77% of founders say that running a business has had a negative impact on their mental health. We work with a lot of startups and understand that running them can be all-consuming and come with a whole range of complicated emotions. As a founder, you need to prioritise taking care of your mental health. For the sake of you, and your business. We wanted to take the opportunity to talk about the importance of managing your mental health as a founder and the steps you can take to ease the stresses of growing your startup.

Leverage your team

As a founder, it can be easy to try and do everything yourself. The business is your baby after all. But the desire to take on all the work, isn’t sustainable, and it certainly isn’t doing your mental health any good. Whether you’re a team of 2 or 10, leveraging your people and sharing the workload will give you some much needed breathing room.

If you’re still early stage and don’t yet have anyone working alongside you, consider outsourcing where you can – anything you can do to ease the pressure on yourself will make you feel a whole lot better, and mean you’re able to work much more efficiently.

Find external support

If you’ve not yet got a team to lean on, or anyone in your immediate circle who understands what you’re going through, finding someone to share your struggles and stresses with can be super beneficial. There are plenty of founder support groups out there that bring groups of founders together and provide the opportunity to talk through anything you might need help or advice on. A problem shared is a problem halved after all.

You can search for relevant groups through websites like FoundersHub and Foundrs which offer memberships to peer communities. If you’re in the South West, drop our CEO Alan a message about Executive Foundation, a peer group for Business Leaders he’s part of.

If you don’t want to commit to joining a peer group, you can search sites like Meetup, where you can find and attend events to network with other like-minded founders. It may be a less structured form of support, but building out your network and connecting with other founders will give you valuable contacts to reach out to for help and advice – whenever you need it.

Master the art of deep rest

To maintain optimum levels of productivity, you need to be balancing work and rest (easier said than done, we know). Non-sleep deep rest is the ultimate kind of rest – when your body relaxes but your mind is awake. This doesn’t mean laying on the sofa watching Netflix. You need to dedicate time in your day (block it out in your calendar if you have to) to do something that slows down your brain frequency, putting you in a state of deep relaxation. This is different for everyone, so you need to find what works for you. Some forms of deep rest include yoga, long walks, painting, or exercising in the gym – so find what works for you and stick to it. Being a startup founder can be exhausting, so adding something else to your diary might not seem appealing – but trust us, dedicating time to yourself is massively important for maintaining your mental wellbeing and will only have a positive impact on your work.

Slow down and unplug

If you want to take deep rest and relaxation to the next level, dedicating a few days to do a digital detox can work wonders for your mental state, leaving you with sharper focus and productivity, improved sleep quality and reduction of stress and anxiety. There are several purpose-made digital detox retreats out there – one of which is called Unplugged and was founded by two people who worked together at a tech startup and were feeling burnt out. Unplugged offer cabins within 1-2 hours outside of London where you can go and stay amongst nature with no distractions. They provide a lock box for your phone and provide you with a replacement Nokia and instant camera instead. Breaks like these where you can escape the digital cloud for a few days and truly slow down can work wonders for your mental and physical wellbeing.

Look after your team

If you have a team, it’s only natural that you’ll be concerned about supporting their mental health. This might feel like a big responsibility, but don’t let it get the better of you. As a founder, it’s no good implementing strategies to boost mental health in your employees if those changes don’t start with you. We’ve put together a blog which might help when it comes to prioritising mental wellbeing in your startup.