Unlocking Daily Success: Micro Self-Care Strategies for Entrepreneurs

In entrepreneurial circles, we often talk about the concept of “being in our flow” and creating “ease and flow” within our business and lives. What we’re really talking about here is sustainable success—a state in which we’re aligned with our values, challenged but not overwhelmed, feeling grounded yet focused, in the right place at the right time headed towards our destination.

Sounds great, but how do we get there? Psychology and neuroscience continue to point in the same direction: micro practices for meaningful self-care help to create the conditions for a more sustainable flow. Self-care is actually the foundation of flow.

So if you’ve ever been guilty of setting your own self-care aside to take care of business (yours or others), listen up. The more self-care you incorporate into your days, the more you’re setting yourself up for a sustainable, everyday flow in your life and work. The more of this flow you cultivate, the more you naturally enhance your creativity, productivity, learning, problem-solving, resilience and intrinsic motivation. The more you do this, the more sustainable your success.

How do you know you’re in flow?

The concept of flow stems from the work of positive psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, whose early research identified an experience he compared to jazz or improv—an immersive, focused state where actions and thinking build effortlessly. We often think about flow in terms of peak performance experiences —that’s more of a macro flow experience. When you’re so into a creative project that you lose track of time, are connecting deeply with a partner, or generating so many great ideas or when synchronicities seem to be everywhere, these are

more of an everyday flow state.

It’s microflow, or everyday flow, that matters most when it comes to creating true sustainability in our business, our work-life balance, and our overall well-being. While we’re always learning more about how we trigger and experience flow, you might recognize it when:

● your actions feel automatic and effortless

● your inner critic falls away

● you’re in the moment and intently focused

● you feel in control

● you know what you’re doing, what you’re doing next, and what’s working

● you’re tapped into your own motivators and rewards

● you’re feeling just challenged enough (but not too challenged)

But just as there are conditions for creating and experiencing more flow, there are also specific conditions that tend to keep it at bay. Not surprisingly, these can often be addressed by healthy self-care. Conditions that keep you from flowing:

● overwhelm

● exhaustion

● boredom

● sleep issues

● lack of clarity

● values misalignment

● distractions

● unclear priorities

● anxiety around outcomes

Meaningful self-care prevents or diminishes these conditions and enhances and protects your flow.

In my book, Nourish, I explored how we can create a naturally balanced and individually meaningful practice of self-care through micro actions and the four quadrants of mind, body, spirit, and environment. Ideally, our self-care practices are multi-layered, meaning that there’s a balance between the things that we practice daily and throughout the day and larger macro actions that we take every week, month, quarter, or year (for example: check-ins, aligning with a vision, retreats, vacations, values-based business planning).

Self-care is not a luxury, but the foundation of flow and success.

Developing your power practices for self-care can be an incredibly effective path to experiencing more flow in your daily life. As more research continues to unfold around flow, the evidence keeps directing us back into meaningful self-care and nourishment practices. By focusing there, you’re essentially nourishing your body-brain at the same time that you’re training yourself to better train and access your own rhythms.

What does this look like in practice? That’s up to you. While the neurochemistry is the same, our specific flow triggers and experiences are individual. Developing and evolving routines and schedules that work for you is key. Here’s what research shows can help:

Foundations

• Dial in your sleep habits. Neurobiology is continually uncovering the importance of sleep for a healthy brain and nervous system, and you need that for everyday flow.
  

• Develop mindfulness practices that work for you. If you’re not a meditator, that’s fine. Consider breathwork, focusing exercises, being mindful of your daily activities, mindful eating, or mindful walking.
  

• Take some form of regular exercise, daily if possible.
  

• Cultivate gratitude and positive emotions such as awe.
  

• Incorporate physical recovery activities such as gentle walking, stretching, baths, sauna, massage.
  

• Spend time in the outdoors, breathing fresh air.
  

• Connect with your favorite people on a regular basis. Social connection has a wealth of psychological and neurobiological benefits.

At work

• Create an ideal workspace that is free of distractions for a few hours of your workday
  

• Take regular breaks, especially when working on a challenge
  

• Cross-train your brain by reading, listening, and talking with others in areas outside your field
  

• Set clear objectives for your workday, with a to-do list that’s tied to your big goals and limited to what you can actually do in a day
  

• Ensure that what’s on your daily list is just challenging enough, but not overtaxing or anxiety-producing
  

• Tie your business vision to your values, and check in regularly

Creating your power practices plan

Whether your preferred style of business is a hard-charging hustle or an easeful unfolding (or, like many of us, somewhere in between), creating an accessible flow is the key to your most sustainable success. It starts by understanding what flow looks and feels like in your life and paving the way so that it becomes easier for you to create the conditions for it to arise more often.

It’s important to note that the aim isn’t to be living in a flow state all the time. That’s not realistic and it’s not desirable. We need the challenges and even frustrations for the flow to happen and we need the recovery time to replenish our brains and nervous systems for next time. Everything in life has a cycle, and this is no exception, so welcome it all.

A simple way to create your power practices plan is to:

1. Audit your energy and self-care. Notice what’s enhancing your experiences of flow and what’s in the way. Adjust accordingly.

2. Once you’ve spent some time paying attention, you can develop a system for yourself. Think about what you’d like to incorporate, and identify what you’d like to do daily, weekly, and a few times a year to more fully embed that into your life.

3. Review and adjust quarterly or a few times per year.

For more ideas and templates and 1:1 support for auditing your self-care and creating a power practices plan, visit wholelifestrategies.com.

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TLDR: Discover the power of micro self-care practices in fostering everyday flow and sustainable success for busy female leaders. Learn how simple, daily actions in mindfulness, sleep, and self-nourishment can enhance creativity, productivity, and well-being, leading to a balanced and fulfilling entrepreneurial journey.

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Sally Anne Carroll, PCC, is founder of Whole Life Strategies Coaching and a life and career coach for high-achieving leaders, entrepreneurs and professionals who crave sustainable success, true work-life integration and meaningful personal and professional growth — while they do their impactful work. Through highly custom personal coaching, she provides evidence-based tools, resources and deep support for leaders to thrive in their work, life and well-being with confidence, clarity and purpose. She is the author of Reinvent Your Reality and Nourish. Connect with Sally at wholelifestrategies.com