Not Your Typical Work-Life Balance Post
Work-life balance seems to be the unachievable everyone wishes to achieve. You want it. I want it. We all long for it. One day two posts from different authors hit my inbox. One believed work-life balance to be a myth while the other suggested such a belief is only held by those who have not experienced balance. I am ready to toss out the word balance entirely and here is why.
Much that is written on work-life balance suggests a tension between what one does vocationally versus the time one has to spend with family or recreation. It suggests that there is a tension where something must always be sacrificed, work or family. I don’t know about you, but for me family will always trump work every time if that is the tradeoff. Why can these things not work together? Why must there always be a tension? What if I love the work I do, and I love my family? Is it healthy to continue to live in such a great state of tension? There is no doubt that stress and anxiety escalate just by worrying about whether or not I’m giving appropriate time to each of these areas of my life.
I prefer to use the word harmony. In this symphony called life that is being daily orchestrated I want every note to form a beautifully created and harmonic chord. For me the priority of my life is my family. Every other note (career, health, leisure) supports that priority. It all works together in harmony. I still create an ideal week to plan my time. I outline my tasks to manage projects. I pencil in margin for life’s craziness. Everyone should know where their time is being spent. You should work to make sure every area of your life receives the appropriate amount of time needed for harmony. This allows me to do what I love, to pursue passion, and not sacrifice people who are dear and near to me.
Planning your ideal week and keeping a regular calendar is necessary for living a life of harmony. It allows you to be proactive instead of reactive. It is never pleasant when you are reactive. For example, taking on that extra project during an already busy month forced you to be reactive in tense situations. You lacked emotional intelligence in those moments because you were stressed and did not plan margin for the extra project. Instead you said yes when you should have said no. This creates dissonance instead of perfect harmony.
Being proactive means you plan for the dissonance. Planned dissonance works. We hear dissonant chords in music all of the time, but unplanned dissonance does not work. In fact, its a mistake. When musicians make this mistake we usually raise an eyebrow and cringe. In other words, you react. Planning allows you to be proactive to dissonance (i.e.: when work bumps up against family) and make it work. Unplanned dissonance leads you to react. You get angry. You want to quit. You have futile arguments at home because of stress. Be proactive so you do not have to be reactive and begin living a supported and harmonic life.
What steps will you take to live a life of harmony? Are you being proactive in planning for your next season of busyness? What tools do you use to manage your time?