When you started your business, I am willing to bet that there was one thing you wanted: Freedom.

Maybe that freedom means that you work your own hours and take as much vacation as you would like.

Or maybe it means making as much money as you want and being in control of your own destiny, rather than being a slave for someone else.

Despite the fact most business owners work for themselves to have more freedom and control over their life, I meet so many business owners who feel like slaves to their business. They work all the time, yet they feel like they don’t have the time or the money to go on vacation. Sounds familiar?

Growing up in Norway where the whole country literally checks out in the month of July to go on vacation, I’m one of those people who take going on vacation very seriously.

In fact, I feel wronged if I can’t go– and for many years that’s exactly what happened. I felt like a slave to my business. Although I was making good money, I couldn’t take time off to travel. Or at least, I thought I couldn’t and as a result I didn’t.

 Are you taking time off to travel regularly? A lot of research has shown that people who take vacations are more effective, creative and happy at work. A break can also do wonders for your body, mind and spirit.

In my own life, I’ve noticed that the more I travel, the more my business flows. I can work a lot less but end up making a lot more in the end.

When you follow the bliss of your soul, life has a way of working out. If your soul longs to travel, trust you are fully supported to do that and you can create a business where you get to travel as much as you’d like.

If you feel frustrated that you’re not able to take more time off right now, read these tips for how you can set yourself up to create more freedom in your business, so you can finally take a well-deserved break and go on an adventure without being strapped to your computer or smartphone the entire time.

You may even want to get the Success-soul™Living Starter Kit to tap into your vision and your soul’s cravings so you can step into living the life you are meant to live. You can get a copy here: free resources.

Plan: Unless you plan for your vacation it won’t happen, so start several months ahead to plan your trip and work schedule. If you plan ahead, you can make sure that everything that needs to gets done prior to you leaving will get done, and you will have a plan for how things will work when you’re away. When you plan, make sure you also plan for your revenue goals. What kind of revenue do you need to have to be able to go on this vacation?  Make sure you hold yourself accountable to your goals.

Use airline miles: Use a credit card that gives you airline miles for business and personal purchases. You can pay every bill for your business this way and accumulate a lot of miles. This will allow you to purchase your tickets with miles when it gets time to travel. (P.S. I don’t recommend doing this if you can’t pay off your bill at the end of the month and you end up paying what you would have saved in finance charges). You may also look into some special travel cards that give you as a small business owner special upgrades and perks at hotels and airlines, such as the Founder’s Card. If you travel a lot and you like to enjoy more luxury, check it out.

Hire help. You can’t do everything by yourself. Hire the help you need while you’re gone, even if that means hiring a student or an intern who will help you keep the fort while you’re away. If you don’t have regular support in your business, now’s the time to start thinking about getting more support. If you want to grow, you need to set yourself up for success. Having support will get you there much quicker.

Automate. There are many processes in your business that can be automated. When your business processes are automated, they runs when you’re away. Imagine making money while you’re lying on the beach! With the right systems and processes, this is absolutely possible! Start looking at your business to see where you are doing unnecessary work that could be automated. Put those systems and processes in place and you will save time and money. In the last few years I’ve put a lot of my business on automatic. It’s a beautiful thing and it’s allowed me to cut down on a lot of the work I do. With today’s technologies, there’s no limit to what you can do. You can set yourself up to get money in your sleep if you do this right. (This is a big topic so I can’t go into this in great details here, but I’ll create another blog post about it.)

Let go. I know it can be hard to let go, but sometimes it’s important to realize that things are okay when you’re away and although you believe you’re the only one who can do certain things in your business, you ‘ll be surprised to see how great someone else can be at doing that job, if you just let them. In order to grow your business, you need to be able to trust other people to do work for you. Let go of your worries and enjoy your time off. You deserve it! – And you’ll come back rested and ready to take on the world with new ideas and inspiration. – And if you set up some of your automated systems right, you may have had a trickle of passive income while you were playing at the beach 🙂

How often do you take your business on the road or take a vacation from your business? Feel free to leave a comment below.

Ready to take this to the next level? I invite you to apply for a complementary strategy session with me here.