28 Jul Burning the candle at both ends

There’s a saying… “Entrepreneurs work 80+ hours a week to avoid working 40 hours a week.”

There is a truth to that saying that all business owners understand. When it’s your business, you do whatever it takes to stay alive for as long as you can. You fight to make every opportunity work, because you never know if you’ll get another opportunity. It is a ridiculous cycle of overwhelming stress and entrepreneurs often end up burning the candle at both ends at some point in their career.

The problem for me is that my work is also my hobby. If I weren’t making videos for a living, I would still be making them for fun. Even my personal vacations are filled with video making as scheduled components of our travel itinerary. I tend to overextend myself and keep pushing as if I have an unlimited amount of energy and ideas.

The truth is, as soon as I turned forty earlier this month, my body started flashing warning lights so as to say: “slow down dude, you’re 40! Enjoy the ride and stop working so much or you’ll end us with no time left to enjoy it.” I’ve tried to listen and am on mission to stop saying yes to every opportunity and be more prudent with my time in office, in the field and in my personal life. The last thing I want is to burn out or burn this career away too quickly.