Just 2 Minutes - What to Do When You Feel Stuck with Lizzie Williamson

Episode 12: Lizzie Williamson
===

Track 1: [00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to the AdminAvenues Podcast. I'm your host, Candice Burningham, and today we have special guest [00:01:00] Lizzie Williamson speaking on t- just two minutes, what to do when you feel stuck. so the incredible~ Liv-~ Lizzie Williamson, if you have not met her before, if you've not seen her on TV, she will be delivering our closing keynote at our 2026 AdminAvenues Sydney conference.

~Uh,~ so if you've not met her before or not had contact with her before, one first tip is always follow her on LinkedIn. but she's a global motivational speaker. She's a TEDx speaker. She's an award-winning author, and the creator of the two-minute method. She's known as the Excuse Buster from Down Under.

I love that title because she helps people stop waiting for the perfect moment and start taking action, even when they don't feel ready. So her closing keynote's gonna be about what are you waiting for? Stop waiting, just start now, just two minutes.

~Um, and because most of us already know that would help, we know we need, uh, to start...~

~Uh, start that bit again. Because most of us already know what would help, we n- I have written that wrong. Hang on one second. Because most of us already know what would help, we know we need to start the task. Okay. Three, two, one.~ Because most of us already know what would help, we know we need to start the task, have the difficult conversation, make the decision, or take the next step, but we're still not doing it.

I think this is something [00:02:00] that admins can very much attest to. We get caught in overthinking, overwhelm, procrastination, and the belief that we need to feel motivated before we can begin. So Lizzie's message is that when something feels too big, the answer isn't necessarily more motivation. It's making the first action small enough to start.

So Lizzie, welcome to the AdminAvenues Podcast. I'm so excited to have you here today

Track 2: Thank you. Me too

Track 1: And so before we start talking about getting stuck, can you tell us a little bit about yourself for people who might not know you, know your story, or the two-minute method?

Track 2: Yeah, I know that what you were talking about before, that knowing that need to be doing something and not doing it. I just-- That feeling is so familiar in so many different areas of my life. But the big one where this all kicked off for me was when I had postnatal depression. This was 18 years ago, and I felt so, so stuck and so dark and so overwhelmed.

[00:03:00] And even though I knew that something like exercise, all the things we know is good for our physical and our mental health, I knew all those things, and I just couldn't get myself to do it. I knew that dancing made me feel so good. I used to be a professional dancer. Couldn't get myself to do that. I knew that reaching out to friends and talking to people would be a good thing.

Couldn't get myself to do it. And so it was after I went and I saw my doctor and she said to me, "You know when you get on a plane and they tell you in an emergency to put your oxygen mask on first before assisting others? That's what you have to do," she said to me. "This is an emergency." And of course, I had heard that a lot of times before, but it was just something about hearing it at this moment.

And even though I was thinking, "Oh, you know what I mean? What can this oxygen mask thing be because I don't have any time?" Or I was so sleep-deprived, and I was juggling so many things. But there was [00:04:00] something about her words, and when I got home to my kitchen bench, I was there in my kitchen and thought, "Okay, I just have to try and do something."

And because I'd been a dancer,

Lizzie Williamson: I put my hands on that

Track 2: kitchen bench like I was back at my ballet barre and got myself to do just a couple of minutes, and that's all I could get myself to do. But I thought, "Okay, right. Do that again tomorrow." And then I did it again tomorrow, and then I did the next day, and the next, and the next.

And then very, very slowly over time, I started to see that this moment was starting to make a difference for me and starting to have this ripple effect. And then I'd hear about other people I knew that were struggling with the way they were feeling, and so I'd send a video of what I was doing there at my kitchen bench to them.

And then social media came to be and started sharing all the videos and then started speaking and, and so then it all, it all grew very, very slowly from that one moment at [00:05:00] my kitchen bench.

Track 1: Yeah. And y- and you've spoken openly about, obv- obviously this is a very touchy subject, and a lot of women have shame around this and postpartum depression and not being able to snap themselves out. But you've spoken openly about this, ~um,~ and this is a method that, that changed your own life. So was there a particular moment when you realized that taking this very small action could create so much of a bigger change?

Track 2: I mean, if you had given me a crystal ball at that time and I could look into the future and see it, I would've said to you, "That crystal ball is false." There is just no way. If you told me that I would be here speaking to you now in that moment, I just would not have believed you at all. And it was this slow,

Lizzie Williamson: slow process

Track 2: over time, and this slowly realizing that, okay, I had been really stuck in this mindset that in my mind everything has to be this, the big thing that I had to do this [00:06:00] hour.

I had to be able to get out the door and get to that gym class I used to always go to. I had to have a certain amount of energy, and all of these rules that I realized I had in my head that was stopping me from taking any type of action. And that slowly came to me, and especially when I started to talk to other people and I thought, "All right.

I'm not the only one stuck in this all or nothing type of mindset. There's a whole lot of other people out there as well." And I think once I started to talk to more people, started to see that I wasn't alone, other people were dealing with it, then it- things really started to change

Track 1: And you've been labeled the excuse buster from Down Under. Clearly someone in America made that up. , What are some of the most common excuses you hear from people?

Track 2: Oh, can you guess it? I don't have the

Track 1: Time

Track 2: time. And, and it's true. you're here listening. Oh my gosh, I can't even imagine what your [00:07:00] inbox must look like, what your to-do list must look like. You're juggling all of these things, and of course we say to ourselves, "I don't have the time." And it's true. We don't have the time often

Lizzie Williamson: for the big things.

Track 2: We don't have the time for the things that we go, "Okay, yes, it has to... If we're going to take a walk, it has to be a 60-minute walk. If we're gonna write a book, then I've gotta go and spend all day writing it or go to a writer's retreat or spend all my weekend. If I'm going to start this project, then I have to just dedicate this big chunk of time."

So we think, "Yeah, of course we don't have the time." And what I started to see was that I was waiting. I was waiting

Lizzie Williamson: to have more time .

Track 2: I was waiting for this perfect amount of time. I was waiting for the conditions to be perfect to actually begin. And then I started to think, "You know what? There actually is no perfect police.

No one is gonna come [00:08:00] along and knock on my door and put my hands in handcuffs saying, 'Sorry, sorry, the way that you did that, excuse me, that wasn't good enough. You didn't show up the way that you have to show up. That wasn't perfect, so you're under arrest and, and let's go.'" There's, there is no perfect police.

So what we need to start doing is turning that all or nothing mindset that's means that the no time, no energy, no motivation, all the things that we tell ourselves, when we turn that all or nothing into all or something, and start to see that actually something is so much better than nothing. And when you say to yourself, "I don't have the time," that's your excuse voice.

We replace it with the excuse buster voice, which simply says back those three words, "Just two minutes." You can do two minutes of something

Track 1: Do, yeah.~ Do you think, ~do you think, like, our excuses are usually about time, or is there something deeper happening there?

Track 2: Yeah, that's a really good question because when you think about time, there's [00:09:00] a whole lot of things that we make time for, and sometimes we could-- I do this myself as well, it's so guilty. I go, "I don't have the time." Say, "Okay, how about we have a look at your screen time and see where you're actually putting your time?"

And then time is a very-- it's a great,~ uh, ~excuse to tell ourselves. It's a really easy one. But then when you do dig a bit deeper, sometimes it might be about, am I feeling too guilty to do something for me? Am I feeling like I'm not supposed to do something for me? Am I supposed to be doing everything for everyone else?

I remember that feeling so well. Doesn't that make me a good person?

Track 1: Yep

Track 2: Feeling of not good enough, that feeling of fear of failing, all of that idea of stepping out and doing the thing that you're wanting to do. We're gonna give ourselves-- That excuse voice is gonna give us all of these reasons not to do it, because in some kind of way, it wants to keep us safe.

[00:10:00] It wants to keep us comfortable. It wants to avoid any type of pain. But that is this short-term pain that we might be avoiding, and then we miss out. We miss out on all the things that we're wanting to do

Track 1: You just caught me in a shame moment of thinking, yes, I am that person that makes excuses of I don't have time, but if I was to look in my phone at how much screen time I've had, I would just be like, you absolutely do have time. That just wasn't a priority for you

Track 2: That's all-- Me too. I mean, we're, most of us could probably look at our screen time and say it. So this is where rather than thinking, "Okay. Oh my gosh, I feel so bad. I haven't, I haven't done all these things, and I'm saying I ha- don't have time, but really I'm spending all this time in social media," why don't we start doing one small swap?

So if you love your Instagram, I love my Instagram. I mean, Instagram at the moment is hooking me in so big t- I can't even have it on my phone anymore. I'm having to delete it. But when I'm on there, [00:11:00] here's the new thing that I'm saying to myself, "You're gonna spend the first two minutes on there connecting, cheering somebody on, actually doing something positive."

I'm on there anyway, so what's a small little shift that you could make? Maybe it's when you are there spending two, you know, the two minutes that you're spending or more on Instagram, maybe that's a moment that you could do some squats at the same time or something like that. Or you could have a stretch, just combining it, spending two minutes of what you're already doing or having that simple little shift rather than thinking, "Right, I gotta get off this thing, and I'm not doing it, and I feel so bad, and I'm terrible, and I'm doing all this stuff."

Again, no, no, no. None of that. Just add in, drop in into your day one two-minute move, one two-minute moment that actually helps you feel the way you wanna feel, sends you in the direction of where you're wanting to go. Small thing because it is really, really easy [00:12:00] to feel all the shame and all the guilt around all this stuff, and that is the last thing that we want, isn't it?

Track 1: Yeah. And like, you know, we're capable people, but we get stuck. Like, admin professionals are incredibly capable people, as you're aware. You have an executive assistant, you know? They manage competing priorities, they solve problems, they keep other people moving. So, you know, why can the people who are the most effective at helping everyone else still become completely stuck when it comes to their own priorities, do you think?

Track 2: Yeah, I think that there's really something to be said for admin assistants about what my doctor told me ~that day ~about putting your own oxygen mask on first, so you're able to assist others. But it's a really, really hard thing to do, especially if you are a giver, and you give a lot, and you spend your day, right, what can I do for someone else?

I've got to do that thing for someone else, right? All of this, everything seems to be for other people, so you get in that habit of that's what you do. You're constantly giving, giving, giving, giving, [00:13:00] giving. So how do we do this whole oxygen mask thing? We can look at it as simply a moment in your day. You can actually get the visual of that oxygen mask coming down in an emergency and just putting it on, and it's like taking this big gulp of, of oxygen.

You don't have to sit there and have it on for 30 minutes or 60 minutes. It's just kind of like this, this moment. You put it on. So what does that look like for you? What is the smallest thing that you can do in your day for yourself? Is that a moment where you simply walk outside, look up at a tree, and breathe for two minutes?

Is it when you're on your chair and you finish a big phone call, having just a simple stretch in your chair for two minutes? Is it when you are feeling like you're,~ uh, ~quite depleted and empty? What is something that you can do? A walk out in the garden,~ uh,~ [00:14:00] writing something down, connecting, whatever it is.

There's always something that you could do for that oxygen mask on that just two minutes or less. And how I would start is looking where you're gonna do that in your day, the one place you're gonna do it. And I know you're probably all incredible at doing so many different things, and you would look, listen to me think, "Right, I'm gonna start doing it here.

I'm gonna start doing it here. I'm gonna do it here, here, here, and here." No, we're not gonna do that. One thing, just one thing. Think about when you could take that two minutes just for you, so you can start building that muscle of giving back to yourself. Maybe it is when you flick the switch on the kettle to boil for water for some cup of tea, and maybe that's when you can put your hands on your kitchen bench and do some push-ups Maybe it's just before you're about to get out of your car, whether that's come back to your family or go to a meeting, whatever it is.

Is that a [00:15:00] moment where you can close your eyes and take a few deep breaths? It sounds so small, it sounds so simple, but the reason why this is so much better than nothing is because it gets you unstuck. It gets you out of that habit of not doing anything for you. And once you start doing something for yourself...

I remember when I first started doing my pliés at my kitchen bench, I would be in bed at night going through all the things that I had done wrong that day, or hadn't got done that day, or didn't do good enough, or done all this sort of stuff. And I'd say to myself, "Oh, you know what? You did that two minutes at your kitchen bench.

Good on you. That's great." And that gives you that sense of achievement, and that feels good. And then you can say, "Do that again tomorrow." Start with that. Start with the one thing for just two minutes

Track 1: Yeah. Well, what do you think's actually happening when we know what we need to do, but we still just can't make ourselves begin?

Track 2: Oh gosh, [00:16:00] where do we begin? We are so designed to keep ourselves safe, and we are so designed to,~ uh, ~avoid pain and just go to, to pleasure because that was essential for our survival. And so we see the pleasure as just staying where we are and not doing the thing. So that's avoiding ~the,~ the pain of the doing, doing the thing.

So it's our biological wiring. So there's nothing wrong with us. We're not lazy. We're not broken. We don't need more willpower. We don't need anything like that. That's just how we are designed. So that's why we need to put some things in place to make it a whole lot easier for ourselves so that we can go, "Okay, yeah, I get it.

I can see what I'm doing here. I can see that I'm trying to avoid the pain. I'm trying to stay safe. I'm trying to stay comfortable, trying to conserve energy," all the things that I used to have to do, we used to have to do back in the day that we don't have to do anymore. So I think that's [00:17:00] why it happens , but I think it's really then very easy for us to start to blame ourselves, to think there's something wrong with us.

How come I can't get myself to do the thing I know I need to do? It's fine. It's hard. We can acknowledge it's hard. So let's now make it so much easier. Let's lower our expectations of ourselves, which are so high of all the things we have to achieve and the way we have to do things, otherwise it's not good enough.

Break it down super, super small, and then what we're gonna be doing in the conference is cheering ourselves on for when we do take that little step, and we've got some, we've got some fun things~ in the,~ in the goodie bags for that too

Track 1: Ooh, I love that. But tell me, how can we tell the difference between genuinely needing rest and avoiding something if it feels uncomfortable? And I don't even mean just like exercise. I mean, I struggle to drink a liter of water a day, and I know I'll feel better [00:18:00] for it, but I don't do it. It's sitting...

It's literally sitting here, Lizzie. I haven't touched it. I could strap it to my face and I won't touch it. Like, why?

Track 2: do you think, first of all

Track 1: I, avoidance. I don't, I don't want it. It's not

Track 2: in, okay, yeah

Track 1: I, ~I d-~ I don't like water. ~ I don't, I don't... ~I don't... But I know I'll feel better for it, and I know it's great for my body, and I know, like, what, it's really not that hard~ to,~ just take a couple of sips. But my, my brain is like, "Nah, don't want it. Don't want it."

Track 2: Don't wanna. I mean, it doesn't help that you don't like it. That, that, that's hard. ~Um, ~yeah,

Track 1: was wine, maybe it'd be different, you

Track 2: wine, a bit of gin in there, but yeah, water. Okay, so we need to set this up something that, you're gonna do, and I feel like this, you might need to call in some bigger guns, and I feel like for this one, have you ever tried giving a [00:19:00] reward?

Track 1: I mean, I know the reward will be I'll feel less crap. I know that I will feel less brain fog. I know I will feel hydrated. I know that there's reward involved in it, but I just don't do it. And yet, as I just said before, I can track that I've spent how much time~ on f- ~on my screen. During that time, I could have been having sips per scroll.

Like, it, it is just an excuse, isn't it?

Track 2: It really is just an excuse. I wonder whether you're starting too big. Because you don't like drinking water, and you're saying to yourself you have to drink the liter of water, the big thing every day. And so then you get to the end of the day, and you, "Ah, haven't done it again. What's wrong with me?" So could we make it so...

Start off with having... getting yourself to drink. Find a really cute little glass or something you like, ~uh,~ or a nice wine glass or something like that with a squeeze of lime in it, and you've got that sitting on your [00:20:00] desk. And let's see if you can start w- even just start with, I don't know how much you're currently drinking, but just increase it just a tiny bit from what you're currently drinking.

We set these big, lofty goals for ourselves, and we th- just think, "Why can't I do it? I know it's good for me," all that kind of stuff. So, okay, let's first of all make it smaller. Then we can change the environment, so that's the environment of the actual, for you, the glass itself. So you're there with this water bottle, and you're thinking, "Oh, I know.

I gotta drink the water bottle." Let's put it in something nice. Put it in something lovely, and then every time you take that sip of water, I want you to look in the reflection of your laptop, or if you've got a window next to you or a mirror or something like that. You're gonna have a lovely sip l- sip of water, and you're gonna give yourself a cheers. And you're gonna say, "Good on you." Sip and cheers. Look at you go. You've taken that one sip of water. Well done. Well done. We're not worried. We're throwing out the [00:21:00] idea of having to do a liter of it. We're throwing out the idea of it has to be this certain amount or a certain amount of time, everything.

What is the smallest thing that you can start doing, that smaller shift? And then cheers. Well done. You did it

Track 1: That's so true. It's like, okay, d- then don't force it to be a liter. You know, have a half a liter, have a cup, have a something smaller and stop making the goal something where you're gonna feel guilty about it. Make it something that you can cheers yourself and have a win over.

Track 2: There's no perfect police. The perfect police is not going to come and knock on your door that you didn't get to that liter of water today.

Track 1: Yep. Yep. So bring it back to what, like we need to, we, we do need, we know we need to do this stuff, and for the people who feel like they just can't like shift, they're like, ~you know, ~I guess what is the difference between genuinely needing rest and avoiding something because it feels uncomfortable? Like,

Track 2: Yes,~ we went off, ~we went off track there. The water bottle.

Track 1: but I did, I did.

I got distracted by the water bottle, but I know like for me, I'm [00:22:00] genuinely tired at the end of the day. I know that I need to rest. I need to get away from screen time. I need to do that. But because I'm possibly ADD, everyone else in my family is diagnosed,~ um,~ my second wind comes at night, and so at 11:00 PM I'm fired up.

I'm ready to go again. And I'm like, "No, you genuinely need to have rest now." But the guilt of yeah, but you've still got emails that you need to get back to, or you've still got to do this. Like

what, what's the difference between genuinely needing rest and avoiding... I guess I do feel uncomfortable by not having work there that I haven't done, and I'm like, you didn't get to that, as you said.

you find reasons to curse yourself of what you didn't do in a day

Track 2: Yeah, that's right. I mean, it's tricky because that 11 o'clock time, you- we do-- I mean, I find that all the time as well. It's just that, boom, okay, let's, let's go. Let's fire. Um, so I quite know what to do about that. But when we come back to this idea of this need for genuine rest and then, uh, compared to, right, let's do something for myself that's going to energize me, it's, yeah, it's this tricky, tricky balance.

So I had long COVID,

Track 1: Yeah

[00:23:00] Oh

Track 2: experienced such crazy fatigue from this thing. I mean, I was the energizer, and it was during ~c-~ during COVID, I was,~ you know,~ getting up in the night ~and, ~and doing live streams all around the world and energizing people and all that kind of stuff. And all I ever wanted to do, even when I wasn't getting up in the middle of the night, all I wanted to do from the moment I woke up to the moment I got back to bed is sleep.

it's like, when can I sleep? I just need to rest. I just need ~to,~ to sleep. And so I think it's really, really important to acknowledge sometimes when we do have that fatigue, and we are really low on energy, is sometimes we need to sleep. We need to rest. And then there is [00:24:00] this other side of it where we are feeling fatigued, we are feeling really tired, and sometimes that comes from the fact that we haven't really moved much in our day, and we have been on back-to-back meetings, and we have been on the phone, and we have been sitting down for a long time, and all that tiredness.

Then we go and we sit on the couch, and we just, we wanna crash. We just, we do not have the energy. And in that situation, it's often because we haven't put any energy out. And so it's just important to acknowledge between that, that chronic fatigue, that burnout feeling, that just, I just need to, to really, really rest to, okay, this is a day where I have been, yeah, doing a lot of sitting, giving a lot to other people.

So really, this is the moment where if I could do something that's gonna give m- me energy, ~it's, ~it's the moment to choose it. Again, you can say to yourself, just two minutes. What can I do now for just two minutes? I feel really tired. I feel like [00:25:00] I'm-- need to rest. What can I do so that~ I've,~ I've done something for myself, ~for my, ~for my energy?

Whether that is something that you're eating, something that you're doing physically. Is it some reaching out to someone? Some way to put your oxygen mask on first

Track 1: Yeah. Can I ask, ~h-~ has it affected you still to this day, or did you recover, or is this something you're gonna have to deal with

Track 2: I feel like I've recovered, and then sometimes it hits me again, but very rarely now,~ which is,~ which is amazing. I appreciate my energy so much after ex- after experiencing that, that's for sure. And the problem, the big problem was is that I didn't tell anybody because I felt so ashamed at the fact that I was so tired and that I wanting to sneak back and go to bed all the time. I was so ashamed of that. And it was only when I finally told a girlfriend and she said, "Oh yeah, my husband's been experiencing that too, and he went to a [00:26:00] doctor and they said it was long COVID." I'm like, "Okay. Right. There's nothing wrong with me." And it lifted up this shame Something about that talking to people or talking to the right person or going to see the right doctor, whatever that is, that really helps in those times where you do feel that shame around the way that you're feeling. Just so important, I think, now. I see that now. Why did I keep that a secret? Why did I have so much shame around the fact that I was so tired?

It's crazy now looking back, but that's exactly where my head was at, and it's really easy for us to slip into that shame, especially those of us who are real doers and achievers, and we get stuff done. And then when we can't, it's like, "Oh, gosh, there's something wrong with me."

Track 1: Yes. Yes. Immediately there's something wrong with me.

Yeah. We, ~I,~ I feel like we can get, like we can spend so much time planning and researching and prepping that it feels like we're working, but we haven't actually taken a first step, researching~ the,~ the program, researching [00:27:00] the run you're gonna do, the route you're gonna do, the,~ you know, uh,~ all the thing- the diet you're gonna do, but then actually putting it into play, like

Track 2: You know what that is? That's resistance

Track 1: yeah, and an excuse.

Track 2: It's a resistance. And we all do it. We all have resistance. If you wanna know more about, ~um, ~resistance, read the book War on Art. It's fantastic. And~ it, it's,~ it's acknowledging that, going, "Oh, okay, here-- look at what I'm doing here. I am just, yeah, doing all in,~ you know,~ all the kind of easier, easy stuff."

~Uh, ~sometimes not always easy, but you know what I mean. Just like doing all that so I don't have to actually do the hard thing. And it's really good to look at resistance as a signal in a way. The greater the resistance, the more you wanna do the thing, the more you need to do the thing. The greater that resistance, the more that you're researching, do all that stuff.

Use it as signal going, "Oh, whoa, okay, I am just going for it [00:28:00] on the resistance here. This is my sign where I actually have to do the thing. What can I do for just two minutes that's gonna start me off~ and k- ~and kick this thing on its way?"

Track 1: Yeah. And look, the, I don't want to discredit it. There is absolutely a, an incredible amount of overwhelm in the admin profession. ~Uh, you know, ~obviously admin professionals, ~they, ~they often work in reactive environments, so their day can be dictated by urgent requests and competing executives and other people's priorities and whatnot.

But, ~you know, a- ~a- how do you think constantly reacting to everyone else affects our ability to just begin our own important work for ourself?

Track 2: Oh my goodness. I mean, ~it m- ~so, so challenging when there's always stuff coming at you, coming at you. If you think about-- have you ever seen one of those scenes in a movie or after a sporting game or some political environment where there's someone there, they've got the microphone, and out there is all the, the journalists and all the people, and they're [00:29:00] saying, "Hey, over here, over here, and here's my question, here's my question, here's my question"?

I would look at you as an admin professional, as that person at the microphone with just everything just coming at you, at you, at you, at you, at you. So what do you do in that situation? It's so, so hard, and I like to always think about there-- bring someone into that room in your imagination who's the moderator, and you've got this external moderator, and that moderator is gonna go look around and go, "Okay, what's really important here?

Who's gonna get the first question? You. You get the first question. Go. Okay. Now you get the question, and go." So start to try and just let that moderator take control of that room so that not everything is coming at you. And then at some point, when everything is coming at you, this is your moment. Go, "Whoa, okay, oxygen mask, it's come, it's come down.

I'm pulling it down." Take that breath of air, that oxygen, get that energy for yourself, [00:30:00] and then keep going. there is so much stuff that is out of your control, and ~that's the--~ that all goes into that out-of-control bucket. I bring an out-of-control bucket of- often with me on stage, and what goes in there is often all that stuff that's coming at you.

Okay. What is in your control? What are the things that you can do for yourself to help you cope with everything that's coming at you? And that's where-- I mean, and we'll do this at the conference, build this toolkit of two-minute moves that really helps you in those moments where you need to reset after someone's ~, you know,~ asked you something that's knocked you a bit, or you need to recharge when it's just been one thing after the other after the other.

Maybe it's a refocus. Whatever it is, there are ways that we can use our body's physiology to help in those moments, and if you can sprinkle them in, then you get to the end of your day and go, "Okay, whoa, that has been a full-on day. It's been overwhelming. [00:31:00] So much coming at me, but how good that I did those, that small little thing for me throughout the day to help with my brain, to help with my body, to help in the way I'm reacting."

Track 1: Yeah. Do, do you think unfinished tasks consume us more than men- like, more mental energy than we realize? Like, a- as you're just saying, ~like,~ doing that thing where you should be two minutes of well done, what you did, tick. But then the unfinished tasks, ~you're, you're,~ you're letting that consume ~your,~ your mental energy and, ~you know, d-~ taking the focus off the wins.

~Um, ~and I guess in the same breath, like, do you reckon there's almost a bit of a danger that people try and change too much at once? Or, they're trying to learn a new tool or do this and do that, and they're feeling like they're failing at doing all of those things, but they're not focused on the fact that actually you set a goal today that you were gonna go for a five-minute walk.

You were gonna walk out of the office today and get some sunshine, and you achieve that. Like, why, why can't you just focus on that and be happy [00:32:00] that you did that one thing today that, that helped?

Track 2: Just know that your brain is always gonna go to the negative. It's always gonna go to that unfinished task. It's always gonna go to the thing that's wrong. It's always gonna go to what's wrong with you, all the doubts, all that kind of stuff. It's wired that way. It's like red berries, that's dangerous.

Rustle in the bush, that's dangerous. We might die. There might be a tiger. That's just wh- just always the brain just goes to... It's looking for the negative. Keep us alive. doesn't have to do that anymore, and we can rewire our brain to go from that negative to the positive. Now, it takes work, and it takes intentional moments that you take to do this, but it is totally possible.

I know it because I've done it. When you catch yourself in a pattern, we've all probably got some kind of pattern, a negative loop. So for you, it might be constantly going, "I haven't finished that. I haven't done that," the constant unfinished thing. ~Um, ~"I didn't do that well enough." ~Um,~ whatever, ~that, uh, you know, uh, you know,~ "Look what...

I don't like what I see in the mirror," all that kind of stuff. So whatever that loop [00:33:00] is for you, you could pick one. And then for me, it was when I was a dancer, and I ship dancer. I was told I needed to lose weight, and then I just from then on just had all these battles with my body and body demons.

Had two little girls, decided I did not wanna do that anymore. And so I made this decision when I, my brain went to that loop, when I'd, say, look in the mirror and didn't like what I see, said something negative about myself, I would catch it and say, "No, no, I don't speak to myself like that." And I would say something positive about myself.

And this I did for years and years, and I still do it, but it's very, very rare now that I will look in the mirror and say something negative about myself. And if I do it, I'll go, "Whoa, whoa. Hold on. We don't do that anymore," and go to the positive. So you can rewire it. It's just I would choose one thing that you keep beating yourself up about.

[00:34:00] So if that is unfinished task, oh, I haven't, I haven't... And it doesn't feel good. Of course, unfinished tasks don't feel good. But, ~uh, ~if your loop is, "I haven't done enough today," then you start to rewire that loop of what I did today. and maybe if that is your thing that, that negative thing you always go to, maybe at nighttime spend two minutes writing down the things that were your wins.

What were your wins For today? So ~that's,~ that's what you think about when you go to sleep, those wins rather than all the, the things that you have, you know, the losses or the things that hasn't worked out or your things you haven't done.

Track 1: Yeah.

Track 2: The self-talk we have is so, so powerful, and our brains are so malleable,

Track 1: Угу

Track 2: really give it some work, which is why I would say choose one thing that you are going to start to notice, and then start to talk back, write back, whatever it is that you want to change

Track 1: Yeah. Okay, let's talk about the two-minute [00:35:00] method. Talk me through it

Track 2: Okay, first step is the mindset, and we've talked about this. So it's this mindset of changing that all or nothing to all or something. Something is better than nothing. So two minutes is so much better than no minutes. So when you hear that voice in your head saying, "Oh, no, no, no, I need the-- I, I need more time.

I've gotta wait until I've got more energy. I've gotta wait, wait, wait. Wait until the conditions are perfect," the mindset is to stop waiting and to do something, take one step, whether that's two minutes, a tiny step, whatever it is, something that's really, really achievable that none of your excuses or obstacles or very real challenges can get in the way of doing.

So you say to yourself, "Just two minutes. What's something I can do?" The second step part of it is the actual, the two-minute move, and often we do this to help us change our state, to change our physiology, because we can get really, really stuck in our emotions. So [00:36:00] that could be some small shift. So it could be some kind of physical activity for two minutes, whatever feels good for you.

It could be having a dance, could be having a walk, it could be having a stretch. It could be spending two minutes of writing down what you're grateful for. and it could be two minutes of connecting with somebody, sending them a message to say you're grateful for them. It could be two minutes of looking out into your garden.

It could be two minutes of putting up your hands and having a box or a shake it out, something like that. And I worked with these nurses, and they, their children's hospital each day or night, and the door closed behind them. Between the door and their car, they would start to shake. So they'd shake, shake it off.

This idea of just shaking off, breathing through, moving through, something to kind of interrupt that, that feeling that's keeping us stuck. So using our physiology, our body. And then the third step is [00:37:00] the momentum, and this is how we make it stick. These are the things that we put in place. I've got a whole lot of strategies in the book, and we'll be doing this at the conference as well, all these ways of how you can keep going, take action, and get unstuck, particularly on those days that feel really hard

Track 1: Yeah. And for the type As~ in the,~ in the listeners, is the goal to complete an entire task in two minutes or simply just create enough momentum to continue or just find the two minutes to just do something

Track 2: Are there any people on this, listening to this~ uh, ~ that aren't type A, Candace? So the goal is to get you... So you're standing there at the starting line, and you're seeing that, ~you know,~ you look up and you're like, "Whoa, th- I've got a marathon ahead of me here today." So we're not gonna look at that. We're gonna look down and look at your feet there at the starting line there, and the goal is to find something you can do to take that foot up, step [00:38:00] it over the starting line.

That's it. That's all we're talking about in two minutes. It's not s- set a time and see how much work you can get done in, in two minutes. It's this idea of what can that step be that gets me unstuck, and what's the smallest, smallest step I can take? Because what happens then is then if, actually, if that first step is so hard, so you take it so, so small and you celebrate it, and then right, go for another one at some point, and then another and another.

And then slowly over time you start to build that momentum and it gets you going. But recognizing that two minutes is so much better than no minutes, taking the smallest step, even if you don't finish the thing, even if it doesn't look like what you think it has to look like, even if it's completely out of all the rules that you have in your head about what something has to look like if you're going to do it, especially if you're type A.[00:39:00]

It's this idea of something is so much better than nothing. Two minutes is so much better than no minutes. Two minutes is achievable. You can do two minutes, and that's all you need to do to start.

Track 1: And what about something like, ~you know,~ can you give an example of how someone might apply the method to a task they've been pro- procrastinating on or, like, something more emotional or difficult? Like, if they're preparing for a salary conversation or trying to set a boundary or raising an issue with an executive or something that you're just like, "Oh, God, I know I need to do this, but I just don't wanna."

Track 2: In those situations, I would definitely recommend spending just two minutes changing your state in some kind of way. So whether that is before a big conversation or something, you can get, in your imagination you can do this, or you could get a real one. The idea of when we are about to have those hard conversations or do something hard and how just the, our body, I mean, you can see it, feel it sometimes, the tension, everything contracts in.

This is a moment we [00:40:00] wanna roll shoulders back and use your imagination or get a real one. So here's where we want to imagine that we are walking into a phone booth. We open up the door, we close the door behind us.

We grab a cape or some kind of superhero outfit, and we put it on. The cape is on. We start the shoulders back. What would superhero version of me do here? Chin up slightly, shoulders back. You could power pose with your hands on your hips if you like. And then what's happening in this moment is your brain's going, "Whoa, whoa, what is happening?"

'Cause all of a sudden you've gone from contracted, worried, anxious, everything, like, into this shoulders back superhero version of you. Walk around the office for a couple of minutes with a real cape on if you want to. And your brain thinks, "Whoa, okay." And then what happens then, other people perceive you as more confident as well.

So in a way it's like a trick of your brain, but it's this shift [00:41:00] in your physiology. So spending that few minutes before those situations is one of the most valuable things you can do, whether that is having your feet on the floor, feel your feet grounded down into the floor like you're a tree and the roots of the tree are going down ~through the,~ through the earth and you're connected there.

Whatever is that emotion ~that you,~ that you need. If you're feeling kind of pent up and got that resentment or some sort of anger, can you get a pillow, put it on your chair, and just have a bit of a punch of it out? Move through those strong emotions. We wanna get in motion, and that's how we move through that.

So that's definitely what I would do in that type of situation

Track 1: Yep. ~My,~ my tip of what I do, and that people know this of me, is that if I put my, my power lipstick on, if I put on a bright red or a bright pink or ... I call it my war paint, it means she's on. She's on. I just ... ~It,~ it completely changes from cas can to, to [00:42:00] here we are. Like, we're, we're ready. Let's do this. ~Um, ~and it's just been my thing that whenever I pull out the lipstick and put it on, it's like, it's go time.

It's ... That's my change of state of mind

Track 2: There you go. Yes. How, I mean, how simple is that? But so often we don't do stuff like that because we're just powering on through and, "Okay, gotta do this, da, da, da, da, da." And that's, for me, that lipstick moment for you, that's the oxygen mask dropping down, taking that breath of oxygen. You put your lipstick on, that's that moment for you, and then you keep going.

We can all find moments like that in our day. It's just getting in that habit, getting in that mindset of those small things like that do actually really matter

Track 1: And look, you are known that your keynotes are very highly interactive and involve movement. There's gonna be no one that's gonna be able to hide or sit, sit quietly and think that they can not be part of what your, keynote is going to involve. But what is the connection between moving the body and changing the [00:43:00] energy and becoming more willing to act ~with, with, ~with the group?

Track 2: It seems like it's such a reflection on us, and it seems like the less that we move, the more that we kind of lose that, that energy, that involvement, that it's hard to stay connected. It's hard to stay focused. I-- A long time ago, I would be in conferences before I was a speaker, and I'd look around and I'd see people had been there in that same position for quite a long time.

And even if the speakers were great, it's really hard for us to stay energized and engaged when our body is so still and sedentary. And I would think if I could just get up on this stage and get everyone moving, I know this whole energy in this room would s- shift. And so that's what I first started doing.

I convinced conference organizers to get me up there. Two minutes is what I started with, and I saw it straight [00:44:00] away because our bodies reward us when we move, because movement was essential for our survival back in the day. So when we move, our brain, for example, releases BDNF, brain-derived neurotrophic factor.

It's essentially like fertilizer for your brain, the way our brain cells communicate with each other. We release oxytocin, we release endorphins, we release endocannabinoids, which is our body's chill pill. When our muscles contract, we release myokines, which scientists have dubbed hope molecules. It's a-- it's like an inner pharmacy that we've got inside of us, and we activate that inner pharmacy.

We get that lovely pill or that potion without any side effects, and it's all free. We get it from being physically active if we're able to, if we're lucky enough to be able to. And so this tool that is such an easy shift to use, and especially for me as a speaker with my [00:45:00] audience, not only do I want them to see that, okay, here's all the things that I can take back into my day so that I can feel in those moments more confident, more energized.

I feel like I can s- you know, show up in the way I'm wanting to show up, but also what happens there in,~ in,~ the room. It's a beautiful feeling. It's like collective effervescence. When people move, they laugh, they smile, and something shifts in the entire room as well. And look, sometimes

Track 2: and I get it.

~Uh,~ but I've, I've got some tricks up my sleeve to make it so that people wanna do it. Don't you worry about that.

Track 1: I bet you do. The, the, I bet you do, and I'm very excitable for, very excited for it.~ Um, ~but what about building the sustainable momentum? So, you know, you, you get all this, you've got your tools, you're feeling good, and then, you know, how do you keep the momentum going? Like,~ you know,~ what, what happens if you miss a day or fall back into old [00:46:00] patterns?

Track 2: Yeah. Well, that's very normal, and that's okay. It, it's happens to all of us. We all fall off the wagon. We all are doing really well, and then something happens, and it just knocks us off our routine. Maybe we've got sick kids at home, there's a deadline, a boss needs more from us, whatever that is. And so I think, first of all, it's giving ourselves that grace that that's okay.

We're so human. This idea that we gotta keep up that habit every single day and, and do all these things, and it's not, not realistic. It's real life. Stuff

Track 1: Yeah.

Track 2: And so I really like this, this visual of, y- say there's a, the wagon, so the idea of falling ~off the,~ off the wagon or fall off the horse, whatever it is.

Let's u- y- let's use a horse. So you're, you're there, and you're, you're on the horse, so you're, you're doing that daily habit. You're drinking your water every day. You're feeling really good. [00:47:00] And maybe then you get a bit sick. maybe something happens, and you fall off, off the horse, so you're no longer on the horse.

And it's really easy when that happens, just think, "Oh, gosh,~ I cannot, I, h- h- that's..." You know, ~you've lost that momentum. You lost that feeling. It's that, that's now kinda gone Have that visualization that that horse that you fell off, still there right next to you, and it's, it's walking along with you, it's going along with you in your day-to-day.

~It hasn't-- ~you haven't left it behind you, when you fell off it. ~It's just been,~ it's just been there the whole time just waiting for you to hop back on. It's right there. And so it's like, "Okay. All right. Let's get back on it." And so that way it's not that idea of, oh, it's, it's all, you know, I've done bad.

~Uh,~ it's all too late, all that sort of stuff. It's like, "Yeah, get back on the horse. ~It's,~ it's right there. What's the smallest thing I could do right now to get back on?" Just leave that shame, leave that guilt, leave the not good enough right behind [00:48:00] you and look, "Okay, right. What's one thing I can do right now?"

So to keep up that, keep up the momentum is this idea of with me, one of the things I'm really wanting to do is my weights, doing weights every day. In perimenopause, keeping stronger, big priority for me. And so I've got my two dumbbells at my, front door. And so my deal is Monday to Friday in the morning, often when I get back from doing something or have a walk or drop someone off, my deal is I have to lift up these weights, before I, you know, get going with all the other stuff and with work and everything.

And the amount of times I look at this wei- these weights and think, "Oh, no, no, I'm not gonna do it. I'm gonna do the dishwasher first. Oh, you know what? I'm just gonna do that email. Let's do that email first, and I've gotta actually do that pro..." pretty much every single day I do

Track 1: Yep.

Track 2: And, and then what do I say to myself? Can you guess it? " Just two minutes. That's all you have to do. you know what?" And, "Oh, no, I don't wanna do two min..." Fine. You need to [00:49:00] lift them up and do one bicep

curl. That's it. That's all you have to do. And so that's what I'll do. I'll lift them up, do one bicep curl. And some days, I've gotta tell you, I've put them down after doing that bicep curl.

I didn't even wanna do the two minutes. That's, you know, s- that's fine. One bicep curl, there you go, I've done it. And the reason why that is so good that I just lifted and done that one bicep curl rather than none at all is because that day I've still done something. And I've done that thing that I said I was going to do, and I've lifted them up, and I've put them back down again.

Well, sometimes it'll go two minutes, sometimes I'll end up going longer. It doesn't matter. What matters is I've actually taken a little bit of action. So if you get to the end of your day, T- Candice, and you go, "You know what? Argh, I didn't do the water thing. I should've done that," pick up that water and have a sip of it Done it, great.

If [00:50:00] there's something that you're, when you're listening and you're thinking, "Oh, yeah, there's that habit I've been really wanting to do and I just haven't, not doing it," , what is the smallest thing you... If you're like, "Right, I'm gonna eat really healthily," and you get to the end of the day and, "Oh, no, I didn't eat really healthily today," ~chop up, ~chop off a bit of a carrot and eat the carrot.

Do something, just a little something that you can do every day if you can. Otherwise, just get back on the horse when you've fallen off. What's the smallest thing you can do each day? 'Cause that's how you start to build that, that momentum, and it makes it so much easier to keep up the momentum. Don't listen to the voice in your head that says, " Not enough.

i'm, excuse me, one bicep curl, one chomp of a carrot, one sip of water, not enough." We don't listen to that voice. That's our excuse voice. We listen to our excuse buster voice that says, "That's enough. I don't, not gonna wait. I'm just gonna do just two minutes or less."

Track 1: Yep. And so we're gonna be talking [00:51:00] in depth about this at the Sydney conference. You're gonna be closing out with your keynote. So, ~it's,~ it's gonna be at the end of a full day of learning. ~Um,~ and we know that ~your, uh,~ your sessions are very interactive. ~Um,~ everyone will be getting a copy of your new book.

Can we have a ~quick,~ quick highlight about that?

Track 2: Yes, that's right. Yes, everyone will. I'm so, so excited. This book was Title is Just Two Minutes, and how I wrote it was saying to myself each day, "Just two minutes." Because everyone would always say to me, ~"How... I~ I don't have the time. How do you make time to write a book?" "Well, I've written three of them." And I'll say, "It is that.

It's just two minutes." I put it on my voice memo app on my phone, and sometimes I would be there going, "Oh, I don't even know what to say. Just two-- I don't feel like it. I don't wanna do it today." Just two minutes go, speak. And that's what I would do. Sometimes that's all I had. There's so many two-minute voice memo apps on my phone, hundreds of them.

Sometimes that would turn into 20 minutes. Sometimes there's even ones there that are [00:52:00] longer than that. ~Uh, ~it doesn't matter. So this idea of, ~um, ~of putting what I learnt over the years into practice, all the stories that I've heard from people, all the different ways that we get stuck, all the different things we say to ourselves that are, are keeping us from taking action.

Sometimes that's comparison,~ it's,~ it's the guilt, it's the doom thinking. There's a chapter on motivation, or as I like to call it, no-tivation. So all these things that we say to ourself, and then write what's our practical way that we can bust through that and take action anyway?

Track 1: Yeah. And as I was saying, your sessions are, aren't designed to be passive sit and learn type presentations. You know, should the Sydney audience arrive ready to get involved?

Track 2: They can arrive however they like because by the end, all of those groans that everyone's gonna be doing at the beginning, I money back guarantee you will have turned to [00:53:00] gratitude

Track 1: I love that. And if you wanna see a little sneaky peek of that, check out ~Lizzie Williams~ lizzie williams.com, and you will see some clips of, of what goes on in those sessions.

Track 2: Yeah, lots of, yeah,

Track 1: it there.

Track 2: lizzywilliamson.com and then,

Track 1: wanna know, you n- you need to come and experience it for yourself. But okay, I, I'm, , mindful of time here, but I just wanna do a quick two-minute challenge.

So before we finish up, what is a one, like a two-minute challenge, ~uh,~ that every admin could try ~when they're trying, when th-~ when they get back to their desk on Monday?

Track 2: Yes. Here's what I want you to do. So often we beat ourselves up and~ tell us all--~ tell ourselves all the things that we haven't done enough of, we've done wrong, all that kind of stuff. So, now take a deep breath and get your phone and press record on the Voice Memo app and spend two minutes recording a voice memo that's cheering yourself on, that's telling yourself what an amazing job you're doing, all the [00:54:00] things that you have maybe, ~you know,~ overcome that, that day or that week or that you're doing something that if you were gonna, gonna send a voice memo to a really great friend to give them a big pep talk, then that's what you're gonna say to yourself.

It's a two-minute pep talk. Then you are gonna now have that in your phone, and when you need to, you can press play on that two-minute pep talk because other people can cheer us on, other people can tell us you're doing a great job. Maybe they don't tell us as much as we wanna hear it, but there is something very, very powerful about you doing that for yourself.

I will cheer you on till the cows come home because I think you are incredible at what you do, and now it's time for you to cheer yourself on. Just two

Track 1: So true. S-

Track 2: You can do two minutes

Track 1: you can do two minutes and, gosh, you know, if you can't listen to yourself in those moments, and we all have those moments where we lock ourselves in a toilet cubicle and go, "What am I doing?" If you can't [00:55:00] listen to yourself telling yourself that you're a good person and you've done great things and this is situational or it's, ~you know, y- you know that,~ that those moments a moment, exactly that, and that you, you still got so many other great things that you're doing, but we get so caught up in, in that moment.

And that's what I love about ~your, ~your message, Lizzie, is that, you know, it removes the pressure to completely overhaul your life or your career or your working habits, and you don't need to wait until you have more time, more energy, more confidence, you know, the perfect plan. You know, it, it... w- when something feels too big, you're saying make the action small, and that's something we all really can do.

~We, we, a-~ as I'm saying this, I'm like, "You are the queen of, Lizzie's the tr- the, ~uh,~ excuse buster. I'm the excuse queen. Like I will find a reason to not do these things, but I, I can't argue with two minutes to do something to break it, to break the cycle. I can't argue with that. I have two minutes. I have two minutes to be able to do this.[00:56:00]

So~ I, ~I really love this message and, ~uh, you know,~ obviously I don't wanna say too much because I'm so excited to be having you at the, ~uh,~ Sydney conference to be closing us out for the day. ~Um,~ but yeah, you too can experience Lizzie, ~uh,~ closing out the conference and learn about the two minutes,~ uh,~ by also getting her book as well, which we'll put the details in the show notes, but by attending the, ~uh, ~I mean, Avenues Conference in Sydney on Monday the 12th of October at Dalton House Hyde Park.

And after a full day of learning, this will be the perfect way to leave the conference feeling really energized and connected and ready to take action. It's a real big connection piece, isn't it?

Track 2: It is. A lot of connection. You'll leave feeling very connected. Who doesn't want more of that? And the other thing is we're gonna have some fun, and who doesn't need, at the moment, a bit of good old fun?

Track 1: need some fun in our lives. Absolutely. So Lizzie, thank you so much for taking the time to join me today. We cannot wait to bring this session to life in Sydney. ~Um,~ as I said, we'll put all the details for how you connect, connect with Lizzie and find out [00:57:00] about her new book, ~uh,~ in the show notes.

But, ~uh,~ yeah, really, really excited for Sydney and yeah, I'm just, I'm so excited. I just,~ I just, I,~ I had a look at, ~um,~ one of the promo videos on your website the other day and I was just like, "Oh my God, this is gonna be just so good." This is just exactly how I want the conference to end. I want it to be that high energy and that people laughing and as you said, all those chemist of feelings and serotonin and all these great things lifting and you leave being like, "Man, that was a good day.

That was a good, good day."

Track 2: Brilliant. We're gonna, we are gonna do all of that and a whole lot more, so I can't wait to see you there

Track 1: Awesome. Well, thank you again for your time. Thanks for listening everyone, and we will chat to you soon

~ uh, ~

[00:58:00]