How to Love Yourself More to Boost Your Business | By Ruby McGuire

Loving yourself can boost your business. Whaaaat?! If someone had told me that a few years ago I'd have said, 'Whatever'!

But as I did the inner work in my business, I learned that you need to practice self-care. How can we be of service to others when we're unkind to ourselves? Self-care is much more than just a bubble bath and early night. It includes how we talk to ourselves, letting go of disappointment and much more!

Below I share some helpful ideas to get you thinking.

Here are 7 ways to love yourself more in your business:

1. Create strong boundaries

If you want to survive in this wonderful world of business (especially when you're in a service-based business) you absolutely have to take care of yourself or you risk hitting burnout.

Yes, of course we want to have a business and not a hobby, but at what personal cost?

So you need to set clear boundaries and make time to look after you; this way you have the energy to help others.

TIP: One thing that's really worked for me is knowing when to take a step back from social media. This might seem weird coming from someone who has visibility as one of the core pillars of her message. But it's so important to take time for you. It's all too easy to get sucked into the, "Everybody is better than me" cycle, and this can really damage how we see ourselves.

I went through a stage of hating social media. I got so visible that I got exhausted and wanted to just hide away. I had to take a step back and define a new way of making my message visible. I now have much clearer boundaries in place, and I make social media work for me, rather than social media making me work.

Action: What boundaries do you need to put in place, so that you become a priority?

2. Acknowledge the disappointment and move on

Being in business can be disappointing. There. I've mentioned the big elephant in the room!

All that hope and possibility when you first trained as a coach, only to find that learning to coach was just the tip of the iceberg. Now you have to learn how to run a business and market your services. There can be a whole host of disappointment.

It's okay to be disappointed. Acknowledge it, but don't wallow in it. Take the attitude that every problem has a solution, and get creative about how you can move things forward.

I'm a great believer that everything happens for a reason. When I look back on things that haven't gone the way I'd planned, I can see that things always worked out how they were meant to. And I also recognise the path that I'd been pushing for would actually have been wrong for me.

Think about how you'd treat a friend whose business/launch/marketing (fill in the blank) wasn't going as well as they'd hoped. You'd remind them of their strengths, empower them to keep following their dreams, give them a big hug and tell them you're there for them. And that's what you can do for you. Deprecating yourself for lack of progress or something not being successful isn't going to help you move forward.

Action: (This one's a biggie!) Love yourself through the disappointment. Be gentle with yourself. Say some kind and loving things about what you've achieved, and then pull together a plan to get out of that rut you got into.

3. Don't be afraid of your own shadow

In this instance, I'm not talking about the shadow cast by light. I'm talking about those aspects of your personality that you might call your 'dark side'. To find out more on this, check out the amazing book by Debbie Ford, Dark Side of the Light Chasers.

Every part of your personality has a dark and light side. When you start to own (and not be afraid of) your 'dark side', you'll find you show up much more authentically. And you can start to love yourself as a whole person.

Maybe you're fearful about your business. Love the part of you that feels fear, and then do whatever it is that scares you anyway. Face that fear head on.

How does this boost your business? People love people that are real, that's how they connect with you. Instead of hiding yourself away, own and love all of you. That's magnetic to people.

Action: Explore all areas of your personality and start to love yourself as a whole person. You're amazing, who knew?! We all do. You just need to convince yourself!

4. Trust your intuition

When you start to love yourself more, you start to trust your intuition. You stop worrying about what everyone else is doing, knowing you're on your own path. Trust your deep inner knowing that you've got this, and trust the right path will be shown to you.

You love yourself enough not to be part of the 'race' and 'hustle'. You take your business journey in its own sweet time, moving one step forward at a time.

The universe has a plan for you. It can be easy so you don't need to be so hard on yourself. Love yourself enough to create a business and life that feels easy.

Action: Instead of just dreaming about a perfect day in your business in terms of what you 'should' be doing, make it a reality by carving out time to get super clear on what you truly want. Then trust your intuition to guide you.

5. Take the time to create solid foundations

When you love yourself enough, you take the time to build a solid foundation for your business. You know that working in this way will set you up for success.

'Cobbling something together' will always grate at the back of your mind. Taking time to deliberately build a core foundation first gives a sign to you; a sign that you love yourself enough to take your time and make the quality decisions that will grow your business.

Success comes when you are consistent, steady and deliberate with the actions you take.

Action: Pull together an outline of what a solid foundation might be for your business. Maybe it's getting your website finalised, maybe it's creating a content plan for your marketing, maybe it's pulling together those terms and conditions that you never quite finished.

Editor's Note: You may also like this cute graphic, "Your speed doesn't matter, forward is forward!"

6. Tap into a better thought

When you run your own business, on some levels you have freedom. Freedom from bureaucracy, freedom from people's management of your time, freedom from systems and procedures that don't excite you, freedom to create whatever you want and market it. Exciting!

But when you don't love yourself enough, you think differently. Your thoughts are negative about the progress you're making, you start to feel (although perhaps unspoken at this stage) that your business is a noose around your neck.

So, if you find you tell yourself stories where the subtext is that you're not good enough then that needs to change. Right now!

Act as if you're good enough now. Good enough at coaching. Good enough at marketing. Good enough at writing etc.

Choose different thoughts. You have free will, and in every moment you have a choice. You can choose not to love yourself and spiral into negativity (those "I'm going to give up and get a proper job" moments) or you can choose to tap into a better thought. Some better thoughts include:

• Who do I know that has done this before successfully?
• Who could I ask for help?
• What would be a better perspective for this problem?

Help is available to you. You just have to love yourself enough to ask for it and be open to receiving it.

Action: You've got the tools for this one, so go do the work on believing you're enough and then explore getting the help that you need. Clear that good old monkey mindset block of "I'm not good enough" now and know that you're amazing just as you are!

7. Stop overthinking things

When you love yourself enough, you stop overthinking things. Answers in your business can be easy, if you allow them to be.

You don't need permission.
You don't need validation.

Action: As one of my good friends said to me once, "Being in business is all one big experiment. Don't overthink things, just play."

Wrap-up

So, there you have it, 7 ways to love yourself and boost your business. Here's a quick recap:

1. Create strong boundaries
2.  Acknowledge the disappointment and move on
3. Don't be afraid of your own shadow
4. Trust your intuition
5. Take the time to create solid foundations
6. Tap into a better thought
7. Stop overthinking things

Which one of the 7 tips will you start with? Tell us in the comments below!

You May Also Like:

• 3 Ideas to Supercharge the Success of Your Business also by Ruby
• 10 Key Qualities You Need to BE - to HAVE a Successful Coaching Business
• 4 Self-Love & Compassion Practices for You and Your Clients by Lynda Monk

Contributing Author:

Ruby McGuire is a Business & Mindset Queen. She's an Accredited Master Coach & Master Mentor with the IAPC&M, Trainer, Inspirational Speaker and Author of multiple books. She loves helping her clients step up and become leaders (aka Queens) of their businesses. She helps her clients develop their leadership and business skills, create a success mindset and attract dreamy clients. She is a Brit on a mission to live a simpler life without marketing on social media so that she can spend more time in her beautiful Scottish surroundings. You can find her at her pretty online home, over on her podcast show, Rock Your Fabulous Biz, and here where she shares her Mini Guide to Marketing Without Social Media. When she’s not working you’ll find her surrounded by books, making hand-made cards, and enjoying life with her hubby, little dog and chickens (usually with a Whittard Vanilla cappuccino in her hand)!

Learn more about Ruby & see all their articles here >>