When I was pregnant I noticed people loved the saying, “Happy mom, happy baby.”

But I got a bit annoyed because I thought, why does that only apply when you're breastfeeding or have a newborn? Isn't it always “happy mom, happy kids”?

And why does it only apply to moms? What about “happy me, happy marriage” or “happy home, happy business”?

And why is it that we only look after our health when we have an event to go to, or when we want to look good for something, like a wedding?

Those things annoy me. Making your health a priority only when it's on show. Focusing on your well-being only if you're in a special time of life, like having a baby.

I think looking after yourself has to be a constant. Sometimes, when you're busy with other priorities, you find yourself varying from the constant. That's when you recognize that you're getting a bit off-kilter and need to get yourself back on track. But it's always something that needs to be there, underneath everything else. This is your foundation.

So I have this baseline level of well-being, of feeling okay, of being myself. The level that I set for myself is about what I give myself permission to be worthy of.

And I know when I'm not there. I know the warning signs that tell me I'm not doing well, and I know what to expect when I let certain things slide.

Finally, I know how to reset myself to where I need to be. I don't look to Florian or my friends or my coach to get my balance back. I just have these things that I've learned over time, that work for me. I know when I do them I'll get closer to that basic level of happiness and feeling like myself.

That's what we're going to go through in this chapter. Where's your baseline? How do you know when you're not there? How do you get it back?

YOUR PERSONAL PIE

We all know what it feels like when the blend is right. You have enough energy to get through most things you want to achieve in a day, and when you get home on Friday night and it's time to sit on the couch with a glass of wine, you feel like you can really enjoy it. When you think about work you feel a buzz of motivation and you can't wait to check how things are performing, because you know they're going well. You look forward to going home to your family. You have time to have a bit of fun.

The blend looks different for everybody. You might be at your most content when you're working fewer hours and spending more time at home with the kids, but another person might thrive on 14-hour workdays. Your ideal week might involve going to the gym five times, but another person will feel great about a massage.

So it's up to you to define your own ideal. Ask yourself, “When am I at my most content?”

To answer this question, imagine your life as a pie. You have a slice for work, a slice for holidays, a slice for time at home, a slice for time with friends, and all the other ways you mainly spend your time. How big do you want each slice to be?

It might help to think about the slices not as chunks of time, but chunks of energy. How much of your focus and attention do you want to be taken up with your business? With your kids? With your social life? With your current hobby, obsession, or personal challenge?

And how small do you need to make the slices of things you don't particularly want in your life, but can't avoid?

An example for me is doing chores. You can't go through life never cleaning up anything, but I want my chores slice to be about 1%. I literally just want to pick up after myself; I get annoyed picking up after my children and I draw the line at picking up after my husband. I will not cook and I will not clean. I don't enjoy it, and I could be doing something I love for half an hour to pay for it instead of doing it myself and taking four hours to get it done. That's what I know about me and chores.

So when you're at your most content, how big is each slice of energy in your pie?

When you've figured this out, you might take some of the main slices and divide them up again, according to what makes you most content in those areas. For example, I know that I function best when my work slice is at least 50% creative work and no more than 10% on compliance and reporting and all that “sleep-at-night” shit. I can handle more of that if it's motivational and related to the creative stuff; the more I'm winning, the longer I can look at a report. I'm happy if I can tweak the numbers and grow things. But in general, about 10% is my limit. I know that about myself.

In my personal life slice, I need one day a week that's all about me—my friends, my children, the activities we like to do. Absolutely no obligations whatsoever. I work during the week and I work long hours; that's fine, it's a big chunk of my life and I love it. But it means that I guard my weekends really carefully. The kids don't do sports on the weekend; they can do as many activities as they like during the week after school, but we don't do sports on weekends. We don't have pets because we love to travel on the weekends and overseas at least twice a year (and we wouldn't want to put our pets in a kennel). Travel is a huge part of keeping me and my hubby sane; if I personally don't go over the ocean at least once every two months I get island fever. And sleep-ins are really important to my well-being, at least one sleep-in a week with cuddles. That's me.

So ask yourself: When are you happiest at work? What activities are you doing? Are you mentoring people, are you strategizing, are you coming up with ideas or executing them?

When are you happiest at home? What activities are you doing? Are you cleaning, are you present with your kids, are you cooking with your family, are you out in your garden?

This exercise is about self-awareness. Once you can define your perfect pie, you know what you need to do to keep your baseline steady. It's not up for judgment because everybody's got their own thing. It's your game and you get to define the rules. Heck, I've never had a gym membership, and I count massage as part of my exercise time!

If you're off-kilter, it can take a while to change your habits to where you want them to be. But it's worth the investment to get back on track. I don't try to fix everything at once. I'll figure out which area is the furthest from where it needs to be and go and fix that.

Getting this right can seem overwhelming, but everyone's always got options. My favorite saying is that you're only one decision away from changing your life. We're all guilty of overcomplicating things, me included.

For instance, I had a situation where I downsized my role in my own company, took on a new CEO to replace myself, and went from earning $200,000 a year as CEO to $80,000 in a part-time marketing role. That might sound crazy, but I knew that I couldn't stay heavily involved in that business because it had grown to a size where what it needed from me wasn't creativity. It needed a whole other level of management that would mean my work slice wasn't anywhere near the 50% of creative work that I need to maintain my baseline.

It was great that I knew which bus stop to get off at. (Usually you don't know until you've passed it, so unfortunately you often need to go through that experience to determine when to press the exit button.) But reducing my salary created a new problem: Namely, how do we pay our living expenses?

So I thought about my options:

I could save money by not having a cleaner, somebody who irons my clothes and does all my chores. That's one way to save $300 a week. But I hate doing chores.

Another way would be to send Florian to work. I could say, “It's your turn now.” But that would mean me having to look after the kids' after-school activities and do the school run. More chores!

Either of those options would bring us back to neutral, financially. But, chores!

The other way to get us back to neutral would be for me to earn more. I could go out and find more creative projects that pay. But fee-for-service didn't serve my small business passion, as I would be working on other people's businesses, not mine.

Alternatively I could sell some assets and grant myself the time to explore my next business adventure. So that's what I did. I know I return more than property does, I was still meeting my commitments to the family and their current lifestyle, and I got the space to reinvent.

Some people get the seven-year itch—I get the four-year itch in business, you could say.

I guess I could happily have chosen to stick to working three days a week at work and done more housework. That'd be a great option for some people, who might hate the idea of having to start a new job and opt to do more at home.

It's not a question of whether work is better than chores or whether assets are more important than self-investment. Plenty of people would be happy working less and doing the chores. I know myself well enough to know I'm not one of those people. It's about me understanding what makes me happy in life.

PEOPLE WHO GET IT

I've mentioned that I belong to my local chapters of Entrepreneur's Organization and Young President's Organization. In both EO and YPO, every member gets assigned to a Forum: a small group of peers who meet up once a month, confidentially, for support and advice. Forum is a place where you can share the parts of your life that nobody else understands. Your family and friends might be supportive, but unless they're also running multiple businesses, or trying to solve a problem that's never been tackled before, or tap into a new industry—unless they share that particular blend of personality traits that make up an entrepreneur—they probably don't completely get it.

If you're an entrepreneur, I can't recommend EO highly enough. If that isn't for you, find an organization that meets your needs. You might get the most value out of a community that's specifically for women in business, or for creative people in your industry, or whatever your personal situation is. Look for a group of people who are going through the same thing, and meet with them for reflection and accountability. They'll be a good sounding board when you're not content, and offer insight from their own experiences to help you get back on track.

THINGS THAT FILL UP YOUR SOUL

While I was writing this book, a friend of mine was going through a lot of shit in his business. I was having a bit of a shitty time too, going through a transition with my own business that meant I was doing hardly any creative work. Both of us are normally positive people who are used to loving our work and basically feeling like we are winning all the time, which made this time extra hard to deal with. It was really wearing us both down and—what do you know—throwing other parts of our pie out.

So I said to him, “We need to pick our top five things that are inexpensive ways to relieve stress and get us back to thinking and performing at our best.” (Not just as leaders at work, but also as good parents and nice people who smile at other people on the train.) We agreed that we'd be each other's buddies and make sure that we did at least one thing every couple of weeks.

I think of these things as things that fill up my soul.

When it comes to physical health, we know that prevention is better than cure. I actually think the same thing applies across all parts of your life, whether it be your marriage, your mental health, or your sense of self. The things that fill up your soul are the things that need to happen to prevent you from getting burned out or being a crappy parent or resentful partner. It might feel self-indulgent, but it's probably your best work.

The things that fill up your soul are things you can do for yourself, without depending on other people to make you feel better. That doesn't make other people redundant; it's just that it's important to know how to maintain your own baseline without relying on other people to tell you when you're off-kilter. The people close to you will be able to sense when you're not doing your best, but only you know when you really need to do something about it.

When you're figuring out what fills up your soul, here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Remember times when you were really content and happy. Write all those moments down and then look for common denominators. Did you have a lot of happy moments near the ocean? Did a lot of your best times involve your children? Whatever it is, just notice it.
• Don't do things that you think will make you happy because they work for other people. When my friend and I agreed to keep each other accountable for doing the things on our lists, he sent me a text at 5 a.m. with a picture of the sunrise. Getting up early fills up his soul, whereas I love sleeping in. For lots of people their “me time” is going to get their nails done, but I'd rather have ugly nails then go through that experience. It takes too long and it smells awful. Don't expect your things to fill my soul or my things to fill yours. Your list is like your DNA. It's unique to you and you can't change it.
• Don't make excuses. Include some things on your list that don't cost any money, some things that don't take much time, and some things that you can do alone without relying on other people. That way you can always find something to do, even if you have limited resources.
• Make sure your list covers different areas of life, and that at least some of the things are within your own control. It's okay if some things on your list are business related (mine are), but you can't tie all your happiness to success at work. You can't wrap everything on your list around your children. A lot of life isn't in your control, so you have to find happiness in all different places. Your list should reflect that.

There's no judging your list; it just is. Mine includes things like:

• The ocean
• Making memories
• A clean, organized home
• Growing startups
• Time with the kids
• Music
• Travel
• Winning in business
• Massage (don't save that shit for a birthday present!)
• Being appreciated
• Time with K (my best friend)
• Creative marketing & strategy
• Looking good
• Giving gifts
• Mentoring and coaching

Last weekend I said to my girls, “Guess what fills Mommy's soul? Music. I love music and I want to do something with you and music.”

They'd recently told me that they didn't know who Elvis Presley was. That sparked an idea for a project we could do together. I got so excited; I hadn't been this excited about anything in a long time. I decided I'd introduce them to all the legends of music. We made a poster and wrote them all on it—The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Elton John, David Bowie (spelled “David Bonie” by my six-year-old). One night a week we were going to do a disco night, watch the DVDs, dance (jump around), “move like Mick Jagger,” and play the records really loud. It was something that I came up with myself, that wasn't going to take me a lot of effort, and that would last the next six weekends. The process of planning it made me happy in an instant.

Understand me when I say it really can be anything that fills up your soul and it's really not up for judgment.

So first you make a list. Then you look to yourself to actually do those things. And then you have to communicate it to the people around you, so they understand why you need to do it.

Seriously, it's important to share your list with the people in your life who can help you fill up your soul, whether it be your partner, your kids (if they're old enough), or your best friend. It's not selfish or self-centered; if somebody loves you, you're doing them a favor by making it really easy for them to show you: If you've told them, “do these five things and that'll make me happy,” how easy is that for them?

You can do the exercise together, so that you know what fills up their soul, too. It's a bit like that theory of the Five Love Languages. Everybody speaks a different “language” that makes them feel loved: You might need lots of cuddles or quality time while I like verbal affirmation, not gifts. (I love giving other people gifts but I don't really care about receiving them.) In the same way, everybody has a different language for what fills up their soul. Find out what makes each of you feel happy, so you can do it for each other.

WHEN YOU'RE STUCK

Sometimes one slice of your pie is way smaller or bigger or made of different layers than you want it to be, but you can't fix it right away. I don't usually say things like “can't” because I believe you've always got options, but sometimes there are really pressing circumstances—like somebody's died or been fired. Sometimes in business you don't have a choice except do the shit you have to do to turn it around. That's fine. Whatever the reason, sometimes you're trapped by circumstances that you can't impact right away.

This is when it's especially important to fill up your soul in all the other areas. When I found myself stuck in that situation where I was only doing 10% creative work (until I could exit), we all knew why I wasn't doing well. Work is this giant chunk of my life and I wasn't doing the part of it that makes me happy. Florian empathized but he said, “Well, I can't do anything about that.” Yes, you can! Don't buy me flowers, man! Review my list!

Flowers won't fix a work problem, but coming home to a clean house instead of a messy one, not having to book the cleaner myself, knowing that Florian has organized a nice family experience for the weekend—that makes a difference. When I'm suffering in one area he can do stuff in other areas. If you get to the end of a weekend and your soul is really full, not depleted by doing more shit you don't want to do, you can face the office on Monday morning.

That's true whether you've got someone supporting you at home or whether you're filling up your soul all by yourself. So when you find yourself feeling stuck:

• Identify the problem.
• Ask yourself: Do I have an action plan? Is there hope or am I sitting in it until I can find a solution?
• Either way, revert to the list of what fills your soul and start doing more of it.

MENTAL WELLNESS

In 2015–2016 I was the president of my local chapter of Entrepreneurs Organization. During my year as president I'd managed to put good reserves of cash in the bank to benefit the year ahead. So we had this extra money and they asked me what I wanted to spend it on. I think they were like, “We've got 10 thousand extra dollars—do you want to have a bigger party?” That's basically what they expected me to do! (Fair enough—I do love a good party.)

But I didn't. At the party, at which I was the outgoing president, I made my thank you speech. I also said this:

According to Forbes, only 7% of the general population suffer from depression but a whopping 30% of founders report dealing with its effects.¹

Entrepreneurship is a deeply personal journey. It's incredibly difficult to separate your individual identity from your business, so business setbacks end up as personal setbacks. Depression can quickly take root.

We need to accept that setbacks will outnumber successes. Most days will be stressful. The game we chose to play, and the ability to embrace these realities, is what makes the people in this room so extraordinary.

Thank God for Forum. When you hit these moments you have your group to go to. But we're not experts in psychology. Entrepreneurs need to be able to reach out and get help when they need it, which is difficult in a world where we want to be “winning.” Asking for help is not a weakness and we need to change the mentality around this.

So I am so proud to announce that the board has unanimously agreed to a 10-thousand-dollar budget to provide these services to any one of us when this time arises.

So we had 10 thousand dollars to cover mental health services for any member who needed it and was willing to ask. Later that night after I made the speech, somebody came up to me in confidence and told me that he'd suffered from depression for a long time in the past. He said, “This would have been really helpful for me. I'll give you another two grand.”

Then somebody else came up to me and said basically the same thing. And somebody else. And here I was thinking I'd been talking to a bunch of boys who wouldn't care about my speech. It was nice to be wrong.

By the end of the night another announcement was made. Through donations made in the past two hours, we'd doubled the funds.

THE WEIGHT OF BEING AN ENTREPRENEUR

The fact of the matter is this: If you're driven, an entrepreneur, a type-A personality, or a hundred other things, mood swings are part of your genetic hardwiring. It's a blessing and a curse.²

—Tim Ferriss

In my generation, mental health is something that we've started to explore as we get a little bit older. When I was growing up it wasn't talked about as much as it is now; we threw pills at the problem as opposed to having conversations and research and support. I'm pretty sure the entrepreneurs of the future are going to be much better equipped than we are.

I think the mental health conversation is really important for entrepreneurs. We're natural risk-takers, and the risks don't always pay off. We're high achievers, which means we put ourselves under a lot of pressure to excel all the time. We thrive on winning, but quite often we lose. All of this means our mental state is a pressure cooker that could explode if we don't keep letting off steam.

And you don't win if you're not confident; you need to feel like a winner to win. I'm not one for putting on a brave face and faking it until you make it. So how do you maintain that state of confidence, when in general you lose more than you win in this game?

Accept that your business is always going to be a roller coaster. You're kidding yourself if you think you'll ever get to the point where you're winning all the time and you can relax. “After we launch this product” or “Once we get investors” or “When we're turning over this many dollars”… no. There will always be ups and downs. That's just the way it is. You're going to be on a roller coaster whatever you do, so you need to learn how to ride it.

If you tie your business (or your career) to your personal identity, you're going to feel the highs and lows deeply, and like I said there are usually more lows than highs. If you let them define you, you've lost. So for me it's about how to enjoy the roller coaster without letting it throw me around too much. I need to keep my personal state more stable.

Your business can't be your source of mental wellness. Your marriage can't be your source of mental wellness. Your children can't be your source of mental wellness. All of those things can be sources of contentment and energy and happiness at different times, but you need to know you'll be okay if you're not winning in any of those areas.

That doesn't mean you shut those relationships out and don't rely on them; it just means that you are responsible for your own stability. It's your job to reset yourself when you feel yourself getting off track. That's when you come back to assessing your blend and doing the things that fill up your soul.

As with all types of health, when it comes to mental health, prevention is better than a cure. The things I'm talking about, filling up your soul and staying on track, are preventative measures.

Saying that makes it sound easy. And women tend to be really good at just getting on with life and making it look easy. But it takes its toll. How do you communicate to people around you when you're struggling?

If you find yourself struggling to keep your head above water, ask for help. Most of us could benefit from professional support at one point in our lives or another. We outsource everything else—somebody to clean our house, train us at the gym, do our hair, deliver our groceries—why not get help with our mental wellness too?

As an entrepreneur or ambitious woman, your mind is your most important tool. Staying on track and filling up your own soul is your most important work; the quality of your personal state determines the quality of everything else you do. So make it a priority.

WARNING SIGNS

If this whole chapter is about self-awareness, there's one more thing to be aware of. I already said it's important to notice what it feels like when you're going well, so you can keep coming back to that state. It's also equally important to notice the things that tell you when you're not doing well, so that you can do something about it before things get too rough.

Everyone struggles sometimes and everyone reverts to bad habits when they're under pressure. We all fall on a shovel but it depends how deep you want to dig the hole. Once you're in it, everything else starts to fall in with it. Your marriage falls in the hole, your work, your relationships. Everything goes in that hole, so you really don't want to fall in. Be mindful of the things that do and don't work for you when you're on the edge.

When I've got a shovel in my hand, I have to limit alcohol. I know that it doesn't serve me very well when I'm feeling low. The way I interact with alcohol can be an indication of how well I'm going at the moment, so I keep an eye on it.

Another bad sign for me is isolation. If I go quiet, my best friend Kylie calls my husband. “What's happened at work? She's not returning my calls, she hasn't made plans for the weekend, something's going on.” That's not a good sign for me; I know that about myself and the people close to me know it.

When I'm not myself I don't accept speaking gigs. I think it's because I feel like I'm losing and I don't have the authority to go and tell people to be successful. That's another sign that I'm not doing well.

Be mindful of the things that you do when you're not yourself. A lot of women hear themselves get bitchier. Some people throw other people under buses. Some people take it out on their partners or kids. Some people have affairs. Some people can't be alone with themselves, always hosting people and filling up their home. Whatever it is for you, just notice the things that make you think, hmmm, maybe I'm not doing so well.

Then figure out the problem.

Share with the people closest to you.

Make a plan.

Go fill up your soul.

COACHING BREAK

When I talk about the category of Self, I'm thinking about spiritual, emotional, intellectual, and physical health—the things you carry inside yourself, that determine who you are, and impact whether you're thriving or struggling.

Emily has designed an exercise to help you thrive in each of those four areas. Take some time to identify what you need in each area, and that will help you to know how to fill up your soul.

Some areas will be more interesting or important to you. And you'll probably be doing better in some areas than others already.

So here we've included the exercises for your spiritual, emotional, and physical health. You can do all three right away, or start with the one that calls to you most. Use these as tools to come back to when you need to reset in one of these areas.

When you're ready to think about intellectual growth, head over to Chapter 9.