Here's Why You Don't Deserve Time Off

Clients kept telling me, It just doesn’t feel the same without you here.

Lordy, lordy, the guilt was setting in fast!

I’d been working from 5am ‘til early evening at the fitness studio I owned, a schedule that was starting to create deep cracks in my armor.

Running on empty, I’d hired help. I was no longer the face at the front desk, greeting clients on their way in & out of the gym.

The people we’d hired were FANTASTIC! I was so pleased with them - and also loved having  more time back in my days.

So when clients started to tell us that It’s just not the same without you, the doubt settled in.

I felt it in my gut. I fretted, Did I deserve more time off?

Um. Yes? Sure? Of course?

 But it was hard to believe…because of GUILT! (And also, to be honest, I 100% LOVED greeting our clients, getting to know them, and giving that high-touch experience!)

Were my talents best suited for the front desk?

Um…I could DO that job well, but was it the right space for me to spend most of my time?

No, definitely not. I was an OWNER and OPERATOR.

With me at the front desk, I was basically doing one job that someone else could do, which was running the daily business…

Without time to take care of an important job that only an owner & operator could do: GROWING the future of the business.

I was feeling pretty GUILTY about the boundaries I’d put in place for myself. I wondered if I’d made a mistake, after all.

This GUILT is why many of my clients (and frankly, most women in business I know) are over-burdened.

We want to be all the things to all the people. We got into our current gigs because we really wanted to be deeply involved and effect great change!

When business gets going & momentum builds, we are no longer able to do it all.

Well, we’re not able to do it all WELL.

And that was me.

I noticed I had started to make my life harder than it needed to be.

Yes, I can cover that front desk shift. No big deal.

Yes, I can take the towels home to wash. No big deal.

It starts like that: all the little things you say yes to.

All the things that you’ve just done because it was easier in the moment.

Maybe for you, you’ve said yes to an annoying little thing because you know it made your kid very happy.

But now it’s turned into an assumption or a pattern, and in order to get out of it, you have to have a hard, uncomfortable conversation.

Or you chose something that was the easy button in the moment, but it wound up creating a pain in the ass situation in the long run. It’s no longer easy, and you’re unsure how to undo the whole thing.

These are the ways we make our lives harder…
These are the ways time slips away from us.

Sometimes the energy of trying to undo a pain in the ass thing is exhausting! So we again say, “Sure, I’ll take care of that” with a sigh. Knowing it’s just a Band-Aid on a deeper wound.

That deeper wound doesn't resolve itself. In fact, it will fester & get more problematic the longer it goes untreated.

We inflict pain on ourselves with the rules we make ourselves live by, too!

I notice that we have policies, procedures, rulebooks, directions for ourselves - whatever you want to call them - that seem perfectly reasonable at the time.

For example, as a teacher, I used to assign a certain number and type of essays because I had a whole bunch of mental rules about what “was expected of me as a high-quality teacher.”

The result? I created a LOT more work for myself. I was constantly grading & resented my students and the work, even though I LOVED teaching! And even though NO ONE ELSE told me I had to do it that way.

Another example? A friend told me that all THREE of her children MUST be in swim lessons at the exact same time, even though one of them was a 6-month old infant. She wouldn’t consider any other option.

The result? No place offered exactly what she wanted, so NONE of the kids got lessons, and she spent her entire summer wrangling to keep those kids only on the steps of her in-laws’ pool.

Have you ever tried to hold an infant while making sure a 3- and 4-year-old are not wriggling off the pool steps? Yeah - it’s a nightmare.

How much easier would life have been for her if she’d just given the littles the swim lessons and gave herself a DAMN BREAK with the 6-month-old?

If you feel like you’re constantly running out of time or steam, it might be because YOU ARE making your life harder than it has to be.

This is one of the MOST CHALLENGING lessons my clients have to learn when they finally decide to make their idea a reality.

And frankly, it’s really hard & painful to admit.

It’s no joke and no small feat to overcome, but I promise that with the right mindset & support, you CAN stop this habit.

Did you hear that? HABIT. Yes, making life harder than it has to be is simply a HABIT.

Who will you be when you break that habit?

You’ll be a woman who can get more done because she has less to do.

You’ll be a woman who’s PRESENT AND HAPPY for her friends, family, colleagues _ AND HER SELF! 

Who will you be?

I promise - you will LIKE YOURESLF and your life so much more, if you just weren’t so busy.

Being busy is a way of hiding.
Being busy is a way of staying small.

I KNOW it feels good in the moment, but being busy is holding you back.

Are you ready to stop being busy and start being productive?

If you’re ready to break that habit…I can show you how. I offer this as the #1 Lesson in my group coaching program The Idea Space.

The women in there never believed they could accomplish what they’re accomplishing right now…

Learn more about their successes here: 

Seriously, in 3 short months, your life can feel COMPLETELY different - calmer, more focused, and more productive.

How would THAT make your life better?

Without guilt.

Or overwhelm.