The Three Decisions That Saved My Sanity (And Probably My Business)

I didn't know I was the problem until I wasn't anymore.

For years, I operated under the idea that being a good leader meant being involved in everything. Every email that went out. Every meeting agenda. Every decision, big or small. I told myself it was about maintaining standards, but really? I just couldn't let go.

The breaking point came on a Tuesday afternoon when I found myself in my fourth meeting of the day about font choices for a slide deck. I remember sitting there thinking, "This is what leadership looks like?" Meanwhile, we had a district partnership hanging in the balance, a product roadmap that needed my attention, and a team member who'd been waiting three days for me to review their work.

I was busy. God, I was busy. But I wasn't doing anything that actually mattered.

The First Shift: Picking Three Things

I started asking myself one question before touching anything: "Does this grow the business?"

Not "Is this important?" Not "Should someone handle this?" Just: does this specifically move us forward?

Most days, the answer was no to about 80% of what crossed my desk.

So I started each week by identifying three things that would actually make a difference. Not three categories. Not three areas of focus. Three specific outcomes I needed to create or decisions I needed to make.

Some weeks it was: close the partnership with that Colorado district, finalize Q2 hiring, and fix the pricing model that wasn't working. At other times, it was smaller but just as critical.

Everything else? I either delegated it, delayed it, or just stopped doing it entirely to see what would happen.

Here's what happened: nothing broke.

The emails still got sent. The meetings still ran. The work got done. And I finally had bandwidth for the conversations and decisions that only I could make.

It felt lazy at first. Like I was slacking. I'd spent years believing that a good founder was in the weeds, knew every detail, had a hand in everything. Stepping back felt like abandoning ship.

But that's where I had it backwards. Being in everything wasn't leadership. It was just me being too scared to trust the people I'd hired.

The Second Shift: Learning to Say No

For the longest time, I blamed burnout on not having enough help. I kept thinking if I could just hire one more person, add one more team member, I'd finally have the support I needed.

That wasn't the issue.

The issue was that I didn't have boundaries. I said yes to every request, every "got a minute?", every "can you just take a quick look at this?" My calendar was a free-for-all, and I was the one holding the door open.

Hiring more people doesn't solve a boundary problem. It just gives you more people to say yes to.

The shift came when I started treating my time like the finite resource it actually is. I blocked off mornings for deep work. I stopped answering Slack messages in real-time. I started saying, "The team has this," and then actually letting them have it.

Did it feel uncomfortable? Absolutely. There were moments when I wanted to jump in, course-correct, "just help out real quick." But I didn't. And you know what? The team figured it out. Sometimes they did it differently from the way I would have. Sometimes they did it better.

The work I'd been shoving to evenings and weekends—the strategic thinking, the relationship building with district leaders, the long-term planning—suddenly had a home during actual business hours.

Protecting my energy wasn't selfish. It was the most important thing I could do for the business.

The Third Shift: Getting Out of My Own Way

The meeting agenda thing was my tell. I insisted on reviewing every single one before it went out. Told myself it was about quality control, about making sure we looked professional, about staying in the loop.

Really? I just couldn't let go of the illusion of control.

One Monday, I decided to try something radical: I just didn't review them. Didn't ask to see them. Didn't follow up. Let the team send them out and run their meetings without my stamp of approval.

I braced for disaster. Surely something would go wrong. Surely there'd be a miscommunication, a missed detail, or something that would prove I needed to be involved.

Nothing happened. Meetings ran. Decisions got made. Work moved forward.

And I got four hours back that week. Four hours I'd been spending on something that added zero value but made me feel important.

That's when it clicked: I wasn't the bottleneck because I was too busy. I was the bottleneck because I was choosing to be one.

What Actually Changed

These weren't grand transformations. There was no dramatic moment of clarity. Just three small decisions that compounded over time:

Stop touching things that don't grow the business. Protect your calendar like your business depends on it—because it does. Trust the team you hired to do the job you hired them for.

Did I get it right every time? No. There were weeks I slipped back into old patterns, weeks where I convinced myself "just this once" I needed to be involved in everything.

But the difference now is I can see it happening. I can catch myself mid-spiral and ask: Is this actually my job, or am I just uncomfortable with not being needed?

Most of the time, it's the latter.

The Real Work of Leadership

Here's what nobody tells you about moving from founder to leader: the hard part isn't learning what to do. It's learning what to stop doing.

It's walking past problems you could solve but shouldn't. It's watching your team struggle with something you could fix in five minutes, but knowing they need to figure it out themselves. It's being okay with "good enough" when you've spent years chasing perfect.

The work that actually matters—building partnerships with districts, creating systems that scale, developing a team that can run without you—doesn't happen in the margins. It requires space. Focus. Energy you don't have when you're spending it on font sizes and meeting agendas.

So if you're feeling like you're running at full speed but standing still, ask yourself: What am I doing today that I could stop doing tomorrow? What decisions am I making that someone else could make just as well, or better?

And then do the hardest thing: actually stop. Actually, step back. Actually, trust the people around you to handle it.

Your sanity will thank you. Your business will too.