A four-hour power cut turned into the most productive moment of my week — here’s what it taught me about systems, visibility, and building a business that survives real life.
There are certain sounds every parent can instantly recognise.
A sibling dispute.
A toilet flush that went on too long.
A horse doing something suspiciously quiet.
A child whispering, “Mum… don’t be mad…”
But this week, it wasn’t a sound that derailed the day — it was the opposite.
Silence.
Complete, eerie, unplanned silence.
We had an emergency power cut.
Four hours.
No washing machine. No tumble dryer. No Wi-Fi.
Not even the humming background noise you don’t realise you rely on.
My entire house — which normally operates like a chaotic ecosystem powered by caffeine and good intentions — simply stopped.
But here’s the strange part:
My business didn’t.
⭐ The irony of the century
While the dishwasher sat there, judging me from the corner…
and the fridge sulked…
and the oven refused to acknowledge my existence…
My business was quietly getting on with things.
Posts were going out.
Emails were sending.
My schedule wasn’t collapsing.
My content didn’t disappear.
Everything kept running without me having to do a thing.
⭐ That’s when I realised something important
My house needs electricity.
My business doesn’t.
Because the foundation of my business isn’t me frantically running around trying to keep all the plates spinning.
It’s systems.
It’s automation.
It’s structure.
It’s planning.
It’s letting tech take the strain so I don’t always have to.
It’s the 10-hour workweek in action — and I didn’t even notice until the lights went out.
⭐ Life doesn’t pause
The universe doesn’t check your Trello board before delivering chaos.
Children still need lifting.
Dad still needs cream cakes.
Schools still call.
Horses still roll in puddles deep enough to summon swamp monsters.
Decorators still need answers.
The kitchen still walks itself into chaos when no one is supervising it.
Life does not pause so you can build a business.
So your business has to be built to handle life.
⭐ What made those four hours productive?
It wasn’t magic.
It wasn’t motivation.
It wasn’t even my willpower (which had packed up and left after realising the kettle didn’t work).
It was the absence of noise.
Literal and metaphorical.
With no beeps, pings, notifications, appliances or distractions, I could actually think.
I sat at the table with a notebook (because remember… no power).
And for the first time in a long time, my brain wasn’t multitasking.
I wrote content.
I planned my week.
I fleshed out ideas.
I mapped a whole content cluster for January in 20 minutes.
All while my systems quietly handled the operational stuff.
⭐ This is why the 10-hour workweek model works
It forces you to prioritise structure before chaos arrives.
Most people build a business that only functions when life is perfect.
Mine is designed to function when everything is on fire, the Wi-Fi is down, the horses are rioting, the kids are poorly and the washing machine sounds like it’s about to take flight.
The 10-hour workweek is not “do less and hope for the best.”
It is:
- do the right tasks
- build the right systems
- let tech carry the weight
- reduce your required input
- prepare for interruptions
- build self-contained workflows
- pre-schedule visibility
- remove bottlenecks
- reclaim time
⭐ Visibility shouldn’t be fragile
Your visibility shouldn’t rely on you being:
- perfectly caffeinated
- emotionally stable
- uninterrupted
- in flow
- inspired
- available
- alone
- in a tidy house
- or plugged into a functioning electricity supply
If your visibility collapses when real life gets messy — it isn’t visibility.
It’s labour.
And labour is limited.
Systems aren’t.
⭐ The lesson the power cut taught me
If your house loses power, everything stops.
If your business loses you, nothing should stop.
Not because you’re irrelevant.
But because you’re not required every second.
That’s the freedom.
That’s the model.
That’s the shift.
A business that supports your life — not the other way around.
Even during a power cut.