6 Self-Care Tips to Fight Burnout When Self-Employed

ith a to-do list longer than Grey’s Anatomy and no end in sight, it’s hard not to become mentally and physically exhausted. When you’ve become your own boss, avoiding burnout seems impossible, but it isn’t as far-fetched as it seems. 

The key is practicing self-care. When you’re overwhelmed with work and constantly moving on to your next task, it’s easy to let self-care fall by the wayside, but taking care of yourself may just be the piece you’ve been missing. 

Here are 6 self-care tips to try when work burnout has gotten you down. 

1. Me Time

Those who are self-employed can definitely use a dose of Me Time!

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Me Time is exactly what it sounds like, time taken out of your day to focus on recharging your metaphorical batteries. Burnout is your body telling you that it needs a rest and that your battery is empty. Me Time reduces stress, increases creativity, increases productivity, helps regulate a work-life balance, and more. 

How can these be achieved? 

Well Me Time looks different for each person. In the way that every human is different, so are the ways we spend our Me Time. Me Time for you could mean, watching your favorite show on Netflix, going on a walk, a trip to the spa, or reading a couple chapters of a book. 

The possibilities are endless as long as they fit within a couple of rules:

Schedule your Me Time

When life becomes busy and every second counts, you’ll often find yourself saying, “I don’t have time today I’ll just push it until tomorrow.” Then tomorrow comes and you say “Hmm no time today I’ll just do it tomorrow.” You then find yourself prolonging time to yourself so long that it never comes and you eventually reach burnout. 

Instead, if you carve out some time, even just 30 minutes a day, and put it into your schedule, it’s harder to say there’s no time for it as that time is already preexisting in your schedule. 

Don't Feel Guilty

You’re going to have the urge to feel guilty about stepping away from your work. Don’t let that happen. It may feel like you’re being unproductive, but taking Me Time allows for an increase in productivity in the long run. When you’re in the moment it feels as if you should be getting work done, but you will be able to get even more work done in the future because you’ve taken time to rest. Without taking that time, you will become burnt out, which will halt future productivity entirely. 

Two rules. That’s it. Me Time is your time, so make it whatever works best for you.

2. Exercise

Work off stress and punch back at burnout.

I know this is probably the last thing that you want to hear, but unfortunately, or fortunately, if you already do it, exercise is proven to reduce stress and therefore help prevent burnout. Exercise can increase endorphins, which improve your mood, reduce the negative effects of stress, and can be meditative, distracting you from daily worries related to work.

Here’s how to get started, and make it into a healthy habit:

Start Small

There’s no need to jump into running a marathon off the bat. If exercise for you simply means walking on the treadmill for a bit, that’s ok, not everyone has the time, interest, or physical ability to be Dwayne the Rock Johnson. All that matters is you’ve taken time out of your day to exercise. 

Schedule Time to Exercise

Like the Me Time, you’re going to have the urge to push off working out and claim that you’re too busy. But if you schedule the time, it’s already there for you. Exercise could even count as your Me Time if that’s what works. 

Chose Something that You Enjoy

Working out can sound terrible but if you’re doing something you like, it makes it less of a chore. Say you really enjoy tennis, join a tennis club or find a second to play a match every Saturday. If you hate what you’re doing the entire time, it isn’t going to do any good. Even something as small as going with a friend can greatly improve the experience and its effectiveness. 

Stop making excuses. Take the long way back from work, accept your friend’s pickleball invitation, and try that yoga class you’ve looked at a hundred times. 

3. Get the Right Amount of Sleep

Stress from work messing with your sleep schedule? Try these tips to get it back on track.

Studies show that sleep and burnout have a bidirectional relationship, meaning that lack of sleep can cause burnout and burnout can cause poor sleep. This is a dangerous loop to get yourself stuck in, especially when you have a business and workers that rely on you. 

Here are some tips to keep a healthy sleep schedule to prevent burnout:

Aim for 8 Hours of Sleep Per Night

Adults, for the most part, need 7-8 hours of sleep a night. Try not to spend more than 8 hours in your bed, as this can promote bad sleep habits and confuse the body.

Eat Healthily and Exercise

As mentioned before exercise, and healthy eating, can reduce stress and by connection help improve sleep. Furthermore, the act of burning energy by working out will make you more tired at night, making it easier to fall asleep. 

Sleep is the most important and most effective way to recharge your battery. Give it the attention and care it deserves. At the end of each day tell yourself “I did good today and I deserve to rest,” because well you did good today and you deserve to sleep, never believe otherwise. 

4. Create Boundaries

Some tips for maintaining a separation between work and home life.

When you’ve built your own business from the ground up, it’s hard not to devote every minute of your day to it. But unsurprisingly if you eat, sleep, and breathe work it’ll quickly wear you out. Here are some tips on how to build boundaries and ward off burnout. 

Have offline hours

Have set hours where you are away from any connection to work or coworkers and communicate these hours to others. Don’t look at your email or do anything related to work in those hours, it’s your time. 

Ideally these off hours should be from the end of your work day to the start of the next work day. When you clock out, actually clock out. Otherwise, it creates problems for you and those around you.   

Say no

When someone asks too much of you, just say no. As someone self-employed, you have more authority than most people to be able to say no, decline, and turn down offers, people, etc. Don’t put yourself in situations that compromise your mental health just to appease others. 

Remember you’re allowed to say no, you shouldn’t feel bad for setting boundaries. 

5. Know Your Limits

It’s good to work hard but know when you’ve hit your limit.

When everyone is telling you to “Push the limits!” and “Defy expectations!” it’s hard to know when to slow down, but if you don’t, ignoring your limits will lead to burnout.

Set realistic goals

Have daily, weekly, and yearly goals to work towards but not ones that are unattainable. Achieving these goals, and being able to cross them off your list will reaffirm the work you put in. This will also stop you from feeling the need to overwork yourself. 

Know YOUR limits

You are your own person. Other people's limits are not your limits, and other people cannot tell you your limits. You set your own limits. Move at your own pace, not at the pace of others.

No one knows you the way you do. Be patient with yourself and be proud of the things you’ve done because no one can appreciate how hard you work as much as you can. Along with that no one knows your limits like you do, take care of yourself so you can maintain a business that lasts. 

6. Mindfulness

It’s more important for you and your business than you’d think.

Learn to turn your brain off. When your brain is in a constant active state, it can become easy to find yourself stuck on an emotion attached to a particular thought or memory. If this turns into a continuous struggle, it becomes hard to function and focus on tasks. This is what leads to mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety. 

Being mindful can help break/prevent that loop.

Evidence suggests that practicing mindfulness can reduce job burnout. This is all awfully scientific if you have a brain more hard-wired to understand things related to The Canterbury Tales, and the relationship between Nick Carraway and Jay Gatsby, but when you take a little time to understand what the science says about how it can help, it becomes easier to grasp.

Mindfulness is “the awareness that emerges through paying attention, on purpose, and nonjudgmentally to the unfolding of experience moment by moment.” 

In other words, it is living in the present moment and accepting your current emotions. Putting all of your effort and time into negative thoughts, solving problems, or letting your mind wander can drain your battery, leading to burnout.

Therefore practicing mindfulness can reduce stress, improve motivation, help improve cognitive function, and more.  

Here are a few ways to practice mindfulness:

Focus

Slow down for a moment, breathe, and hone in on your five senses. This will help ground you in the current moment.

This is an easy habit to add to your daily routine when work stress becomes too much.

Be open

Bringing a positive and open attitude to everything you do leads to a better and more mindful mindset. You’ve worked hard to get to where you are, be proud of that, and enjoy it.

Meditate

Whether you’re looking to do sitting meditation, body scanning meditation, or walking meditation, they can all help with staying present and mindful. This is another example of Me Time. Guided meditations can even be found on platforms such as Spotify and YouTube.

Pro tip: Read more about mindfulness and ways to include it in your life. 

Those are some of the top ways the self-employed can help reduce burnout

As Ferris Bueller famously said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” Everyone gets sad, acknowledge it, tell a friend, partner, or family member about it, embrace it, and keep going. In order to experience highs we have to make it through the lows. 

That’s all I have for you. This is in no way a complete list of ways to beat burnout while self-employed nor will these work for everyone, but it never hurts to try. Remember there is no shame in going to therapy (more people go than you think). The strength to avoid/escape burnout is in your hands, take advantage of it.

You are powerful enough and smart enough to have started your own business, don’t let negative energy or burnout drag you down.