Starting her own business gave her the flexibility she needed. Still, the desire to establish a new project was accompanied by loneliness, and she says that the first year was an intensive course on protecting herself from exhaustion.
“As an entrepreneur, you will be dealing with completely different issues, and you will have different clients that you deal directly with, so there are a lot of different pressures now that I deal with myself,” says Semenyuk.
When you are launching a business on your own, the only way you will succeed is to not burn out all your energy at work. A joint 2015 study by the University of California, San Francisco, and Stanford University found that mental health concerns affect 72% of entrepreneurs. A 2012 Gallup survey in the United States found that entrepreneurs were more likely than others to be stressed in their daily activities, so they had to take care of their mental health. For example, you can start with something as simple as going for a walk near the house.
Anna Akbari, Ph.D. sociologist, entrepreneur, and author of Startup Your Life: Hustle and Hack Your Way to Happiness, says: "If you are not physically healthy, you are not mentally healthy, so set your priorities as an entrepreneur because your time is very limited."
Akbari noted, for employees who work 9 to 5 who are thinking of achieving success and starting their own business, having this kind of control over your time can seem like overkill, but on the flip side, when the only person you have to respond to is you, every hour can be a work hour."
So when you realize that you have a limited time at work, you can ensure that the level of stress will not rise much, and the small actions you take can build a strong safety net.
For Semenyuk, the first step was turning off notifications on her phone and keeping it on silent at all times, she also set aside time to check social media and respond to inboxes, and take out anything she didn't benefit from, even people she was following or who were following her that felt like a drain on her mood and energy. And She was keen to set time for daily rest to get out to the gym. Akbari says: "I also started meditating for only 10 minutes a day with the help of apps like Calm."
"It really helps you get rid of negative thoughts and criticism. In fact, it also helps you observe it, monitor your feelings, pay attention more, face stressful situations, and make better decisions at work and in life because you have more clarity," says Semenyuk.
Akbari is also a fan of meditation because of its importance when it comes to changing the way you make decisions in high-pressure moments. "If there ever comes a time when you need to improve this process, I would say it's time to launch your own business and expand," she says.
If all goes according to plan, you will not be alone for a long time. As your company progresses, you can be sure that you are modeling healthy behaviors,and also creating a workplace where your employees feel supported.
Dr. David Ballard, chair of the American Psychological Organization's Center for Organizational Excellence says: "If you're overworked as a leader, then that affects all people who work with you and the work environment. Most of the key people are in very stressful roles, and if you add work pressure to that, it's actually hurting your company's performance and the well-being of the people who need to be the best they can be."
The American Psychological Association's (APA) annual workforce survey last year found that only 42% of American employees said their workplace provided them with the tools they needed to manage stress. Over a third stated that they had experienced chronic stress at work. When people are stressed, they look to move to other companies. If they stay, they may not take on new roles that are entirely appropriate for them."
When employees are stressed, they don't seek promotions, Ballard says: "They don't try to move to higher positions, if they think opportunities aren't worth it, and if the stress level is too high for what they get, they will ignore opportunities, and these may actually be very useful people in terms of the company's progress and success.
There are some essential things that employers control when it comes specifically to stress, such as being transparent and open to dialogue about compensation and benefits, providing flexibility in employee work schedules, setting pathways to progress, and ensuring that the type of work your employees do provides value to both them and the company as a whole, even if it's on an administrative level. One of the influencing factors affecting the work environment is a factor called "Qualitative Underload," which means that the employee has enough tasks, but these tasks do not live up to his potential. You may be busy, but you feel bored. As Ballard explains, work becomes uninteresting, unchallenging, and unimportant to you. It actually stresses people out, and we don't tend to think of it that way, but that's what happens.
Akbari says: “Another hidden stressor is the guilt that can creep in if the work-life balance isn’t quite the way you want it to be, and she recommends creating a system to stay alert during these stressful moments, whether it’s setting an alarm or scheduling an appointment with a friend or business partner, but otherwise, it's okay to continue on the path you've taken.
Many of the most important moments in our lives actually come from a little imbalance or some harshness, and whether you're stuck in a project and don't want to stop, you're on a creative path, or you're launching a new venture, one of the important things that entrepreneurs must do is embrace the absence of balance and ensure that it does not arouse in them a sense of remorse, guilt, or a desire to apologize.
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