If you’re running a business or in a senior leadership role, stress is part of the job.
There’s ‘good’ stress: adrenaline that motivates, focuses, and energises, that feels like a high-performing muscle. Then there’s the other kind: that creeps in slowly, weighs you down, and saps your drive to continue.
It’s not always easy to tell the difference, especially when you’re busy.
But here’s the problem: if your default setting becomes “just get through this week”, or “I’ll push through, I can do it”, then you might not notice the strain turning into something more significant.
Which might not serve your business – or you – in the way you wish.
The story of business stress
The myth that resilience means always coping
Business owners are expert at holding things together. It’s practically a job requirement, given how uncertain the outlook can be and how many hats most leaders have to juggle.
But it’s important to remember that resilience doesn’t mean never struggling. It means knowing how to recover from periods of intensity, and knowing when to stop pushing.
If your version of coping means permanently running on adrenaline, you’re not actually coping. You’re bracing, like teeth gritted against a fierce wind.
The myth that stress is always obvious
With something as insidious as stress, sometimes the signs are subtle. You might find:
- You’re constantly tired, even after a weekend off
- You’ve lost interest in ideas you were excited about just a month ago
- You find yourself irritated by things that wouldn’t normally bother you
- You’ve stopped making time for the things that keep you balanced
Sound familiar? If so, you might not need a holiday, you might need a rethink.
The way forward
Here’s a question to ask yourself:
What does your business need from you – and what do you need from it?
Strain becomes stress when the balance is off.
It’s an easy trap to fall into, given how much business owners care about doing the best they can, providing for their family, or keeping pace with their outpouring of ideas.
But if your business demands more than you can sustainably give – or if it’s stopped giving you what you need (I’m talking about motivation, energy and purpose) – then something needs to shift.
That doesn’t always mean a big reinvention. Sometimes it’s about being honest with yourself and your business partners (if you have them) about what’s working and what isn’t.
It might mean redefining your boundaries, establishing a clearer work-life balance, building better systems, or creating a culture in which you can talk openly as a team about what the work is costing you.
It might even mean getting better at delegating (something pretty much every business owner I’ve ever spoken to struggles with).
Whatever it is, getting to the bottom of it is the only way to unpick the stress, uncoil the strain, and get you back to your best.
Time for a change?
Pushing through can be useful – in short bursts. But if you’ve been “just getting through this week” for the last six months, it might be time to pause and reassess.
If you want a space to think that through, let’s talk. You may well find it easier to chart a way forward in conversation with someone else.
Kind Regards,
Chris