4 Tips to Reignite Your Passion and Energy for Your Business Entrepreneurs stuck in a rut need to rekindle their passion for their business or else they'll never succeed.
By Zech Newman Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Staggering out of bed, I zigzagged unconsciously from my bedroom to start the day with zero energy and desire to work on my business, take care of my family, or do anything else. I wanted to curl up in a ball and die. I started the coffee, and as the aroma filled the house, I slowly got ready for another day feeling more like a robot than an entrepreneur.
This unconscious, no-energy state was a far cry from the early years of my businesses. When I started my business I had five employees in my little restaurant. In the beginning, my ambition and my dreams were huge, and I had so much energy. I was ready to take on the world. In those days you couldn't keep me from working if you tried.
Now I was just tired. I had no emotion and energy and just wanted a paycheck. I had 30 employees, two locations and had tripled the revenue, but my joy was zapped. Frankly I was on auto pilot and survival mode. If it wasn't for caffeine, I think I would have laid in bed for a month. This business that I once loved I found myself hating.
Eventually I was able to rekindle the passion and energy for my business, but it required change and it wasn't easy. If you are feeling burnt out from your business, remember these four tips to get your passion and energy back.
1. Monitor your health.
Our health should come before everything else, but often we put it last. Author Michael Hyatt said that in the case of emergency on a plane you are to put on your oxygen mask first before you help others put on theirs. Those are wise words. We must focus on our health before anything else to become a better business owner.
Related: How to Rekindle Your Flame for Your Business
2. Ask yourself "Why?".
The why is the pulling force behind passionate action. The why behind your business needs to be one hundred percent you. If it's money, why do you want more of it? Mine is to grow in depth and scale, and when I remember this I look at everything differently. We often forget why we are in business and get focused on the drudgery of the day and the remedial tasks we are working on. Remember why to re-ignite your passion.
Related: 7 Reasons Why the 'Why' Is So Important in Business
3. Never stop learning.
Learning must never stop. Whether it is books, podcasts, conferences, or coaching, we must always be learning and growing. If you stop filling up, you will have nothing to pour out. If you are pouring out with no refilling, you will be just like a dry riverbed. Where once there was life, there is now death. Learn to sustain energy to give out.
Related: 7 Tips for Loving Your Career and Working With Passion
4. Maintain your relationships.
Relationships are very important to a happy and fulfilled life. We need people to walk alongside us. To complain to when times are rough, encourage us and to let us know what is good when we can't see it. Entrepreneurs are famous for going it alone, but we need companionship and friendship. Invest the time into people outside of your business. Join a mastermind, have a mentor and have some friends. Relationships will help you in business and life.
Take a break, focus on your family and just live a little. Focus on getting your heart back in it. That is the driving force in your business. Your passion and energy are contagious and so is your lack of it. Don't fall into the trap of paycheck and existence. Business is too hard without passion and energy.
You can get your energy back, but it will take time. And if you can't re-ignite your passion for the business, sell it and start a new one. Don't give up easy but you are not bound to your current business, you can build another one. Your company needs you engaged, and alive. Now get back out and change the world one customer and one employee at a time!
