Break The Chains

Unchained Melody?

You remember the song by the Righteous Brothers. Sure, it's a love song. But, remember how you once felt about your business when you first began? Courting her, bending over backward to please her, always anticipating her every need, and making sure she always knew she was supported. It was fun and exciting until one day you realized, you had given all you had to give and this relationship was not a reciprocated love story. Now you're left wondering how you'll ever break the chains.

Lonely rivers flow
To the sea, to the sea
To the open arms of the sea
Lonely rivers sigh
“Wait for me, wait for me”
I'll be coming home, wait for me
 
Do you remember where you were trying to go? 

The Giving Tree

It also reminds me of the book, The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. From his website there is this excerpt:
 
“Every day the boy would come to the tree to eat her apples, swing from her branches, or slide down her trunk…and the tree was happy. But as the boy grew older he began to want more from the tree, and the tree gave and gave.

Shel Silverstein has created a moving parable for readers of all ages that offers an affecting interpretation of the gift of giving and a serene acceptance of another's capacity to love in return.”
 
If you’re feeling that you’re working too hard (for too little) and struggling with the symptoms of entrepreneurial burnout, you'll want to be sure to listen to me talk about how to get your life back from your business in the Profit by Design Podcast Episode 75. 

Work Supports Life, Not the Other Way Around

Work Supports Life
At Tap the Potential, we are laser-focused on developing strategies for your business so that work supports life and not the other way around. When you’re in the weeds of growing your business, you may have more work than you can handle. Perhaps it’s time to really start reclaiming your life and shifting the balance so that your business is supporting your life.

Where Do You Begin?

In order to break the chains, we have to reset our mindset to its true leadership capabilities; otherwise, you end up treating the business and teaching those around us (team members, our clients, our customers) to rely on us for everything. This is how entrepreneurs become the bottleneck. Get out of your own way.
 
What served us well in early entrepreneurship is no longer serving us as
the business matures.

The 3 Simple Steps to Take Your Life Back

I've identified three tangible action steps for you to put into practice right away, so that even in a week or two you’re feeling more life than you’ve experienced in quite some time. Who doesn’t want to feel that?

  1. Recognize that your mindset has to shift.
  2. Practice being unavailable in your business.
  3. Assess the weaker points in your business.
In the podcast mentioned above, and regularly in my coaching, I'm quoted as saying “What got you here won’t get you there.” It's time to make a change. (Okay, okay… yes, it's another song. Thank you, Michael Jackson.) Break the chains from your business. It's time to lead and find yourself again.

Discover which foundational pieces you have firmly in place, and what to work on next to transform your business into a highly profitable, great place to work that allows you to take a 4 Week Vacation™.

Take Our 10-Minute Assessment

 

About The Author

Dr. Sabrina Starling, The Business Psychologist and international best-selling author of the How to Hire the Best series and The 4 Week Vacation™, is the founder of Tap the Potential and host of the Profit by Design podcast. At Tap the Potential, we work to free business owners from the constant demands of a growing business.

We believe work supports life, not the other way around. Clients in our Better Business, Better Life coaching program have more time for what matters most and more money in their bank account than they’ve ever had. Next, we send them off on a 4 Week Vacation™ to celebrate their hard-earned journey to take their life back!

Dr. Sabrina and her team at Tap the Potential are on a mission to change the story of entrepreneurship from one of long hours, grinding it out, to one of sustainably profitable businesses that support and enhance life. The Tap the Potential Solution™ and our Tap the Potential Family of Business Owners are disrupting small business as usual. We are on our way to making the Tap the Potential Solution™ the mainstream model for growing business.

By 2023, 150 Tap the Potential clients will have taken 4 Week Vacations. These are the trailblazers, role modeling what’s possible for entrepreneurs. In many entrepreneurial circles, it is becoming more and more common for one entrepreneur to ask another, “Have you taken a 4 Week Vacation™?” (as opposed to asking “How many employees do you have?” or “What is your annual revenue?”). Taking a fully unplugged 4 Week Vacation is rapidly becoming the recognized symbol of entrepreneurial success.

Never one to accept the status quo or back down from a challenge, Dr. Sabrina’s How to Hire the Best series grew from her desire to solve the toughest hiring challenges interfering with her clients’ growth and profitability. What sprang from her experience working with entrepreneurs in rural areas catapulted her into becoming the world’s leading expert in attracting top talent in small businesses—no matter what hiring challenges those businesses are facing—and earned Tap the Potential’s reputation as the go-to resource for entrepreneurs committed to creating Great Places to Work with thriving coaching cultures and highly engaged team members working from strengths.

As The Business Psychologist, and with her years of driving profit in small businesses, Dr. Sabrina knows what it takes to find, keep, and motivate exceptional performance out of your biggest investment—team members.