10 DAILY HABITS OF SUCCESSFUL & HEALTHY ENTREPRENEURS

As an entrepreneur, your daily habits can make or break your success.

I’m not just talking about how well your business grows, but how well you take care of your business’ biggest investment — you.

Here are 10 things productive and successful entrepreneurs do everyday:

 Set your intention and raise your vibrations 

Upon waking, ask yourself how you want to feel for the day.

Tap into that feeling and create yourself an intention. You’ll make more empowered decisions and find it easier to say “no” to the things that won’t serve you and “yes” to the things that will.

Follow that up with a visualization exercise to raise your vibrations. You’re thinking about the things you want to achieve: confidence, clients, energy, focus, income.

Get specific about what you want to attract, visualize it and then invite it into your day.

Schedule your time and have a routine

As an entrepreneur, you have complete control over your own day. But don’t get blindsided by the feeling of freedom.

Having a routine and a schedule for your day is essential to achieving your goals. You know what you need to be focused on and you can actually create more balance in your life.

Without a routine, you’ll quickly end up distracted, overwhelmed and wondering where all your time is actually going. So, prioritise and split your time between work and personal time.

Please make the time for both. This means you can get your most important work done and still have time to go for a run, get to a yoga class, find time for meditation, or catch up with friends without feeling guilty.

Plan and prioritize

Each evening, write out your to-do list for the next day. This helps you start each day focused and will increase your productivity.

There are often 100 different things that could go on the list — with more added daily. So have a master list you can brain dump everything onto, and then create a daily list where you pick out the key things that you need to do to bring you closer to achieving your goals. From that list, highlight three key things that need to be achieved that day. The rest are ‘nice-to-haves’.

Then, complete your biggest or most important task first. That way, it’s not looming over you all day and you’ll know that even if you only managed to tick off your top three action items, you’ve still been productive and kicked your goals.

Time your work blocks

You’ve set yourself a couple of hours to work on a blog post, create a new project and get through your growing to-do list. So why does it always take you longer than it should? Procrastination and distraction sneak up on you and all of a sudden you’re way off track and behind time.

So, time your work blocks and commit yourself to focusing on a single task for 30 minutes at a time. Remove your distractions — I’m looking at you, social media — put your phone on silent and set the clock.

Ready, set, go. 

Take breaks

Ensure your schedule includes regular breaks. Doing this will actually help you to be more focused and energised throughout the day.  It may be five to 10 minutes in between each work block and then a good 30 to  60 minute lunch break in the middle of the day.

Make a cup of tea or coffee, sit for five minutes of meditation, take a walk around the block, stretch out for some yoga, go sit in the sun.

Just do something to give your eyes and your mind a break. Mix it up between relaxation and movement each break.

Exercise 

Even if it’s as little as 20 minutes a day, move your body. Your mind and mood will thank you for it, too.

Most people try to get this out of the way earlier in the day so it’s done, can’t be de-prioritised and they’re more energised and focused for the rest of the day.

If this doesn’t work for you, find a time when it will. Schedule yourself a lunch break yoga class or take the dog for a walk around the block after dinner. Any sort of movement will also help to relieve stress and clear your mind.

Keep nourished and hydrated

If you work from home, keep a big bottle of water on your desk so you don’t forget to keep hydrated throughout the day. This will keep you energized, as well as improve your concentration, memory and mood.

The same goes for food. Plan and prep each week to ensure you’ve got healthy, easy-to-grab-and-go snacks and meals on hand. This way you’ll keep your blood sugar even, avoid the 3pm slump, and you won’t be wasting time standing at the refrigerator working out what to eat.

And please, start your day with a good breakfast.

Be mindful and practice gratitude

Start and end each day in gratitude. When you’re on the go, running your business and chasing down your dreams, it’s easy to be focused solely on your big goals.

But when you’re so focused on the future, sometimes you can’t appreciate what’s right in front of you and you end up frustrated and stressed. So, take a few minutes to reflect on and write down what you’re grateful for in the present moment. You’ll see that even though you haven’t caught up to some of your dreams yet, you’ve already got some amazing things going for you here and now.

Know when to switch on and off

When you work for yourself, it’s easy to be ‘on’ 24/7. After all, you’ve got a business to grow. But that’s the fastest path to burnout.

Set yourself boundaries and stick to them when it comes to work and technology. Maybe in the morning you don’t check your emails and social media until after you’ve set your intentions and had breakfast.

In the evening, aim to shut down your technology at least an hour or two before you go to bed to give your body and mind a proper chance to switch off and get a good night’s sleep.

Get enough sleep and wake-up on time

Do not underestimate the importance of sleep! Just because you can ‘survive’ on a few hours’ sleep doesn’t mean you should. So, set yourself a curfew and stick to it. Aim for seven to nine hours of quality sleep each night.

For the parents out there, continuous sleep isn’t always in your control. That’s why it’s even more important to get to bed on time. Aim for 10pm each night.

Don’t be tempted by a sleep in the next day. Aim to get up at the same time each day and make the most of your morning. Your internal body clock with reset itself and you’ll get up with more energy and focus. Learn the mindset of being an entrepreneur.

As an entrepreneur or career woman, what are some of the daily practices you rely on for success? Share with us in the comments below!