My thoughts on being a mum and an entrepreneur

I was a mum before I officially became an entrepreneur.

And I think that matters, because motherhood shaped the kind of entrepreneur I eventually became.

Being a mother is one of the greatest roles I believe a woman can be given.

You are entrusted with this little person who depends on you for almost everything.

You nurture them.

You teach them.

You protect them.

You help them grow.

And you cannot really do it part time.

You cannot postpone their childhood because work is busy.

You cannot pause their development until your business becomes more stable.

You cannot tell them to wait six months while you finish building something.

They are growing whether you are ready or not.

Motherhood is ongoing.

And from very early on, I knew that I did not want to trade that role for anything else.

I wanted to be there.

I wanted to watch my children grow.

I wanted to see the milestones.

I wanted to be present for the ordinary days too, not just the big moments.

I wanted to be available when they needed me.

At the same time, I understood the reality of the world we live in.

Most of us cannot simply stop working indefinitely.

Life costs money.

There are bills.

There is a household to run.

There is a future to build.

So eventually you have to answer a very practical question.

**How do I remain the kind of mother I want to be while still creating income and building a life for my family?**

For some women, the answer is returning to employment and arranging support around their children.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

For me personally, that was not the choice I wanted to make.

I wanted to find another way.

And entrepreneurship became that way.

## Entrepreneurship started as a solution

I did not initially go into entrepreneurship because I wanted to become some great businesswoman.

I was trying to solve a problem in my own life.

I wanted to stay home with my child.

I wanted to earn an income.

I wanted to do meaningful work.

I wanted to serve people.

And I wanted enough control over my time that motherhood did not have to become something I fitted around somebody else's schedule.

That was the beginning.

Of course, what sounded simple in theory became much more complicated once I was actually running businesses.

Entrepreneurship gives you flexibility.

But flexibility does not necessarily mean less work.

Sometimes it means you are doing everything at once.

You are a mum.

You are a founder.

You are thinking about staff.

You are thinking about money.

You are answering emails.

You are thinking about tomorrow's meeting while making dinner.

You are solving a business problem while somebody is calling you from another room.

There are seasons where both roles need almost everything from you at the same time.

And that is where I have had to learn something I was not naturally good at.

Grace.

## Sometimes the business has to wait

There are times when my businesses have suffered a little because I was being a mum.

I can say that openly now.

There have been tasks I could have completed sooner.

Decisions I could have made faster.

Projects I could have pushed forward.

Opportunities I may have moved on more aggressively.

But something at home needed me first.

And if I had to make the same decision again, I would.

I have had to become comfortable with the fact that sometimes the outcome I want in business may have to wait because one of my children needs my immediate attention.

That is the reality.

I often say I am raising two kinds of babies.

I have my actual children.

And then I have the businesses I am building.

Both require attention.

Both require patience.

Both go through stages.

Both sometimes keep you awake at night.

The difference is that one will always take priority.

My children only get one childhood.

I can rebuild a strategy.

I can push a project back.

I can change a launch date.

I cannot go back and relive their childhood with them.

That perspective has helped me enormously.

It does not remove the guilt completely.

I still sometimes feel guilty when I am working and think I should be spending more time with my children.

Then I can be spending time with my children and suddenly think about everything I should be doing in the business.

I think many mothers who work or build businesses understand that feeling.

You can feel like you are never giving either side enough.

I have had to learn not to measure myself against an impossible standard.

## Pregnancy changes everything

Then there are the seasons when you physically cannot operate at the level you normally would.

Pregnancy taught me that very quickly.

Towards the end of pregnancy, everything slows down.

Your body is doing something enormous.

Your energy changes.

Your ability to move changes.

Your priorities change.

And then the baby arrives.

I genuinely laugh about this now, but after having a baby, I feel like my brain shuts down for about six months.

I cannot explain it any other way.

I know the business exists.

I know there are things happening.

But my brain is somewhere else entirely.

My focus is the baby.

Feeding.

Sleeping.

Recovering.

Adjusting.

Learning this new little person.

Trying to remember what day it is.

Business Sharon is still somewhere in there, but she is definitely not operating at full capacity.

And over time, she comes back.

That has probably been one of the most interesting patterns for me.

After each period where I have stepped back because of motherhood, there comes a point where I feel myself returning.

My brain starts working differently again.

Ideas begin coming.

The energy starts returning.

I start seeing opportunities.

I want to create.

I want to build.

I want to solve things.

And when I come back into the business after that season, I often come back with enormous energy.

Sometimes I think those pauses have actually helped me.

They force me to stop.

They create distance.

They give me perspective.

And when I return, I can sometimes see things that I could not see when I was deep inside the business every day.

## There is something incredibly rewarding about doing both

One of the greatest feelings for me is looking at my life and realizing that I did not have to completely give up one part of myself to pursue another.

I am a mother.

And I am an entrepreneur.

I can be deeply committed to my children and still be ambitious.

I can want to be present at home and still want to build large companies.

I can love motherhood and still love business.

Those things do not have to cancel each other out.

There is something incredibly rewarding about seeing your children growing while also seeing something you once imagined becoming real.

You realize that you did not give up on motherhood.

And you did not give up on yourself either.

That makes my heart happy.

## Entrepreneurship will test you too

And then there is the other side of this.

Business itself is difficult.

When you start a company, you have no idea what is going to come at you.

Some of the curveballs are enormous.

There are moments that challenge the very core of who you are.

There have been times when I have not known how I was going to make the next payroll.

There have been times where the bills were coming faster than the money.

There have also been seasons where money seemed to flow and I was looking at the numbers wondering how we had suddenly reached that point.

That is business.

There are highs.

There are lows.

There are employees who are incredible.

There are employees who will test every leadership skill you have.

There are wonderful clients.

There are demanding clients.

There are days when everything appears to be working.

And then something happens that you could never have predicted.

Entrepreneurship changes you because you are constantly being asked to become someone capable of handling the next level of responsibility.

And when you combine that with motherhood, there are days when the load is very real.

I can tell you this.

Being a mother and an entrepreneur at the same time is not for the weak.

You need the heart for both.

## What has helped me keep going

There are a few things that I think have helped me navigate motherhood and entrepreneurship together.

The first is resilience.

I do not give up easily.

That does not mean I do not get tired.

I do.

It does not mean there are not moments where I think, "I have had enough."

There are.

But somewhere inside me, there has always been something that says:

**Keep going.**

If something does not work, I try another way.

If the plan fails, I make another one.

If I need to stop for a season, I stop.

And when I am ready, I get up again.

The second thing is remembering where I came from.

My history matters to me.

It reminds me why I work the way I do.

I know the life I came from.

I know the opportunities I have had.

And I know the kind of future I want to create.

Not only for myself.

For my children.

For the generations that come after me.

For the people I love.

And increasingly, for the communities connected to the businesses I build.

I want to create a life that gives back.

That purpose has carried me through many moments where motivation alone would not have been enough.

When business becomes difficult, I remind myself where I have been.

Then I look at where I still want to go.

And somewhere between those two places, I find enough strength to keep moving.

## I do not believe in perfect balance

People often talk about balance when they talk about motherhood and entrepreneurship.

I am not convinced that perfect balance exists.

At least, it has never looked that way for me.

Some weeks, the business gets more of me.

Some weeks, my family gets almost all of me.

Sometimes everything is moving beautifully.

Sometimes one part of life has to wait while I deal with the other.

I have stopped expecting every area of my life to receive equal attention every single day.

What matters more to me is knowing my priorities.

My children know that I am there.

My businesses continue to grow.

And I continue becoming better at recognizing what requires me right now and what can wait.

That has probably brought me more peace than chasing balance ever did.

## It is hard, but it is worth it

Motherhood has made me a better entrepreneur.

Entrepreneurship has also made me a stronger person.

Motherhood has taught me patience, responsibility, compassion and perspective.

Business has taught me resilience, courage, leadership and how to make decisions when there is no perfect answer.

Together, they have shaped almost every part of who I am today.

There are days when it is exhausting.

There are days when I wonder how I am managing all of it.

And there are days where I look around and realize that I am living something I once only hoped would be possible.

I am raising my children.

I am present.

I am building.

I am creating opportunities.

I am growing businesses.

And I am creating a future that I hope will give my children more choices than the generation before them had.

I do not do either role perfectly.

I do not think anybody does.

But I show up.

And when things become difficult, I remind myself of something I have told myself many times over the years.

We are not giving up.

Motherhood and entrepreneurship are a tough combination.

But for me, they are well and truly worth it.