Finding Work-Life Balance

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Work-life balance. It’s an all-inclusive and sorta all-elusive term. We all want it, but many of us struggle to actually nail down that coveted sweet spot between professional responsibility and personal wellness.

Before getting into finding work-life balance, it makes sense to define it. The Cambridge Dictionary defines work-life balance as “the amount of time you spend doing your job compared with the amount of time you spend with your family and doing things you enjoy.”

A little simplistic for my taste, but hey it’s a start.

I’ve worked and spoken with lots of people who struggled with finding the right balance. And I think it’s almost mythical.

In real life, work-life balance often means different things to different people. Work-life integration might be more appropriate for some people, as their ideal is to mix work with life, simultaneously tending to both the professional and the personal throughout the day. Others may prefer a complete separation between the two, stepping out of one world to parachute into the other.

We each have to define our own sense of balance, and that’s hard. Still, here’s some tips to get you started.

CLARITY COMES WITH ACTION

Maybe you’re not sure what the ideal balance would actually look like for you. If that’s you, you’re not alone. But clarity comes with action. In other words, things start to get a little bit clearer as you begin to move.

Ask yourself this: Are there any things you can change right now that MIGHT lead to you feeling more balance in your life? Make a list of 3-5 things.

That might be a hard question to answer, but the good news is that you don’t have to get it right! The idea is to brainstorm some “low hanging fruit” options that you can try. As you move forward making conscious choices regarding the breakdown of your life and responsibilities, you’ll start to gain insight into what your ideal sense of balance might look like

Quick history lesson! The term work-life balance was coined in the mid 80s during the Women’s Liberation Movement as women fought for the right to maintain their job and still have time to take care of their families.

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