A Bottomless Well of Energy from a Place You Might Not Expect

There’s a lot of things I schedule into my day that aren’t what most people think a business owner has time for.

I don’t think it would have even occurred to me to prioritize these things five years ago, but as I detailed in a previous post – Unlocking the Potential of Having it All: Part I – the Path of Force – I had my reasons, and none of them were working to my benefit.

Thankfully, that’s all changed and now I prioritize accordingly: self-development, exploration, and purpose.

Spending time on these every day is how I have the energy and creativity to run my company, focus on my family when I’m not at work, and spend time also giving back to my community.

SELF-DEVELOPMENT

This means spending enough time on myself so that I can give my best at everything I do. There’s always going to be something more to achieve in business but what makes a fulfilling life are the relationships we create.

When I was always pouring everything into the business, I never really got to the health goals, so my energy was low. I started to realize that this impacted my attractiveness, not only outside of work, but within work, with customers and with my employees.

I had this idea that there would always be time later to pay attention to my health and my relationships, until one day I thought, “What’s holding me back from being that person today?”

EXPLORATION

I take time to look into the things I’m attracted to and curious about and I continue to invest in them.

I’m very passionate about health so I’m involved with the Heart Association.

I’m very passionate about entrepreneurs so I’m involved with economic development in Wisconsin.

I’m passionate about sports and education so I sponsor and coach local universities and athletics programs. I do a shark tank class at the local high school.

All these things give me even more energy than I put into them.

PURPOSE

I’m focused on the things where I can make the biggest impact. I’ve figured out the two or three things that I can do for my business that drive success.

As entrepreneurs we usually believe we’re the best at everything because we can probably dabble in a lot of activities. I know a lot of CEOs who can do a lot of good things, but it doesn’t mean they’re the best at all of them.

Investing time and energy into activities that aren’t really your strengths can start to drain your energy.

But when you focus on the areas where you’re strongest, you go through the day with less frustration.

I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed that you start the morning working on something that really engages you and all of a sudden you look up and it’s after lunch.

It felt like it was maybe 30 minutes because you were so engrossed in what you were doing that the time just flew by and you got so much done.

That’s the definition of Flow. And that only happens when you’re passionate about something and you can’t be passionate about every function in a company. Focusing on that purpose really stokes your energy and it actually fuels itself when you work on the things that you’re passionate about.

Don’t manage your time; manage your money

Time is a limitation, but energy can be expanded when you develop yourself, explore the things you care about and understand and focus on your purpose.