I’ve been building businesses online and offline for almost 15 years now. In that time, I’ve learned a lot about the intricacies of running a business, managing work/life balance, and everything in between. Especially the toll being an entrepreneur can take on your mind.
One thing people don’t talk about enough is burnout and longevity. It’s becoming more common to discuss mental health and finding that balance, but it’s still very much an under-discussed area.
Did you know that you can build your entrepreneurial confidence through improving your mental well-being? Check out this study from MIT on just that.
So in this article, I want to share some advice I have for entrepreneurs who are looking to stay consistent. These are my five tips on longevity.
Staying Consistent Long-Term as an Entrepreneur
Working day in and day out for years and years on the same thing can be monotonous. So how do you keep it interesting and stay consistent?
1. Scheduling and Planning
Creating a structured schedule and planning your tasks in advance is crucial for maintaining consistency.
This doesn’t just mean having a daily to-do list; it means understanding your long-term goals and breaking them down into manageable steps.
How do I do it? Each week when working on my businesses, FilterGrade and Moloney Creative Agency, I:
- Use Apple Notes app for both short and long term goals/tasks.
- 1 note titled TD is just for the daily to do list. Things I want to get done today!
- 1 note titled Goals is for yearly goals. What big picture things do I need to work towards incrementally throughout the year. This could be revenue goals, audience goals, or anything. Just bigger.
- Use Apple and Google Calendar for scheduling calls, meetings, and travel.
- Keep it simple and focused. Don’t get too broad and try to plan everything in a single note. Take things 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, and 1 quarter at a time!
Then just focus on regularly reviewing your tasks and schedule to ensure you are actually getting the work done. Which brings me to my next point: work flows.
2. Deep Work vs. Light Work
Not all tasks are created equal. Understanding the difference between deep work and light work can help you manage your energy and focus more effectively.
For me, deep work is usually early in the morning or late at night. No phone calls, no social media, no distractions.
This work is for focusing on writing, building new products, web design and website changes, legal, accounting, and other mentally intensive tasks.
Light work is for more simple things like updating social media, editing images, simple administrative tasks, email, and even scheduling/planning is a form of light work.
Balancing the two of these well will help you avoid burnout, because you’ll constantly be bouncing between intense work sprints and more casual workflows.
This point is definitely subjective to a degree, like all of these tips on longevity are, but I think it’s important to distinguish the types of work you’re doing on a daily or weekly basis.
3. Location
Make sure you are working where you are most content. It plays a significant role in your productivity and your mental health.
If you are surrounded by loud noise and distractions, it may be hard to do your deep work.
Find a place where you can consistently lock in to get your work done. That way you have less to think about on a daily basis.
This can be:
- A home office
- A coworking space
- A cafe or library
- Outside (weather and wifi permitting)
4. Distractions
We already talked about the importance of location in minimizing your distractions, but this tip is about distractions in the broader sense.
As an entrepreneur, it can be really easy to chase every shiny thing you see. Whether it’s a new business model or idea, another market, another side project. They all seem valuable at times, but are they really helping you reach your goals?
To truly maintain longevity as an entrepreneur, you need to stay focused long term. Relentlessly focused. This means finding ways to eliminate distractions completely. For me it meant completely deleting some social media from my phone, not following certain creators or industries, and avoiding certain devices (like my phone or TV), for stretches of time.
Things like meditation, fitness/working out, and exploring the world can really help with this. Which brings me to my final point on staying consistent as an entrepreneur: variety!
5. Variety
No one likes doing the same thing forever. If you’re an entrepreneur, you have even more flexibility.
I can’t speak for everyone, but I chose this career path for the freedom. The freedom to do ANYTHING.
That means the freedom to go. As they say, variety is the spice of life. Add variety to your schedule and your workflow to help you stay consistent over the long haul. For me this looks like having a work week with some days inside, some days outside.
Some days I am taking pictures and filming with my drone, other days I am in the office on the phone and answering emails all day long.
The key is to balance this energy flow between the various tasks you have on your plate so you never get bored. If you’re feeling stuck, sprinkle some variety into your work routine and you may find yourself more invigorated than you can imagine.
Conclusion
You can build the life you want as an entrepreneur. You just have to stay focused and consistent! I hope these lessons that I learned from my journey as an entrepreneur so far were helpful to you. For more say hi on Twitter and Instagram.
This is a contributed blog post by Mike Moloney, a multi-passionate entrepreneur who is always building something. He most recently launched FilterGrade, a marketplace where you can find and purchase digital products from your favorite creators. Additionally, Mike is the co-founder of GlutenBee, a health site offering informational content that will help you learn more about gluten related diet issues; a photographer; and in the process of building a creative agency.
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