Let’s talk about stress and overwhelm and how we can (and should) stop wearing busyness as a badge of honor. Going from a working a 9-5 to working for yourself with an online business can be challenging. Whether coming from being a working mom or a stay at home mom, the same still holds true: the faster you can adjust to this new life as a mom entrepreneur, the faster you can settle into it and truly enjoy this season.
And while hard work is definitely required, I’ve noticed that many times, we just accept that being stressed and busy is just part of life as a mom and definitely as an entrepreneur.
Many times, we’re trained this way in our career life, and then we bring that with us when we start working from home.
But this often leads to being impatient and snappy with your kids, and what you thought was going to be this amazing transition, actually ends up being even more stressful than when you worked out of the home.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
This was 100% me.
Figuring out how to be less stressed so I could enjoy my business, my kids, and my life as an entrepreneur (and life in general) was a HUGE focus for me for the first 2 years of working from home.
I was reflecting with a friend one day, and I realized that I’m really not that stressed anymore. It’s a HUGE contrast from when I worked in my 9-5 job and even when I started working from home.
Since I know so many of you are either preparing to quit your job OR you’ve already made that leap and it feels like you’re barely holding your head above water, I’m here to help you get to a place that’s less stressed and more motivation, joy and peace.
Here are my tips that I hope will make things more enjoyable as you pursue your calling to be an entrepreneur.
8 key things to reduce stress and overwhelm as a work at home mom
When I really look at it from a big picture perspective, I realize it’s more than just 1 or 2 things. It’s not just that I learned how to be really productive…or that I simply gained patience somehow.
It’s actually a whole combination of things.
1. Mindset work
I started being an entrepreneur with so much doubt, imposter syndrome, fear, etc. It’s hard to function without stress when you’re scared of everything. This is not what God wants for us.
Scared you won’t make any money…scared you will.
Doubting you can do this or that.
So you just keep showing up, but the entire time, there’s this mental battle going on.
This led to the second one.
2. Reading my Bible and learning what God has to say about me
After years of not reading my Bible, I got back into it and started really leaning on God’s word and His truths about who I was, that He provides for me, and I didn’t have to do it all.
It was through reading the Bible that I realized all the things I was worried about was because I didn’t see me or my life the way God did.
Here are 7 Bible verses that really helped me with worry.
Developed a daily practice of journaling, praying and quiet time with God.
This was probably the biggest thing that helped. At first, it started with just 10 minutes and then it got to the point that I would wake up about 1-2 hours before everyone else and just sit down to be with God.
(Here are some tips for how to spend time with God even when you feel like your time is limited.)
At first, I didn’t even know how to read the Bible honestly. I had to go dig it out of a box (if that tells you anything). Then I would try to read it like it was a book. Which, if you’ve done this then you know, makes it really hard to even comprehend anything.
It wasn’t until a friend of mine told me to read the Bible to see what it told me about God, about who He is and about what He was like.
When I did that, everything changed. It was wild. I got so excited about waking up because I was excited to see what God was going to show me as I read His word.
Then the journaling was huge too. A lot of times I would just “prayer write” as I call it. I would brain dump every single pain, confusion, worry, etc. and I would just write it out as though telling God. It helped me so much because it forced me to focus on one thought at a time and really sit with it and hear God speaking. If I’m talking, it makes it harder to hear that small voice.
Those 3 were huge in getting me in a place where I wasn’t as stressed or overwhelmed unable to take action. Now that I was not in my head as much, I could start to really look at which areas I was struggling in and fix those.
Meal planning
I found myself having to spend so much time on figuring out what to eat, buying all the groceries for it, and then making it. I didn’t really know much about meal planning but once I learned about it, I was all for it. Meal planning saves me time, stress, and money. The Living Well planner helped me here as it has a specific meal planning block.
Cleaning routines
Funny how when you work from home the house gets a million times messier a million times faster. I would spend so much time either cleaning everything randomly as I saw messes or I would ignore it all together for my work while stressing over the mess I was leaving.
Then I found Hot Mess to Home Success by Rosemarie Groner.
This course changed everything for me and taught me all about cleaning routines and decluttering in a way that worked for my ADHD brain. If managing the home is a struggle or just something you’d like to improve, then definitely check out this course. Not only was it life-changing for me, but it’s super affordable.
Time blocking
Fitting all the things in that you want to do can be challenging when you work for yourself. You’d think it’d be easier since you don’t have the demands of a regular 9-5 job.
But without anyone holding you accountable (i.e. a boss), you have to set your own schedule. Which is both awesome and challenging.
Blocking out time for all things that are important to you and then being present for each block without worrying about the others is a huge aspect of not feeling overwhelmed and stressed all the time.
Inside of my Goal Setting for Christian entrepreneurs course, there is a section that walks you through time blocking and includes a printable planner page to help you in each season you’re in.
Business friends and accountability
Having friends to talk to that shared my values and understood what I was doing in my business was huge. Getting their encouragement and motivation to keep at it was important.
If you’re the only one you know doing something different for God like this…then it can feel really lonely and loneliness will cause stress. I’m reminded of Elijah when Jezebel was after him ( 1 kings 19:9-11). He felt like he was alone so it got to him.
I’d love to have you join us inside of the free community over on Facebook.
Constantly tweaking, improving and giving yourself grace
Everything isn’t going to click into place the moment you start working from home or even just because you say you want to do better.
You’re learning how to function in a new career with a new life and embracing a new identity.
You’ll try it and then learn and get better with time.
This is a journey so give yourself grace for not being at the finish line yet.
Final Thoughts
With these 8 things, I went from randomly breaking down, being super grumpy, and worrying about everything to being motivated, excited, and having a strong sense of peace and calm around my business and life.
An extra resource to help you take that next step toward less stress is this free guide I put together. It’s a week worth of journal prompts around Biblical truths that God has given us and how they apply to you as an entrepreneur. Grab that here.
I hope my story encourages you to keep making steps toward your calling.
This was also done as episode 23 on the Mama With A Calling podcast (Apple ; Spotify) You can listen below or your favorite podcast player.