you're not a perfect parent, you could slowly
build habits that will get better over time. You know,
if you're mindful of the things you're doing, mindfulness will
slowly improve these things. It's not a perfect fix, but
it's like a it's a journey towards better.
Speaker 5 (17:38):
You know.
Speaker 1 (17:39):
One of the things I've noticed over the past twenty
years being in the industry is that audio school usually
leaves most graduates completely unprepared for answering the industry. I mean, sure,
you learn how to rewire a patch bay or sleep,
but they probably won't teach you how to stand out
and attract the kinds of artists that fuel your passion
for recording. I appreciate what you bring to the table,
let alone pay their rates you want to get and
(18:00):
YouTube university is full of people telling you that their
way is the right way, and it doesn't help you
apply things to your unique struggles, personality and ideal clients.
So I've been building studio land to fill those gaps.
We use structured learning paths. We leave live classes in
a private community of other pros to help you discover
how to turn your technical expertise into a thriving business
that attracts the right clients at the right rates.
Speaker 3 (18:23):
Try it out for free the links in the show notes.
Speaker 4 (18:27):
So I wanted to talk about the Pomodoro method, which
is kind of like you set aside a certain amount
of time to do something and then you have a break.
You set timers basically on your device. I don't remember
if it's like fifteen minutes. I think there's different ways you.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Could do it. Twenty five is the one that I
hear more often.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
Yeah, I'm not sure what it is, but I do
feel like it's like a great idea in concept, and
maybe it's a great idea for the two minute rule
kind of tasks, Yeah, where you can kind of like, OK,
I'm gonna do this for twenty five minutes and then
i'll i'll, i'll check out because like the next thing
on my to do list is anyways just two minutes,
so it'll it'll wait. But for mixing engine years, for
music producers, it's just not a good method at all
(19:03):
because it literally takes you out of a flow state.
Because once you get into the flow state, that's where
you want to be. Now, it's hard to tell how
long it's gonna take someone to get into a flow state,
and everybody's different, but for me, it might take fifteen
twenty minutes for me to get into a flow state
and then I'm there for like an hour or two.
And then don't don't distract me. My phone's on silent man,
(19:23):
I don't look at my phone when I'm mixing. Don't
give me an alarm after like twenty I was like,
if you get an alarm like twenty five minutes into
your mixing session and you just got into the flow
state ten minutes ago, you totally lost your game. So
this is just not like a it's not an applicable
method for us, you know.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Yeah, I think maybe it can work with like admin tasks.
I think it was a Walt Disney that said it
takes like thirty seven magical moments to come back from
one tragic moment. I feel like it takes thirty seven
great things inspiring things in a mix to get into
the flow state, and it takes one distraction to pull
(20:02):
you out. But obviously it's probably an exact thirty seven
to one ratio or the point that it takes you
so much longer to get into the flow state that
it doesn't take you out of it, Like it's so
easy to get knocked out of it. Yeah, Like I've
tried the Pomaduo technique on mixing before, just to kind
of see, like, Okay, I'm going to try to get
just like the drums and the bass to feel really
(20:22):
good together in these twenty five minutes. Let's just see
what it does. And like I found for myself, I
do work really well under pressure, which is probably why
I also procrastinate. But that's a whole other conversation. So
I do find like sometimes like that it does actually
really work. But I've found it's more like, rather than
doing twenty five minutes, fifty minutes, twenty minutes, whatever it is,
(20:43):
and then taking a break, it's like, Okay, if I
set myself a timer and like I have to get
this thing done in that amount of time, I'm probably
gonna get it done in that amount of time. And
then instead of it being like okay, well now it's
going to be put out of the flow state entirely
and take a break, it's like, okay, well maybe when
that time it goes off that I'm gonna just switch
and apply that flow state to the guitars and synse whatever.
(21:06):
Like I'm not going I'm not pulling much up out
of it. I'm just like cool. That is my little
signal to just redirect my focus onto another creative aspect
of the production or the mix. And for me, weirdly enough,
that seems to work pretty well when I need to
do it, and I'm usually only doing that when it's
like super tight deadlines so I don't go down rabbit holes.
(21:26):
But yeah, the actual doing the Pomodoro technique the quote
unquote like correct way, it completely destroys.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
It for me.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 4 (21:38):
I feel like we're like working towards a solution of
time based things are good for things outside of flow state,
and maybe like we could set guardrails for ourselves when
we're not doing our most important work that you know,
that's that special time holy work, when we're in our
deep mix. Like maybe it is good to set guardrails
so we don't get lost in those two minute things
or the admin work. I find I get lost in
(22:00):
admir work and then all of a sudden, like why
am I still looking at a screen?
Speaker 5 (22:02):
My eyes hurt? You know what I mean?
Speaker 4 (22:03):
Like, do you do anything to like get yourself off
of the screen, like to give your eyes a break?
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Maybe just having ADHD and being distractable. I just like
I'm like, oh, I'm hungry, I need some water, or
the dogs whining, or I hear Rowan talking in the
next Roe moment, Ago play with her for a minute.
So I feel like life pulls me away from the screen,
just like a good thing. I want to talk about
one more thing with the Palmadora technique that I did
find that works kind of well for me. And this
(22:29):
is actually kind of going back to I think it
was two episodes ago when we talked about how do
we know when.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
A song's finished.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
I've found it's really helpful for me if I do
set a timer or if I have like a really
strict time limit of like, Okay, I'm giving myself thirty
minutes to make any last minute changes before I send
this to the client. Then it's like I found for
myself working under the gun, like that, I make a
lot of really good decisions, can make a lot of
quick I trust my gut in those moments because I
have to, and my gut's.
Speaker 3 (22:59):
Pretty good, you know. So I do that.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I trust it, and it forces me to only focus
on the big things because I've spent plenty of time
going down little nerdy rabbit holes, so like I know
they generally lead nowhere. So like I in those moments,
I think I have enough experience in crunch time to know, Okay,
this is important, this is not I'm gonna just do
(23:23):
the important thing too much. I get as many important
things done as quickly as possible, And I found like
that forces me to listen from a different perspective than
if I had all the time in the world, if
I had four hours to do the same amount of
work and I just go down and I'm like, ah,
do I need that one tambourine hit there?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Do I not? I don't know.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
You don't need to deliberate that shit.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Yeah, I can just be like nope, I'm just gonna listen.
Speaker 5 (23:47):
It's a good no, not necessary mute.
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
So in those cases like that actually does help a lot,
like setting a timer and forcing myself to be under
the gun for that. I was just thinking about that
and wanted to mention.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
That, Yeah, that's really interesting. I think I need to
start doing more time based things. Not like in the
beginning of a mix when you're getting in the flow
zone and you're like really setting up what the actual
like mix is going to be like, but for like
just other things in life, I feel like I should
be setting myself more timers because I do get lost
in whatever I do. So I think it's important too.
For flow state stuff, you want to get lost because
otherwise you're never going to get there. But for not
(24:20):
flow state stuff, you want to like have those guardrails
to kind of keep you in check, especially when you
know there's so much on my to do list every
single day, Like could be good if I had a
bit more vigilance.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Something that I just was thinking about too, is that
I've gotten so much more efficient with mixing since having kids.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
I feel like, before we had.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Our oldest daughter, who's going to be turning nine soon,
I would spend so much time on a song because
I had nothing but time, you know, I could do that,
especially for we had our oldest daughter. My wife was
working as a nurse, like like doing I think she
was doing like three nights a week, but from seven
(25:04):
pm to seven thirty am, And at the time, I
was primarily just either gigging at night or like teaching
lessons after school, so my work day didn't start till
three thirty pm, and I tried. I usually tried to
stay up until she got home, so like I would
be up until five, six, seven o'clock in the morning
(25:25):
because I just wanted to be able to be as
on her schedule as I could, and I had no
reason to be up. I mean, I could go to
bed at seven and get a solid seven seven and
a half hours of sleep before I have to like
get up and start getting ready to teach, which is
wo weird and very different from now, very different from
this morning.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
When the baby woke me up at five am.
Speaker 5 (25:46):
But can you imagine at that time, that's always like
a lifetime ago.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
It feels so it feels like a different person. It
feels like a book I read once. But I found
that like once we had our ownest daughter, and just
like the realities of those curveballs that kids throw at
you all the time, it made me get faster and
faster because I had less time, and not just because
I had less time total to work on things, but
(26:10):
also because I had no idea when the next melt
done was going to happen. I had no idea when
the next you know, when the next curveball was coming.
So it was just like I got to get as
much done as I can, as quickly as I can
before the inevitable interruption distraction that happens. And I found
(26:30):
that I got faster and faster and faster with it.
And then once we had our second kid, or actually
really was like once we were getting ready to have
our second kid, and when my wife was pregnant and
she wasn't able to do as much around the house,
wasn't able to really help as much with our other daughter.
The necessity of that I had to get even faster
and even more efficient, and then by the time that
(26:51):
we had our second kid, like I get most mixed
ones out the door in like an hour and a
half maybe two hours, you know, so fast, and hopefully
it's only going to get faster, you know, or at least,
like we're confident. Yeah, but it's just because like I
don't have any choice other than to make quick, instinctive
(27:13):
decisions because.
Speaker 5 (27:13):
The time get it done.
Speaker 4 (27:15):
And I think faster mixes are better mixes honestly, because
you're going with your gut and you're not overthinking these things,
and you just like you go with your gut. Like
at the end of the day, we're looking for like
a bodily response, like we want to be like grooven
shaking our butt or you know, head bobbing or whatever,
and like you get there with your gut much more
than you get there with your brain.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
In a weird way, I would say that the time
management technique that actually helps my career the most is
having children.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
It's amazing, which is a very weird.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
I don't know if if I would classify that as
a time management technique. I feel like my wife would
be very my therapist would be very disappointed if I
refer to my children as a time management technique.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
But well, they're filling the other part of that time. Yeah,
they're also like go make money techniques, like yeah, get
your shit together, bro, Yeah, yeah, kind of technique.
Speaker 5 (28:04):
I will say.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
Also, just to add to that, like the pandemic was
also a big thing in terms of like expediting things
for me also because like months on end we had
we weren't leaving. I don't remember how long it was exactly,
but there was a lot of time where at that
point we only had one kid, but he was home
and like when he would nap, it's like, oh, this
is my chance to actually get some work done, you know,
and once he woke up, it was over. It was
(28:25):
like those are crazy time crunches.
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Yeah, and it's like a ticking time bomb.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
But you don't know how long the fuse is because
like some days, I feel like there are some days
when you know you're lucky if they napped for forty minutes,
and then the other days it's like they fell asleep
for three hours and you're just like, I don't I
don't know what to do with myself, Like I'm not
used to having this much time.
Speaker 5 (28:45):
I know that feeling.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
Yeah, and then you and then you look around the
house and look at the thousand different things that you
should have done before, and then you just get analysis
paralysis and.
Speaker 5 (28:53):
Uh, analysis paralysis.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
And they started scrolling through Instagram and then next thing,
you know, they would wake up and you realize that
you forgot to you know, send an invoice or finish
the mix, and you get distracted by those two minute things.
We want to call back the back to the beginning
of the episode.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
Yeah, this is inside the brain of ADHD music production
professional with kids.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Yeah, and also it's fun when the kids have ADHD two.
If you want to know why I am the way
I am, that should probably explain it.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Yeah, more on that in future episode. So life is hard,
life is distracting, and we have a certain job that
we have to do that we just need, we need
our space, and then there's other things that we do
where we need to be kept in place. And so
if you need your space, try to like clear the
(29:46):
schedule as much as you can clear yourself with distractions.
Make sure your phone's on silent, don't get distracted, and
do your mix and get into your flow state. But
then there's all these other things that you could be
doing and you kind of have to not go off
the rails and you need your guard in order to
do that. So maybe it's a good idea to experiment
with like time based timers, Pomodoro methods, stuff like that. Yeah,
(30:07):
be careful with those two minute get it off the
checklist tasks because you can lose track of time.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
And if you are trying a technique and it's just
not working for you, that's okay, you know, I think
just try to figure out, well, why is it not working?
Is it something that I can control? Is it not
working but it's something that I can control, or is
it not working because of something that is outside of
my control?
Speaker 3 (30:29):
You know?
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Is it not working because I can't stop looking at
my phone notifications and I could just put it on
focus mode and I'm just not doing that. Or is
it not working because your kid's sick or you need
to do something, or like the dog barks every time
that there's movement outside the window, you know, like whatever
it is, Like there's it's just figuring out, well, what
(30:51):
is this something that you can adjust and what are
the things that you can adjust and then figure out
why that technique isn't working and what you can do
about it.
Speaker 4 (30:59):
Yeah, and also giving your grace so you don't like
beat yourself up for things that you can't control and
trying to do that, because that's it's not so easy.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Good luck to us all, Yes, we all need it.
Speaker 5 (31:13):
Well, Carl, this has been fun.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Yeah, thanks for putting up with my sleepy ramblings.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
No problem. Thanks for coming to hang with me on
this riverside chat. I don't know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Well, if you made it this far in the episode,
I'm sorry for me and for Ben. We are sorry,
but you're awesome and we appreciate you listening and thank
you listeners. Yeah, until next time, Bye Ben.
Speaker 5 (31:41):
Bye Carl.
Speaker 4 (31:43):
We hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as we did.
If anything here resonated with you, please share this or
your favorite episode with a friend.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
And as always, we love to hear from our listeners,
so find us on social media at Secret Sonics.
Speaker 5 (31:56):
At Ben Wallace Music, and at Carl Bonner.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
Until next time, Bye Ben.
Speaker 5 (32:01):
Bye Carl. That was good. I think the outro is great.
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