Three Tips for Staying Sane As You Run Your Own Business
Congratulations, you’re a business owner! You (and your team) have poured your blood, sweat, and tears to get your passion off the ground. Now, how do you keep the fire burning without burning yourself out? Here are three lessons I learned the hard way in the early years of building and running our independent production company Cherrydale Productions Ltd.
Tip #1: Tame Your To-Do List
It can be easy when you work by yourself or with a small team to always have business on the brain. Being a team of three at Cherrydale, we’ve had to wear many hats in order to keep the business and our productions running smoothly. As the first season of The March Family Letters started to ramp up it quickly became difficult to stay on top of tasks and they started to pile up. Keeping my usual mental to-do list stopped being effective and I couldn’t sleep at night worrying over how much work there was to do! I was overwhelmed and unorganized and things needed to change — fast. By doing something as simple as making a physical to-do list and colour coding it by urgency, I immediately noticed a difference in my ability to tackle my workload.
As a company we started to use team task manager tools Trello & Slack to communicate with each other, keep track of progress and delegate tasks between our team. Being able to see everything in one place allowed us to prioritize more efficiently and made even our busiest periods seem more manageable. Nothing beats the feeling of turning your to-do list into a “to-done” list and there are countless ways to get organized. From bullet journals to the latest apps, I encourage you to experiment and find a system that works best for you and your team. You’ll definitely be better off for it!
Tip #2: Set A Schedule & Stick to It!
Setting your own hours can easily turn into a dangerous game of “I’ll start it later” especially if you work from home. If you’re anything like I was, before you know it you’ve entered a Youtube wormhole of procrastination with no end in sight! I had gone from working a 9 to 5 to being completely in control of my own hours. While being a night owl might have worked for me in university, procrastinating during the day and working all night wasn’t sustainable, so I needed to find a better solution. Ironically, it was while browsing Youtube that I came across Ingrid Nilsen’s Working from Home video. Following Ingrid’s advice I started to set a regular workday schedule and just like that I was literally back in business.
Sure, sometimes our line of work requires the occasional all-nighter but more often than not, working late into the night gets to a point where it stops being productive and just wears you out. I learned to save that email until tomorrow morning when I was refreshed and awake. After all, I probably wouldn’t get a response to that 2AM email until the morning anyways. Another important part of setting a regular working schedule is taking breaks throughout the day. Set a reminder on your phone and go for a quick walk every few hours and be sure to give yourself a dedicated lunch hour to step away from your work. Also, set a time when you’re going to be finished working for the day. It doesn’t have to be what is considered “regular” working hours, but setting a dedicated time to step away from your work for the evening will go a long way in helping to stave off burnout.
Tip #3: Take Time for Some Self Care
This one is important! When you are running your own business it’s very easy to lose track of your own well-being. I learned this lesson in just the last year of working with Cherrydale. I was grinding away at a part-time job in an unrelated field and in production on All For One Season 2. Despite all of my best efforts to follow my own advice and keep a schedule, I was on a fast track to a flaming burnout. Taking care of yourself can sometimes feel like it’s eating away at valuable work time but at the end of the day you are your business’ greatest asset, so you have to invest in you.
Fuel your body with nutritious food, one cannot survive on junk food and coffee alone. Sometimes when time is tight I’ve used meal delivery services like Chef’s Plate or Hello Fresh to relieve the pressure of grocery shopping or figuring out what’s for dinner.
Find something you love that will get you out of the house, whether it’s joining a gym or a rec sports league, going shopping, or maintaining a weekly date night with friends or a loved one. Having an excuse to get out of the house and out of your own head can be a blessing.
Prioritize sleep because no one is their best self when they are tired. If you have trouble turning off your work brain at night like I do, I suggest trying to meditate before bed using apps like Calm or use a white noise app like Relax Melodies to lull you to sleep.
Lastly, build a strong support system around you for when things do get tough and don’t be afraid to turn to them when you need help. I found an online therapist through Tranqool that worked with my weird schedule and really helped me feel more in control of my mental heath.
There will always be challenges and roadblocks when running your own business, but you have already accomplished something amazing by taking action and making your dream a reality. I hope that you are able to take something away from my experiences to make the road to success a little easier and with fewer grey hairs.
