How Sleep Influences Your Success As An Entrepreneur

There are many factors which influence your chances of success as an entrepreneur. A great business idea is a must have, as is a passion for your craft and a dedication to making your company thrive.

However, there's a crucial part of being a successful entrepreneur that many new business leaders overlook: self-care.

When you start your own business, it’s easy to get into the habit of working unreasonably long hours and pushing yourself very hard. However, the more you burn the candle at both ends, the more you’re putting your company, and yourself, at risk.

The key to a great business starts with being a healthy entrepreneur, and you can’t be healthy without a good night’s sleep.

The Link Between Sleep and Business Success

Sleep is one part of proper self-care which entrepreneurs should be paying more attention to – but it’s often the most important. Most business leaders take sleep for granted, assuming rest is a luxury they’ll be able to indulge in when they make enough cash.

Countless business people wake up before dawn and go to bed late at night, gradually grinding down their physical and mental health in the process. However, scientific research tells us that sleeping is essential for running a successful company.

Fail to get enough sleep and everything from your motivation to your creativity levels start to suffer.

The Reasons You Need More Sleep

So, why exactly should you be getting more rest each night? Because getting a good night’s sleep is crucial to your health, wellbeing, and functionality.

Here’s why you need more sleep as an entrepreneur:

Your brain needs sleep to survive: Your brain actively needs to rest to get rid of the toxins and waste that accumulates in it during the day. When you’re awake and working, your brain can’t rejuvenate itself, so it begins to stagnate.

You end up with headaches, trouble concentrating, and pain in your eyes. Even your attention span begins to suffer.

Sleep deprivation ages the brain: Business success isn’t always a young man’s game, but you’ll have a hard time competing if your brain is twenty years older than you are.

Failing to get the right amount of sleep causes your brain to age and deteriorate faster, which means you struggle with mental performance. You might not come up with as many ideas, and you may find it’s harder to focus.

You need sleep to be charming: Charming people is an important part of being a good business owner. You need your team, clients, and shareholders to actually like and believe in you if you want to thrive.

It’s hard to encourage those positive interactions if you’re constantly grouchy and irritable. Your bad moods could eventually end up toppling your company and scaring away investors.

You need sleep to make decisions: It’s up to you to make a lot of important decisions quickly. The wrong choice can destroy not just your business, but the livelihood of everyone you’re connected to.

When you’re not getting enough sleep, it’s difficult to weigh the pros and cons of each option correctly. Lack of sleep makes you a poor decision maker, and you start to make mistakes. The more errors you make, the more your business suffers.

Sleeping makes you more creative: As mentioned above, a good night’s sleep is essential in having a more creative mind. The more you rest, the easier it is to come up with out-of-the-box ideas.

If you fail to get the sleep you need, you become boring and predictable. You need a dose of creativity if you want to stay ahead of the competition.

Sleep is Also Essential for Your Health

Perhaps most importantly of all, a good night’s sleep is critical if you want to stay healthy. Ultimately, your business isn’t going to get anywhere if you’re not around to run it.

Putting an extra ten hours a week into your company might seem essential, but when you’re in hospital it’s really not worth the trade.

A good night’s sleep is essential to keeping all of the parts of your body working properly – not just your brain. Humans can’t survive without sleep – and you shouldn’t be attempting any superhuman feats as a business owner. Ask yourself whether you’re getting enough sleep each day. That’s around 7 to 9 hours a night for most people.

If you’re constantly exhausted, irritable, and rushed, it might be that a little extra shut-eye is all you really need. It might be hard to commit at first, but the sleep will pay off eventually.

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