Chances are that if you are reading Under30CEO, you work hard. You push yourself to the limit. You work late, party later and do whatever it takes for your young business to succeed.
Living on the edge of over-working, happy hours, travel, meetings, stress, tech and whatever personal life you have will eventually take a toll on your body. Ryan Hanley recently wrote on Under30CEO syndciate Reuters.com that “at no time in your business’s growth will the health and wellness of employees be more important than the startup years.”
As you get away from the college scene and move out from under whatever is left of your parent’s internal circle of life, you must go out on your own and worry about more than that big stack of laundry, but things like car and health insurance, eating more than pizza and Taco Bell and making financial decisions that are going to affect your day-today and future living.
When you are living on the edge, as I do nearly everyday these days, you begin to neglect your health, even when you aren’t trying to.
I mean, yesterday I ran a few miles at 6:30am, had a nice breakfast, a salad for lunch, an afternoon snack and then continued working till 9pm or so till I realized I needed some grub. And I needed it now.
At this point there was no cooking to be done, but some Chinese delivery on the way and 10 minutes to catch the end of the Magic game. Then it’s back to the computer for some more emailing, proposal writing, research and campaigning before passing out round 1 or 2. Only to do it all again at 6:30am.
Sounds about right.
This neglect of health for young entrepreneurs takes a toll on many things that are not just the obvious bag-filled eyes at your 8am breakfast meeting or Skype chat.
The Value Of Your Time
As an entrepreneur you are responsible for many things and unfortunately at the early stage, if you are not front and center in your business, stuff just doesn’t get done. When you begin to crash, get a cold or wake up with a massive hangover from yesterday’s sales celebration, you have a great chance of missing opportunities and revenue. And that sucks.
Now imagine going on hiatus for a week or so to attend to whatever ailment you have suddenly come down with. I know for me that would totally throw a wrench in my plans. Yea, I can check some emails on my phone and do all the cool mobile stuff that Apple shows off in their commercials, but in reality I am going to watch me some Iron Man, reruns of Brewmasters and think about doing some Bear Grylls excursions as soon as I heal up and find another day to take off.
The Value Of Your Responsibility
I’ve learned the hard way this year that crashing on your responsibilities are no fun. When you start feeling overwhelmed and stressed and start blocking too many responsibilities off your plate they seem to come back and bite you right in the ass.
Making sure you stay on top of your physical and mental health on a daily basis is a strong ingredient towards being successful in business. People love doing business with other strong people and if you start neglecting this, it becomes extremely visible in your appearance, your confidence and your ability to close.
This is a responsibility killer. For you personally, for your company, for your employees if you have any and for those that depend on you busting your ass in a healthy way to deliver on what you need to deliver as a CEO. What value does your being an “A” player have on your company? It should be pretty high at this stage of the game.
The Value Off Your Game Off The Court
I know for me and a lot of people that got into this young entrepreneur space got into it for the freedom. The freedom to work when and where we want, with who we want and scale our income well beyond the 3% raise or whatever that “real job” world is experiencing these days.
I can guesstimate that you might have done it for some of those same reasons. For Gen-Y, family is a big part of our lives. From our parents, siblings and extended family on to our girlfriends, wives and late nights on the town, we love good times surrounded by good people.
The way we treat our health and our bodies affects our time away from the office. It affects our attitudes, our states and the way we treat others. Felling sick, worried or stressed transcends right into the people we spend our time with. Managing our states through our health is beyond important, and while living on the edge is fun for a while, there comes a time when you need to spend a Friday night glued to Netflix and not a bottle of Jack (pick your poison).
The Value Of Calling For Help
The biggest key to living on the edge and having a killer, non stop life is asking for help. Whether that be from delegation or outsourcing of tasks at work, to not taking on projects to bringing on employees.
The number one aid for me in my business is setting up both people and services to help me out and kick off some stress in my business lifestyle. People like my business partners, who have my back at my company, help me make good decisions at lunch and make sure I find answers to my problems before my keyboard winds up being a 2-piece Bo Jackson style.
On the services end this can be joining forums, being part of online groups and masterminds, accountability groups or using services like Red Butler who will do a ton of tasks for you that give you your time back, helping you to get back to what you do best (whatever that is).
There are also services for your health that can make all the difference in the world. Being able to call a nurse when you start feeling dizzy in the morning, or have a question about your diet is really a key factor and a great person to have in your corner. What’s worse is when you really feel sick, injure yourself on a weekend snowboarding trip (looking at you Matt) or need help coping with an illness of a family member.
With a service like On Call Nurse, you can have this luxury. It’s like a Black Card for your health. You hope to never have to use it, but when the time comes you know you have a team member that you can call on to keep you on your toes and make sure you never miss a beat while plotting to take over the world.
Are You Living Life On The Edge?
Let’s talk about your life on the edge. Are you giving your mind and your body more than it can take right now? Let’s discuss in the comments below.
This post was written by Greg Rollett. Greg has been rocking his Internet Business for over 5 years now and recently joined the Internet Marketing Startup, Cognitiv in Lake Mary, FL. Their first big product is On Call Nurse, a 24/7 phone number that gives you access to a Registered Nurse whenever you need it.
