This is the most important part of your business

On no longer putting yourself last in business + a bumper crop of favourites

Last week, paid subscribers received a behind-the-scenes post on 5 lessons I learned from my recent launch (and what I’ll never do again). We’re also cheering each other on in the monthly Accountability Club.

The business gurus will tell you that investors, hustling, your product or marketing are the most important parts of your business. They’re wrong.

In today’s post, I’ll share what I truly believe is the most important part of your business, and why paying attention to that means no longer putting yourself second (or third, or fourth, or fifth…) in your business.

A radically new way of doing business

Traditional business tells us that our businesses need to be all-encompassing.

We need to be using every free minute of the day to check in with social media, post to Pinterest, catch up with email.

We need to hustle and work hard, even if we also work a 9-to-5, have care responsibilities, or bodies and minds that need more attention.

I don’t believe any of that. At the core of my business is a stubborn refusal to hustle. A refusal to buy into the hacks and pushing through.

Because the most important thing in your business is you.

The most important thing in your business is you: the you that gets squeezed into the corners if we follow traditional business advice.

The you that tries to push through even though you’re tired, exhausted, beyond exhausted.

The you that works hard even though you don’t want to spend all of your time working.

Without you, there is no business. Sure, you can work quite a while burning yourself to the ground and being miserable. But if you chose to start your own business why would you make yourself miserable doing so?

Because the most important thing in your business is you.

Putting your non-negotiables into place

One of the topics my clients and I talk about the most is making space for themselves in their business. We are not taught to do this—especially those of us socialized as women are encouraged to

So how do you make space for you in your business? My favourite way of doing so is by creating a list of non-negotiables.

Non-negotiables are the things that you need in your life in order to take care of yourself. The things you know you need (even if you don’t always give them to yourself).

A daily walk is on the list of non-negotiables for one of my clients. Another client’s non-negotiable is at least one hour for rest before her kids come home from school. An hour to write in the morning is on the list of non-negotiables for a third client.

On my list of non-negotiables:

• 30 minutes of reading before the start of my workday

• 10 am start to my workday

• frequent breaks and rest, including a 1-hour nap around midday

• (near)daily movement, such as Pilates or gardening.

All of these things are things I want to do, and things my body and mind need. Starting my day with 30 minutes of reading feels like a delightful luxury that I enjoy every single day. Reading is one of my biggest joys and I want to have plenty of space for it in my days. I thrive on slow mornings and a 10am start lets me have just that.

Daily movement reminds me that there is more to life than work, and Pilates connects me to my body in a way that also soothes my mind.

Making space for yourself in your business is a radical act.

How to fit your non-negotiables into your day

Over the past few years, my body and mind have started to require more explicit rest. I sometimes struggle with this. There are days that I rail against the need to rest, like a toddler resisting a nap.

What living with mental illness means for my business

And while I can go through the occasional day without a nap, I really do need it in order to function properly, physically and mentally. Whereas in my twenties and early thirties I had perfected the art of not needing to rest, now things fall apart when I don’t rest. Depressive symptoms, extreme mental pain, intrusive thoughts and even deeper exhaustion set in.

If making space for yourself in your business sounds good but feels scary or impossible, you’re in the right place.

With all of our culture’s talk of self-care, truly taking care of yourself and making space for yourself is a radical act.

We tell ourselves that we don’t have the time to read for fun during the day.

We tell ourselves that don’t have time to go for a walk.

We tell ourselves that we don’t have time until we’ve done all the work.

We tell ourselves we’ll start to make time for ourselves when our business is up and running, when we’re making more money, when we’re feeling more successful.

But the thing is: you don’t need to earn this space for yourself in your business.

You already deserve time for yourself, you need time for yourself.

An invitation

Today, I’d love you to experiment with your non-negotiables. What are the things that you do or want to do solely for you? To take care of the human that you are, the business owner that you are?

Start small, but prioritise your non-negotiables. Don’t squeeze them into the corners or at the end of the day.

What are you going to experiment with? Which non-negotiables already have a place in your days and in your business? Leave a comment to join the conversation.

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Substack for small business owners, freelancers and creatives | I relaunched my popular self-paced course with new videos and a behind-the-scenes at exactly how I have made Substack part of my business.

Female Owned | answering paid subscriber questions on how to deal with self-doubt in business, lessons from my recent launch and a free post on how I built a calm business. And we started the month off with the Female Owned Accountability Club.

Work with me | I’m getting ready to open my books again for new mentoring clients starting this Summer. If you want to be the first to know, leave your details on the waiting list and I’ll be in touch (no strings attached of course).

a book | “Slowly, the outside world receded, replaced by the ongoing epiphany of the everyday”—I deeply loved reading Olivia Laing on gardens, on their history and radical potential in The Garden Against Time (affiliate link).

nectarine season | It’s nectarine season again and I’m here for it, adding them to my breakfast every morning.

a newsletter | So much of what

Anne Helen Petersen

writes in her reflections on 10 years out of academia resonates with me, especially this, “With distance, I’m embarrassed I buried myself so deeply in that one-way channel. I’m talking about the possibility of that specific job, of course, but also about a career as a media studies academic”.

another book | I’d been wanting to read Leslie Jamison’s Splinters ever since I read an excerpt from it a few months back and it did not disappoint. Even though I am not a mother, I loved reading her reflections on motherhood and creativity: “[the story I told] was meant to suggest a certain vision of motherhood, as expansion rather than claustrophobia. This vision didn’t require sacrificing work at the altar of my daughter, or sacrificing my daughter at the alter of work” (affiliate link).

Your Artist Knows the Way | My lovely client

Cynthia Morris

recently launched a free Substack that guides readers to (re)discover their own inner artist. I deeply admire her creativity and drive, and know this will be so useful to many creatives out there.

What’s on your lists of favourites this month? What did you read, see, hear, drink, eat, observe that made your day?

I’m off to hope for more sunshine, and more time spent in the garden watching it explode 🌱 I’ll be back in paid subscribers’ inboxes next week with an update on my 2024 financial and business goals (hint: big steps ahead!), and with a free newsletter later this month. Until then, have a lovely month x

Female Owned is more than a newsletter. If you are ready to do business differently, I’d love for you to become a paid subscriber and become part of our gentle community of small business owners, freelancers and creatives. You’ll get bonus resources (the accountability club! the mini-mastermind! the new mini podcast series!) and behind-the-scenes posts right in your inbox.