One thing you should never do as an entrepreneur is give up the love of travel. Burning the midnight oil and setting ambitious goals for your business are all well and good, but the ability to break away and travel to new destinations will help reignite your spark.
Re-booting the soul
Travelling is always good for the soul, and in doing so breaking away from the 9-5 grind, you'll be taking yourself out of your comfort limits. Taking on new experiences, such as windsurfing, paragliding, or just appreciating art galleries in a foreign city, will nurture the soul and reboot the ideas department in your head. Coming back refreshed and ready to take on challenges in a creative way.
Becoming more assertive and confident
If you allow yourself to be in a straight-jacket of options when you travel, then you'll only see what the tour agents want you to.
Taking yourself off the beaten track and forcing yourself to become resilient to change, tackling language barriers, transportation difficulties and other life issues, you'll be re-emerging as resilient, more adaptable to change and ready to tackle business aspects head on.
Discover new angles on life
Being parachuted into a completely foreign way of life should force you to take stock of your own and see new angles on your business that you may not have considered before. Analysing outmoded beliefs will enable to grasp new technologies and working practices quicker, and more flexible within the business environment.
You may also consider that adapting to a foreign land is a risk, so why not consider taking risks in business that you may have dismissed when your confidence wasn't as high.
Time management improves
Travelling against the clock always focuses the mind. This in itself should be seized on during your business 'time' and stick to it. Just as you would stay on a budget in business, so you would when going for a break. The two aspects of time and budget management are intertwined and if managed appropriately makes you the ultimate winner.
Become a leader
A vacation, especially backpacking, is all about making key decisions and ensuring that time is well-spent and not wasted. So observing these traits and adopting these in real time, will make you a leader in business and an inspiration to be around. Rather than trying to keep your head above water, swim and lead on.
Touching your creative
Spending time in any country - from Africa to Alaska - you will discover new cultures, new skills and appreciate more about you. In your home life, you have structures and inbuilt routines to hang onto. Stepping off a plane into a completely different location allows you to think creatively, and problem solve as you go. Thinking outside the box will become natural to you when seeking creativity in the business sphere.
Be calmer
Taking a break from business is probably one of the most fraught options to consider. Fear of losing control, that the business won't be able to perform while you are not there, or that it will leave you in ruin, will all run through your mind.
But seeing the world is a bigger place than your business, and the 9-5 rat run is not the be all and end all of life, may well help you to de-stress in the long run. So, while you're away, set yourself the challenge of not accessing the Internet every five minutes to check if the business is still in existence.
Andy Probert left the British rat race after a 25 year journalist and PR specialist to live in Turkey and now Cyprus, a compulsive traveller his favourite places include Vietnam and India among many. Among the travel Andy continues to write freelance and still maintains PR client base.
