“I’m too busy. I don’t have time.”
I hear this from business owners all the time who say they don’t have time for the responsibilities in their personal lives.
Whether it’s washing the dishes, picking up the kids from school, or spending time with your partner—whatever commitments you make that contribute to maintaining and growing your relationships and other interests outside of work.
And I have to say that, respectfully, I disagree.
First, I believe that most people actually do have the time. In fact, I believe most people work too much.
The Pareto Principle says that most people produce 80% of their results from 20% of their work—and this has just been updated to say that people produce 60% of their results from just 4% of their work.
So part of it comes down to working smart, not hard: Whatever you’re doing for your business, learn from people who have already done it and cut out some of that excess, unproductive work.
And second, sometimes you have to make the time.
I understand as business owners and entrepreneurs, it can be very easy to let our businesses take over our lives. We often work from home without set hours, and it can feel like we’re always working. And our personal lives can get lost in the emails, ads and funnels.
Well please—make the time; don’t use your business as an excuse. You want to practice the habit of being consistent in all areas of your life. (And if you’re not consistent in your personal life—if you don’t do the things that you’ve agreed to do—the truth is you’re probably not going to be consistent in your business life, either.)
Sure, this all sounds good in theory, right? But how do we put it into practice? How do we ensure we make time for our personal lives?
By giving ourselves hard deadlines.
You create a structure for yourself that allows you to maintain and grow a pleasurable life outside of your business. Maybe for you that means working from 8am to 4pm, then calling it a day. Or maybe a different block of time works better for you.
What’s important is that you give yourself a deadline, after which you start focusing on other things.
And what’s surprising is that once you give yourself this deadline, you get done everything you needed to get done! What could have taken you all day, what could have eaten up all the time for everything else in your life… You get it done.
And by having the intention to do more in your personal life—and purposefully putting that time aside—you are already succeeding. Before you even do anything with that time, you’re putting attention on it. And what you put your attention on, grows.
So let’s use our businesses as an excuse to have even better personal lives.
Video Highlights
0:33 The Paredo Principle
0:56 Taking some time away from the business
1:20 It’s something that applies to every area of your life
1:55 The way it works is with deadlines
2:20 Setting clear container, clear structure for your business
3:01 Don’t let your business be an excuse to ignore your personal life
3:19 If you just work all the time, you’ll burn yourself out
Click Here For Video Transcript
It’s not actually true. You actually probably work too much. If you look at the Pareto Principle, which has been proven over and over, 80% of your results are coming from 20% of what you’re doing, and actually they have doubled that again, and 64% of your results are coming from 4% of what you’re doing.
So it’s easy to say, “Ah, I’m too busy. I can’t do that.” But actually what you want to do is you want to be the kind of person who can be counted on in every area of your life, and practicing that in your personal life. Actually taking some time away from the business and investing into whatever cycles that you’ve committed to, driving the kids to school, doing the dishes, doing the laundry, taking out the trash, landscaping, whatever those cycles that you are committed to in your life, if you practice being successful in them in your personal life, that will translate over to your business, and that practice is just that.
It’s a practice. It’s something that applies to every area of your life. How you be in one area of your life is how you be in all areas of your life. So if you can’t get consistent in your personal life and you can’t show up there, you will not be able to show up in your business. So showing up consistently for the cycles that you agreed to do is a very important part of being a person of integrity and a very important part of being a person who is successful.
This sounds all good in theory. Like, “Hey, Ezra, I get. It sounds great. I’d like to have more time. I’d like to be able to show up more in my personal life. I understand the concept, but how does it actually work?” Well, the way it works is with deadlines, because your business will take up as much time as you give it in your life. It really will. You give it a full day, it’s going to eat that whole day alive. So if you set yourself really hard, clear deadlines, like I work from 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. every day, then what will happen is you will get everything that you need to get done in that amount of time, and it will free you up to then use the other time for other things.
So it’s really about just setting clear container, clear structure for your business because you will get done everything that you need to get done in the time that you give yourself. If you just kind of leave it open, “Hey, I work all the time,” then it’s going to eat up your whole life. So it is your responsibility to set that container and set that routine and set that structure that allows you to have a life beyond just your business, because that is a common pitfall.
We work from home, we run our own businesses, it can eat up your whole life if you let it. So the practices of not letting it eat up your whole life and holding yourself strong to those deadlines in those time constraints, because you will get done what you need to get done that amount of time. Don’t let your business be an excuse to ignore your personal life. Have your business be an excuse to invest more in your personal. Use it as an excuse, “Hey, I’m doing well in my business. I’ve got time and energy.”
Even if you’re not doing well yet, you will be to invest into my personal life, into my relationships, into having a balanced life. Because if you just work all the time, you’ll burn yourself out. So don’t be that guy or gal. Ezra here from new.smartmarketer.com. Use your business wisely. See you in the next one.
