5 Strategies I Use to Keep Myself Sane

Running a rapidly growing business can be very stressful. When you include two young children, an office renovation, and building a new house in your life as well, it’s important to look after your mental health and stay clear.

If I hadn’t used the strategies below to ensure my mental health stayed on track, the last two years could easily have got the better of me.

Set personal goals

Setting realistic, challenging, and motivating personal goals is important. I have just revisited my personal goals at a business retreat in Tokyo, and it was a reminder to ensure that you set yourself achievable, measurable, goals that you hold yourself accountable to.

Your goals do not all have to be about business. For example, two of the goals I have set relate to my personal life and family. I allow myself two hours of ‘me time’ every week, which consists of a one-hour massage and one hour of undisturbed reading. Another goal I have set for myself is to spend one hour a week doing an activity alone with my daughter, as I have ukulele lessons with my son.

Take stock of what matters

It is in my nature to want to scale my business and always look into the future. I intrinsically look for opportunities and ways in which the business can evolve and develop. It is therefore important that I take stock and remember to actually enjoy the moment.

If someone had told me nine years ago – when I started my business with $200 and a lot of hope – that today I would have a highly profitable company spanning three countries and employing 55 people, I would not have believed them. Sometimes I have to force myself to stop, take a deep breath, and look at what we have achieved.

Focus on the good stuff

There can be 20 great things that happen in a day, then something negative happens and it throws out your entire day and mood. Approaching your failures, setbacks, or negative experiences with a positive mindset means accepting and learning from them, instead of letting them throw you off. Remembering your successes will give you the confidence to inspire and lead – even yourself – when things go wrong.

A positive mindset requires me to look at everything with the right perspective and try not to let the negative stuff impact me too much.

Remember what is important

Reminding yourself why you go to work every day is motivating, but it’s also crucial for staying balanced. A bad interview, a lost client, or another issue in your work life can drag down your day, but it doesn’t change the good things outside your business.

Sometimes I get so wrapped up in business and working toward growth that I forget what is important. If the business went under tomorrow, I would still have my wife, my children, and my health. When things get stressful at work, I take a moment to remember this.

Think about the bigger picture

I remember a time recently where I got extremely stressed out because our work internet stopped working. I was thinking about lost productivity, missed deadlines, increased costs, reduced margins.

It is important to remember that we live in the best country in the world – New Zealand! We have access to great healthcare, education, nature and so much more. Our first world problems are meaningless in the grand scheme of things and I remind myself how fortunate I am to be here.

It is important that no matter what you are doing in life, you learn your own strategies and take the time you need for yourself. Staying healthy is much more than simply physical exercise – it’s remembering the good that you do every day and being good to the important people in your life.