August moves at a different pace; time seems to stretch and soften. Heat hangs in the air, slowing everything as deadlines drift, clients pause for vacations, and the usual urgency thins at least for a few more weeks. Last year, I used this time to focus on the basics of my messaging and communications; that work is still ongoing. This summer, I’m using these slower days to sit with something a bit different, and a bit bigger: my businesses are pulling in different directions, and I don’t yet know where they’re going and how I’m along for the ride.
evolution, in practice
My businesses, and I, have evolved over the years. This year it’s been intentional but I would not have pictured my days to look as they do today even eight months ago.
PSG Studio has shifted, though in a quieter yet intentional way over the past several months. This past winter, I recognized burnout—in the work itself and in me—so I made a deliberate choice to give it space to breathe while I turned my attention toward what was emerging. The burnout was fueled by the weight of it all falling on me—the endless software updates that rarely align across websites, unpredictable phone calls and emails requiring something fixed now, and being the one they turned to, always.
While this work has slowed, PSG Studio hasn’t stopped. I’m assisting existing clients while actively working on finding the next shape of my work. Part of that reckoning is sitting with how rapidly the generative AI landscape has shifted and what it means for the work I do. I’m still mapping this new terrain and working out what it might mean for both my businesses, and yours.
Since January, little acorn creations has been shifting rapidly and drawing more of my focus: I launched a weekly knitting and crochet group, am teaching more private lessons, and I’m designing again. All of this growth is gathering its own momentum—not because I’m pushing harder, but because the work is.
That’s where I am on this hot August day. One part of my practice is lighter. The other is growing. And I need to remember to both accept the change and actively direct it in a way forward that’s right for me and my businesses.
methods of reflection
What I’m doing is what I know how to do: I’m sitting with my notebooks and asking hard questions. What parts of this work do I find the most exhausting? What still energizes me no matter the subject matter? Where has the technology landscape shifted so far that I’m no longer the expert, and do I still wish to advise directly on the topic?
This time is for endless revision; understanding the territory so I can explain it to others. Recognizing that not yet landing on clarity doesn’t diminish the expertise—it means I haven’t found the right words yet.
what might emerge
As of today, here’s where I’m leaning. I might bring in more products and guided worksheets to help you break down your big problems, open new ways to schedule time with me, and explore how I integrate analog and digital in ways that feel true to both of my businesses.
Or I might not.
I don’t expect to arrive at the final answer in the next few weeks. My goal is to use August the way I know how: to tend the systems beneath the surface; to notice what’s been lingering and poking with sharp edges; to ask myself questions I don’t usually create time to sit with. To write in my notebooks, answering these questions repeatedly until the clarity reshapes what I’m building into what I need it to be.
