How to Say No to Loved Ones

How do you balance entrepreneur life alongside your loved ones?

In the latest episode of The Complete Entrepreneur, our hosts steered around a topic that they fail to teach you at business school, one that can help you, your family, and your friends.

We are all about teaching and helping one another at The Complete Entrepreneur and what better topic to seek advice on than how to say no to loved ones? Should we be saying no to our loved ones? Aren’t your family and loved ones your priority in your life? How do we go about that?

Are you communicating effectively?

Have you ever heard of the five love languages? There are different ways people feel loved. The book describes the five love languages: receiving gifts, words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, and physical touch. (If you haven’t read it yet, please go do so!)

There are simple steps you can take to build a better communication system, but understanding your own way of loving and feeling loved should be the first one.

The pandemic has allowed us to reassess things that we normally wouldn’t have in the past. The lengthy pause we endured during the pandemic allowed us to reflect, spend time with loved ones, and be grateful for those around us.

We’ve all shifted our priorities a bit, and nothing is ever as important as we think it is.

Does the dinner meeting outweigh the quality of family time, date nights, or special family birthdays? This is a question you should always ask yourself.

As entrepreneurs, we always think everything [to do with business] is absolutely critical! And the reality is, if you miss that business meeting or reschedule it, it’s not going to be a disaster! It will still be there tomorrow…

Michele, like many others, struggles with deciding whether she needs to be at every meeting.

Finding ways to bring other people into the equation is important to scale your company, but it also allows you to have some time off and to hand over the responsibility of the company to someone else if you’re in need of some downtime or have a family event lined up.

We can be our better self if we’re not burning the candle on both ends Michele Van Tilborg

It’s also important to bring your family into the conversation and involve them in that side of your life. Maybe you can even bring them to one of your business trips so they can see you in action and better understand what you do.

What needs to be reframed is that it’s not MY business. It’s OUR business! By changing your words from ‘my’ to ‘our’, it becomes more inclusive. Your family and loved ones are a big part of your business, as they are the ones supporting you behind the scenes.

Read more: https://startup.club/how-to-say-no-to-loved-ones/