Don't Forget To Have Fun

There’s a funny thing that happens when you turn something you love into a business: at some point, you can get so busy running the business that you forget why you wanted to do it in the first place.

Suddenly, the thing that once sparked your creativity becomes a never-ending parade of to-do lists, deadlines, decisions, emails, invoices, and approximately 47 things you meant to do yesterday. Add motherhood to the mix, and now you’re also keeping a tiny human alive, negotiating with someone who thinks pants are a personal attack, and attempting to maintain some semblance of a personality outside of your responsibilities.

Fun, right?

Lately, I’ve been reminded just how easy it is to lose the fun in the very thing you built because you wanted to do it.

Between expanding my business, preparing for the holidays, working long hours, and being a mom to a two-year-old, life has felt like one giant game of logistical Tetris. Every hour has a purpose. Every task has a deadline. Every quiet moment is an opportunity to get something else done. And if you’re not careful, even the things you genuinely love start to feel like one more item on an already offensive to-do list.

Somewhere along the way, creativity can start to feel less like an outlet and more like another deliverable.

The business will always need something.

If you’re a business owner, you know there is always something else to do.

There’s always another idea to execute, another process to improve, another opportunity to chase, another problem to solve. You can have the most productive day of your life and still end it feeling like you barely made a dent. The finish line is apparently on wheels, and someone keeps moving it while you sleep.

And when you’re also a parent, the day doesn’t exactly end when the laptop closes. There are snacks to prepare, baths to negotiate, bedtime routines to survive, and approximately six hundred tiny tasks required to keep a household functioning. Then, once everyone is finally asleep, you get to decide whether to work a little more, spend time with your partner, catch up with a friend, or stare silently into the middle distance like a Victorian woman recovering from a mysterious illness.

The glamorous life of entrepreneurship.

I love what I do. I love building something of my own. I love the challenge, the independence, the growth, and the feeling of bringing an idea to life. But loving your work doesn’t mean every part of it is exciting. And being passionate about your business doesn’t magically make you immune to exhaustion.

Sometimes, you’re just tired. Sometimes, the creative well feels suspiciously empty. And sometimes, the thing you once couldn’t wait to work on becomes the thing you’re squeezing into the final 30 minutes of a day that has already taken everything out of you.

That doesn’t necessarily mean you’re doing something wrong. It might just mean you’ve been doing a lot.

A little creativity goes a long way.

Recently, as I’ve been expanding my business and preparing for the holiday season, I’ve found myself engaging with my creative side again.

And I’ve realized how much I’ve missed it.

Not necessarily because I haven’t been creative at all, but because there’s a difference between being creative because you have to be and being creative because you genuinely want to be.

There’s a difference between checking something off the list and getting completely absorbed in an idea. Between executing a plan and having the freedom to experiment. Between doing the work and actually playing with it a little.

That feeling of getting excited about an idea simply because it’s interesting? Of trying something new because you’re curious, not because you’ve calculated its return on investment? Of making something and thinking, Oh, this is fun?

I think we underestimate how much we need that.

Especially as business owners, we get very good at turning everything into a strategy. Every idea needs a purpose. Every decision needs to make sense. Every investment of time needs to justify itself. We become experts at optimizing, streamlining, scaling, and maximizing.

Which is all well and good. Nobody starts a business hoping to become exceptionally skilled at creating unnecessary chaos for themselves.

But not everything has to be optimized to death.

Sometimes, it’s okay to follow an idea because it excites you. To try something different because you want to see what happens. To make room for the parts of your work that remind you why you started in the first place.

Not every good thing has to immediately translate into growth, revenue, or a five-step plan for world domination.

Sometimes, the reward is that you enjoyed doing it.

Imagine that.

Motherhood has a way of putting things into perspective. And occasionally stealing your last brain cell.

Being a mom to a two-year-old has added an entirely new dimension to how I think about time, energy, and ambition.

Toddlers are wonderfully, infuriatingly present. They are not concerned with your quarterly goals, your inbox, or whether you’ve responded to that email you’ve been mentally drafting for three business days. They are concerned with the very important discovery that a cookie can, in fact, be broken into seventeen pieces and then rejected in its entirety.

They remind you that life is happening right now, whether or not your to-do list is finished.

And while I am absolutely still ambitious, still building, and still figuring out how to balance all the moving pieces, motherhood has made me more aware of how easy it is to spend all your time preparing for the next thing.

The next milestone. The next launch. The next season. The next stage of growth.

There's always something coming around the corner, and as a business owner, you're often thinking several steps ahead. You have to. Planning is part of the job.

But I don't want to become so consumed with building the life I want that I forget to actually enjoy the life I'm living.

I don't want every hour to be measured by how productive I was. I don't want every creative pursuit to become another obligation. And I certainly don't want to look back on these years and realize I spent all my time trying to get ahead while missing the little moments happening right in front of me.

The goal isn't to care less about my business or my family. It's to stop treating enjoyment like something I'll get around to once everything else is handled.

Because, spoiler alert: everything else is never handled.

Consider this your permission to enjoy your own damn life

As we head into the holidays, it feels particularly relevant to remember that we don't have to earn the right to have fun.

We don't have to finish every project, hit every goal, answer every email, or reach some mythical level of professional success before we're allowed to enjoy ourselves.

We can be ambitious and playful. Responsible and spontaneous. Focused on growth and still willing to take the scenic route every once in a while.

We can build businesses without allowing them to consume every available ounce of our energy. We can take our work seriously without taking ourselves so seriously that we've forgotten how to enjoy it.

And we can make space for creativity that isn't born out of necessity, but out of curiosity, excitement, and the simple pleasure of making something we're proud of.

For me, that might mean leaning into the creative side of my business, getting excited about holiday projects, or letting myself enjoy the process of building something new instead of focusing exclusively on the outcome.

It might also mean closing the laptop when I said I would, being present with my family, or acknowledging that a productive day doesn't have to be followed by an equally productive evening.

Radical stuff, I know.

I'm not suggesting we all abandon our responsibilities, light our planners on fire, and move to a cottage where the only deadline is when the bread comes out of the oven. Although, depending on the week, that does sound appealing.

I'm simply reminding myself that fun isn't a reward for finishing the work. It can be part of the work.

Enjoying what we do matters. Feeling inspired matters. Having interests, ideas, and experiences that exist outside of our obligations matters.

And perhaps most importantly, we don't need to wait until life slows down to make room for those things. Life may not slow down. The business will keep growing. The kids will keep growing. The seasons will keep changing. There will always be another opportunity, another responsibility, another reason to tell ourselves we'll make time for fun later.

Later is a very convenient place to put things we claim are important.

Don't forget why you started.

I started my business because I wanted to build something meaningful. Something that challenged me, allowed me to be creative, and gave me the opportunity to do work I cared about.

I don't want the day-to-day demands of running that business to completely overshadow those reasons.

Growth is exciting. Building something bigger is exciting. Reaching goals and watching hard work pay off is exciting. But so is the process. So is the experimentation. So is getting your hands dirty, trying something new, and remembering that you actually like doing this.

As I head into a busy holiday season and continue growing my business while navigating motherhood, I'm trying to hold on to that feeling.

To make room for the work that energizes me, not just the work that needs to get done. To let creativity be something I enjoy, not another box to check. To remember that success isn't just about how much I can accomplish, but also about whether I enjoy the life I'm working so hard to build.

Because I didn't start a business just to spend the rest of my life being busy.

And I don't want to become so good at managing everything that I forget how to have a good time.

So, consider this a friendly reminder to myself, and maybe to you, too:

Don't forget to have fun.

Make the thing. Try the idea. Get excited about the project. Do something a little differently just because you can. Enjoy the season you're in, even if it's chaotic and covered in toddler fingerprints.

Work hard. Build the business. Chase the goals. Do the responsible, grown-up things.

But leave a little room for the fun stuff, too.

Because if we're going to spend this much time working, building, planning, growing, and occasionally questioning every decision that led us here, we might as well enjoy some of it.

The to-do list will survive.

Probably.

And if it doesn't, well, that's a problem for tomorrow.