The elusive work-life balance
The elusive work-life balance is something that so many of the people I work with are constantly searching for, yet feel like they are never finding. This idea of balance is touted as a holy grail that, if we can just achieve it, everything will be sunshine, roses and happiness ever after.
I don’t know about you, but to me, the way this balance is talked about makes it feel really bloody hard to actually achieve! So, today, I invite you to take a slightly different view of this most desirable of concepts. Let’s look at how you can create more of what you do want in life, without it feeling like a quest to get there.
Work-Life Balance: the problem
Work-Life
The implication in ‘work-life balance’ is that there is work, and then there is life. These are our two boxes, our two modes, and we are allowed to be in one or the other, but they are separate and don’t touch. As we all know, especially after the Covid lockdowns in which almost all work was from home, as was school, and, well everything, this is total nonsense!
In reality, we have any number of boxes our time could be split into: work, being a parent, being a partner, being a friend, being a daughter. The list could go on for quite a while. And these aren’t distinct boxes, they have porous walls, so we can see what’s going on in the others whilst we are in one, much as we might like to pretend otherwise. Likewise, events in area of life can reach out and influence us even when we’re in another. It’s just not as simple as the work-life dichotomy suggests.
Balance
The most relevant dictionary definition of the word balance here is “a situation in which different elements are equal or in the correct proportions”.
Equal definitely doesn’t work! All those boxes I mentioned above are definitely different sizes, and they aren’t fixed sizes either! Correct proportions feels closer to the mark. However, I don’t know about you but, as a sort-of-recovering perfectionist, the implication of a ‘correct’ answer can easily set me off into paroxysms of ‘am I doing it right???’! There’s no one right answer to how we split our time and energy between our boxes – it changes all the time.
How about harmony?
Now, you might be thinking, ‘Great Jen, but really that’s all just semantics, what can I actually do with what you are telling me here?’
Well, instead of balance, how about we consider the idea of harmony. Harmony is defined in the dictionary as “the quality of forming a pleasing and consistent whole”. It’s not a single ‘right fit’ solution. Rather, it’s an approach that can adapt and change to find the consistency that pleases us.
Doesn’t that sound nicer?
For me, the idea of finding harmony in our lives opens the door to an exploration of what that pleasing whole might look like. What it looks like today could be different to tomorrow, which might be different to next week, next month, next year. Finding harmony is an approach that looks to create a flow in our lives, we can choose how discrete our ‘boxes’ need to be, and how we move between them.
Making harmony happen
So how can we practically replace the frustrating struggle for work-life balance with finding more harmony between the different areas of our lives?
Find your vision
Let’s start somewhere in the future:
If you allowed yourself to think and dream about some indeterminate point in your future where you had this harmony figured out what would that look like?
What would you be doing?
How would you be feeling?
Create a vision, a holistic vision for all areas of your life, that shows you how your life will be in the future. The link to “Imagine a future: a reflective exercise” below may be helpful to get you started here.
Identify changes
Once you have your vision to be your anchor point in the future, you can start to look at what changes need to happen to move you towards that. My preferred approach for this is journaling, just taking a notebook and allowing myself to write whatever pops into my head about this until I hit the good stuff.
This might be blocks that need to get out of the way, such as dealing with an overwhelming workload.
It may be new skills that you need to learn, such as a constructive way to set boundaries or ask for help.
Moving in the right direction
When you have some ideas for steps to take, your vision then becomes your compass. You can ask yourself, if you take this step, are you still moving in the direction your compass suggests?
And as you consider those steps towards harmony, I would encourage you to be open and curious. This isn’t a strict work-life balance equation where there is a perfect sweet spot to be found. This is an ebb and flow of harmony, playfully creating the life you want.
So, go and play and see what you can create! I would love to hear more about how you work to find harmony in life, so if you aren’t already a member please do join my Facebook group, Soulfire Community, and tell us about how you are working on creating a life in better harmony.
If you’re still feeling overwhelmed at how unharmonious your life currently is then my next blog, on radical replenishment may be a great place to start.
My blog on play touches on the theme of balance, so you may find it contains some helpful ideas for what your vision might contain.