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Many entrepreneurs live in a strange paradox: they have money, their business is growing, but life is absent. I was in this state for 11 years: I worked constantly, didn’t see the light of day, and at some point realized that I would simply fall apart if I continued at the same pace.
The balance between scaling a business and personal life begins with the entrepreneur’s own state.
Today, my team has over 250 people, branches in different countries, yet I have enough time for myself. My son is now eight months old, and because my office is at home, I can spend time with him both in the morning and at noon. This is fundamentally different from how my daughter grew up 17 years ago: I used to leave for work early in the morning and return late at night. The journey from that total burnout to the current balance has nothing to do with classic time management. The causes and solutions lie much deeper.
The Point of No Return
About 11 years ago, I moved to New York to open an American branch. Simultaneously, we were launching an office in Taiwan and continuing to develop the network in the CIS. It was a period of colossal pressure: in addition to the usual business difficulties, there was a new cultural environment and a language barrier.
Although I had been interested in spiritual practices and self-development since I was 30, it was at 45 that I fell into a deep crisis. I felt I was starting to fall apart—both physically and mentally. Then I asked myself a simple question: “Why?” What’s the point of building a global company if you don’t see life at the same time? It was then that I formulated the truth for myself: my emotional, physical, and mental state is the main asset of my business.
The strategy, success of negotiations, and the future of the entire team directly depend on the resourceful state of the owner. If I am sluggish, we will not close deals, will not attract investors, and the company will end. I looked at myself through the eyes of an investor and realized that this asset needed to be invested in.
This philosophy is not just a personal choice but a standard for world-class leaders. For example, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos openly states that as a top executive, he is paid to make a small number of high-quality decisions.
Bezos adheres to the 8-hour sleep rule and dedicates his mornings to “puttering time”—breakfast with family and coffee—without scheduling important meetings before 10 am. His logic is simple: if you are tired and sleep-deprived, the quality of your decisions decreases. For Amazon’s scale, the cost of error is too high, so Bezos believes it’s better to make three excellent decisions a day than a hundred mediocre ones while exhausted. We agree with him: a leader’s state is a lever that either accelerates the system or breaks it.
Productive Time and Investing in Yourself
My transformation began with the English language. Many people ask how I reached the level that allows me to speak at international conferences. The secret is simple: I made time for it.
I determined that my most productive time for learning was in the morning, and I simply allocated an hour six times a week. My business and habits literally screamed against this decision, as the morning is the most valuable time for communicating with branches due to time zone differences. But I was convinced that this was an investment on which my entire future depended.
A Google Calendar and reminders that you would never give up for work tasks—that’s where freedom begins. Later, regular physical exercise and other recovery practices were added to English.
It is important to note here that I could only afford to focus on myself because my business was already generating income. At that time, I had 11 branches in the CIS, and they were built like a well-oiled machine.
This is not innate talent but the result of implementing a system. For a company not to hang on the owner in manual control mode, it must be structured correctly. Only when the business stopped demanding my constant presence could I go through the launch phase in a new culture much faster, without becoming a hamster on a wheel.
The Illusion of No Time
The most common excuse I hear is: “I don’t have time.” A deep realization of this phrase came to me only a few years ago.
“I don’t have time” is a primitive judgment. In reality, it means only one thing: “This is not important to me.” It’s not a question of time management, but of values. Who do you consider yourself to be—someone who has to serve the interests of others, or are you valuable in yourself?
From childhood, we are taught that spending time on our own pleasure is selfish. We are instilled with the idea that we must serve society, family, and the state. Such a mindset benefits the system because it needs obedient people. It took me many years to realize that life is given to us to experience pleasure. Not low-quality consumption, but deep enjoyment of the moment—the opportunity to sit on the ocean shore, listen to the sound of the waves, and revel in it.
Your state is the foundation on which your empire stands. Invest in it as seriously as you do in marketing or product. And remember that time will always be found for what truly holds value for you.