Just Two Minutes: The Northern Beaches Mum Who Reckons That's All It Takes to Change Your Life

We've all got that one thing we keep putting off. Getting fit, writing a book, changing careers or simply finding a little time for ourselves. But what if the secret to finally getting started wasn't finding more time, but giving yourself just two minutes? Northern Beaches author and motivational speaker Lizzie Williamson thinks it might be.

I'll start on Monday. I'll do it when work settles down. When the kids are older. When I've got more energy. When life isn't quite so ridiculously busy.

Sound familiar?

Most of us have a mental list of things we'd love to do, if only we could find the time, motivation or confidence to actually get started. And while our intentions are usually pretty good, somehow another week, month or even year slips by and we're still telling ourselves we'll get around to it eventually.

But according to Northern Beaches local Lizzie Williamson, we've been going about the whole thing the wrong way.

The internationally recognised motivational speaker, TEDx presenter and award-winning author, who's been dubbed the "Excuse-Buster from Down Under" by American media, has built a career around a wonderfully simple idea: stop waiting for the perfect moment and just give yourself two minutes.

That's it. Two minutes.

Not an hour at the gym, a complete lifestyle overhaul or a colour-coded morning routine that requires you to get out of bed at 5am. Just 120 seconds doing something, however small, that moves you towards where you'd like to be.

And before you dismiss the idea as another self-help gimmick, it's worth knowing that Lizzie's philosophy was born during one of the most difficult periods of her life.

At 31, with a toddler and a baby, the former professional dancer was struggling with postnatal depression and felt she'd completely lost herself in motherhood.

"I'd imagined I'd be this calm earth mother baking muffins. Instead I felt like I was failing at everything, and I was so ashamed," she recalls.

Her doctor had encouraged her to prioritise her own wellbeing, but like so many mothers of young children, Lizzie couldn't imagine where she was supposed to find the time.

"I couldn't even go to the toilet on my own. The idea of an hour-long exercise class had my inner critic in stitches."

Then one morning, while wiping down the kitchen bench after her daughter's breakfast, she found herself doing a few ballet pliés.

It was something she'd loved since childhood, long before motherhood, exhaustion and the endless demands of family life had taken over.

She managed about two minutes before her toddler called out.

Hardly a workout worth writing home about, you might think. But for Lizzie, something unexpected happened.

"For the first time in months, I felt calmer, more empowered, even a little bit proud of myself."

The next morning she did it again. And the morning after that.

"Just two minutes, I'd tell myself. When my inner critic said that wasn't enough, I answered back: something is better than nothing."

Those tiny moments of movement didn't magically cure her depression, but they helped her reconnect with a part of herself she'd almost forgotten existed.

"That first plié reminded me of who I was underneath the exhaustion. It didn't fix everything, but it opened something that had felt blocked."

Today, Lizzie encourages other women to find their own version of that moment.

"What's your plié?" she asks. "It might be a song, a stretch or picking up an old instrument. It's the small thing that brings you back to yourself."

It's a question that feels particularly relevant when you consider just how much women are expected to juggle.

Between careers, children, relationships, ageing parents, household responsibilities and the various hormonal adventures that come with getting older, it's hardly surprising that finding time for ourselves often ends up somewhere near the bottom of the list.

And then, just to make us feel even worse, we're told we should be meditating, exercising, journalling, meal prepping and practising self-care.

Honestly, who has the time?

Lizzie believes we've managed to turn looking after ourselves into yet another thing women feel they're failing at.

"We've been told we have to do it all, have it all and be it all. Then self-care gets handed to us as one more job – the 5am meditation, the perfect routine, the ten-day challenge with a weigh-in. Of course we feel like we're failing."

Her advice is to stop making everything so difficult.

Instead of trying to squeeze another enormous commitment into an already overcrowded day, make it small enough to fit into the life you're actually living.

That might mean drinking your coffee while it's still warm, stepping outside for a few minutes of sunshine or taking a moment to yourself before the rest of the household wakes up.

"You're allowed to take up space in your own life – not once everything is done, but now, in the middle of your real, messy, full life."

And while two minutes might not sound like enough time to achieve anything particularly meaningful, Lizzie argues that we're missing the point.

The idea isn't necessarily to finish something in two minutes. It's to start.

"Two minutes won't write a book or run a marathon. But it will get you started, and starting is the hardest part. Two minutes turns into five, five turns into ten, and one day you look back and realise your whole life has moved."

In fact, Lizzie used the very same approach to write her latest book. You guessed it, Just Two Minutes.

Rather than waiting for those elusive uninterrupted hours at her desk, she recorded voice memos while hanging out the washing, walking along the beach, waiting for her daughters and travelling between speaking engagements.

Sometimes she'd manage a few sentences. Other times an idea for an entire chapter.

Eventually, those little snippets began adding up.

"The moment it hit me was when my wonderful editor, Amy Molloy, took my hundreds of voice memos and turned them into actual pages. Seeing my own words come back to me as chapters was surreal."

It's rather fitting that a book about the power of tiny actions was written in tiny pockets of time.

And for anyone who's ever spent half an hour scrolling through Instagram while insisting they don't have time to exercise, call a friend or pursue a long-held dream, Lizzie has another suggestion.

Try swapping just two minutes of scrolling for something you actually want to do.

Send that message you've been putting off. Look up the course you've been thinking about. Write the first sentence of the book you've always wanted to write. Or simply text a friend and organise a walk.

"It doesn't have to be big. It just has to be on purpose."

Of course, the problem with most of our grand plans isn't necessarily a lack of time. It's that we don't particularly feel like doing them.

Lizzie has a name for this, too: "no-tivation".

And rather than waiting around for motivation to magically appear, she believes we need to understand that it often works the other way around.

"Motivation isn't something you wait for. It's on the other side of action."

When she was writing her book and found herself feeling flat or uninspired, she'd put on her sneakers and head out for a walk along the beach, recording ideas as she went.

On particularly difficult days, she'd make the first step almost laughably small.

"Put on your socks. That's a win. Then your shoes. Now you're moving."

It's an approach that also challenges something many women know all too well: perfectionism.

You know the thinking. If you can't manage a proper workout, why bother exercising at all? If you don't have an hour to write, there's no point opening the laptop. And if you've already eaten a biscuit, you might as well abandon the healthy eating plan until Monday.

Lizzie calls this imaginary set of rules the "Perfect Police".

"Perfectionism rarely makes us do things perfectly. Mostly, it makes us do nothing at all."

Her solution is to replace the familiar all-or-nothing mentality with something a little more forgiving.

"At my keynotes I write 'all or nothing' on the board, then cross out the 'no' and write 'some'. All or something."

It's a philosophy she's found increasingly valuable as she's got older.

Having navigated postnatal depression, long COVID, perimenopause and periods of sheer exhaustion, Lizzie says her understanding of productivity has changed enormously.

"I used to think productive meant big, impressive and exhausting. Now I think it means showing up in a way that fits the season you're in."

These days, she might be working long hours on a book or preparing for a major speaking engagement. At other times, being productive might simply mean catching up with a friend, going for a walk or allowing herself to rest without feeling guilty.

It's a refreshing perspective from someone whose professional life has been anything but ordinary.

Lizzie has appeared on major television programs including Good Morning America, Today and Sunrise, and spoken at international events alongside some of the world's most recognisable names, including Barack and Michelle Obama, Arianna Huffington and the Dalai Lama.

But ask her what she's proudest of, and it isn't the television appearances or impressive speaking engagements.

It's her marriage to actor and filmmaker Felix Williamson.

The couple recently celebrated their 24th wedding anniversary, and Lizzie credits much of their happiness to the simple pleasure of spending time together on the Northern Beaches.

"I attribute the success of our marriage to the many 'date nights' we've had where we go to Avalon Beach or Clareville to sit on a park bench and soak up the beautiful place that we live in."

Their daughters, Stella and Ruby, now 20 and 18, have grown up on the Beaches, attending local schools and occasionally rolling their eyes at their mother's enthusiasm for motivational speaking.

Particularly, it seems, when she gets out the pom-poms.

But despite the occasional eye-roll, Lizzie says her daughters have embraced the philosophy in their own ways.

She recalls walking past Ruby's bedroom and discovering a wall covered in Post-it notes featuring things she was grateful for, from family and friends to cats, music and sunsets.

Ruby had created a gratitude wall and invited anyone passing by to add something.

Lizzie loved the idea so much she incorporated it into her speaking engagements.

On another occasion, one of her daughters was struggling with a large school assignment. Rather than becoming overwhelmed by the amount of work involved, she simply wrote one sentence.

When Lizzie came home, her daughter proudly announced she'd started.

"So we celebrated like she'd finished the whole thing, pom-poms and all, and the next sentence came more easily."

And perhaps that's the loveliest part of Lizzie's philosophy. It isn't really about becoming more productive, squeezing more into our days or adding yet another achievement to our already ridiculous to-do lists.

It's about giving ourselves permission to begin, even when we don't feel ready, confident or particularly motivated.

Lizzie admits that even she still has things she's putting off.

Despite being known as the Excuse-Buster, she's been procrastinating over an idea to interview people on the street about the things they've always wanted to do but haven't quite found the courage to pursue.

Her inner voice has been offering all the usual excuses, including waiting until her speaking commitments settle down or until the book launch is out of the way.

"The Excuse Buster still has an excuse voice. It just doesn't get the final say anymore."

So what would she say to the woman reading this who has been dreaming about changing careers, starting a business, getting fit or finally doing something purely for herself?

First, acknowledge the excuse you've been telling yourself. Then think about what you'd do if you knew you couldn't fail.

And rather than getting overwhelmed by the enormity of the dream, choose the smallest possible action that would move you towards it.

Look up the course. Draft the email. Put your runners beside the bed. Write that first sentence.

Then give yourself a little credit for actually doing it.

"You don't need to change your whole life today. You just need to take the next small step, and the next."

And considering how much time most of us spend thinking about the things we'd love to do, perhaps two minutes isn't such a big ask after all.

In fact, by the time you've finished reading this article, you could probably have made a start.

Lizzie Williamson's new book, Just Two Minutes, is available through her website.