Stop Pushing Through

Do you ever find yourself on a Sunday evening, looking at the week ahead and feeling a knot of anxiety in your stomach? Or maybe you're exhausted from wearing all the hats in your business and you know something has to change, but you're not sure what.

I talk a lot about 'energy', and I thought it would be worth explaining what exactly I mean by this and why it's important.

I started my business as an occupational therapist in Cape Town in 2017. Like many business owners just starting out, I didn't really know what I was getting myself into. Although I had sufficient experience in my trade, I knew very little about what it means to run a business. A lot of it was trial and error.

When you're just starting out, you say yes to everything. You don't really take yourself into account when you plan your calendar. It's more about getting the most done in the shortest time possible.

This can work initially, but if you want to run a sustainable business, you need to start taking note of your energy levels when planning your calendar. It's about energy management, not just time management.

What exactly do I mean by energy management?

Firstly, it refers to your actual physical energy. How do you feel in the morning when you wake up? When in your day do you typically feel most energised, and when do you usually have a physical energy dip?

But it also relates to your emotional and cognitive energy. Are you full of new ideas, or does your thinking feel slow and sluggish? Do you feel hopeful about the future?

Energy also refers to how you're doing spiritually and your current view of yourself and the world around you.

All of this influences how you make decisions in your business and how you manage day to day tasks.

This is important if you're a business owner, but especially if you're a creative who runs your own business. Why? Because you are your business. There's no way to separate the business from who you are as a person and how you function in the world. Thinking that you can is exactly what leads to burnout.

If you've come from a corporate environment, you might be applying that same 'always on' mentality to your business. But now you're employee, manager, marketing department, and creative director all at once. The corporate playbook doesn't work when you're all of these people.

Many creatives might also identify with being neurodivergent, which means you're likely to have a higher sensitivity to signals within your own body and mind, as well as the world around you. Your energy levels likely fluctuate from day to day. A challenging interaction with someone could have a profound effect on how you're doing emotionally. If you don't allow time in your schedule for self-regulation, you'll try to push through challenging emotional reactions, making things worse.

What Does All of This Mean and What Can You Do About It?

It's worth paying attention to how your energy (emotional, cognitive, physical) impacts the way you function and work. Getting to know yourself better will help you start making decisions and plan your schedule in a way that actually supports the natural ebb and flow of your energy.

This might mean blocking out Monday mornings for deep creative work when you're fresh, or acknowledging that after a networking event (even a good one), you need recovery time, not admin tasks.

Imagine planning your week around your actual energy patterns rather than fighting against them. Imagine knowing which tasks to tackle when, and giving yourself permission to honour your natural rhythms. That's what we'll be mapping out together at my workshop on 29 November. You can book your ticket here.