Maintaining Balance in Work and Life

In today’s transforming world, many of us find it difficult to balance the increasing demands of career, family, and community with our own self care. We often end up working harder, enjoying our lives less, and searching for a better way to manage our lives and responsibilities. Maintaining balance in your personal life, ensuring that all of your fundamental needs being met, might be an answer.

If you would like a quick estimate of how balanced your life is, try this. Write down these headings: physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, family, social, work, material well-being. These represent core needs for overall wellness for most. Now take a moment to think about each in tern, what they mean to you, and how satisfying your life currently is in each. Rate each on a scale of 0 (very unsatisfying) to 5 (completely fulfilling). Now compare the numbers. If some areas score notably lower than others, this suggests an imbalance. If all of your numbers are comparable but are lower then you would like, you might want to consider undergoing personal growth work.

If you find your life out of balance, regaining it may be the best investment you can make for yourself, your loved ones, and your work.The tips below are a few that many find helpful when re-establishing balance. Family and friends are often great sources of feedback and support, but many find the objectivity and expertise of a counselor or personal coach invaluable when making such changes. Whatever approach you take, keep in mind that changing too much too quickly adds to life stress. A gentle consistency often produces greater results than all out efforts.

Tips for Achieving and Maintaining Greater Balance

1. Envision the future you want. Take some time to picture your life as you want it to be, keeping your core needs in mind. By envisioning your desired life in each area, you will tend to focus your efforts toward achieving greater balance.

2. Leave work at work. With cell phones, electronic organizers, laptop computers, and the home offices, many are literally dragging their work around with them, or inviting it to intrude into their private lives. These tools can reduce our workload and increase our freedom, but in practice they often do the opposite. Placing reasonable restrictions on us of the home office and computer, and shutting off the cell phone for work black out times can help.

3. Attend to your physical health. The greater the health and vitality we have, the greater our ability to live out our dreams. Diet, exercise, and stress reduction are critical, but proper sleep is often overlooked. Many of us are trimming minutes off both ends of our sleep schedules to fit everything into a day. Good sleep hygiene proves to be a missing element for many.

4. Focus on family. Having close family connections can help buffer us against stress and keep life in perspective. Here, family may be immediate, original, extended, or even adopted; whoever you consider to be family, is family.

5. Maintain an active social life outside of work. Recent studies suggest that a healthy social life may add as many years to our lives as regular exercise. The quality of our overall lives often parallels the quality of our social networks. Cultivate and maintain an active cadre of friends and associates outside of work. Choose those who expand your life in some way, rather than diminish it.

6. Adopt a spiritual practice. Spiritual practices are simply those which help us to connect with our inner selves and give us a sense of meaning and purpose. Religion and other formal approaches are an option, but for many, a regular walk in natural spaces, an art form, or even quiet contemplation can provide needed spiritual focus. Find a practice that brings you a sense of peace and contentment with yourself and the world and make it a regular indulgence.

7. Enjoy your life. Do something that makes you laugh each day; we often take life and ourselves too seriously. Set aside personal quality time for yourself each day to do with as you please; try to have something to look forward to at the end of each work day that is not work related.

Bell well. Safe journey.

Copyright © 2001  Phoenix Life-Coaching.

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