If you’re in business for yourself, you know the demands on you are very high these days. It’s as if your capacity to grow and succeed is under heavy pressure. Your mental bandwidth feels overloaded sometimes!

Technology is constantly changing.

Clients need more, more, more.

Entrepreneurial record-keeping can be complicated.

Goals have to constantly be set, revised and achieved, and, of course, all your skill sets need to be continually improved.

Then there are the other details like keeping your social media business pages humming along, your website, demos, or portfolio current and updated, new products created and blogs or books written. And all the while you need to keep cash flowing by doing the actual WORK you do to live and run an organized office.

Well, as daunting as it can be to be an entrepreneur, (which may leave you feeling sometimes like life is a rollercoaster), I want you to stop, right this minute, being so hard on yourself if not everything is perfect and on a continuous, upward trajectory.

Yes, there will be days, weeks or months when many things are going great!

Business is flowing in effortlessly and you’re able to confidently handle most anything that comes your way. You feel organized and efficient, learning comes easily and you feel in control. You’re riding the wave. On top of the mountain!

But guess what?

There will be other times when money is NOT flowing into your business – maybe you even experience a negative cash flow – you don’t feel successful, learning new technology or having to implement new systems is making you tear your hair out and your web designer or accountant just quit or you lose a great client.

Yep, you’re down in the pit… down in the valley and that mountain peak you were on just a little while ago seems like a million miles away.

Well one of the keys to handling it all is to be PREPARED for those peaks and valleys, realize they’re coming, and not get down on yourself as you move from one to the other.

The secret is to not get too amped up over those “highs” and not too deeply discouraged by those “lows,” but to look at your overall progress OVER TIME.

Then, cast an analytical eye over what’s happening so you can improve on what’s working and stop doing what’s not.

There’s always a cause and always an effect.

When you’re up on a peak, take a moment to look back and see how you got there.

Notice what’s working, listen to your verbiage – have you been speaking in very positive terms and using affirmations? – watch how you’re treating yourself and other people, be aware of your business and marketing practices and keep track of what you’ve done right to create this great experience.

Actively notice what you did to get up onto this peak.

Conversely, when you’re in a valley, take a moment to look back and see how you got THERE. (Even if it does feel a bit unpleasant!)

Notice what bad habits you may have fallen into, listen to your verbiage – have you let a lot of negative words come out of your mouth? – take note of your organization, marketing strategy and the time you’ve spent cultivating your creativity. (Yes, creativity is a habit!) Have you allowed some important things to fall by the wayside? Actively notice what you did to get into this valley.

Everything in your business (and in life!) is cyclical. There will be ups. There will be downs. Sometimes you’ll be moving forward, sometimes backward. You simply cannot be perfect all the time!

But remember this: As long as you’re consistently making an effort and moving forward over a period of time, even if it’s two steps forward and one step back, you’re doing fine.

Just keep an eye on your goals and keep taking focused action on your must-do list.

Try to always finish the projects that you start and even if something is taking WAY longer than you’d planned, keep coming back to where you left off and get going again.

But be prepared for both the positive side of business (the peaks) and the not-so-positive side (the valleys).

Know that they will both come and instead of getting discouraged, just take a look at how you’re evolving over time.

That’s what matters.