(FORTUNE Small Business) – It was a mild but still wintry Sunday morning in New York City's Central Park. Through my headphones Wagner's Parsifal opera played while I watched runners of all sizes, shapes, and abilities trot by. Retreating to the warmth of my gym, I logged my own five-mile treadmill run. Afterward I spent an obscene three hours in the kitchen making ricotta gnocchi with a wild-mushroom saute, using a recipe I'd spied in the paper. Then my partner, Bryan, and I settled in front of the television to watch Les Bonnes Femmes, by French film director Claude Chabrol.

Until recently, I couldn't have imagined such an indulgent Sunday. For the past two years I've been creating Element, the first style magazine for the 11 million-strong Asian-American market. Like many entrepreneurs, I adopted a you-snooze-you-lose attitude and resigned myself to certain startup givens: sleep deprivation, spousal sightings as elusive as night-blooming cactus, and the need to take calls anywhere, anytime--even in the bathroom. If success required sacrifice, I was willing to make whatever personal offerings were needed.

Having been a magazine writer and editor for the past 10 years, I thought I knew what all that meant. But even I was surprised. Despite the angelic help of volunteers, friends, family, champions, and mentors, at the end of every long day it was all about me. Me assigning stories and supervising photo shoots. Me bolting to FedEx 30 seconds before it closed. Me taking out the trash, washing out the coffee machine, and schlepping 40-pound boxes of magazines around the cold streets of Manhattan.

Last year all that work resulted in a well-received prototype that drew the attention of investors, ad agencies, media, and readers around the world. But while others noticed what I'd created, I noticed what I'd neglected: me. I hadn't had a vacation in a year and a half. My meals had become catch-as-catch-can. I'd smoked a cigarette for the first time in four years. And friends' social invitations had begun feeling like intrusions.

Our culture pays lip service to striking a work/life balance but offers little in the way of real reinforcement. I found reinforcement right under my nose, when, during a late-night talk, Bryan finally said: "You have to give yourself permission to stop."

With that proverbial pebble, changes began to ripple through my life. I dieted away 20 pounds. I carved out time to start running and keeping a journal again. Bryan and I remodeled our tiny apartment, making it into a place where we can relax after our long workdays. Soon, hanging out with friends no longer seemed like an intrusion. And I began doing something that still feels practically sacrilegious: I reserve Friday afternoons for myself. I walk aimlessly through neighborhoods I've rarely visited. I shop. I read. This weekly dose of "hooky" makes weeks filled with entrepreneurial minutiae fly by.

I used to think that succeeding in business was a never-ending sprint. In truth it's a marathon that requires pacing and patience. By being a little selfish, I have found stamina I didn't know I had. That has enabled me to safeguard my company's most irreplaceable asset: me.

Angelo Ragaza lives in New York City and plans to launch Element magazine later this year.