When you are bogged down in the day to day tasks involved with running your business, it can be easy to focus on frustrations and become overwhelmed. We have all had ups and downs in our businesses, but to keep pressing forward, it is important to express gratitude for the benefits and perks of being a business owner. Here are a few things to be thankful for:

1. First and foremost, you are in control of your business direction. You can choose what projects to pursue and work in the way that best suits you (and the way you want to). This means that you can make change happen: you don’t have to wait for red tape or for someone else to decide.
2. You get to choose who you work with. You can hire people with strengths that compliment yours and with personalities you know you can work alongside. It is far easier to achieve success with people you connect well with.
3. You can take time off whenever you choose. Yes, I know that there are deadlines, client requirements and other factors that affect your ability to do this! But essentially, you CAN take a day off, without having to justify it to anyone else.
4. Many of us can choose our workspaces and design them to best fit our creativity. And many of us can also move our workspaces around, thanks to technology. We can give ourselves a break from the desk and work at the beach or a café for the afternoon. This does wonders for boosting our creative juices.
5. As a small, local business, you have the opportunity to play a positive role in your local community. You know your clients and customers by name, you can get involved in local charity events and sponsor local sports teams. You get to show people the value of dealing with local business rather than a nameless corporate giant.

Generally, the most successful business owners are not those who have the greatest monetary success, but those who enjoy every step of the way. So find ways to be thankful every day.

Michelle Grice writes a weekly column for business women in The Western Weekender

This morning on my Facebook newsfeed, the following sponsored post appeared: “Would you keep working if you won $15 Million?”. For many people in the workforce, I think the answer to this would be a resounding ‘yes’. But is that true for you as a business owner?

Your answer to that question comes back to the reasons why you are a business owner. If your reasons are purely to earn money or ‘get rich’, then I would imagine you would most likely quit working if you won $15 million. But many business owners established their businesses for reasons besides just making money – and I wonder if many of them would answer ‘no’ and want to continue working.

Personally, I would keep working – although the capacity of that work and what work I undertake would be likely to change dramatically! Winning a large sum of money would provide me with an enormous scope of choices around how I spend my time and the enterprises I could establish.

But as I thought about this question more, I realised that it is a great evaluative tool. If answering this question brings to light the things that you would REALLY rather be doing, perhaps it is time to challenge yourself as to why you are not aiming for more of those things now. As we hear time and again, life is short. So you need to ask yourself: am I focusing on the things that are important? Or am I waiting for the big lottery win before I change my focus and priorities?

Michelle Grice writes a weekly column for business women in The Western Weekender