 All right, welcome back to our second interview with Erica this year. She is one of the helpers in my ABC client group program. And yeah, I'm really excited to talk with you about any updates to your work recently, your experiences, your lessons, your learning. But Erica, maybe I'll just have you give you a chance to introduce yourself, how whatever you want to say today is just great. Cool. Thanks, George. It's good to be here with you. So, yeah, I'm Erica O'Kane and my work in the world is to care for people. I just happened to do that by way of Apple products. I bring an approach that is there's something great that you know how to do in this world that I have no idea about. I just happened to know about the technology. And so I'm here to be a companion rather than a do it for you kind of person. I believe that people should be able to do what we just did when I'm gone. Unless it's a one time thing, if it's a one time thing, you know, you're not going to have to do this again. Don't waste your brain energy. Let me just take care of that. But for things that people are going to have to do over and over again. I want to make sure that they can do that independently. That's great. Yes. And it's, it's unusual, right for someone who is supporting others with tech to say I care for people and that's sort of like my first goal. So that's, that's a wonderful uniqueness about your work. All right, so before we started recording, we were just talking about how you've been doing this practice. I'm going to call it net caring. You can call that if you want to but for those who, well, I'll let you describe what you're doing on a regular basis, and the kind of synchronicities effects that it's having so go ahead and share with those who are watching. Yeah. So I make it a point to reach out to three people each week, not even about business just, hey, you've been on my mind I'm thinking about you how are you doing. Sometimes when we connect we end up talking business and sometimes we don't. What I've noticed that happens though is when I am consistent in this particular practice business comes out of some other location. There's somebody that I haven't talked to for a while, or a new client gets referred to me. All of these things, they just kind of materialize out of seemingly nowhere. But I feel it, but I noticed when I don't keep up with the reaching out to three people. Those sorts of things don't happen. So I find it fascinating to watch the energy move and flow and see how it goes. It is so cool. What a simple practice and what a profound noticing of, you know, there is something, it's so weird like I often talk about how like, I'm like, unsure about law of attraction, except that I have seen it happen again and again with regards to people with regards to how we attract people into our lives and attract, you know, people reconnecting with us. So somehow, and the law of attraction, like you're activating it by actually doing the caring and the universe responds back. And it's so it's so interesting that I mean this is this is a great example because, you know, like when I talk about net carrying it's different from net working. Like if you were net working, you'd be like, Yeah, George, my networking isn't working because I talked to, you know, Sally and Sally didn't hire me again after that conversation so it's not working. Right. And that's how most of us approach it like like what do you what have been your thoughts I mean have you have you tried networking before and how's that gone. It's excruciating for me. Yes. Well, because it doesn't feel like I'm caring for the person. I'm just trying to talk to them to get something out of them. And it's like, that's, that's so out of resonance for me. And so when I'm more in resonance with who I am, which is my job is to care for people, then things just materialize. Yeah, it's now the fact that you do it consistently is is an important sort of element to this. You know, I said like if you if you want a consistent income, it probably helps to have consistent action. Maybe there's a connection there. And the and the fact that you found this action that is doable for you is really awesome because it's simple. It's connected to your energy flow. It's connected to your like your heart. You know your your sense of like, like it's good for your heart. And it's good for the other. And it's good for the energetic universal flow. Okay, so I tell us about how do you figure out which three people to reach out to. Like let's say you're doing it this week like how do you decide. Honestly, it's kind of gizmo. It's who kind of pops up into my mind. And who feels like, you know, I really would like to reach out to that person. There's somebody that I reached out to this week because we've been kind of going back and forth and memes on Facebook and basically saying, why don't you just tag me next time. And so I'm like, you know, we think kind of should have tagged each other. So would you like to get to know each other better. Yes, absolutely. I've been meaning to reach out to you too. That's awesome. Yeah. I know you're you're you've also implemented the to do with CRM type of system. For those who don't know, I made a YouTube video about you could find it just go to my YouTube channel and search or you can search on YouTube to do is CRM. And the video inside that video I actually used Erica as an example. So you can see. And so, and I'm going to be updating our notes right right now and in my to do with CRM. So does that come into play and you know, it's not that someone pops up you have to reach out to them but does that somehow remind you and come into play there for for choosing who you reach out to. If I had fully implemented this do is CRM yet, it probably would come into play more. That's one of those things that I'm still trying to get good about staying with. Yes, yes. And, you know, every person that I, you know, get in touch with put them in there and every time I have contact, make a couple of notes. That's on the project list right now. Right and it doesn't have to be every time you make contact right. It could just be like every conversation you had that was more than a minute or more than three minutes or something like that. But yeah, like every call that I have with a client. I'm definitely updating my notes there. And a colleague or. Yeah, so, but but if I like commented, like one of my students asked a question I made a comment before I don't update the, I don't get the CRM but Okay, so tell me tell us more about, like, do you tell us more about the outreach itself or the the contacting them like, like, I want to know more about. Do you prepare yourself in some way like do you like look at their profiles or something or or tell tell me more about the process of the practicalities of it. Yeah. Very often it's as simple as, hey, you've been on my mind. How are you doing. Or I saw this thing that reminded me of you. How are you doing, how's it going. And one again, it's, you know, well, in my scheduling software, I have a follow up that goes out three days after the last appointment. And it says, Hey, is there anything that you know any loose ends that need to be tied up or are there anything that you're happy with everything. By the way, this is an automated email from my scheduler so don't feel compelled to respond if you don't want to there's no pressure it's simply an opportunity to respond if you want. That's a nice way of putting it. Yeah. And so the fact that you say, how's it going. How you've been up to. I mean, that could sound pretty generic, I guess to somebody like do you do you feel like, well, first of all, how was your response rate. I generally get a response. Oh, thanks for thinking of me. You know, and it's, if there's something that's more specific to that person or if there's some particular reason that prompted me to reach out. Then of course I mentioned that and say, you know, oh, hey, I saw you know this platypus the other day and I know you like platypuses. It made me think of you. That's sweet. So I thought I'd let you know I've been thinking of you. And I guess what I'm trying to try to get is even though the message you sent sounds kind of generic, I feel like the energy behind it is not like there is a there's a palpable energetic difference between someone who we feel is kind of robotically using a templated outreach message versus the kind of thing you're doing, even though the words might be the same. And I find that really interesting because I know what you mean. And I do think there is some kind of, I don't know what it's opportunity. The right timing, some energetic connection that creates that right timing or that feel of the message being different. And, you know, you exercise to care. I mean, you know, even in that moment, right. So, that's, that's, that's wonderful. People already know me by this point. And they know how I care for my people. And so even just that little ping of, hey, how you doing is they understand the care that's behind that because they already know how I'm going to care for them. That's so essentially, you're reaching out. Not just to pass clients or only past clients. Tell me tell us more about like the categories of people using on to past clients. People I know, Facebook friends, you know, friends in real life. Yeah, just, it's, it's really for me, it's, oh, you come you popped into my mind there must be a reason for that. I just want to let you know that you've been on my mind because so often it's easy to say to think that nobody's thinking about you and that nobody really cares. And yet, you know, I have friends who will be like, hey, how are you doing? Because, you know, maybe they know that something's been going on and they just check in a few days later. Yeah, but it's because they're thinking about me that they check in like that. Yes. Yes. And we have more people to check in with than we usually remember, you know, realize I mean if we don't make a list or go and actually look at our Facebook friends. Like, wow, there's there's a lot of people that I haven't been in touch with for for quite some time. Yeah, so thank you for for sharing that. Okay. Question for you. Like, if you so so it sounds like you're doing a better job than most people of keeping in touch with your warm audience. I'm wondering what are your thoughts about expanding that audience. So you get new people who don't know you reaching out to you like what's your current thought on that or what are you working on in terms that That is definitely a work in progress that I haven't given a ton of thought to it's one of those I want to get really good in the rhythm because Yes, this reaching out to three people a week practice is great. And unless I'm accountable to another person, I don't stay on track with it very often. And I just set up an accountability partnership with somebody we had our first meeting yesterday, and it was, you know, each day, you know, each week, we're going to do like kind of a I guess a planning call on Monday. And then each day, we text each other with Okay, what did you get done today. And so we celebrate everything that we got done. And if something's on the list of, you know, to do for too long, you can say, I noticed this has been on the list for a little while. Is this still something that is a value to you do you still want to do it or is it no longer important. That's so awesome that you're creating that kind of accountability to too few of us have that and thank you for kind of, you know, and for sharing that with us. Hopefully others watching this will feel inspired to reach out. So, okay, one more question about the whole not caring thing is, do you do you have a sense like do you because three people a week means you could possibly reach out to something like 150 people a year, right. And I don't know if there's 12050 on your list of people to reach out to. But I guess what I'm trying to say is like, do you do you remember, oh, we already reached out to George or like how do you like, like, some people might get contacted multiple times a year or how do you have a sense of keeping track of course you're working on the CRM thing, or you're going to you're going to you're going to check it out. But, but for now, like how do you manage that. For now, it's a purely intuitive process. Okay, so you kind of have a sense that okay I haven't reached out to that person in a while. Yeah. Yeah. And it's a spark of they've come into my mind for some reason. Yes, or you know I've I've seen some something on Facebook for from them or something in the world reminded me of them. Right. Yeah, I figure there's some reason for that. So following the spirits call for connection. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. One more quick topic before we we start wrapping it up is we also talked before we started recording about this, this idea of honoring our capacities, our own capacity to do things so tell us about that and particularly if you want to relate it to your own experience or you could just talk generally about it. You know, not every day or not every week. Do I have the same bandwidth to be able to do X number of things or X number of tasks, and not every task takes the same amount of energy to do. And so it's a matter of, okay, what kind of energy do I have today. How much do I have to give. And where is the most important place to put that energy so that I can get what I'm putting that energy in, I can get the most return of that energy. And not putting it in to get the return but putting it in. And it generates that. Yeah, it's, it's a it's a wise investment of your energy to create the greatest positive impact in the world. Which of course includes your own life and your own business. Much more eloquent is said than I could. No, it's really, I'm glad you said it. I mean, you know, honoring our own capacity, which it which does change day to day and particularly for those who have part, you know, dealing with health challenges. Sometimes it's chronic illness. It's it might be difficult to plan to say well tomorrow I was going to do tomorrow I'm going to do these 12 things. And then tomorrow goes around. And then there's a different health situation that day. Yeah. I have energy for four of those today. Yeah, so tell us more about that like like what what do you think about that. Yeah. Yeah, it's what are the things that I have the energy to do today. If I have the energy to do one big thing, then I can do that one big thing. Or if I have the energy to do if I've got 12 tasks, and three of them are big, and nine of them are small or three of them are medium and then three of them are are small. That's only nine. But anyway, the math works out however you want it. Yeah. But you know, maybe I have the energy for all three small tasks and a medium task. Yeah. Yeah. So which one of those stands out and says, Hey, this one really needs to get done. Right. And how do I make a practice of prioritizing those tasks. And I think the accountability helps prioritize those tasks, because it helps. I'm an external processor. Half the time I don't know what's going on in here until it comes out of here. And so when I talk with somebody hey I'm going to do this task and this task and this task. Great. And I only have energy for two of those one day. Okay, well which ones are most important or which ones just need to get done sooner rather than later. Do you deal with the always present, I guess, resistance, or the anxiety or fear towards certain tasks. Because how do you how do it's and I'm sure there's no perfect answer everybody and we each have our own way of going about but essentially this very delicate very delicate difference between a real limitation that we need to honor and respect versus an excuse perhaps or a imposed limitation that we can lift. How do you how do you think about that for yourself. That goes back to external accountability for me. Because I'm one of those people that if I'm left to my own devices, I will never get anything done. But if I have somebody that I can say okay I'm going to get this and this and this done. And I'm like, Oh, and now that I know that we're going to celebrate things when we get stuff done, like, ooh, what can I do so that I can celebrate these things. I actually get excited about doing tasks. Versus, geez, I don't want to do that. But it's a what can I say I did at the end of the day. Yes. I love that you've created you know yourself well enough. So therefore you created a system that works with you. Yeah, it's really great because. Yeah, my, my, this is why I'm on focus made like hours and hours a day for those of you who've heard me talk about it's like I'm religious about focus made because I need it. Otherwise, just like you said. If it was up to me, I would be playing video games and you know having having popcorn and watching that whatever I'm not not here and doing this. And yet, when I do show up. Again, designing a system that works for me each of us has to find the way Erica the accountability buddy things brilliant. Or like, like, when we show up for the system we've designed. You probably feel proud. At the, you know, like you said celebrating like, I feel proud that I showed up for my focus made such and even though I didn't really feel like it but I'm like, Hello, buddy, I could tell my buddy like, Yeah, I'm a little bit tired right now. Don't really feel like doing this but this is something I'm going to do and and one more thing of course, you know, I'm sure you probably do this you like breaking it down into smaller pieces. That so that it's not like any project. Most projects feel intimidating can feel intimidating to us. It's like, no, no, no, it's a breaking down. Oh, this thing I can do this piece I can start with, and then this piece I can probably get right like how do you how do you handle that. It's, it's starting with that little list piece, and then saying, Okay, I'm going to do just this little piece. Well, and then I get doing that little list piece and it's, well, I can move on to this next piece. And that, and then I just get going in the role. Yeah, it's easier to get going in a role if I can just start one little thing. Yes, absolutely. And there's always no matter how intimidating a project is, there's always a small piece we can get started with. You know, so, alright, well, I, you know, I could, I could talk with you for a long time about any all of the stuff and more but share with us what your current offer is what are you how do you serve your clients and you know how can people get in touch. Yeah, so I serve my clients on an as needed hourly basis. And so they get in touch with me and say, Hey, I have Apple products. Now what, and who G apple gal Apple. Apple computer. So what kinds of devices do you tell us more. Yeah, iPhone iPad Mac, Apple TV Apple watch, you know, all the different Apple incorporated products, because they're not Apple computer anymore they used to be when I works in the stores, but they're not anymore. Now does that mean it is okay. Yeah. You know, I do, you know, just as needed, because sometimes you just need that little kind of lift up to get you moving on that next project. And, you know, I do internet based stuff as well, just because, you know, I'm a tech nerd with a computer science degree. I know these things I know I know the underpinnings of them and how they work and I can explain them in ways that make sense to regular people, and you know, computer engineers. And if people would prefer a so called tech nerd who has a heart of gold and actually brings that kind of spirit and carrying into the, into the client work in the conversation well Eric is your person. So, tell us about your how the best people best reach you. My website is soulful support.com. So you L FUL support.com. And then my email is just info at soulful support.com. Awesome, I'll have that information below as well. Thank you so much Erica for what you do how you do it and just yeah being an example of doing these things that can inspire as well. Thank you so much George it's always good to talk to you. Thank you.