If you’ve ever felt weighed down by burnout or the urge to abandon it all and start fresh, you’re not alone.
In this lively conversation, serial entrepreneur Megan Eckman shares her delightfully candid journey of starting, scaling, hibernating, and moving on from multiple businesses, offering honest lessons you won’t find in most business books.
We talk about Megan’s recent ADHD diagnosis, the three distinct ways she’s learned to transition in business, the emotional toll and freedom of letting go, and how curiosity and self-awareness have kept her evolving as both a creator and entrepreneur.
Why You’ll Love It:
Megan walks us through the three ways she’s learned to pivot and the circumstances that led to each one, allowing her to follow her curiosity and pursue her creative impulses, without risking her well-being or financial stability:
Test & build - Learning to listen to your customers, running small experiments, and transitioning into new opportunities
Jump Without a Parachute: The Hard Stop Pivot - When a dramatic, not-so-planned exit from a thriving business is the way to save your sanity —and what it really takes to walk away.
The Hibernate & Resuscitate Pivot - Sometimes the best move isn’t quitting cold turkey, but putting a project “in the freezer” while you work on your next big idea.
Three key takeaways:
Mic Drop Moment:
“It was basically a ‘hold my beer, I’ll go build that business for you.’ To be fair, they did wait a month.” Megan Eckman
About today’s guest, Megan Eckman
Megan Eckman is a serial entrepreneur who constantly finds new ways to delight her audiences, from fantastical pen-and-ink illustrations to bold embroidery kits to fantasy rom-coms.
For 14 years, she ran an embroidery kit business, managing revenue streams from wholesale, retail, and subscriptions. She's a published author and now also a podcast co-host for a show all about networking.
When she’s not working, she’s likely out on one of her bicycles exploring new routes in the woods. She lives in Vancouver, WA, with her husband and tri-color cat. Megan was diagnosed with ADHD in her 30s.
Connect with Megan:
Your ADHD-ish host, Diann Wingert
Diann Wingert brings decades of experience as a psychotherapist and serial business owner and is now a sought-after coach to entrepreneurs with ADHD traits. Her style is direct, strategic, and always honest—peppered with the insight of someone who lives and breathes the neurodivergent experience.
Known for her candor and her refusal to compromise on what matters, Diann Wingert is a fierce advocate for self-acceptance and meaningful growth at the intersection of neurodivergence and entrepreneurship.
Mentioned during this interview:
Simple suggestions for preparing for your next potential pivot:
1) Assess emotional, financial, and market conditions regularly.
2) Define your personal “red flags” for burnout and your criteria for build and grow, hard stop and hibernate, and resuscitate pivots
3) Inventory current and planned activities, noting which are energizing versus draining.
4) Keep communication open with your clients/community during hibernation phases. You never know who might want to be a part of whatever you do next.
If this episode saved you from burnout (or burning your business down…), now would be a perfect time for that 5-star rating and review you keep meaning to leave. Here’s the link to make it happen. Be sure to mention what you loved about the episode or the show in general.
© 2026 ADHD-ish Podcast. Intro music by Ishan Dincer / Melody Loops / Outro music by Vladimir / Bobi Music / All rights reserved.
H: You have started, run, shut down, hibernated, resuscitated and pivoted between many different businesses at different times. And I can't wait for you to help me unpack that because so many people think you either just have to go, go, go until you can't do it anymore and then start again from scratch, but you've actually uncovered several different ways that you can swap in and swap out. Where should we start?
G: Yeah, I think your response when I told you that I pivoted was, why am I not surprised like, ohhhh, she called me out on that one. You know, I think for me it always is because I have done so many different things, I think it's easy to just start from the beginning. So I went to first official business was started when I was in college. So I went to school to get art and creative writing degrees and my parents were very supportive of that. But I did have to start a business or I graduated, it was a requirement.
H: Proof of concept, right. Like, I can make a living with these arts degree, that was smart.
G: Yep promise. Yeah, for better or for worse, it was very smart. So I started an illustration business called Studio MME. And so I was making prints, like illustrating some books and things like that. And right after I graduate, so that was like, this is like the OG days of Etsy. So I was also making like pinback buttons in my college dorm room and like, you know, selling them for like $3. And then right after that, pretty much like a six months in, my partner at the time got into grad school. So then we had to move every across country to the bay and I had never really thought about a J O B.
H: As evidenced by the fact that you have to spell it out, even though it's three letters.
G: I was like, well, I want to keep running this. Well, he went to grad school for photography. And so I got a part time job at Borders to pay the astronomical rent.
H: Yes.
G: And so I was, you know, this was really a part time gig. Borders went under very soon after that too. But I did learn how not to run a business by working at Borders. So I started to pick up some odd jobs I never had. I've never had a 9 to 5, really unusual. And I don't realize that until I have normal conversations with people and they're like, what do you mean you've never had to a work meeting and I'm like, yeah, I don't know how those work.
H: You're probably hardcore unemployable by now because you're so accustomed to the entrepreneurial life and to taking risks and to starting and stopping and making up the rules that yeah, I don't even think you could get an interview at this point.
G: Which is just as so narrow like that's what I don't. I'm too, yes, I know too many things. So it was a struggle bus, like to make enough money. So I was spending at all these shows and I really started to make art based on what people said they wanted and then they buy it and like, I need to eat. So this, it was like three, four years of just really barely scraping.
H: Doing things that you didn't love, I'm kind of reading between the lines here. Like as an artist, you want to make this stuff that lights your brain up like a Christmas tree. But to survive and especially San Francisco, you have to make what sells. So now in a way, you're basically a contractor and you've got a million bosses instead of just one.
G: Yep. So one night when I just broke down crying, I was like, okay, I need to make something that's just for me. So I dug around in our apartment and I found some doc canvas, which is just raw canvas for paintings. And I found some black thread and a needle and I was like, well, my grandma taught me to embroider when I was very little. And I was like, I'm just gonna take one of my illustrations and I will sew that. So I just drew it on the canvas and then just spent the night sewing. You should not do embroidery on canvas?
H: No, I'm just thinking and I'm not a seamstress, my daughter is but I'm thinking that's got to be the hardest material to get a needle to go through.
G: Yeah.
H: But you needed a something that just for you.
G: I needed an outlet, and I posted it when it was finished. I posted it on, like, Facebook, and my feed just kind of blew up like it never had before. And thankfully, everyone said, I want to sew this, not I want to buy this, because I knew I wasn't going to be making these for other people. But everyone was like, I want to make this. And so I was like, okay and I was like, give me a month and I was like, I will figure it out. Give me a month and then I had to, like, research. Okay, what are the ways that I can do. Where am I going to get supplies? How do I get my illustrations onto something? And this is if anybody's crafty, this was Priest Rune Flower.
So this is me calling up colonial iron ons, which is, like, the ones that still do, like day of the week patterns and jobs for you. So I was like, I need these things printed and, like, sending digital files and then, like, the iron ons would come to me. And so a month later, yeah, I put them in my shop and I vended at a craft fair, and I kind of split the booth between my illustrations and these kits, and the kits sold out.
H: Just for shits and giggles, I want to be very clear here, Megan. You told me before we started recording, like, you don't even actually like to sew.
G: No, I don't.
H: It sounded like you kind of didn't even really know how to sew. It was just something that your granny had showed you how to do, and you thought, why not?
G: Yeah. And so this is actually it leads into everything else, because not knowing how to do it actually meant that when I designed the kits over a series of years, I designed it for somebody who did not know anything about sewing because I didn't know anything about it. So a lot of people, they like to do a craft.
H: Yes.
G: And they will do a sew kit an there's so many obstacles that they don't think about for the user who has.
H: Because they've already mastered those skills and they don't consider them, and oh, that's so good.
G: Yeah. So I ended up, like, over so this is kind of my test and build the runway pivot, where I was like, the art isn't selling. The embroidery is, do I like the embroidery like, it was a puzzle. That's basically what it was at that point is, how do I make this really good? Not, oh, yay, I'm so happy I get to sew the model for each of these designs.
H: It became a creative challenge for you.
G: It was.
H: And you know what else is true? It's really interesting that you said that you were able to create it without making any assumptions with being able to meet people right where they at. If they're beginners, they can just skip ahead. But you didn't assume that they knew how to do things they didn't actually know how to do. But what's also true is the fact that you aren't that you aren’t a seamstress and you don't actually enjoy sewing, and you had no intention of starting another business, at least not this business. But the fact that someone said, hey, I want you to show me how to do this, and you didn't even know how to do it and it didn't stop you. All I could say is how very ADHD of you. Who else would do something like that?
G: I know. It was basically a, hold my beer. I'll go build that business for you and to be fair, they did wait a month.
H: A whole month. Wow.
G: I know. But it worked and it just kept growing. And I kind of had to ask myself it was a big. It was a big mental hurdle for me because the business before was kind of art with capital A, and craft is the opposite. And I had to kind of come to terms with I have a degree in doing very good portraiture and stuff. Am I now the person who does dinosaur embroidery?
H: I delegitimized myself.
G: But the art background actually meant that my designs were very unusual. And nobody had ever seen stuff like that, so it kind of lent itself to it, and it took off. And then because I just had very good design sense. And as it grew, I tag teamed in my husband, who is a master photographer and graphic designer and everything.
H: Smart.
G: We're able to really set ourselves apart and make decisions that other companies weren't making to best give a customer experience that was I always said, it's like handholding. So I would when I would sit in my booth and people would be like, oh, I don't know if I can do this. I'm like, this is crafting with handholding. I have designed this kit so that you can sew, watch Netflix, and drink all at the same time and it's still going to turn out great.
H: Multitasking at its finest.
G: But I knew that I couldn't, like, I didn't just jump into it and close the one down, I really wanted. Part of it was the identity was still tied so I really need to see can this make more money? And also for me, I needed to figure out, like, what does the monetization track look like before we put all the eggs in this basket. And I think that that's something that I see a lot of other people who jump from one thing to the next.
at, and I had burned out like:H: Not only that, Megan your business model, the kind of business model that creates raving fans. And I'm beginning to see the through line to what you did later is because of that exquisite level of awareness of your target customer and building a business in with the level of care that you call hand holding. Like, you become committed to the success of your customers that is not scalable. And for people for whom that is where they get a lot of joy and satisfaction in their business, you will eventually burn out. It's almost inevitable.
G: Yeah. So we had wholesale retail, and then people got obsessed. People became Superfam and so we had three subscription clubs running. These are monthly clubs at one time.
H: Wow.
G: Because they couldn't get enough.
H: Did you fall in love with sewing along the way? Because I'm just thinking how ironic this is. You're like, you don't understand, I don't like sewing and these fuckers are totally obsessed.
G: No, I tried to pay other people to sew the samples for me, but I couldn't find anybody who could also shoot the photos well enough. So it was like, I was so disgruntled at this point and so I was ready to be like, let's figure out what the next step is. And I told my husband, and I was like, you've been employed by me for three years now. Like, you're still employable at this point so I was like, go for it.
H: Yeah, you're not totally tarnished yet.
G: Yeah, like, go forth, find a job and then the pandemic happened and then there were no jobs. And all of you decided that embroidery was the thing you wanted to pick up. But the thing that you don't remember is that all the global supply chains collapsed and I had to rebuild my supply chains overnight. And unfortunately, I had left my Etsy listings to be unlimited. And then they featured me on the front page so I woke up to like 300 orders.
H: Ohhhhh.
G: And I can't get anything out of China for all my suppliers.
H: Be careful what you wish for, folks. Oh, my goodness.
on to the wild ride that was:H: Wow.
G: Where it was like double, triple Christmas every month. And we worked 14 hour days and we packed those orders and we shipped them out and we kept all of United States sane.
H: And you stayed married. I mean, that's the other thing.
G: Yeah.
H: Wow.
G: All we've been through worse than that. We'd been in a 700 square foot apartment, both working out of the same. We're weird so after the peak, it became apparent that like, we need to exit now, the ship is sinking. I don't care enough to try and like plug the holes because it was like it was like you said, we can't scale beyond this point without really changing the structure of business. This is Michaels having to come in and pick me up and I don't want to be sold in my goals so it just wasn't working out.
H: I mean, I want to be really clear, Megan. Yes, you were burning out, that's totally legitimate. And you could have taken a different exit strategy, but it would have been a business that was no longer aligned with how you like to do business. So you chose to let it go, not because it wasn't working, but because it was working and required you to do things that you were not interested in or willing to do and that is totally legitimate. So many people think when we talk about burnout, it's because we're busting our nut and we're not getting anywhere. And we're going to talk about that in a second with the next business.
G: But the next one.
H: But it's like, you know, you can burn out on your own success just as easily maybe even easier. And you can also burn out from having to do things in a certain way that while they're paying the bills and you may look like, wow, you're featured, but on the inside, you're kind of dying a little bit every day. So there's a lot of different ways we end at that spot. So you ended up shutting that thing down. It was a no ceremony, no burial just, you're dead and we're moving on.
to drag it out to the end of:H: Yeah. Yeah.
G: And my therapist is like, what if you just ended it now and I was like, we could do that? And she's like, I mean, I think so like, it's your business.
H: You’re the boss.
G: I mean, flash sale. I was just like, guys, this has been great, this is the end of the road, here it is. And the fun thing about mine was, like, besides just the inventory, it was like I could print whatever they wanted. So I'm like, whatever you want, put your orders in now. And that sustained us for, like, the last few months of the year because, like, they just bought so much stuff. I was like, it was very, the emails that I got were just, it was so hard. Like, it's very emotional without meaning to and I didn't realize how much I meant these people. And then I was in this place of like, okay, well, now what do I want to do?
H: And this is the one that we're calling because you have several different types of pivots. We've already talked about the test and build. Now we're talking about the hard stop jump with no parachute. Like, it's like a flash sale or a flash flood. This has to be over with, and I have no freaking clue what I'm gonna do now. You're probably somewhat traumatized by the whole situation too.
G: Yeah, yeah. Thankfully, my husband had a job, a little bit of golden handcuffs, where it's like, the benefits are nice, the paycheck is not enough for like to be comfy comfy. So yeah, the one thing I always tell people they are like, I just need to burn this down and start again is like, if you can wait until you have a 6 to 12 month emergency fund, please do that first. Otherwise it's just too stressful and I promised never to do that to my husband.
So I took some certifications, I basically was like, I haven't gotten to learn in a long time. Like, I didn't get to go to grad school because nobody. I did two things for undergrad and they don't know what to do with you when you do two things for undergrad. So my husband's like, why don't you take a UX certification? So I got that and I was like, this is everything we did to make basically fans to make this amazing experience. And I looked into going into it for other companies and everybody that I interviewed said, do you like screaming into the void because you're in a hierarchy and nobody cares what the UX designer, you just need to tell them what color to make the button. And I was like, well, I do not do well with invalidation so no, this isn't going to work.
H: That was a really good question. I'm really glad someone asked you that.
G: Yeah. Yeah, they saved me, I wouldn't have lasted a week. I would have just cried in my death. So I kind of had to really think about it and I started to build, I did some web design for people. I tried to do some UX. It's very hard to explain user experience to a very small business, which is all my entire network.
H: Yep.
G: And then I was like, you know what, I can it kind of morph over the next year into Fat Cap. And Fat Cap is like, you know what, let's focus on making bands. Because a business that has fans is a really different type of business than a lot of people build.
H: Yes.
G: Why wouldn't you want fan power? These people who will like stand in line for you, they will buy every single thing you make. They will fight somebody in your name, like in a Wendy's parking lot. You know, if they say anything bad about you and I think a lot of people don't think of their customers that way because they're just their eyes on the next one and it's very transactional. Instead of like, how do I nurture and keep you and really help you go on this long journey with me together, with whatever I'm offering you, product or service. And I thought it was great, I thought, I can help so many people. This makes so much sense to me and nobody wanted to come play with me.
H: You know, the thing is that I love this part of your story so much. I mean, I love the whole story.
G: Bottom of the yeah.
H: Yeah, no, it's that because, and kudos to your parents for getting you started on the entrepreneurial journey when you were not even fully adulted. Because you have learned how to take risks. You have learned how to try things. You have learned that you don't even have to know what you're doing to try something. You have learned that you can create ridiculously unrealistic expectations and timelines and manage to fulfill them. And you learned how to create super fans without even trying. Like, you didn't set out to create what I call a standout, sought after business based on your unique brilliance. You just did and did so in a way, like so many other neurodivergent people.
Because while they recognize that they do different things and they do things differently, most of them really don't have a full appreciation for just how unique they are. And it is, you have been convinced of how unique and original and exceptional you are by your fricking customers again and again and again. And I like that so much because if I think about someone saying, I don't want to create customers, I want to create fans, I want to create super fans. I want to create people that are so fucking obsessed with me that no matter what I'm offering, they cannot get enough, that's kind of cringe.
G: People got tattoos of my embroidery designs, they are that obsessed.
H: But you never set out to make people obsessed with what you do. You did the ADHD thing of following your interest, following your curiosity, taking risks, seeing where it goes, and just saying, hey, I made this. And people could either say, oh, good for you, or could say, I want one, or can you teach me? But you had to be willing to try the things and put them out there to learn everything that you've learned about business, including, hey, I didn't set out to create super fans, but now I can reverse engineer it because it happened organically and I see that there's a way that it can be created. And then now you're in your next business, Fat Cap.
G: Yeah. And then I just didn't go where I expected. I kept listening to people, I kept tweaking the offer I would do user interviews. I would listen to active listen at all the networking events I went to. I would get a few clients here and there, and it just. It so frustrating because I was ready to take them on this amazing roller coaster ride like, let's go. And they're like, I think I just need ads, you know, I think I just need a bookkeeper. And I'd be like, no, no, like, it's right here, like this and so I kind of had to have this moment. You know, I told my husband, I feel like I've spent the last two years just failing over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.
And I'm not gonna burn it to the ground because I promised not to do that anymore. But I was like, I kind of just our relationship we're always in these things together. And I was like, I just want you to know I'm not gonna do that, but permission to put it into hibernation. I want to keep doing a few things that I love about it. I love writing the weekly newsletter. That's always been one of my greatest joys is weekly newsletters and people, like, the open rates are crazy and everything.
H: They're really good.
G: Oh, thank you.
H: They're really good.
G: So I was like, I will keep that so the lights will stay on. It will keep running but there's been something my therapist posted she's like, you just took, like, the scenic route for 20 years. I went to school to be a writer, and I finally figured out how to write the book. And I was like, well, I can't just put a book out there with no fans that is, what is the point?
So I was like, okay, well, it needs a subscription business, obviously. So I was like, what did I do before, you know, when I was running all these clubs? And it's like, okay, so what does this look like? How do we start this? So this is like, hibernate and then hibernate the one business to grow the next so all the emotional energy that the one was sucking out of me, like, we don't. It's not failed because it's still technically like, there's still a pulse.
H: You could resuscitate it.
G: I could resuscitate it. People can still work with me. I'm just not actively pursuing anyone and instead focusing on honestly building something that I haven't seen many. I don't know if I've seen anyone do this before, which is a runway of monthly short stories in the world that the novel is to build an audience for the book then when it comes out. So it is difficult to start at zero fan again.
H: Yeah.
G: Again, yeah, very humbling, the first hundred is always the worst. But it quickly the joy came back and I kept meeting the right people to help me do what I need to do. Like, I have where I'm recording this right now. I'm in my friend's recording studio, which means I have access to voice actors and so we can make audio versions, audiobooks.
H: Yeah.
G: Yeah, so I keep meeting the right people and the universe is very cheeky. And it tends to reward me when I tell it like, fine, we're going to do that. Because I told it, I was like, okay, I'm putting this one business into hibernation. I'm going to focus on writing the book and I kid you not, an hour later, I got a phone call from my dentist, and they're like, you won a free iPad? And I was like, great okay, I needed that actually.
For one, there's something I wanted to do with a new business and I was like, okay, so I think I'm on the right track here. But I think for all of with this new path, it is what does monetization look like? So I really sat down first and was like, here's how much money I want to make. And honestly, my husband's goal at this point is to be a house husband like, he would just. He needs a sabbatical like, he gave me for a year to just chill so it's like, how do I make X amount of money?
H: How do I get to that?
G: And we both agreed, my husband and I, that there would always be multiple streams of revenue. So I do have a podcast and then kind of an event series launching soon with a friend so that it's never just one business. Because we learned pandemic, I do not have both of you in the same business.
H: Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Yep.
G: So but it is kind of that looking at it and being like, what do the models look like? How much could it bring in and when? And, like, what are the scale points of it? Instead of just being like, this is the thing I want to do, let me just drop everything and go run after this shiny object. I really sat with it for ugh, I noodled for, like, six months. And I had a lot of conversations with my therapist and my husband about this is the time I really want to do this but here's the parameters that I'm putting around this experiment.
H: Yes.
G: Because I'm not going to drive us into the ground over this. And for somebody, you know who like the world we live in, our value is some, let's be honest, mostly determined by how much money we make. It's been really hard the last few months to have like zero come in while I am actively deep in the I need six short stories so this can launch. Sitting in that discomfort of like, what is my value right now in this house and trying not to overcompensate for those emotions by like all of the emotional or like, you know, cleaning labor. It's been really interesting and again, it's another experiment. I don't see them as risks, but when I talk to other people, I realized, yes, how unusual my life has been and just how many businesses I have and put down and pick up and put down.
H: This is your path though. You know, it's like, I mean for so many years, I thought my inability to do one thing indefinitely was a weakness, a flaw.
G: Yeah.
H: And a limitation and it took me far too many years to realize your path. And the path of many neurodivergent people, I'd say perhaps the majority, maybe even all of us, is a path of continuous personal evolution where we grow into and we grow out of multiple versions of ourself, multiple iterations of ourself, multiple forms of expression of ourself. And I think this conversation has been a massive masterclass in how to pivot in ways that steer you away from the extremes of burning it down or burning yourself out. And I think unfortunately we tend to be people who are pretty determined and hard headed and we most definitely seem to have to learn things the hard way.
But you have learned just how much burnout takes from you and you've learned that it's hard on your relationship as well. So marrying the right person obviously was a big part of this because he's been able to kind of roll with the punches and know what you need and lean in and pull back and give you good advice. But you've talked us through three different ways that you can pivot from one business into another. The test and build, the jump without a parachute and the hibernate to grow. And you will probably go through many different variations of these over your working lifetime and probably create multiple others.
This is your path and yeah, it's definitely not for everybody. There's probably some people that would feel quite nauseous just thinking about doing that. But for you, it's probably the only way for you to really exist in the world and be able to make the contributions that are uniquely yours to make. I think you've already answered this question in so many different ways, but I like to wrap up these interviews by asking this particular question. What is one of your many traits that serve you well in business that you associate with your ADHD?
G: I would say we were talking about it before, and curiosity is my top value. One of my friends, Lisa Congdon, she has like a value stack, we do it every year to see because they will shift. Your top three to five tend not to shift that much for the next 10 as you're in different phases of your life. And curiosity is always my top one because I think it helps to get to know your customer really well. I think it makes you a better listener because, honestly, trying to figure out things. My friend and I were just doing a recording and she's like, I don't talk to the grocery store checkout people.
And I'm like, oh, I do because I want to know what's the weirdest combo that they rung up that day? Because it's always a good one and that doesn't occur to most people. But, like, I think being curious allows you to keep learning to just be like, well, why I mean, everyone that I told about, like, yeah, I'm building a subscription business around a novel. They're like, that's a thing, I'm like, I think so now I'm looking into it. You deep dive, see what other people have done. But I think if you're curious, you can get to understand what makes your customers tick because they're different than you. Because if they were you, they would be doing your job.
H: And also, Megan, to just point out the obvious, you also learn what makes you tick by being curious and saying yes to things for no other reason than why not. You don't limit yourself to only doing things you already know how to do. You don't limit yourself to doing things that you already know are going to work out or that you can make money. You follow your curiosity and you see where it takes you. And you also know that it needs to check certain boxes otherwise it's just a distraction or an indulgence. And at the end of the day, you got bills to pay. So, you know, I think we are going to continue to see many wonderful and amazing things from you. Thank you so much for spending this time with me. I'm excited to continue observing your journey and cheering you on from the side.
G: Oh, thank you so much.