Running a small business is stressful. Big understatement, I know. There is not one single aspect of running a small business that doesn’t have the potential to cause you sleepless nights.

From finance to customer complaints, there is always something tough to deal with. Your brain rarely gets a break. If you aren’t careful, the pressure will send you under. But, still you wouldn’t change a thing; you love being your own boss, growing a successful company and giving yourself new challenges. So what’s the solution? You need to find a way to manage your stress. Here’s how.

Focus on the Good

It’s all too easy, as a small business owner, to focus on the negative aspects of building your empire, but if you do that, you’re never going to be stress-free, not even for a second. It’s far healthier to devote as much of your headspace as you can to the things that are going right. Sure, you may be behind schedule on the new launch, but the new products are amazing. Yes, that company might be stalling on paying you but you just picked up a dozen new clients. Find the light in the dark and you’ll lighten your load even just a little.

Prioritize Tasks

Small business owners could easily spend 24 hours a day working if they were able – there’s always something to be done. However, burning the candle at both ends does no one any favors. Not only will it leave you feeling stressed, but you’ll make more mistakes and cause more problems for everyone including yourself, your employees and your clients.

What you need to do is prioritize. You can do this by ranking your daily tasks from most to least important. Focus on doing the tasks that are most critical, and which add more value, well, and either outsource the rest or stop sweating when it doesn’t get done.

Take a Vacation

When was the last time you took a vacation? Can’t even remember? It’s time to book a really posh vacation rental, like the ones on this website, and get away from it all. Unless you’re a one-man-band, your business will survive and once you’ve had time to relax and refresh, you’ll be even more efficient when you do come back to work.

Meditate

It might sound like something that only hippies and navel-gazers are interested in, but meditation has been making its way into corporations for a few years now because it works. It works when it comes to reducing stress and enabling relaxation. It helps you to clear the junk out of your brain so that you can perform better. More importantly, it’ll help you keep stress at bay. Try it with an open mind and you might just be surprised.

Hire a Great Team

As soon as you have the means to do so, hire a great team to help you grow your business, even if it’s just one more pair of hands. That way you can hand off tasks to others or go on vacation without worrying that your business will sink without you. It will take some of the burden off your shoulders and that will make all the difference.