Unpopular Opinion: Every Day of Your Entrepreneurial Life Should Be a Vacation

It was my birthday the other day, so naturally, I attended a friend’s kid’s birthday party that happened to fall on the same day. Some adults might not choose to spend their birthday watching three-year-olds (to whom they have no relation) fight over cake and rainbow lollipops, but I’ve since taken a different stance towards birthday parties (and birthdays) in general. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve done some cool things on my birthday, from swimming with dolphins to parasailing 800 feet above the Pacific Ocean. In fact, barring a change of plans, next week my fiancé and I should be 372 feet up in the air paragliding over the cliffs of Torrey Pines for my delayed celebration. However, I’m well aware that paragliding won’t likely top my typical weekend, and it surely won’t be the best day of my life. For those who came here looking for business advice, bear with me — it’s all very relevant. Years ago, <a href="https://index.medium.com/how-to-get-and-leave-a-6-figure-job-in-your-early-20s-from-an-ex-wall-street-banker-turned-ceo-c72e6f62f3ea" rel="noopener">sometime between leaving finance</a> and <a href="https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/the-formula-that-got-my-business-a-200x-roi-in-our-first-90-days-2b0d12fa5f91" rel="noopener" target="_blank">hitting my entrepreneurial stride</a>, I began to make some critical changes to my (and my fiancé's) life. Mind you, these changes happened before I’d made my first million (or even half a million) in business. They happened before I’d <a href="https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/my-startup-got-risky-so-i-bought-a-million-dollar-house-at-the-top-of-the-bubble-62f5df86a7cc" rel="noopener" target="_blank">acquired my first piece of property</a> and before I had any real tangible and lasting evidence of entrepreneurial success. In fact, I made these changes for that very reason: I didn’t want to put our lives and happiness on hold until my startup(s) reached that mythical inflection point of “success”. <a href="https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/unpopular-opinion-every-day-of-your-entrepreneurial-life-should-be-a-vacation-5b3484ec3fb2">Website</a>