When you are running a VA business, often you’re going to find that you are pulled in one of two directions. Either you’re going to find yourself thinking about taking off more time than you probably should or you are going to find yourself thinking about work into the wee hours of the morning wondering what it is that you forgot to add to your to do list. During the holiday season, one of the things that you are going to discover is that the pull in each direction seems to get a little bit stronger.

So what are you going to do about it?

When you’re running a VA business, you’re going to want to be sure that you’ve gone beyond time management 101 and have mastered fitting everything that needs to be done into your schedule (including leaving some “extra” time for those things that will invariably come up. Similarly, you’re going to want to make sure that, when you are running a VA business, you’re willing to schedule some time off for yourself – especially during the holidays when you’ll have time to spend recharging with family and friends.

Running a VA business, of course, is something that you can control – at least to some extent. By making sure that you focus on taking the time that you need for yourself (at least every once in a while) you’re going to find that you’re in a great position to love running a VA business.

When you are running a VA business, one of the things that you are likely to find is that, from time to time, some of your friends are going to be looking for services like the ones that you have to offer. The challenge, of course, is that while you are going to want to help them out and while you’re going to know that there are suggestions that you could make that would get them through their rough patches, it doesn’t benefit your business.

That’s going to leave you with three options:

1. You can focus on running a VA business and only offer your services if your friend is willing to pay a reasonable rate for them.
2. You can open the door and say that you’re willing to help get them started and to point them in the direction of things that will help them without making a significant time and energy commitment to helping them out.
3. You can make the choice to just help out your friends because, hey, they’re your friends.

When you’re running a VA business, you’re going to find that it’s a good idea to separate your working relationships and your personal relationships. While you may want to help, be sure that you are not taking on so much that your clients are feeling neglected or you are unable to meet the obligations that you have to your business.