Okay, sorry about that.. a bit of an inside joke. Or, was it? How many times a day do you find yourself muttering those words to yourself.

I may be aging myself here but I think that sentiment is felt by everyone, at some point. As busy entrepreneurs, we need to “get away from it all” in order to rejuvenate our bodies and our minds.

Our days, as home-based business owners, are filled with task after task, project after project, both personal and business. And, if we don’t take a little time to take a breather, we can end up burning ourselves out.

How you choose to recharge your batteries is a personal choice. For myself, I make sure to take ‘family time’. When 6 o’clock (at latest) rolls around, my computer goes into sleep mode and my brain officially switches to “life” mode. I don’t know what it is but, just thought of relaxing (even if it is mixed with a few household chores) has a calming effect on me. It’s kind of like a winding down feeling.

There are many other ways to help you calm your nerves and take a break:

Get back to nature. Puttering around in your garden can make you feel very relaxed. Sure, pulling weeds and watering your plants may seem like hard work but rewards from your efforts have a calming effect. Watching your plants blossom and flourish is a wonderful site.

Curl up with a good book. After you have put kids to bed, find a quiet place and open up a favorite book or that book you have always wanted to read. Winding down this way may go a little far and you may fall asleep. But, if that does happen, who cares? And just imagine what it will do for you.

Well, I had one of those days recently… my computer was in shop for a minor repair. Ahhhhh! What was I going to do?

Ok, so I planned to take my computer in for repair. Then I would go shopping for my daughter’s birthday present and have lunch with my husband. But, that still left half a day. No problem. That was taken care of as my phone continued to ring even without my computer there. But, whole time I felt like something was missing.

Why are we so dependent on our computers? Why do our routines feel completely out of whack if we don’t have our trusty keyboard and mouse?

In today’s high tech society, a computer is a common site in most homes and nearly all businesses. Everyone and his brother has access to these electronic lifelines and most depend on them to help run their lives smoothly.

For any entrepreneur who relies on virtual work for business, when our computers are unavailable, we can be at a loss as to what we can do. So, following is just a few ideas of what we can do during time that you would normally be on your computer.

1.Get out of your office! And, if your office is in house, get out of house. Take advantage of time to separate yourself from your work. It may be hard to leave work behind but, for entrepreneurs who generally are dealing with all aspects of keeping a business running smoothly, a few hours away from office can help recharge batteries.

2.Run some errands. Not only will this help by getting you out of your office but you can get some of those odd jobs done that have been sitting on back burner.