MBA2146 Is Your Business Pushing You Around?

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Ba da ba ba b. One of the things a lot of people don't talk about is that as your business starts to grow and starts to expand, you get more customers and you have more opportunities. As there's more things that you can do, the more demanding the business becomes. It sucks your time, it sucks your energy, it sucks even your health, your happiness, sometimes your well being. And you get on this hamster wheel where you feel like, I gotta keep going or I'll lose everything I work so hard to build. This is not a great place to be. I know because I've been there several times and I've learned my lesson the hard way. And I want to share with you some strategies to identify and get out of that situation so you don't have to go through what I did. One of the number one signs of your business is pushing you around is that there are no boundaries. Meaning your business gets the attention, takes your time anytime it wants. And this is very subtle, by the way. Sometimes it's hard to notice. You might be on vacation or on a road trip, or it's the weekend and you get an email and you're supposed to be enjoying time with your family or friends, but you say to yourself, oh, I'll just reply real quick and get back to this person or get back to this vendor or whatever it is. Now you might think it's no biggie. You might think, oh, it's something small, it's not a big deal, it's gonna take me a few minutes. But the reality is, is that your business is pushing you around. In that case, your business is saying, I'm more important than whatever you're doing right now. Enjoying with your family, enjoying time with yourself. You're reading a book. Might be do what I'm asking, do this task, reply to this email because it's more important. You need to do it now. And if you're loose about your boundaries, about your business and your life, things start to snowball. It will be a five minute email, then it becomes a phone call, then it becomes a webinar, then it becomes, there are no weekends, there are no holidays, everything is work and work takes over. And some people might say, hey, what's the big deal if I love what I'm doing? And here's my answer to this. In business, not everything you're going to do, you're going to love. There are going to be some tasks you're going to have to do. Administrative tasks, paying bills, whatever. It's not fun. But once you set the precedent, once you start building these habits, which says basically the business comes first, no matter what, you are no longer enjoying anything. You're not enjoying the work, nor are you enjoying the time off with your loved ones. In fact, in 2017, on this podcast, I did an eight week experiment where I worked while I was traveling on quote unquote holiday for eight weeks. I'm gonna let you listen to that eight week or eight part episode experiment. The first episode is MBA 880 and you'll learn what I was learning along the way. But a bit of a hint. I didn't enjoy my work, nor did I enjoy my holiday in Europe because my mind was split. I was working when I was supposed to be relaxing. I was relaxing when I was supposed to be working. I felt guilty. It was just horrible. And that's because I didn't have control over my business. I let the business control me. Another sign of your business is pushing you around is that you make decisions based on the business's needs and not your own or your family's. What does this mean? Look at the finances of your business. Are you reinvesting or giving your business more money for marketing or sales or hires and holding off on things that you or your family or your personal needs are? Some people put all their net wealth, everything, into a business and therefore it's a very high risk situation for your Personal wealth, meaning what if the business doesn't work out? That means you are left with nothing. Yeah, you have experiences and you have maybe some connections you made, but any smart entrepreneur will tell you, hey, diversify your wealth, meaning take some money off the top. Dividends. Don't reinvest everything. When you're profitable, make sure that you're comfortable so that way you can make the right decisions and not desperate decisions with your business. Another sign that your business is pushing you around is that you might have feelings of resentment towards your business. You're not really sure how to describe this feeling even. You might even feel like, oh, this business, I wish I could just sell it or get rid of it or whatever is driving me nuts. You'll have moments like this. Not all the time, but you have moments like this where you have resentment towards the business because it's intruding on your life and your happiness. So the solution to all of this is actually discipline. It's actually disciplining your business, disciplining yourself to make sure you put boundaries. And there are three boundaries I think are very important when it comes to you and your business. And those are time boundaries, financial boundaries, and energy boundaries. Let's start with time. One of the fastest ways to reverse this so your business is not pushing you around and you're in control, is to put some time back. Boundaries, even if you feel like you don't need them. Okay, just try it and see how you feel. Spend a month where you say, hey, I'm gonna take a weekend, right? I'm gonna have Saturday and Sunday off, for example, And I'm not gonna work, I'm gonna shut down my laptop and I'm gonna make sure all my notifications are off on my phone. And I'm gonna allow myself to enjoy the weekend, enjoy it and do life stuff. Go get groceries, you know, go do some laundry, go on a hike, do something fun. Have hours for your work. I like to get up early and get as much work done and then end my day before dinner. So around 4 o'. Clock. That means not scheduling any meetings that are late. You have to be vigilant about it though, because you can't just set these time limits and then break them. And one of the ways to do this is to have a very tight schedule, meaning just follow your Google Calendar and make sure you don't schedule anything before or after these hours or during the weekend. Now, this is not the only thing you have to worry about because you know yourself, even if it's on the calendar. You might open up your laptop and start working on something because you have a laundry list of to do's and you want to get ahead of the week by doing some work on the weekend. This is your business pushing you around. This is your business pushing you to break the boundaries. This is where you have to stop and say, hey, I'm trying this out for one month. I want to see what happens. And the experiment is just to say, hey, is your business going to just collapse if you do this or if it's going to be fine? You might find that your business is doing just fine and it might even grow because the time you are working, you are refreshed, you have a better mind, you're more creative. The other thing that helped me is reminding myself that there is always gonna be things to do. The to do list never ends. Okay, yeah, you have a list and there's five things on that list and you wanna get rid of them. But guess what happens when you get rid of them? You add things to the list so the list never ends. So don't think like if I just cram in some work this weekend I'll feel better. No you won't because you'll add more stuff and it'll never end. Like I mentioned, okay? So the point is take control and say, hey, the work will be there for me on Monday. I think it's very important to have, you know, some off time in the evening where you just don't answer any messages or work related emails. I think eight hours is the minimum to just let your brain relax, do other things, read a book, enjoy a meal, whatever it is. So if you go to bed, let's say at 9 o', clock, then set a timer like 1 o'. Clock. I am not going to do that anymore. Especially emails. So do your emails in the morning, messages, things like that. You might want to do some creative work at the end of the day, but you want to have a good stretch of time where you're not answering the demands of your business. And we'll talk about what you can do with that time when we talk about setting boundaries with your energy. All right? The second boundary is finances. I can't stress this enough. It's so important for you to have separate finances for your business. You need to make sure your business is sustainable and is self sufficient. It needs to be profitable and maintaining itself without any intervention from your own finances. This is the number one goal for any business when they're getting started is make sure that it's sustainable. That means you're making more than you're spending. And the best way to do this is just keep your expenses as low as possible. Don't bring on more expenses unless you can afford it and you're still profitable with that expense. Now, when I say profitable, I'm talking about including your salary, okay? A lot of people forget about their own salary, okay? You need to pay yourself so that you can live a life. You can put a roof over your head. You can be independent from your business and feel a sense of security. So pay yourself a decent salary that allows you to live a lifestyle that's decent and make sure your business is profitable. If your business is not profitable with your own salary and all your expenses, you need to work on your business model. You need to work on your offering. You need to work on how you're acquiring customers. Your business is not good enough yet for it to have legs. Don't try to dump money from your own accounts, your own finances into your business, hoping that it'll make a difference if you have customers. If you're selling a product and you're making money, that's where you get the revenue. This is where if you need more revenue, make more customers, right? Make more sales. That should be your goal by having separate finances and your business being totally sustainable and profitable. And if you want your business to grow, then you have to figure it out within the finances of the business and not your own finances. You have to see yourself as an investor where you're investing your time and energy. Energy and not your money. Now, if you want to get finances from outside yourself, like a loan or an investor, that's a different story. But don't put financial pressure and financial risk on your own finances to sustain a business. I am telling you out of experience, I know that sometimes you're passionate about your idea and you feel like, yes, I want to bet on myself and put all some money down, put my money where my mouth is. Not a good idea in the long run because you're basically giving full reign permission for your business to push you around. And the third boundary is boundaries of energy.

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All right, so we talked about boundaries of time. We talked about boundaries of money or finances. The third one is energy. Now, a lot of people confuse this with time, but it's really about how you feel and the energy you spend. One of the biggest mistakes a lot of entrepreneurs do is that they sacrifice their health. They don't exercise, they don't move, they cash in the time they're supposed to go to the gym for another hour of replying to emails or doing some busy work. I get it, there's a lot to do. But when you exercise, when you move your body, you actually gain energy. This is scientifically proven. This is not my opinion. It clears your mind. It allows you to step away and get a new perspective. I'm a big believer that you should do some form of exercise every single day of your life. And exercise could be playing basketball, it could be playing tennis, it could be going to the gym, it could be going for a walk, it could be a yoga class, it could be doing some pushups and sit ups and pull ups at home, it could be going for a swim. It doesn't matter. Move your body. I like to be really efficient at the gym. I spend 40 minutes at the gym. I rather do 40 minutes, seven days a week, 365 days a year than do two hours, three or four times a week. And then I kind of get tired of it or I just can't sustain it. So I feel guilty and I kind of taper off after a few weeks. No, for me, consistency is the key when it comes to your exercise. Exercise is an investment in your energy. The other form of energy sapping that your business will do is stress. And stress, we know, is a killer. This is why you have to be mindful of the stress and the pressure that a business will put on you. This is why having breaks throughout the day helps. Getting fresh air, having a lunch, getting a good night's sleep. You have to manage your energy to make sure your business is not just taking over your energy energy and saying, hey, your energy, everything, 100% of it is mine. No. Then you have nothing left for yourself or your family or your loved ones. This is why you have to be very mindful of your energy. Your attitude matters a lot. One of the things I have adopted over the years that has really helped me is have a default response of humor. Okay? Just keeping things light. Business is hard and serious as it is, so when things happen, I try to find the humor in it. I try to make a joke out of it. If things don't go great for me, for some reason, I screw up. I just kind of laugh at myself and move on instead of letting it fester and just cause me more stress. So you have to be mindful of how your energy is spent because all energy is not created equal. One of the best things I did to increase my energy throughout the day is standing. I have a standing desk. I don't stand all day, but my default is standing. And then when I need a break, I'll sit down for maybe 15, 20 minutes. But I do all my webinar standing. I do my podcasting. Right now I'm standing. This allows me to get more oxygen in my lungs, think on my feet, just be a little bit more alive. But more importantly, I'm telling the business how I'm running things. I say I'm standing up, I sit down. I don't just allow it to just summon me into a chair for 18 straight hours working in front of the computer. No, I'm mindfully saying my energy, my health matters. Well, there you have it, guys. If you feel like your business is pushing around even a little, you could turn it around. Go ahead and try some of these strategies to set the boundaries of time, finances and energy around your business. If you loved this episode, let me know in a rating and review. Head on over to Apple Podcasts and drop us a rating and review. We'd love to hear from you. Also, if you love the show, you could pay it forward by sharing it on social media. Send them to 100nba.net and let them know you love the podcast. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. I always do not ignore the fact that business is hard, it's stressful, it's tiring. So you need to be on guard. You have to be actively trying to make sure it doesn't affect you. You can't be in a hurricane and say, oh, I'm just going to try not to get wet. No, you're going to wear a raincoat. You got to be prepared. You're going to wear boots so your feet don't get wet. The point here is that you know, you're going into battle. Make sure you have boundaries. Make sure you know what you're doing. Make sure you're going in on the offense. Don't just submit to whatever the business wants to do. Thanks so much for listening and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode Freeride Friday. I'll see you then. Take care.

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