Being able to run your own business can be fulfilling along with lots of freedom. However, being an entrepreneurs can also be demanding and can negatively affect your health.
Health issues like depression are common among entrepreneurs. Recent study by Dr. Michael Freeman (2015) shows that 30% of entrepreneurs experience depression. Percentage of depression experienced by entrepreneurs is far higher than the depression rate in typical American, which is around 7%.
Long hours and stress of running a business may be part of the reason leading to the significantly higher rate of depression among entrepreneurs. Health issue cannot be neglected as health is a wealth as well. If you are unhealthy, you will loss the precious time as you will need time to recover. This will lead to potential loss of income as well.
Good news is, such health issues can be prevented through series of activities, diet and lifestyle which will be discussed in this article. It is absolutely possible for entrepreneurs to be both physically and mentally healthy even with the high demand nature of the job.
Keep a healthy diet and lifestyle
You’ve probably heard of this way more often. But this is because they are really effective preventative measures against mental and physical illness. It’s also important in making sure your body and mind are always in tip-top condition to function effectively.
Maintaining a healthy diet and lifestyle means to have a balanced diet and exercise appropriately. You don’t have to sign up for a latest fad diet or sign up for a marathon, you just basically have to make sure you eat different types of food in a day and keep your physical body active from time to time.
Always remember fruits and vegetables in your daily meal
A balanced diet also means to make sure you eat fruits and vegetables daily as study shows that they can help reduce stroke, heart disease and reduce blood pressure. People who eat fruits and vegetables daily also have lower risk of digestive problems.
Preventing yourself from getting ill can help make sure that you can keep your business running effectively too.
Have a colourful diet
Are all your meals just meat and rice (brown and beige)? If your meals are colourless or just one or two colours, that may be a sign that you’re not having a balanced diet.
Having a colourful diet means that your meals won’t be boring and that it will increase your appetite. Besides, many nutrients come with different colours, having colourful diet means you will most probably obtain a good variety of nutrition.
Move your muscles for at least 30 mins daily.
Moving your muscles keep your muscles fit. Although it doesn’t mean to exercise them with strenuous activities, but a moderately intense aerobic exercise for two and a half hour every week is vital to stay healthy. Meaning, optimally, we should aim for a 30 mins exercise daily to stay healthy. Activities including fast walk, jogging, and swimming are good aerobic exercises.
For entrepreneurs with little-to-no time to spare, you can get away with short burst exercise throughout the day. Hence, you can replace jogging for 30 mins around your neighbourhood with taking the stairs throughout the day.
Moving your muscles is crucial as you may not get to move your muscles much since you will be chained to your desk trying to make sure your business’ operation runs smoothly.
Learn to relax too
Running a business keeps your mind and body busy. Busy in making sure everything runs smoothly. However, our body isn’t made to work 24/7 non-stop. We need a time away from our busyness and relax. Even machines need to rest at some point of time, and we aren’t machines – the more we need time to rest and relax.
Many entrepreneurs work through meal times. This is not a recommendable practice. You need to schedule time to relax, a personal time where you stop doing what you need to do and slow down your pace to do what you want to do.
The government has also set a rule that workers are not allowed to work more than 5 hours without break. Even the government emphasizes on a time for relaxation, showing that relaxation is really a need for everyone.
A time of relaxation also helps boost your morale and creativity. Ideas that may not appear during work time may suddenly appear after you relax and stop thinking about it for a while.
Get enough sleep
Studies have shown that human brain functions optimally with enough sleep. Human brain requires at least 7 hours of sleep each night.
If you have trouble falling asleep at night, try practice some useful tactics to help you to get more restful nights.
Here are some useful tactics:
- Sleeping and waking up at the same time everyday.
- 4-7-8 breathing exercise. Count of 4 to inhale with mouth, hold on a count of 7 and exhale with nose on a count of 8.
- Avoid caffeine, alcohol, cigarettes or any substances that interfere with sleep.
- Don’t watch TV or read in bed
Be a happy entrepreneur
A healthy person is a happy person; likewise, a healthy entrepreneur is a happy entrepreneur. To ensure you can run your business well for long term, it is better that you take care of your health now.
You can also visit the links below to read more on related topics in TreezSoft:
TreezSoft is a cloud accounting software for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). It allows you to access your financial information anytime, anywhere. It also allows you to have unlimited users for FREE for your account in TreezSoft. Our aim is to help reduce our clients' time spent on accounting mainly by using our automated processes and integration to help increase their company effeciency at a minimum costs. SMEs can use TreezSoft to keep track their expenses, accounts, daily operation e.g. Point of Sales (namely QPOS) system and etc.
Visit TreezSoft at http://www.treezsoft.com/ to sign up for a 30 days trial account with us!
You can also email us at [email protected] for more enquiries.