Choosing Maintenance in a World Obsessed With Growth
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If you're someone who feels like maintenance is more aligned with you in a world of growth and expansion marketing, this might be for you.
I've been sitting with my 2026 word of the year, which is nourish. For me, nourish comes from a place of wanting to be super intentional. I want to be intentional with the why, the how, and the what decisions that I make in my business and in my life.
And one thing that has been a part of my life and my business for years at this point is this idea of maintaining rather than growing or expanding.
Maintaining has required me to get really honest with myself about what I actually want my days to look like.
Not just what looks impressive on paper. Not just what makes sense from a growth perspective. But what feels sustainable in real life.
For me, this comes back to my values. Transparency first, last, and always. Sustainability over urgency. Thoughtfulness over volume.
I do not want a business that looks good from the outside but feels heavy on the inside.
I want a business that supports my life, not one that slowly replaces it.
The History
It’s important to always give context, right?
This blog post would be entirely too long if I gave you my full story. But, for context, you should know that for about 5 years, I was grinding. I did what I had to do for as long as I had to. And then I made the shift.
For those 5 years, I:
Had two full time jobs
Owned a physical therapy clinic I was treating at and managing
Owned my online business, where I was doing work in the off hours and on weekends
Was an adjunct professor at my alma mater
If you’re doing math in your head, you may be saying “that’s a whole lot of work”. And you’d be right. When it was all said and done, I think I was working about 100-120 hours.
I did not skip the grind phase, surely. But here’s the thing: I truly believe that in those years, I still only had one vision in mind: life. What did I want my life to look like, not “how can I make this as massive as possible”.
And I will not glorify the grind phase, but I also will not bastardize it. It was what it was.
I hope that context helps a little bit here…
What I Mean by “Growing” and Not Focusing on “Growth”
I mentioned that I’m focused on maintaining, not on growing, or growth.
I do want to say, by growing, I do not mean, “let’s not read personal development books or business books”.
What I mean by growing is hiring or adding more client work hours or active work time to my schedule.
I have chosen intentionally to maintain instead of grow and expand.
And it is not because growth is bad or expansion is bad or wrong. Absolutely not.
It is because maintaining can be super intentional.
It can be values driven, and it can be deeply supportive of your best life or your ideal life, the life that you want to live.
…and so can growth, for some people. More on that later.
When Expansion Is Available, But Not Aligned
I am so grateful to be in a place where I could hire or I could expand. And I work with the best people regularly.
I could add more client work hours.
Anyone who is a physical therapist or a movement professional can probably agree that you have some sort of guilt inside at times because you understand that you absolutely cannot help everyone at the same time.
So anyone in that situation could make different decisions around growing, expanding, and having more work hours.
But just because something is available does not mean that it feels aligned.
This has been one of the hardest lessons for me to learn and also one of the most freeing.
Just because I can do something does not mean I should. Just because I am capable does not mean I am obligated.
There is a quiet pressure in business to keep saying yes.
Yes to more clients.
Yes to more hours.
Yes to more offers.
Yes to more growth.
But I have learned that discernment is a skill, too. Choosing what not to add is just as important as choosing what to build.
Maintaining gives me the space to stay present. With my clients. With my work. With my life outside of work. That presence is something I am not willing to trade.
One of the most powerful lessons I have learned is that “by saying yes to one thing, you’re saying no to something else” (I do wish I remember who I learned this from…) and whenever I am contemplating doing something new or adding something to my schedule, I always ask myself that question: “If I do this, what am I saying no to?” and then if I am happy with that “no”, then I will add it. If I have any sort of hesitation, I say no (because if it’s not a hell yes, it’s a hell no, in Dr. Shanté Cofield’s words.)
So here in my world and in my business, I choose to maintain.
And I know there are likely others who may be reading this and saying, yes, me too.
What Maintaining Actually Means
Maintaining does not mean settling. It does not mean stagnating.
It means knowing your “enough”, knowing your values, enjoying and loving your days, and living your best life. It means protecting your energy, your values, and the quality of your work.
For me, this also means protecting my integrity.
I do not want to operate from a place of urgency or extraction.
I do not want to sell from fear or scale at the cost of connection.
I want to be able to stand behind every decision I make and feel good about how I made it.
Maintaining allows me to teach instead of gatekeep. To build systems that work instead of chasing the next shiny thing. To stay competent and grounded in the work I do rather than stretched thin across too many priorities.
That kind of steadiness might not be flashy. But it is deeply meaningful to me.
If your business is working, your clients are well cared for, and you are living your best life…
It is okay to let that be enough.
Growth, Expansion, and Sustainability Can All Be True
Do not get me wrong. Growth and expansion are powerful and necessary. I love it so much for those who thrive in that environment.
Sustainability is also very powerful.
We do not talk enough about sustainability as a success metric in my opinion.
We talk about revenue.
We talk about team size.
We talk about expansion.
But we rarely talk about how we want to FEEL while we are running our business.
And to be honest, I am always wondering “is this person a f***ing mess behind the scenes?”
Might sound harsh, but I’ve seen it in many scenarios. The front-facing person is put together and has it all figured out, but their personal life, their boundaries, their stress levels, etc. are literally a shit show.
PS- I intentionally did not say “work/life balance” because there’s a quote out there—who said it, I cannot recall— that is “This is my life’s work”. I don’t really believe in “work/life balance” as a metric, because they blend so much. But I do believe that you shouldn’t have put-together as your front and complete chaos on the backend.
…so, about how you want to feel:
Does your work give you space to breathe? Does it leave you with energy at the end of the day? Does it allow you to show up as the version of yourself you actually want to be?
For me, sustainability looks like clarity. It looks like boundaries. It looks like choosing a pace I can actually maintain without burning myself out or burning through my love for the work. It means going to the beach on Wednesday mornings, taking Fridays off, being able to shift around my schedule because I have the capacity to do, knowing that if shit hits the fan, I have the ability to tend to whatever that emergency is without my clients going unserved.
Again, I am not trying to villainize growth and expansion, hiring, or having multiple clinics. That is not what I am trying to do.
This is merely a permission slip that you did not even need, if you’re someone who doesn’t say “HELL YEAH!” when growth and expansion are brought up.
If you are in a position where it feels more in line to say that you are maintaining rather than being on the hamster wheel of feeling like you have to always grow and expand, or that because you have a waitlist of one month, two months, or three months, you absolutely need to hire.
You don’t have to hire. You don’t have to add clinic hours.
“Good for Her, Not for Me”
I like to quote Amy Poehler with this: “Good for her, not for me.”
Because again, just because something is available and widely marketed, and it does actually make sense logistically, it might still not feel aligned for you specifically.
And I feel like in the online content world, you get a lot of messaging around the growth and expansion side of things.
There is not much to be said about the maintaining side.
I think part of this is because maintenance does not sell as easily as growth. It does not promise exponential returns or a million effing dollars.
It does not feed into the urgency of doing more and becoming more all the time.
But there is something really powerful about deciding that your life does not need to be that.
That your business does not need to be an experiment in endless expansion.
You are allowed to choose a model that fits you even if it does not fit the narrative that is sold.
Some people just want to own their own business so they can work 9-2 and go see their kids’ soccer games when they need to, be home for dinner, and be able to have a say about when they can and cannot take vacation. Some people want to manage multiple clinics and practitioners and grow their business so big it can be sold.
Good for her. Not for me.
But that comes from knowing what you want, knowing your values, and knowing what your enough is.
Why Lifestyle Business Matters to Me
Because I always like to give credit where credit is due, Shanté originally introduced me to the lifestyle business concept, and that is where I get a lot of my confirmation that this is a fantastic way to run your business.
I also know that this is a great place to be because I am not feeling burnt out every day, and I am also able to witness the messaging around growth and expansion and know that it is a good fit for other folks and not for myself.
I am very grounded in the fact that I won’t make 1 million dollars a year. And I don’t need one million dollars a year. So, that’s great!
Final Thoughts
Nothing that I am saying now is telling you that one way is good and one way is bad.
It is simply my push for you to figure out what is best for you, because then you can make decisions from that place.
When you know what you are building for, the decisions get simpler. Not always easier, but clearer. You stop chasing what is loud and start listening to what is true for you.
Whether that leads you toward growth or toward maintenance, the point is not the direction. The point is the alignment.
And if maintaining feels like the most honest choice for you right now, I hope you let that be enough.
