Have time freedom without the guilt
It has been half a decade since I left my corporate career. (And it still feels weird every time I do that math!)
But I still have a lot of the habits and mindset from that career.
One of the major reasons I started my own business was to have control over my time and my schedule. But I often find myself feeling guilty about it, even now.
I still regularly feel like 40 hours is the benchmark for the number of hours I should be working every week.
I often feel guilty if I’m away from my desk between the hours of 9am and 5pm.I’m still working on getting more comfortable taking time off.
But I also firmly believe that we all deserve to have time freedom in our businesses without feeling guilty about it.
Why is creating time freedom so hard?
If you want to create more time freedom in your business, but without feeling guilty about it, you're in the right place.
Today, we're going to dive into some things that might be holding you back from creating the kind of time freedom that you're looking for, and what you can do about it.
If you want more time freedom but you're feeling guilty about it, it's not your fault.
There's two main things at play here:
1. The prevalence of hustle culture. It's everywhere, and it's so hard to get away from it.
2. There are probably some areas of your business where you're having trouble letting go.
Hustle culture
Hustle culture. I hate the concept of hustling so much that saying the word makes my whole body clench up.
I just don't love this culture of busy-ness that we have. That busyness is a virtue. That the only way that you're going to get ahead is by working yourself to the point of burnout.
As I mentioned before, I find when I'm having trouble creating the kind of schedule and lifestyle that I'm looking for in my business, one of the culprits is that I still feel that I'm not doing enough if I'm not putting in a 40 hour work week. That I'm doing it wrong if I'm not working between the hours of nine to five.
It's so hard to let go of that ingrained capitalist work structure.
And it means that when you are not working according to that structure you feel guilty, like you're doing something wrong, like you're not doing enough, and that's not true. You just need to have the right business plan and the right structures in place to make it happen.
No one says that you have to work 40 hours a week.
Even people who work 40 hours a week in an office are not productive for all of those 40 hours.
Really, it's not about the amount of time that you work, it's about being able to get everything done and move your business forward in the way that you want to.
Letting go in your biz
If there are not enough hours in the day to move your business forward in the way that you want to, then your problem may be the other thing, which is letting go.
If you have so many things that you want to accomplish in your business that you don’t have enough time to do them, you may need to let go of some of them. At least for now – maybe not forever, but at least for now.
You should be focusing on tasks that are going to actually move your business forward, and move you towards your goals, and not get bogged down and sidetracked by things that either aren't taking you in the direction that you want to go, or aren't involved in directly making you money, and things like that.
Letting go of the hourly pay structure
Another thing that you may be having trouble letting go of is trading time for money.
Again, this goes back to the traditional job structure, but it doesn't have to be the way your business is structured.
So many of us start out with an hourly rate when we're first getting started, because we don't know how long things will take and what we will have to put into them. Initially, it seems like a good way to get compensated.
But as you go on, it seems like a good way to get penalized for being good at things, right? Even if you increase your hourly rate, you're going to get faster and better at things, which could result in losing money for the same projects or work.
You may want to move towards some sort of retainer or package structure or things like that in order to still get fairly compensated for the value that you are providing, and not being tied to the clock and the number of hours you are putting in.
Letting go of things that no longer serve you
You may also be having trouble letting go of things in your business that no longer serve you.
I know that when we put a lot of work into something or somebody told us that this thing was a really good strategy, it can be hard to let it go. There are so many reasons why we might have created something or started something in the past that is not working for us now.
It's hard to say, "Yes, I put a lot of time and effort into making this happen, but it didn't actually get me the results I was looking for."And it can be hard to say, "Yes, I paid for this software (or course, program, etc.), but it's not doing what I need it to do anymore, and now I need something else." We get stuck holding on to these things, and again, they're distracting us from moving our businesses in the direction that we want to go.
They are costing us time and they're costing us money.
It's important to get honest with yourself every once in a while about things that you can let go in order to grow in your business.
Letting go of doing everything yourself
The final thing that you might need to consider letting go of is the idea that only you can do certain things, or that certain things in your business will only be done properly if you do them.
You will reach a point where, in order to move forward in your business, you probably can't continue to do everything yourself. We'll talk about that a little bit later.
This is an area where it's very hard for people to let go, relinquish control, and trust other people, but it can be really beneficial for your business and for your own mental health and well-being as well.
How time freedom benefits your business
A lot of us probably became entrepreneurs in order to have more time freedom and more flexibility.
Other than being a goal that many of us are working towards, what are the benefits of having more time freedom in your business?
A major thing that time freedom can help you do is to prevent burnout.
If we go back to that hustle business culture issue that I was talking about earlier, it's so easy to overwork yourself, burn out, and grow to hate what you are doing in your business, because it's just draining you so much.
That's not what I want for you or for your business.
But having more time freedom, being able to reduce the number of hours you work in a day or in a week, or having the flexibility to take time away, go on vacation, spend time with friends or family, do things that you enjoy means that you're going to be able to bring more passion and energy and creativity to your business.
I know that for me, one of the reasons why I left my corporate career was burnout. I could tell that if I continued on the path that I was going on, I was going to end up in the hospital having a health crisis. I knew that there had to be a better way.
I'm very conscious now of how much time I spend working and where I put my attention, because I do not want to live to work anymore. I spent so many years doing that and it didn't make me happy or healthy.
Now I’m trying to create a business and create a schedule that allows me to have the life I really want to have, so that I really enjoy my time outside of work. Which also allows me to enjoy my work more, because it’s not the be all and end all.
How to create more time freedom
If you are struggling with creating time freedom in your business, one of the first things that you need to do is be honest with yourself. Be honest about some of these things that I mentioned that might be holding you back.
What are things that are limiting beliefs that you are carrying with you from the past and what are things that are actually facts, actually reality? Because a lot of the things that we believe about the number of hours it's possible to work and still grow the business that we want, and the schedule that it is possible to have and still effectively run our business, are not true.
It's just our perception of reality based on the things that we've been told and based on the things that we experienced being in more traditional careers.
But if it's really important to you to create a different schedule and a different lifestyle for yourself, and you actively work at it, it's possible.
Really be honest with yourself. What is your ideal work schedule in terms of the days of the week you want to work, the hours on those days you want to work, and the maximum number of hours in a week that you want to spend working?
What are your priorities? Is work the top priority in your life or is it something else? And does the way that you spend your time reflect that? If your family is the most important thing to you in your life, but you are spending 60 plus hours a week working, what are you actually prioritizing?
I invite you to write out, or at least sit and envision, the ideal life that you would want to have and how your business fits into that. What your work schedule looks like, what it allows you to do, what your life looks like outside of your work.
If you are really serious about creating time freedom, then you have to work at it. For example, working at letting go of some of those things that are no longer serving you and aren't moving you forward. Maybe prioritizing different things in your work and in the rest of your life.
Getting help in your business
Another thing that can make a huge difference to creating more time freedom in your business is of course getting help and support in your business. This goes along with letting go of the idea that only you can do the tasks in your business.
For a lot of things, especially routine recurring tasks, admin tasks, marketing, things like that, there is lots of support out there for you.
There are so many different people offering so many different types of support, and it can take some time to find the right person for you. But there are lots of people out there who would probably be a great fit, so I encourage you to take some time and think about what sorts of things you would want to pass off to someone else, what sort of specializations you might need, and really look for the right person if this is something that you are serious about.
To grow your business to the point that you are looking for, you may not ever need a huge team. I know people who have 6 figure businesses who only have one team member in addition to themselves, and they are doing just fine.
It's all about how complex your business is, how many different projects you're trying to have on the go at once, and what you are prioritizing. Again, this comes back to really being honest with yourself about what you actually want and actually need in your business, and then putting it into practice.
This is not something that is necessarily going to happen overnight, but if you make a conscious effort and you prioritize the time freedom that you're looking for in your business, it can happen for you.
You can create the business and the life that you want without feeling guilty about it.
If you have questions about the best way to do this for your individual business and situation, please reach out to me in the comments or feel free to reach out.