From the outside looking in, being the boss seems like a piece of cake. You have the power to call all the shots, earn a decent living, and work on your terms. Contrary to popular belief, being an entrepreneur comes with significant physical and psychological challenges. More than delegating assignments, you play a vital role in everything from employee management and finance to marketing and customer service. Essentially, you sacrifice your time and energy to ensure your business succeeds.
The long hours and emotional pressures begin to weigh heavily on you, causing you to develop unhealthy habits. Some days you skip meals; other days, you overindulge in comfort foods. You’re working around the clock, leaving little time for sleep or personal interests. When you find some downtime, you turn to coping mechanisms like prescription medication, alcohol, and even drugs to deal with stress.
Prioritizing Yourself
Business owners that continue unhealthy habits ultimately reach a breaking point. Eventually, they feel burned out and stop caring for their physical and emotional needs. Consequently, their health declines along with their ability to effectively manage a business. The only way to prevent something like this from happening to you is to learn how to prioritize yourself through self-care. Continue reading for suggestions.
Set Business Hours
You can’t have a healthy work-life balance if you don’t set clear boundaries. Your business can take over your entire life if you’re not paying attention. You can nip this in the bud by determining your work hours. Choose a time that works best with your lifestyle. Whether it’s the traditional 9 to 5 or you prefer noon to 7 pm, just ensure that these are the only hours you’re working.
Create Morning And Bedtime Routines
How you start and finish your day has a significant impact on your physical and emotional well-being. If you’re going to prioritize your needs, creating a morning and bedtime routine is ideal. Select a wake-up time and set the alarm. When you get up, ensure that you’ve made time to exercise, shower, complete skincare routines, get dressed, take your daily vitamin and healthy gut supplements, interact with your family and eat breakfast.
After a workday, ensure that you eat. Then, take a bath or shower, spend quality time with loved ones, and do something calming yet entertaining before turning in for a good night’s sleep.
Eat Healthily
Much like a car needs gas to operate, your body needs a well-balanced diet to function efficiently. Skipping meals and indulging in unhealthy foods reduces the number of vitamins, nutrients, and minerals in your body. You might start feeling sluggish, aggravated, exhausted, and emotionally overwhelmed. Your body loses strength, the immune system weakens, and before long, you’re unable to perform your job.
You have to incorporate the proper nutrition into your diet. Start drinking smoothies in the morning, taking supplements, eating salads for lunch, and reducing the fast food and takeout you eat. If you tend to skip meals, set the alarm for mealtimes so you can ensure that you’re eating at least three times a day.
Hire Or Outsource Help
One of the quickest ways to burn out as an entrepreneur is to try and take on everything yourself. While this concept may work well for financially strapped entrepreneurs in the beginning stages of starting a business, it can’t stay that way forever.
As your business grows, so do the responsibilities. Essentially, you need to get help. Even if you don’t have the money to hire a full in-house team, you can outsource specific tasks to freelancers or agencies—some entrepreneurs barter services instead of using cash to save money.
Take Breaks
All work and no play is a surefire recipe for disaster. Entrepreneurs need to take breaks from their businesses. On a small scale, taking a 30-minute lunch break or 15-minute breaks throughout the workday can prove beneficial. However, scheduling days off and vacations to focus on your personal life and interests is also ideal.
An entrepreneur’s main objective is to provide a quality product or service that accommodates the needs and interests of their target audiences. The only way you can do this is if you’re kind to yourself. While the physical and emotional pressures of running a business can get overwhelming, prioritizing your health and wellness makes being an entrepreneur more manageable. The self-care practices listed above serve as a starting point to helping you prevent burnout and be your best self inside and out.