Why Work/Life Harmony Starts With You
Photo credit Elijah O'Donnell. Woman with brown hair wearing a grey jumper and jeans sitting by a river
At some point most of us feel like we are too busy but not getting anywhere.
Maybe you’re suffering from the hamster wheel effect or juggling everything and hoping nothing breaks.
Finding work/life balance seems like yet another thing to do, another task on the never ending ‘to do’ list.
The problem is that we can’t see the wood for the trees. We are so busy with busyness we think we don’t have time to step back and take stock of where we are going, or why we are doing the things that we do.
This is why so often we only stop when we are forced to, through burn out, illness, or other stress related problems.
Or when those close to us confront us and demand that something has to change.
So where do you start?
Don’t wait for burn out, or a family intervention. Instead of aiming for the intangible ‘balance’, think about what a great life would look like for you. How would your life look different than it is now? Before you can reach a goal, you have to define it
Decide what you really want. Grab some paper and answer the following questions.
What do you want more of in your life?
What do you want less of?
What makes you happy?
What’s most important to you right now?
Of course sometimes other people are the priority, family or friends that we care for may need us, and that’s fine. But not taking care of your own needs as well will quickly leave you feeling burned out and feeling resentful of all the things you have to do, and that’s no help to anyone.
Sometimes we feel rushed and out of control or overwhelmed because we are following someone else’s agenda. Someone else’s idea of where we should be heading. It’s not their fault, they want the best for us.
But only you can really decide where you want to go.
Not doing what you really want to be doing is always going to make you feel unfulfilled or stuck.
Or perhaps you feel as though you are rushing through the present moment to get to a future that won’t arrive. When what you are doing never feels like enough, perhaps you should ask yourself, is it enough for you? Or are you trying to be enough for someone else?
What would happen if you stepped off the hamster wheel for a few moments and took stock of the things that are really important to you?
Life
What areas of your life do you enjoy? How can you do more of those things? Do you have hobbies that have fallen by the wayside? Or perhaps you’d like to try something new.
How’s your social life? When you see friends how do you feel afterwards? Do they support you with your hearing loss or do they remind you how difficult things can be?
Sometimes the people around us are keeping us in a certain situation or frame of mind. When you talk to friends about doing something different is the response a positive one?
If friends leave you feeling drained of energy or negative about things, this is a warning sign that you’re hanging around with the wrong type of people.
Work
Why do you do the things that you do? Why did you take your current job? Do you have a passion for the work you do or did you fall into your career by accident? Do you suffer from ‘not enough time in the day’ syndrome?
Perhaps you need to make changes to some of the the things you do. It doesn’t have to be drastic.
Sometimes small things, such as setting work boundaries or improving your time management can make a huge difference to your productivity at work, so you can spend less time there.
Many people with hearing loss stay in jobs they don’t enjoy as it can be difficult for them to find alternative work. But it’s not impossible. Research jobs or new careers that interest you. Find out about companies in your field, network on LinkedIn. Find out about training you can do to advance your career. Keep your CV up to date and be prepared when the ideal opportunity arises.
Harmony?
If you had the perfect work life balance, what would you do? Everyone’s idea of this is different, but it can also change over time. What worked for you 5 years ago might not be working for you now.
Choices we made that were right at the time may need to be changed for us to feel properly fulfilled.
In reality there is no such thing as work life balance. It’s all part of life, which is fluid and needs us to adapt and grow as things change around us. As time moves on our priorities also change. Perhaps instead of finding work/life balance the goal should be finding life harmony.
What does yours look like?
Not sure where to start?
Talking to a coach can really help you to decide which areas of your life you need to work on to improve your work life balance and general wellbeing.
Just making one small change can have a huge impact on other areas too.
If you’d like more help, why not contact me to arrange a chat, and we can discuss how life coaching can help you.