Four myths about work that need busting

+ new favourites, updates and a workshop to devise new stories that truly serve you, your life and business

My gentle group marketing programme Grow is returning! The programme will run from 1 November to 1 April, with a break for December. Sign up for the waitlist to be the first to know about the launch (and get free bonuses and a discount).

One of the biggest reasons why many of my clients started their business is to have more flexibility and autonomy. To break free from the 9-to-5, from expectations and demands that don’t fit their lives, desires and needs.

And yet for many of us, actually breaking free from ‘regular’ work and the stories we’ve been taught about what work should be, can be really hard.

In this post, I share 4 work myths and how to reframe them. And, if you’d like to dive deeper, I’ve created a workshop to help you tackle and rewrite your own work myths, leaning into beliefs and stories that serve you instead.

Myth #1: I should work 8 hours a day

The 8-hour workday is a relic from the Industrial Age and was actually seen as a step forward: no more 12 or 14-hour days for factory workers, hurrah! But it seems that we’ve gotten so stuck on it, that for many of us, “8 hours a day” has become a stick to beat ourselves with.

Working 8 hours a day is not a rule, or a law. And for most people, actually working 8 hours a day is neither an option nor necessary. Many of us can or have to do our work in fewer hours a day.

If you struggle with this myth, try to embrace the freedom to put yourself first. How can you shape your business, including your working hours, to serve you, your needs, your body, mind and life?

Myth #2: It if feels fun or easy, I can’t charge (more) for it

My business’ tagline deliberately includes slow, gentle and profitable. Especially those of us socialised as women, and those of us that are attracted to slower, gentler ways of doing business often feel uncomfortable around making or asking for money.

Surely, if you’d create art anyway, you can’t really charge much for it? If your work feels fulfilling and fun in itself, why would you want to charge more for it?

We deserve to be paid well for our work.

I love working with clients. I love creating courses and programmes. But I’d not be doing it if I wouldn’t get paid for it—certainly not on this scale, because I’d need to get more income elsewhere.

I firmly believe that we deserve to be paid well for our work, no matter what it is, and no matter how much we love it. No matter whether we’d do it anyway.

You deserve to be paid well. Your talent, your time, your energy is valuable.

We need to talk more about money in slow business

Myth #3: What I do isn’t “real” work

If you have the freedom to work from home, from your studio, from a coffee place; if you do work that fulfils you, that you might be doing anyway—does it even count as work?

Depending on your background, you might consciously or unconsciously hold the belief that “real” work is hard work. That “real” work is a struggle. That “real” work happens in an office or a factory. That work isn’t work if it’s fun, easeful, fulfilling.

But whatever you do—your work counts as work (and, see myth #2, you deserve to be well paid for it). Your work is every bit as “real” as someone else’s, no matter where they work.

Acknowledging that what you do is work makes it easier to guard the time and energy you spend on it. To protect it and take it seriously, even amidst others’ demands and expectations.

Myth #4: Rest is earned by working

This one is the one that has been most persistent for me. Even as I consciously believed that we all deserve rest, that rest needs to be an inherent part of our days and lives no matter what we do—I struggled.

I found myself wondering why I felt like I needed rest when I hadn’t done much. Why I needed more rest when I’d already rested so much (#chroniguefatiguelife).

Rest needs to be an inherent part of our days and lives.

It’s taken me the better part of the past decade and more to shift my ideas around rest. I remind myself that rest is not just rest—it’s also ‘non-work’, and a big part of what I want to spend my life doing.

No matter what you’ve done today or this week, you are allowed to rest. You need to rest. Rest is not a reward at the end of the day, or something that you need to earn. Rest ought to be a core part of your life as a human.

Which stories and beliefs do you carry about work? And how do you want to shift them? Leave a comment to join the conversation—I’d love to hear your thoughts!

If you want to dive deeper

Becoming aware of the stories we tell ourselves about work can really help us get out of our own way—and help us design the life and business we truly crave.

I’ve created a 20-minute workshop for paid subscribers that’ll help you identify and reframe your stories about work, and formulate beliefs and stories that serve you, your life and your business best.

At the end of this workshop, you’ll feel more confident in the beliefs about work that you want to hold, and how these shape and support you, your life and your business.

» Paid subscribers: you have immediate access to this workshop right here «

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A peptalk if you're feeling strapped for time

💌 And…

Grow is returning! I had such a blast running my marketing programme Grow this spring that I decided to bring the programme back earlier than planned. Grow will run again from November 1st to April 1st, with a break for December. The programme is self-paced with lifetime access—and during the 4 months that we spend together, I give you hands-on support through the monthly recorded office hours, bi-weekly check-ins and our monthly planning calls.

a show | J and I loved Whiskey on the Rocks, a cold-war comedy filled with egos and mishaps. Tip: if you watch it, set the original language to Swedish with English subtitles to avoid the cringey English dubbing.

a book | I devoured Kamila Shamsie’s Best of Friends—such a gorgeous and moving book about decades-long friendship, and being a woman in the world (affiliate link).

a catch-up | a few weeks ago, some business friends and I caught up over Zoom. We were originally part of a mastermind programme that ran in 2021, but now we speak about so much more than just business (books, teenagers, life). It’s such a joy having these women in my life.

As always, thank you for being here, for reading and commenting. I love reading your comments and reply to every one of them✨ x

Female Owned is more than a newsletter. If you are ready to do business differently, I’d love for you to become a paid subscriber and become part of our gentle community of small business owners, freelancers and creatives. You’ll get bonus resources (the accountability club! the mini-mastermind! the new mini podcast series!) and behind-the-scenes posts right in your inbox.