Sometimes, it feels like work-life balance is impossible when you’re a business owner. How’s it even going to work? What even is work-life balance when you’re a business owner? Some days, if you ask me that question, I truly don’t know the answer. Owning a business sometimes feels like a wild mix of feeling like you need to say yes and no to everything all at once or everything will implode. Or maybe that’s just me.
The reality is that over the last few months, I’ve been pretty terrible at work-life balance. I’ve had to cancel plans on friends, I’ve had to miss dinners with my family. It all comes from a place of over-scheduling – or never wanting to over promise and under deliver. I’ve missed trips that I was excited to go on. But it brings me back to the question – why do this if you have to sacrifice the things you love?
Why’d you start to begin with?
When I started Misty Saves the Day, the idea was that I’d make my own schedule so that I could focus on doing things that I love. That means hanging out with my family, riding my bike, training for a century, having lunch with my friends, going for walks in the woods. There’s a lot to be said for doing the things that you love – and then letting that inspiration bleed over into your job. It became super clear to me that if I wasn’t focusing on the things that I loved to do recently – and that’s why I feel stuck.
I’m always reminded when I don’t focus on myself, or don’t focus on self-care, that everything seems to suffer a little bit. Our clients never felt it, and for that, I’m super thankful. Our team did, though. My family did, my friends did. So something had to change.
We did a camping trip with friends two weeks ago. Then, this past weekend, I had a quick overnight camping trip with my best friend before what I know will be a crazy week. It was recommended to me to bring a camera that WASN’T a work camera – so that I didn’t feel like I was working. It worked. I loved those photos (see below). Sometimes, you just have to remember WHY you’re doing what you do – and then the work-life balance starts to come.
Here’s a few tips to help you out if you’re a business owner struggling with creating work-life balance (and maybe I’ll reference some of these in the future:
- Schedule the things you want to do on your calendar. Want to ride my bike? It’s an appointment on my calendar. No one has to know what the appointment is for – just do it. You’re booked at that time – don’t move it for anything.
- Acknowledge that even if your day is clear, you don’t have to fill it up with things. I’m the worst at this, truly. When my day is clear, and I know I COULD take a meeting, I say yes. Nothing is usually urgent, and it can wait if you’ve got other things to do.
- Prioritize your family and your friends. Don’t cancel things to hang out with them- but don’t over schedule work so much that there’s nowhere to fit in hang out times. Your version of over-scheduling might not look like mine. This is where I falter the absolute most.
- Schedule your social media management – or have us do it for you 😉 It’s the whole reason we own a business, and the whole reason that I have a team to support that idea.
Our team supports me when I need to take a break – and we all do the same for them. We want to do the same for you and your small business. If taking one thing off of your plate means you’ve got time to go to your kid’s softball games or go to yoga or go take a weekend away with your family, then we’ve done our job. My team even helps us with my social media and blogging. Clearly – I trust them, and you should, too.
Oh, and here are a few of the photos taken this weekend. It wasn’t a lot. After all, I wasn’t TRYING to work.
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