The System for Guardrailing Your Day (When Your Brain Won’t Do It for You) with Christi Johnson

What if your calendar wasn’t just for managing time, but for protecting your energy?

In this episode, I sit down with Christi Johnson, business strategist, podcaster, and founder of the Dream Biz Lab. She helps creative and neurodivergent entrepreneurs build businesses rooted in joy, sustainability, and brain-friendly systems.

Christi shares how hitting a $10K month almost cost her her mental health, how discovering she had bipolar 2 disorder reshaped her entire workflow, and the non-negotiables she’s implemented to build a life-first business. From no-meeting weeks to white space for late-night brainstorms, she breaks down exactly how she structures her day to work with her ADHD brain, not fight it.

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The Hidden Cost of “Success”

By the end of 2023, Christi was flying high. She’d scaled her online business management company, brought on team members, and hit her first $10K month. From the outside, it looked like she was living the dream. But inside, she was spiraling.

Christi wasn’t sleeping, she was working constantly, and eventually, everything crashed. A full-blown mental health crisis led to a bipolar 2 diagnosis—something she’d never anticipated but, in hindsight, had been building for months.

She had no boundaries on her time, her schedule, or her communication. It was a big mess.

This moment didn’t just prompt a reset. It demanded one.

Diagnosed, Disrupted, and Re-Designed

Once Christi understood what was happening in her brain, she realized she couldn’t keep working the way she had been. So she started listening—to her body, to her energy, to her intuition.

And then she made bold moves:

• No meetings before 11 a.m.
• A max of three meetings per day—with white space between them
• One full no-meeting week every month
• Zero guilt for “off” days
• Permission to follow late-night brainstorms when the ideas hit

Instead of viewing ADHD and bipolar as hurdles to be managed, she began to treat them as truths to be honored. Her brain needed different rhythms. So she stopped pretending productivity had to look one way.

Systems for Self-Acceptance

One of the biggest shifts? Learning to work with her brain’s natural tendencies instead of trying to force traditional productivity strategies.

• When her brain popcorns from idea to idea, she grabs a notebook.
• When she’s spiraling after a task, she lets herself close the loop before transitioning.
• When she has a low-energy day, she doesn’t force herself to push through, she rests.

“Self-acceptance is the foundation. If I’m constantly beating myself up, there’s no room for clarity or momentum.” – Christi

She also builds in space to process. On days that fall apart, she journals the messy thoughts without censoring herself, then reframes with what she did accomplish. That one-two punch of honesty and compassion has become a lifeline.

Boundaries That Feel Like Freedom

Saying “no” used to feel like self-sabotage. Now, it feels like strategy. Christi’s decision to block out a no-meetings week every month was terrifying at first, but it’s now one of the most protective systems in her entire business. Our calendars will fill up with other people’s priorities if we don’t take control.

She uses that week however she needs: deep work, creative play, or pure rest. Sometimes she’s productive. Sometimes she’s watching YouTube bloopers on the couch. Either way, she’s honoring her energy, not chasing arbitrary metrics.

Pay Attention to the Signals

If there’s one lesson Christie wants every entrepreneur to hear, it’s this: Your body is talking to you. Stop pushing through. Start listening.

For Christi, anxiety shows up in her chest. For others, it might hit in the stomach or shoulders. These physical cues aren’t just symptoms, they’re signals and they can help you redesign your workweek from the inside out.

By getting curious about when she feels anxious versus when she feels in flow, Christi created a business that aligns with her natural rhythms.

You’re Allowed to Build Differently

You don’t need to hustle like the gurus. You don’t need to copy that CEO’s calendar. And you definitely don’t need to feel guilty for being human.

If you’ve ever felt like your brain doesn’t fit the mold, maybe that’s a sign to change the mold.

As Christi says, “Some weeks I build. Some weeks I rest. Both are productive.”

Julie: Welcome back to the System for Everything podcast. This episode is brought to you by the color coded Chaos management matrix, where red means panic, yellow means overcommitted, and green means you probably forgot something important. Today’s guest is Christie Johnson, a business strategist and the founder of the Dream Biz Lab, where she helps creative and neurodivergent entrepreneurs build sustainable, joy driven businesses that work with.

Their brains not against them. With a background in photography and operations, Christie combines heart and strategy to help creatives grow profitable businesses without burning out. When she’s not working with clients, you’ll find her playing the piano, hanging out with her 25 nieces and nephews, or recording episodes for the Dream Biz Podcast.

Welcome, Christie. I’m so glad you’re here. I am so excited to be here. I love your podcast so much. Oh, thank you so much. That means the world. All right, we are gonna start, as we always do with the system. Reboot. A quick little reset to start our episode with some humor and humanity. What is a hill you are willing to die on when it comes to household chores?

Whoa. Whoever notices

Christi: the chore. That’s a problem, does the chore. So I live with my partner, my husband, and we don’t divide up chores as like, I do this and do you do that? I’m not about gender norms. So it’s really just like if you notice the chore and it’s bothering you, just do the chore.

Julie: Okay. What app do you use daily that you are mildly embarrassed to admit?

YouTube.

Christi: I watch so many hours of YouTube. It’s not even funny. Like a lot of, a lot of YouTube

Julie: I could watch. Like one of the things that brings me the most joy in the world, especially like if I’m in a funk, is watching like the Office or Parks and Rec bloopers on YouTube. Oh yes. I mean, instant joy. I love that so much.

What is a snack you could turn into a personality trait?

Christi: Um, a snack.

I mean, I’m a snack. No, just kidding. Okay. That is such a good answer. Chex Mix is my favorite. It has like variety. Ooh. It’s salty, it’s crunchy. Different textures, and I like to think I’m a little bit. A mix of everything, so I’ll go with that.

Julie: Good answer. All right, everyone. You have met the personality. Now meet the powerhouse.

Christie doesn’t pretend to have it all figured out, but she does have some beautifully honest systems for keeping her days from running her over. This isn’t about perfection, it’s about boundaries, energy, and building a day that works because you’re human. Here’s my conversation with Christie on the system for guard railing your day when your brain won’t do it for you.

Okay, let’s get into it because I know you’ve put a lot of intention into how you structure your days, but before we get into the actual systems of it. Like that are working for you now, I wanna rewind, like what made you realize that the way you were working was not sustainable?

Christi: Yeah, this is such a good question.

So I’m gonna rewind back to the end of 2023. I was growing my online business management. Company and I had brought on a full-time team member who was my brother-in-law, and I brought him on in June of 2023, and things were going so great. Everything was working awesomely. We were getting clients and I had my first $10,000 month at the end of 2023.

I was so excited because literally I had I, when people said. Hey. I started my business and then six months later I hit my first $10,000 month. I literally thought they were lying or something because I couldn’t imagine that I could be that successful. But that year it happened to me. Within six months, I had a $10,000 month, and I was like, oh my gosh, I’ve made it.

I’m on top of the world. Everything’s awesome. That’s how I felt and I couldn’t believe it. And so then in 2024, I was started continuing to scale my business and I brought on more team members. And my brother-in-law was really great at web design. And my brother is a graphic designer, so he does branding and he’s so good at that.

And then I brought on my sister-in-law because she’s really good at organization, so she was an executive assistant for me. So we were growing. And growing and I was bringing on clients, but I wasn’t paying attention to how I actually felt while I was running my business. And what happened was I was working constantly and I was helping people launch their funnels, their businesses, and I ended up having a complete mental health crisis.

I. Discovered that I have bipolar two disorder, which I had no idea about because I was just shout out. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I had no idea because I had never been in a situation that really kind of like triggered it for me and I just haven’t really paid attention. But I was not sleeping. There were two weeks where I didn’t sleep for seven days except for maybe an hour a night.

Oh gosh. And it was so bad that like my parents were calling to check on me. My friends were calling my parents and my husband like, is Christy okay? And I wasn’t. Okay. And that’s when I realized like, okay, I can’t sustain. What I’m doing, I didn’t have any boundaries on my time, my schedule, my communication with my clients.

And it was a big old mess.

Julie: Okay. So you realized in that season, I mean something had to change. Yeah. So what did building that new structure actually look like for you? What is a typical day look like now in terms of structure or maybe even lack of it?

Christi: Yeah, okay. Now it looks totally different because as in addition, having a mood disorder.

I also have a DHD, and so my brain. Goes a million miles an hour. I have a lot of ideas and things like that, and I really, really need white space in my calendar to give me the freedom to pursue the ideas that pop up into my brain when I want to pursue them. Oh, I love that. And so now. My days have a lot less structure, so I have a large amount of white space in my days every single day.

If I don’t have that, I remove something off of my calendar. So for me, I don’t now, I don’t do meetings until 11:00 AM because I really have to prioritize sleep and I really have to make sure that I’m not stressed about waking up for like a morning meeting or whatever. Whereas before, I would have meetings at 8:00 AM 9:00 AM 10:00 AM 11:00 AM and then like.

All day now, no meetings till 11. And then when I do have meetings, I put like a max of three meetings on my calendar and I really make sure that I have a lot of white space in between those meetings. So it’s so much different now. I feel so much like easier, lighter, breezier calm.

Julie: It’s way better if your business couldn’t run without you.

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Grab yours today@dallasgirlfriday.com before life throws a plot twist. So you, you don’t have meetings till 11. So I get how you set those limits on like your time availability, but. Do you ever feel tempted to let yourself walk that back when it’s so tempting sometimes to say yes to everything?

Christi: A thousand percent, because I’m also a person who really gets fomo, like I really hate not being a part of things.

So I definitely am tempted to and have Jomo. What is

Julie: that joy of missing out? Joy of missing out? Oh, I love that. Leave me at home.

Christi: No, I like wanna be at all the things. So yes, I’m tempted, especially if like my friends are hanging out or something like that. So I definitely am tempted, but I have seen the effects of not sticking to my boundaries.

So when I. Go back into over committing myself or doing things in the mornings. ’cause I’ll be like, well, I, I wanna do this. This’ll be fine. I’ll be able to do that. Then I go back into that place of. Anxiety and stress and like having trouble sleeping. And so when I’m tempted to do that and I walk that back, I’ve seen the effects on my body.

So it’s really just like a personal thing that I have to be like, no, I’m protecting that time for myself, my morning time. If they wanna meet with me, they can meet with me later.

Julie: I love that you are able to use your calendar for energy protection and not just time management, but of course every day does not go according to plan.

It never does, especially with an A DHD brain. So. What are some ways that your A DHD shows up in your business that you’ve learned to work with and not fight against?

Christi: That is such a great question. So number one is like brainstorm sessions. So I used to be really strict about like my bedtime because I thought, oh, I gotta go to bed at a certain time so that I can get up for these meetings.

But then I started to realize, hey, you know what? My brain really is a gift and I have the ability to brainstorm all these ideas. So if I get a late night brainstorm. I allow myself to go with that brainstorm, and because I don’t have meetings in the mornings, I don’t feel like I have to shut my thoughts down, so I just go with it.

Also, I, my thoughts kind of popcorn so they float around and so instead of, uh, being frustrated about that or being worried about that, I just make sure that I keep a little notebook with me so that I can write down those thoughts when they come up. Yeah, so then I don’t forget them. ’cause I often feel like, oh, if I don’t deal with this right away, I, I’m not gonna be able to get it done.

So if I do have something coming up, like a meeting or something, I just write it down and I know that I’ll get, get back to it later. And I also just allow myself to go with the flow if I’m not feeling energetic one day. I don’t force myself to work. If I am feeling like I have a lot of energy, then I go with that energy and go with the flow.

So that way it really helps me to not feel forced, like boxed in to like, I have to do this today. I can allow myself to go with the flow. And since I have that flexibility in my calendar. Like I’m allowed to do that. And then another thing is I have trouble transitioning from TA one task to the next task.

So I found myself, like after meetings, I would kind of go down a spiral and do a lot of things related to that previous task and have such a hard time initiating the next task. And so now, instead of viewing that as a flaw, I kind of accept that about myself. I let myself go with whatever I need to do to transition from one task.

So I might be sending some emails, buttoning up some tasks related to that meeting I had or whatever, and then just not feel bad about it. So a big piece of it is self-acceptance, to be honest.

Julie: Oh, that, that is great. ’cause that I was gonna say, when you do have a day that completely. Derails. How do you talk to yourself in those moments?

Like especially when that guilt creeps in that we’re supposed to be doing all these things all the time. So how do you talk to yourself?

Christi: I’m gonna be honest. Sometimes I do still. Talk to my brain and I am negative about it. Mm-hmm. Because I will say, oh brain, why can’t you just do this? And so I think it’s important for me to allow myself to process the things that I’m feeling.

So if I have a feeling of frustration, it’s important for me to allow myself to process that. Feel it. And so one of the things that I’ll do is journal and get all the thoughts out there, just like brain bomb it, the thoughts on the page. And I’ll let myself be as mean as I want on that page. But then I reframe it and I say, no, here are the things that I am loving about myself.

This is what I love about myself today. This is what I did get done today. So I’m giving myself that like safe space to process my thoughts. In my journal so that they’re not coming at me all the time throughout the day. And so if I have that space to process my feelings, I’ve found that that helps me as I’m going throughout the the day to have more accepting and loving and kind thoughts for myself.

Because sometimes we just have a crappy day and it is what it is, and we need that time to be sad about it. Yeah. And just recognize that tomorrow is a new day. I can go get some sleep and

Julie: try again tomorrow. Ugh. I love that. Okay. I wanna talk about boundaries from the other side of things. What no longer makes the cut for you?

What are some of the boundaries you’ve set? That felt really scary at first, but have been absolute game changers. So

Christi: I have a no meetings week every single month.

Julie: Ooh. That’s good. Yeah.

Christi: I don’t let myself schedule client meetings. I don’t even, the things that I want to do, like. I am a part of, I’m a part of a lot of communities and I really wanna go to those meetings.

I just don’t put them on my calendar because our calendars can get full if we don’t put that control. If we don’t, if we don’t take control of our calendars, they will get filled with all of these things. And so a big one for me is that no meetings week. So that way I just have the time to. Do whatever the heck I want.

I don’t, I don’t say, okay, this is what I’m gonna get done this week. I literally just let myself be, and oftentimes I’ll find that my brain gets a lot done during that week, but sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes I’m just chilling on the couch watching YouTube for the majority of the week, and that’s okay because I’ve allowed myself that time to just kind of.

Exist. So that was a big one for me. That was really scary because I was like, oh, I’m gonna miss out on these networking opportunities, or I’m gonna miss out on a lot of work. But I’ve really found the opposite where because I’m pouring into myself, then I’m able to be more present for all these other meetings and be happier and things like that.

Julie: For someone who is listening to this episode who is really struggling to find their rhythm, what would you tell them about designing a day that fits? Their brain.

Christi: I think it’s really important to listen to the signals that your body is giving you. Yes, it’s really important to pay attention when you are feeling.

Anxiety. Just take a moment and be like, okay, where am I feeling this in my body? A lot of times we push through that feeling because we think it’s just a symptom of being a business owner or a symptom of being busy is we’re gonna feel a little bit of anxiety, but I don’t think that we actually have to feel that.

As someone who struggles with anxiety, I recognize that sometimes it just is there and there’s not really anything we can do about it. We can manage it with medication or practices that we do for ourselves, but if you’re consistently feeling that anxiety and not doing anything about it. It that is a signal for you that something needs to change.

So anyone who wants to design a week that works with their brain, pay attention to those signals and then get curious about those signals. Okay. When did this anxiety start? How or this feeling, what it might not be anxiety for you. For me, I feel anxiety right in the center of my chest. Like always. For other people, they feel in their stomach or they feel something else, like pay attention to those signals and get curious.

What is this telling you about your self? About your brain, about. The way you’re designing your week and those times that you’re feeling energetic and like you’re doing your best work and you feel in flow and you’re like, oh my gosh, I’m unstoppable. Like what is it that triggered that for you? So just pay attention to those things and get curious about them.

Then you can start to give yourself the gift of giving you what you need to have more times of flow and ease and joy and less times of. Stuck and overwhelm and anxiety.

Julie: Oh, that is such good advice. And for the record, I am a stomach anxiety feeler. Interesting. I didn’t know people felt it in different parts of their body.

Mm-hmm. And that is fascinating. All right. Tell everyone where they can find you online. Tell us about your latest offerings, promote, brag, do all the things. Thank you, Julie.

Christi: So you can hang out with me on Instagram or threads. I’m really active on threads right now. I do my late night. Unhinged thoughts there?

Um, that’s the best kind. Yes. It’s like my new notes app. I just let myself love put it on threads. I love that. So you can hang out with me at Christie Johnson Creative and I am currently building something I’m very excited about. It is a membership community called the Dream Biz Lab. I’ve literally been dreaming about this for six years and I’m so excited.

Cited It is a community for creative and neurodivergent entrepreneurs to build your business your way instead of the way that some guru taught you that is not working for you. So, um, you can hang out with me on Instagram. You can check out the Dream Biz lab@dreambizlab.com.

Julie: All right, everyone. We have talked about the very real systems Christie uses to protect her time and energy, but now let’s shift gears entirely and talk about a movie that left me emotionally confused in the best way.

I just watched the movie Companion starring Jack Quaid, and I am giving it a solid four and a half out of five. It is this dark. Funny, slightly unhinged sci-fi thriller that starts with sort of a breakup and then somehow spirals into murder theft and a morally questionable robot boyfriend situation.

It’s one of those movies where you’re laughing and then immediately asking yourself, wait. Should I be laughing at this? The humor is absolutely pitch black, but there is an underlying emotional core that catches you off guard. I love a story that makes it feel like you are watching something completely ridiculous and then suddenly it.

Punches you right in the chest with a deeper theme. Companion pulls that off in a way that’s both entertaining and unsettling. If you’re into films that are offbeat, slightly creepy, but smarter than they first appear, this is one to add to your list. And if you’ve already seen it, please message me immediately so we can unpack it together.

I have thoughts and feelings. And a few ethical questions. If this episode made you wanna toss your color-coded planner and start fresh, or just feel a little more seen in the chaos of running a business with a human brain, I hope you’ll share it with a friend. You can find me over on Instagram at Dallas go Friday, and I’d love to hear what boundaries you are building into your day.

Make sure you’re subscribed to the system for everything so you never miss a new episode. And if you have 30 seconds to leave a review, it helps more than you know. See you next time where we’ll tackle another system. Business life or otherwise.