You are losing sleep. Your business is falling apart at the seams. You are making less and less money with your business. These are but a few of the signs that you are facing burnout as an entrepreneur. The problem is all too common among the entrepreneur set, for people tend to overwork themselves, feeling that squeezing the 25th hour into the day makes all the difference. Guess what? It only leads to more burnout, more failure and more health problems. You will never go far by abusing your body or your mind as an entrepreneur. You will only go backwards. You see, you eventually reach a point of diminishing returns. Picture a sponge, sopping wet, full of moisture. You attempt to soak up a little bit of water, just a smidge extra, but not, it is useless. You can only soak what you can physically soak via the sponge, and all continued efforts are futile, you learn, as you watch any excess water drip out of the sponge.
You are like the sponge. You can only retain so much knowledge in one day and you can only act do much in one day. If you push yourself beyond what is humanly possible, you break down. If you work 20 hour days, you break down. You get sick, irritable, angry, frustrated and upset, and your creativity suffers. You stop making money with your business. Your domestic life suffers. You lose your zest for business. You begin to hate working your venture. These are a few clear and distinct signs that you are crashing and burning, in a big way, and you need to heed these warning signs if you are to succeed and remain sane with your business.
You Begin to Hate Your Business
Burnout types begin to hate their business, losing their zest, vim and vigor for their operation. You are burning out fast, flaming out actually, when you despise waking up and working your business each day. Some fools feel that this is normal, to grow to despise your business, as they feel that expecting headaches and getting annoyed by your business activities is part of the routine. This is absolutely untrue and it is a big reason why many entrepreneurs fail. They operate on an empty tank for weeks, months or even years, and they expect bad things to happen as they trudge forward and naturally, bad things do happen to their businesses.
Pull back and take some time off. You will begin to love your business again. If you still hate your business after taking a few days or weeks off it might be time to move towards a new business venture.
You Experience General Exhaustion
Few entrepreneurs go through their career without facing exhaustion. Maybe you work a series of consecutive 15 hour days and feel totally tuckered out, or perhaps you pulled an all nighter to grow your business. In any case if you feel totally overwhelmed and exhausted for more than two or three days you are burned out. This is not natural or normal, it is simply a sign that you need to outsource some functions or simply take a few days off from your business.
If you are in the early stages of your business and feel exhaustion coming on you need to act more intelligently. Almost all rookies try to do it all on their own, or they simply lack creativity. Pay people to handle some of your work functions or think through a better business approach to prosper. You can succeed by paying or thinking your way through exhaustion, but of course, take a few days off to address these issues.
Kelli Cooper, writing for Conquest Graphics, is a freelance writer who enjoys sharing tips on how people can build successful businesses; check out Conquest for great deals on printed marketing materials for your business.
