For those that don’t know, I’m Ted Lawlor, a wellness entrepreneur known as “the manifestation guy” as I found a toolkit of practical manifestation techniques that saved my life back in 2017. Now, I’m sharing these tools with the world. Here are my 3 tips to take care of your mental health.

1: Build a vivid vision

If you are an entrepreneur, it’s very unlikely that you don’t have some vision of what you want to achieve in the future, but just how vivid is that image?

For me, I’ve broken down my vision into a big picture dream and smaller, month-by-month positions that I want to be in. This is important because the big vision should provide you with the powerful emotion needed to give you the energy and willpower to continue with your mission in order to achieve that vision (e.g. changing the lives of your customers) and the smaller visions act as the carrot on the stick to keep you going and chasing those monthly visions.

The science behind why a vision is crucial for the mental health and energy of an entrepreneur comes down to the brain’s reward centre (the mesolimbic system) which actually gives you mental & physical energy as it wants you to achieve your goals.

2: Balance your energy

I get it. Being an entrepreneur can be extremely stressful, especially when you’re just starting off. This pressure can cause an increase in cortisol (the stress hormone) which can send your body into overdrive.

This can alter your nervous system and send you into fight mode (by activating your sympathetic nervous system) which can have a negative impact on your mind, body and therefore your decisions and work rate – ultimately leading you down a very steep spiral into trouble.

My top techniques to put an end to this spiral is by meditating, listening to calming music and my favourite method is breathwork. By using the breath with intention, you can regain control of your nervous system and bring you back to a state of calmness.

3: Leverage boundaries

Another practical technique is by introducing solid boundaries to your daily routine.

Block out your working time in chunks by setting a timer for 25 minutes and working until the timer ends, taking a short break of 5-10 minutes before going back to work again. After the fourth round, take a longer break for 15-30 minutes. This is a great way to ensure that you are working with intent throughout the day and stopping you from scanning your phone when you should be working.

Before working, I’d try to get myself into peak state in order to make sure that I’m making the most of my time at my desk or on stage. One way I do this is by using sense triggers, specifically, audio and smell triggers.

I use specific incense sticks to begin this peak state warmup, using familiar smells to remind my brain that it’s time to work. I’d then use some of my favourite songs to help to truly get my brain into this work zone, playing a similar set of songs in my peak state playlist every time.

Using these 3 tips, this should put you in a much better position to be able to regulate your thoughts & emotions, as well as allowing you to achieve more in your personal life and business.

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