What Running a Business Is Doing to Your Brain (with Natalie Mackenzie, The Brain Lady)

You are your business. So what happens when the one thing it all runs on - your brain - can't keep up? Brain fog. Walking into a room and forgetting why you're there. Losing a word halfway through a sentence. Most of us put it down to being busy, or getting older, and carry on. But so much of what we do every day as business owners is quietly working against the very thing we rely on most. I don't do many interviews - I only sit down with people whose work I really rate - and Natalie is one of them. In this episode I'm joined by Natalie Mackenzie, known to a lot of you as The Brain Lady. She's spent 25 years in cognitive rehabilitation, and she works with business owners on protecting their focus now and their brain health for the long run. What I loved about this conversation is that none of it is about overhauling your life or living like a monk for an extra few years. It's small, doable tweaks - the kind you can start tomorrow. You'll learn: ✅ Why reaching for your phone first thing puts your brain into low-level stress before you're even out of bed ✅ The truth about multitasking (it isn't real) and how task-switching is quietly stealing hours of your focus ✅ Why your afternoon coffee might be the reason you can't sleep - and the slump cycle to break ✅ How scrolling at night overloads your brain right when it's meant to be winding down ✅ Why leaning on AI can make our thinking lazy - and how to use it without losing your own judgement ✅ The hustle myth that does real damage (and why running on four hours' sleep was never something to brag about) ✅ Why what you do in your 40s shows up in your 60s - and the small changes that lower the risk If you're a course creator, membership owner, or coach who runs on your own energy and ideas, this one matters more than most. Because you can have the best strategy in the world - but if your brain isn't firing, none of it lands. Timestamps 00:00 Intro 00:50 Meet Natalie, The Brain Lady 03:00 Why our brains weren't built for how we run businesses 06:00 The scary bit: dementia starts two decades before you see it 08:30 Why up to 80% may be avoidable (and why sleep is huge) 14:00 The worst habit - your phone first thing in the morning 22:00 Morning coffee and the 3pm slump cycle 26:30 Screens at night and why your brain won't switch off 30:00 The multitasking myth - what task-switching really costs you 36:00 Notifications, Slack and protecting your focus 40:00 Is AI making us lazy thinkers? 47:00 Small changes, big long-term payoff