Okay, business owners, let’s talk self-care.

Owning a business or being a freelancer can be a big part of who you are. Over time, you’ll put in a ton of long hours into getting your business into a position of success. Working takes over were sleeping and resting once were. 

It doesn’t always help that we are conditioned with images of entrepreneurs working in Bali for half of the year but seemingly never working at all. It is leading us to put even more hours in and eventually burn out. 

Not cool, yo.

But there isn’t really a secret code to sipping coconut water on a beach for most of your hours. It comes down to organization, working smarter — not harder — and, of course, self-care. 

You can’t light a candle that has burned the wick beyond repair, and you can’t produce your best work when you have burned out. 

Stress and being tired can have a significant impact on your ability to perform, and this will lead to a knock-on effect of losing clients or underperforming.

Your health is a no brainer, ensuring that you see the doctor for aches and pains, the dentist for your sore gums and if you wear glasses a regular visit to your optometrist (top tip: an incredible selection of round eyeglasses here). There is more beyond those things though. 

Here are some simple ways for the modern entrepreneur to indulge in some self-care. 

Meditate

Meditation is one of the big buzz words in self-care, but only because it is proven to work. But that is because meditation has been proven time and time again to help tackle depression, stress levels, inability to concentrate, and how quickly you react. 

Meditation is a practice that has been used for centuries to promote calm and well-being. Presently, there has been a growing interest in the role that healing crystals can play in meditation. The belief is that the energy of the crystal can help to reduce anxiety and promote feelings of peace and relaxation. For example, amethyst crystal properties can help to ease stress and anxiety. If you are interested in trying crystal meditation, it is important to choose a crystal that appeals to you

If you haven’t meditated before, it can feel like something quite alien, and it is better to start with a guided meditation option.

A guided meditation will help you with finding a comfortable position, talk you into a relaxed state through some simple thought control processes, and then help you ‘wake’ from your relaxed state. You can meditate for as little as 3 minutes to hours long. It is all about finding what works for you. 

There are a number of highly recommended applications for meditation:

• Headspace
• Calm
• Insight Timer
• Aura

Move

Take yourself on a walk, stretch, do yoga, or hit the gym. Whatever you do, don’t sit in one spot all day. Not only is it terrible for your posture, but moving is good for your brain.

When you work from home, you tend to spend a lot of time at the desk or your designated working space. Unless you have a standing desk or a walking desk, then you might not be getting in as much exercise as you want. 

Ideally, you should have 30+ minutes per day, and one of the easiest ways to fit that in is a daily walk. Walking will give you some fresh air and can give your brain some room to make fresh connections. It also allows you to come back to work with a fresh perspective. 

Sleep

It cannot be stressed enough that good quality sleep is essential to keep your business running well. Most of us get some type of sleep, but not many of us are getting the kind of quality sleep that we really need.

The deep sleep that lets us recharge our batteries and gives our body time to repair. The strange thing about sleep is, if you are actively trying to get to sleep, your brain monitors if you are asleep — which keeps you awake.

According to Dr. Stever Orma, the best thing to do is not try to get to sleep but just get into a relaxed state. 

Many of us make the mistake of going to bed before we are actually tired and lying there until we fall asleep. One of the better options is to only head to bed when you become tired.

One of the biggest issues with people going to sleep is using your phone or watching telly; this keeps us engaged for much longer than a book or some calming music. They are keeping us up longer. The same applications that have meditation usually have calming music that you can use to help you drift off. 

Disconnecting 

If you use your mobile phone and computer to work, then it probably won’t take long to drift back into work when you use them on your downtime.

Your brain will associate your work station, certain platforms, and your work computer with work. Thus it will naturally drift your thought pattern into working. 

On your designated downtime, do your brain a favor and turn off your notifications, don’t check your emails, and let your phone stay on silent for a while.

Getting that space to disconnect is incredibly healthy. Business opportunities that really count will still be there in an hour or on Monday morning. 

Over to You

Self-care isn’t all bubble baths and facemasks. It’s about creating a space where you don’t work, and you can truly relax.