There is much talk these days about Work life balance. This often tends to be about how to work less and spend more time doing household chores or taking vacations.
In reality it doesn’t quite work that way.
Work life balance is not about spending more time doing this or that at the expense of work. It is not about a separation between Work and life. That is an erroneous view. Everything is life. Work is one of the domains and the balance comes not from increasing or decreasing the time spent on a particular domain. The balance needs to take place within us. We need to create an emotional, mental and psychological balance within ourselves.
There is no doubt that we need to devote the time that is appropriate to each domain of our life. Each of us can define what is most important to us.
It can be work / profession / education; Family / spouse / significant other; Community / Environment; Health and Fitness; Self / spiritual etc.. We can define these for ourselves. The weightage of each of these need not be equal. Some domains can mean more to us than others. It is not about the weightage, it is the degree of fulfilment that we achieve in each domain that matters.
Now that we have looked at Balance from a holistic perspective, lets see what we can do practically to achieve it.
The first thing to realise is that there are no quick fixes and Band aids that you can put on and achieve balance.
Balance by its very nature demands that we approach it holistically.
- Understand your drives, needs, desires and aspirations
- What matters to you most
- Create your own domain wheel
- Mark your current state on your domain wheel.
- Understand why your life ride is bumpy. Which domains are unfulfilled and are causing the bump
- Re examine the your current state in your unfulfilled domains and see what you can do to improve them.
- Create a schedule wherein you set apart the required time to attend to your unfulfilled domain.
- Do the work.
Renew the Domain wheel and see where you stand. Is it changing. Is your ride becoming a little less bumpy.
Talk to a Manashanti Coach on how you can achieve balance.