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In a previous life, I was a fitness instructor and wellness coach. I worked really hard to stay in my best possible shape. Fortunately, there are many different muscle groups in the human body and I could exercise almost every day without over-taxing any particular group. Whether it was alternating upper body/lower body, cardio, small muscles… it was easy to have a great work-out without over-stressing any part of my body.

At the beginning of this year I wrote out what was to become my mantra… if you read many of my posts you probably have seen it: “Entrepreneurship is living a few years of your life like most people won’t, so that you can spend the rest of your life like most people can’t.

And then I put my nose to the grindstone. I wrote blog posts; I did research around my niche; I dusted off some training I had done last year and I signed up for more. Around my home life and my job, I seemed to always be at the computer.

Don’t get me wrong! I was loving it and I was focused and I could taste accomplishment! I was tired but I knew that was a temporary condition. My path, my strategy, my goals, became clearer and clearer as I continued to work.

Then one night I sat down at my laptop and I stared at the screen. Not one to try and push a dry mind, I sat down in front of the tv. My Home channel always has great reno and real estate shows so my evening passed.

The next night was the same thing. This time I fired up the mahjong game on my laptop and won most of my games!

This went on for several nights, and I was feeling a little frustrated with myself, but just could not bring myself to find a business topic to focus on.

Weekend came and went, I got some yard work done, caught up my indoor chores and Lo! Monday evening I opened up one of my class tutorials and I was back at it!

Now, when I was a fitness fanatic, every once in a while I would complete my cardio and then work a large muscle group to failure. Just because it felt good and it was only from time to time.

In retrospect, I realize my on-line workouts have been like my fitness workouts: they have been focused, they have been arduous… but I have been working out only one “muscle” day after day after day and finally it said “Enough!” It needed a rest from the workout, a few days off to rebuild and strengthen and refocus… and then I could go back at it.

Try to recognize the signs that your own brain is getting tired if you are creating or building an on-line business. It is a huge learning curve for some people and no one can run up hill forever! Change up your workout with games, or humour, or sleep, and then you can be up and running again on all cylinders!

A change is as good as a rest, my mother used to say. Keep that in mind as you make new and challenging demands on the only brain you have!