3 Keys to Achieving Work/Life Balance
No doubt, you’ve heard about work/life balance. You may even have agreed that it would be wonderful to reach a state of equilibrium, balancing out the various areas of your life. But, at the same time, you may have been at a loss as to how to end the time-and-energy conflicts between your different roles.
What Is Work/Life Balance?
Work/Life balance is pursuing your ideal work and feeling alive and engaged in your life. It’s feeling in control of your time and destiny. It’s all about making things happen.
Rather than relying on existing social systems, like working for a company, enrolling in a school, or going to a house of worship—you’re organizing your life based on your wants, needs, and interests. This doesn’t mean you disengage from your social networks, just that you don’t rely on them to give meaning to your life. You see them as support systems rather than constraints dictating what you should think and how you should behave.
Making lifestyle-based decisions will make you far happier than anything else you could do. When you regain control of your time, energy, and dreams, you’ll naturally gravitate toward personal development projects, live healthier, and start doing more of your favorite things.
With that in mind, let’s look at the 3 keys to getting back your time and living life on your own terms:
Key #1: Work for Yourself
Unless you are exceptionally lucky, you’re unlikely to find a corporate job that isn’t rife with frustration. It’s a sad fact of modern life that most companies, regardless of their founder’s inspiring origin story, have overcontrolling, frustrated, or disengaged employees. It’s also common to grapple with dysfunctional rules that unintentionally stifle your creativity and self-expression.
This leaves you with a few choices: adapt as much as possible, rebel to bypass the constraints of the company, try to change the system, look for another corporation where things are better, or work for yourself.
Many people in pursuit of work/life balance have found that their best option has been to ride the wave of the gig economy by freelancing, starting their own business, becoming independent business owners, or investing in a passive income stream.
Key #2: Find a Healthy Hobby
The best hobbies give you a mood boost. Some healthy hobbies to consider would be power walking, running, cycling, swimming, or working out.
If you’re looking for something different, consider taking up SUP yoga. SUP is an abbreviation for stand Up paddle board.
Doing yoga on a paddle board is way more demanding than regular yoga, requiring you to improve your focus, strength, and balance to avoid tipping over into the water! Essentially, this new sport is a blend of two healthy activities—the fun of paddle boarding on a lake and the physical demands of Hatha yoga.
Key #3: Spend Quality Family Time
While you can, of course, enjoy family time by shopping, dining, watching TV, going to a game, and so on, it doesn’t quite rise to the level of “quality” family time. This is because the level of fun, engagement, and novelty is banal. You can go from having a good time to having a great time by going on family vacations or doing things together, like exercise, reading aloud, art, cooking, or volunteering at a charitable event.
Finding the Good Life
In essence, then, reducing the demands of your job; enjoying some healthy pursuits and spending quality time with your family will change your life for the better. Of course, these changes will take time to implement, but now that you see how to enjoy the good life, you’ll be able to figure out how to get from where you are to where you want to be.