May 17, 2008

Do You Feel Guilty About Taking Time Off?

It’s amazing to me how many people feel guilty when they take time off from their business. If you’re feeling guilty about taking time off because you’re not being productive, you’re actually loosing a lot of money.

Let me explain something to you that actually seems counterintuitive about taking time off and it is…

I used to feel guilty if I took time away from my business especially if it was during the week. By the way, this was from my old Job Mentality. It was a program that was still running in my mind that if I took off time Monday through Friday to enjoy myself and it wasn’t vacation time, I was cheating the company.

Now that’s silly isn’t it, especially being in your own business?

However, if you’ve had a job or been raised with a job mentality and most of us have, you’ve got to become aware of this situation because it’s actually costing you.

When you’re in business for yourself, it’s ok to take time off any time you want and there is no reason to feel guilty. However, when you feel guilty, which is a negative emotion, you don’t get the downtime you require and when you get back you’ll actually be less productive.

The guilt of taking time for yourself actually destroys any benefits you would have received if you took the day off without feeling guilty.

So what do you do about this situation?

Read on…

I’ve talked about this before and if you haven’t read my blog post on decision making you may want to do that now. Because everything starts in a decision.

With that being said, what kind of decisions have you been making around taking time off?

If you haven’t been making decisions like a millionaire, you’re going to have a tough time becoming a millionaire. And becoming a millionaire also means you take time to yourself and you’re not working 16 hours a day, 7 days a week because you’re going to burn out.

All work and no play makes you a dull person not to mention tired.

Let me ask you something. Have you been feeling tired? Are your energy levels low? Do you have a hard time getting up in the morning? Do you work excessive hours in a day? Do you work seven days per week?

If you answered yes to any of these you’ve got a problem.

And, if you don’t take care of this problem you’re probably heading for disaster.

The other day, I was feeling a bit tired and it seemed like my creativity was running low. This is my indicator that it’s time to stop and take a break. Right then and there I made the decision to turn off my computer and take the day off. I made the decision that it’s me time and it’s healthy for me to do so.

Shortly after making this decision, I decided to get a massage and get a chiropractic adjustment. I figured it’s time to get the body back into alignment and relaxed.

And guess what?

After I did that, I felt so much better. But then I suggested to my wife Tamar that we should start date night early. By the way, Friday night is date night with my wife and we go out and enjoy each other’s company every week. It’s a great relationship builder. I’ll tell you more about this some other time.

Right now it’s important for you to understand how to get rid of the guilt when taking time off.

Did you notice what I did when I realized it was time to take some personal time?

If you didn’t, read what happened again because it’s really important that you get this.

What I did was I made the decision and I committed to the decision and I didn’t allow any feeling of guilt to enter in. Because I did that, I now feel so refreshed, relaxed, and energized. When you allow yourself to feel guilty it sucks the energy right out of you and makes things even worse.

Here are the steps you must take in order to rid yourself of the guilt.

Make the Decision that you are going to take time off to rejuvenate yourself so you will be more productive when you get back.
Commit to your decision and enjoy your day off.
If any thoughts or feelings of guilt come up, immediate clear your mind of these thoughts and remind yourself it’s ok for you to take time off.
Do something for yourself that will keep your mind focused on relaxation and enjoyment.

In my best selling book Wealth Without a Job you’ll find several different methods to help you keep your mind clear. I don’t have time to get into each method here. It’s important that you Get Your Copy of Wealth Without A Job so you can enjoy guilt free time off.

It’s vitally important for creating your wealth to be able to master this skill.

And yes, it is a skill. No one has ever taught you this skill. That’s the challenge and maybe no ones ever told you that it is a skill. So here you go. Now you know what you have to do.

Make sure you take time off regularly and you’ll see how much more productive you really can be when your rested and relaxed.

Go ahead a Write a Comment and let me know what you learned. How will you take the information you learned and apply it in your life to be more productive.

When you Write a Comment you’ll be glad you did because you’ll engrain the lesson deep down at the cellular level because you took action.

I look forward to reading your comments.

To Your Success,
Andy Fuehl

PS: Guilt and taking time off are a bad combination. This negative emotion will literally suck the life energy out of you and make things even worse. You will make a lot more money when you learn how to eliminate the guilt when taking time off because you’ll be so much more productive when you come back.