You work hard for your small business and for the personal fitness clients you depend on…
But for many of us out there, we often work too hard. There was once a time when you might have felt a little pride that you put in a 50-hour week into your new company, but now that you’ve been doing 60s for the past three months -you’re beginning to wonder just how long you’ll be able to keep up this pace.
But at the same time, whenever you take just one day off, you’re mind is constantly on your work, your clients, your leads, etc. By lunchtime, you’re already feeling bad about having ‘skipped work’ to run a few errands or visit with a friend for the day. You think about the money you could be making, the progress you’re missing, and your inbox that’s been filling up for the past 18 hours.
No matter how hard you work, you just can’t seem to work hard enough.
And even if there were an extra 8 hours in a day, you’d probably figure out a way to work those too.
But the problem is simple: eventually, this unhealthy pace is going to end. And it will end, whether by balance or burnout. So, what should you do? Well first, let’s get the guilt-factor out of the way.
FACT: You’re Not Like Everybody Else …And That’s OK
Entrepreneurs, in whatever industry they might be, are inherently different from most people. While there are certainly exceptions to this rule, most are content with the joys of routine, and the safety of working a punch-in-punch-out kind of job.
You, on the other hand, have always been unsatisfied with that kind of life. You’re willing to take risks where others are not, and you’re willing to bet your paycheck on those risks. This makes you an uncommon individual, and that’s also why startup personal fitness trainers tend to have a natural knack for this business: your vision, your drive, is inspiring.
It takes more than just a few reps at the gym in order to get your clients into the best shape of their lives. They need to be inspired. Your ability to believe in them is rooted in the fact that you believe in yourself. This belief, however, is also what fuels your uncommonly strong work ethic.
Whereas most spend their time at work, watching the clock in anticipation for the drive home …you glance at the clock periodically, wishing you could make it slow down or stop altogether.
The reason I’m saying this is simple: you have absolutely no reason to feel guilt for rewarding yourself with a little downtime. In fact, you’re probably more than deserving of it.
Fires Burn Out When They Run Out of Fuel
Now I’m going to take this one step further…
Not only are you more than deserving of reward, but your company depends on it. In fact, Adam Hartung of Forbes wrote a fantastic piece, issuing a strong indictment against companies that discourage time off for their employees, citing one company in particular that took major losses as a result:
“That division of CSC lost 80% of its revenue, and employees, as burn-out drove people away.”
I’ve been there, myself. Sitting in my office chair with my eyes feeling the burn from a very long day, I would sometimes remember my bucket list, my dreams, and my own personal goals. And then, I would realize just how far away those rewards felt to me.
This realization didn’t make me want to work harder. Quite frankly, it made me want to give up altogether, because I had been missing the point all along.
I began my business because it would eventually give me a means of seeing my dreams become a reality. My work-lifestyle at that point was the exact opposite of what I wanted from the beginning. My dreams were the original fuel to my fire, but because I was denying myself that fuel, I was headed for burnout.
Success depends on dreams, because fires depend on fuel; and the bigger your fire, the bigger your dreams have to be …and an unburnt log next to a dead fire is a waste.
Fuel: Log Vacations and Twig-Kindling Weekends
With that said, a good campfire needs, both thick logs in order to burn throughout the night, and also smaller sticks in order to start it and keep it maintained. You should throw on a log every once in a while, but you have to feed it thin twigs every couple minutes to keep it hot.
In the same way, you can’t simply sustain your drive on those giant dream-log vacations that you add to the fire once a year. You’ve got to feed it with the smaller rewards of life: those days off, the nights out, the weekends away, and those occasional 12-hour movie marathon Mondays.
Time Off Is Good For Your Company
This will not only keep your motivation going, but spending time away will help you incubate ideas, nurture your vision, and give you excitement to get an early start to the following morning. It will also give your mind and body that necessary routine rest it needs to keep going.
You’re already a hard worker, there’s no doubt about that.
But success truly lies in your ability work smart, steadily, and stopping when you need a breather. Your company’s survival depends on your survival.
And this pace will have to end …whether by balance or burnout. (I’d personally recommend balance to be the better option of the two.)
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