Being a small business owner is incredibly exciting and comes with unique chances to craft the life you want… but I think it’s fair to see it comes with it’s share of challenges too!
In this piece, I’ve interviewed five incredibly talented entrepreneurs to get their perspective on how we can take better care of ourselves from within their area of expertise.
The Big Picture
Tammy Whalen Blake, Founder of The Yellow Mastermind
As business owners, we’re taught to measure success in profit and growth. But perhaps the truest measure is sustainability—our ability to thrive alongside our businesses.
Running a micro-business demands wearing multiple hats: marketer, accountant, customer service rep, and strategist. It’s exhilarating but also exhausting.
In this relentless hustle, founders often sacrifice their own wellbeing, unaware that their health is deeply tied to their business’s health. The reality is that burnout, decision fatigue, and stress sabotage even the most viable businesses when the owner is depleted.
Self-care isn’t indulgence; it’s strategy.
A well-rested, clear-minded founder makes better decisions, navigates challenges more creatively, and leads with resilience. Taking time to care for yourself is an investment in the stability of your business. Regular exercise, quality sleep, and even short, intentional breaks can significantly improve focus and energy.
I commonly see business owners with back-to-back meetings, but these quickly lead to wasted time. Taking regular 15-minute breaks can boost productivity by 6%. If you were told that you could increase your revenue by that same percentage simply by taking breaks, you would jump at the opportunity.
Now is your chance to do the same. Additionally, learning to delegate tasks and setting clear boundaries are essential strategies that can help free up mental space and prevent feelings of overwhelm.
Micro-business closures are rarely about money alone. Often, financial strain snowballs because an exhausted owner lacks the bandwidth to adapt or spot opportunities. In contrast, a founder who prioritises self-care has the resilience to pivot, seek support, and find innovative solutions under pressure.
Managing our time
Hannah Kear – founder of Blu:Print Coaching
To prioritise self-care in your business strategy will be the wisest thing you do: YOU are your business! As entrepreneurs, one of the attractive elements is working outside of the 9-5 trappings. But, without boundaries, this, and many other aspects of small business life, has the potential to trip you up.
So how do you run a small business without running on empty? One of my most valuable lessons as a small service-based business owner has been to understand myself and work in alignment with that. If I don’t know myself, I can’t help myself. So, my advice to you: Get to know yourself! Here are some example questions:
Look at how you are scheduling your days/weeks – does this work in sync with your natural energy rhythms, mealtimes, rest times etc? Schedule self-care activities into your week – be brave and book that slot out of your day. If you don’t know where to start, use your answers to the prompts above to come up with a list of things to try.
And, as a life coach I can vouch for the incredible way coaching supports your self-awareness, sense of personal responsibility and action planning. It’s also an incredible motivation and encouragement in the often-lonely world of small business.
Managing our relationship with social media
Nao Mason – Founder of Social By Nao
I love following other business owners for inspiration and to support them, but there’s still some content that either leaves me in a comparison spiral or I find certain comment sections to be a super negative place.
If you can catch the content that doesn’t make you feel good – cut it. Either unfollow or mute that account. Keep your social media feeds full of educational, uplifting or motivational content and watch the difference it makes to your headspace.
Another top tip: train your algorithms!
Platforms are so clever nowadays, they really pay attention to what you engage with – so if you start stalking that person that makes you feel rubbish, the platform thinks you’re interested and you’ll see them more. If you take a second to “like” or save posts that you love, your feed will very quickly fill up with more of that instead!
Managing the legalities
Mark Maclean – Founder of Straight Line Legal
“Who would have thought a great lawyer would be so good for my well-being?” You wouldn’t think legal services could be good for your health but this is an exact quote from one of my clients. She was a massage therapist who was involved in a dispute that I helped her to resolve. She told me she felt so much relief afterwards – just like her relaxation treatments.
But this was removing a problem that had already happened and caused a lot of anguish. What if you could avoid that pain entirely? That would be worthwhile, surely. The issue with the law when you’re not a lawyer, is that there are lots of unknown unknowns. These are much worse than the known unknowns – as the old saying goes, you don’t know what you don’t know! You have no idea how to tackle a legal risk you didn’t know existed.
So the best advice I can give to business owners is to take the time for a proper legal audit. Your lawyer will work with you to catalogue all your legal requirements and risks, and prepare a clear roadmap to tackle them. Every time I have done a legal audit with a client they have walked away happier and more relaxed. They tell me they feel a real sense of control and they’ve removed a load of uncertainty (typically a cause of unpleasantness).
So next time you need to unwind, you could have a massage. Or…you could roll your sleeves up and get to grips with your legal risks.
Top three tips to finish
Naomi Regan – Founder of CAPE Coaching & Development Ltd
Number one, change your space. Rationally, we know that shifting our environment can have a huge impact on how we think about the situation. So getting out, getting away from our desks, going for a walk… allows our brain to think differently, connect differently and bring different perspectives.
Number two, think about where you put your energy again. We can get caught in a trap of thinking about and worrying about things outside of our control. An exercise I do frequently is creating three columns to reflect on:
1) what is within my control,
2) what can I influence but not fully control,
3) and… what can’t I control.
Taking a step back allows you to be more intentional about where you place your energy.
And tip number three is when you are in a loop of thinking about things in the same way, talk to a friend or colleague. You may find that they go to ‘fix’ mode because they hear us having a challenge and go straight to trying to fix it for us. So, instead, try being really clear with the other person that what you need from them is to listen… and maybe even to playback what you’ve said, or ask you some questions. The act of talking something through with somebody else and hearing our words back, gives us some different perspectives as well.