5 Habits of a Successful Mompreneur

Habits are powerful and as the old saying goes "habits make us or break us." This is why it is especially important that we build good habits into our daily lives. Little things do matter because over time they create a big impact. Below are 5 habits that I incorporate into my daily life as a Mompreneur. I believe that these habits help to keep me organized as I strive to provide for my family and for the stakeholders who depend on me in business.

Plan your Day the Night Before

Every evening I plan for the next day. Planning helps me to think of what I want to accomplish and it also allows me to manage my time better. With a family and a business, at times I am juggling so many obligations: a child has a chorus concert at 6:00 pm, another child needs to be picked up from College because her Christmas break has begun, payroll is pending, an employee needs a job letter, not to mention dinner and general homekeeping. I am quite sure you too have a lot on your plate. For me, planning allows me to segment my day between: 

• Home
• Business
• Kids
• Personal Time
• Family Time

Though I may not get everything done daily, at least I am aware of what needs to be done. I can then delegate and or postpone. Not keeping it all in my head helps me to be a lot more organized. Daily planning works; but keep in mind that annual goal setting and monthly planning helps one to accomplish so much more.

Maintain a Personal Habit Tracker

In addition to planning, I maintain a personal habit tracker that allows me to focus on those areas of my life that I tend to neglect. My personal habit tracker may change from month to month. For this month the items are:

• Read my Bible
• Exercise
• Eat Healthy
• General Reading
• Bed Time
• Water
• Vitamins

These may seem simple but they are not. It is so easy to neglect oneself and not get enough rest nor enough exercise. This happens especially for busy Mompreneurs who at times focus on everyone else and everything else. For me, I literally put a check or an x in the columns daily. By so doing, I am more conscious of my neglect or of my attention to those personal habits that are a big part of my overall well being.

Maintain a Business Habit Tracker

Like the personal habit tracker, the business habit tracker keeps me conscious of those areas that are important but easily overlooked or neglected. My business habit tracker is aligned with the things I want to do and or measure daily. For instance, I reconcile all financial accounts daily, I check on social media and blogs daily, etc. If I do nothing else, by doing all the things on my business habit tracker, I have a good understanding of where my business is and how it is doing.

Maintain a Budget

Some people feel as though a budget is a straight jacket. I'm the opposite; instead I feel as though my budget gives me the freedom to spend in each particular category. By living on a budget, I know where my money is going. It's a terrible feeling for the month to end and I'm wondering what I did with the money I made this month. I avoid this feeling by setting up a budget each month before the month begins. Then, I enter this budget in my mobile app so that as the transactions are coming in, I can see how I am doing in each category. 

Currently, I am using Mint  What's great about this app is that when you are getting close to your budgeted amount, the bar turns yellow and when you've spent all your money in a particular category it turns red. Also, Mint sends alerts to your phone when you are approaching your budget. So in the end, you know where your money was spent and hopefully you have funded your savings portion of your budget.  

Take One Day a Week to Rest

Buddha says "do nothing life is too precious to waste." Though I am not Buddhist, I recognize that most of the world's religions emphasize the need to set aside a day to rest and rejuvenate. In fact, studies show that rest helps to energize our creative genius. Also, with proper rest, one has the energy to tackle all the tasks at hand. Of course daily rest is important but for me weekly rest is even more so. One day a week I literally do nothing. My kids know that I sleep in; I hibernate; I don't want to be disturbed; I am annoyed when activities are planned on that particular day. For me, weekly rest gives me what I need to continue to produce.

My success isn't your success; and for some success is a moving target or even an elusive concept. For me, success depends on whether or not I feel like I am really trying my best in the different areas of my life. If yes, then I am successful if no then I try harder. The above 5 habits helps me to achieve my definition of success. What about you? What habits help you feel successful in your life. Share below and remember Life is Good!