Running a business and a family with your partner at the same time can seem overwhelming! But it doesn’t have to be hard, and today we’re going to share with you some of the best tips and life hacks that we know to keep your marriage, your personal life, and your business life running smoothly and staying on track.
When you’re an entrepreneur with a small business, it can be challenging to separate the different aspects of your life. But you want to own your business– you don’t want your business to own you. That’s one of our big philosophies; we believe that your business should not take time away from your family life.
So today’s tips are going to be framed around organizing your life in a way that lets you make progress with your marriage goals, your business goals, and your personal goals, all in service of making a better life for you and your family.
Start Small
When you’re building your business, don’t go all in right away with your time and money. Make small investments in these resources to find out what works and what your audience and community will respond to without having to take too many risks. This way you can run fewer risks and avoid the major marital stressors of debt and pressure.
Make these growth steps in a way that feels good for you and your partnership. Remember, you’re spouses and members of a family first– business owners second!
Systems and Structure
Your life is constantly being bombarded with new information. This can include physical things like mail or your kids’ homework, intangible things such as new ideas, emails, and reminders, and other miscellaneous sources of stress that can end up in piles all over your desktop and counters. Lots of people live in piles! Creating systems and structure can help you escape these piles and keep you moving toward your marital, business, and personal growth goals.
Establishing a “command central” is a great way to keep your life organized and you on the way to your goals. A command central is an organization method that sees you sorting these things into “daily,” “weekly,” and “as needed” subgroups.
The daily tasks are the tasks that your brain needs to focus on daily. You can’t focus on all the piles at once– it’s too much for your brain to process. This might look like a super simple calendar or a “next actions” list that becomes very doable and your brain doesn’t feel overwhelmed.
Weekly tasks don’t need to be done every day and should focus on progress– reviewing your goals, cleaning your inbox, and other maintenance and review tasks. During the week, things that get moved to the weekly review are things that you tell your brain not to focus on now, but that you promise yourself you’ll address in a timely manner.
“As Needed” material is material that you don’t have to think about at all during the week. If you ever need them, these things are on the calendar or part of a project that you’ll get to at the right time.
Essentially, you can put all the piles into this command central, and then they’ll come back to you when you need them. This system lets you keep all of your good ideas in a safe place and ready to reference when you need them.
The thing that makes this organization structure important is that it helps with a hidden problem in peoples’ marriage and personal lives. Most people don’t know how much an unstructured information system weighs on them! An organization system will help you feel calm and relaxed on a daily basis even while you’re running a business, a family, and a marriage at the same time.
Don’t Do Too Much At Once
Taking on too many projects at once is a surefire way to bring unnecessary stress into your marriage, business, and personal life. If you try to focus on too many things at once, none of them will get across the finish line. Instead, stick to a smaller number of things that can command more of your attention and time.
Take a smaller, more bite-sized approach for greater chances of success. If you limit yourself to the very realistic and doable number of eight projects a month, that’s ninety-six projects a year… and that’s a lot more than most people can accomplish!
Our Rainmaker families are small business owners, but they’re also families who want to spend as much precious time together and make amazing family memories. Rainmaker families get involved with our community because they know that real wealth is created when you’re able to see financial and family growth at the same time.
If you’d like to grow your business without sacrificing your marriage or personal life, join us! Take our 7-Day Rainmaker Challenge and learn how to make it rain!
