How’s yours doing?
With all the changes most of us have gone through over the past year or so, whatever state our work life balance had been in before, it’s likely to have gone through a number of iterations since – some positive, some not so!
For many of the clients I see in my coaching practice, a lack of balance across their personal and professional lives tends to be one of the key challenges they face. Whether they come fully aware of that issue or we unearth it when digging into why they feel unfulfilled in their career or overwhelmed by their business which isn’t performing as well as they’d expected when they first started out.
Typically, their own needs and wants are not being given the due attention they deserve and the lines between those major aspects of their life have become blurred.
Whether you’ve been:
- Crammed around the dining table with the rest of your family, blending working from home with being the home-school teacher
- Craving what had previously been your haven for those few precious hours in the day whilst everyone else is out, as it’s been taken-over and ripped from your grasp
- Finding it hard to step away from the laptop/phone at the end of the working day, as there always seems to be one more call to make, one more meeting to attend, or
- You’re at breaking point through losing your usual physical and emotional outlets of the gym/yoga classes/drinks out with friends…
…the chances are, you’re feeling it!
Frazzled! Overwhelmed! Exhausted! Stressed! Zoomed-Out!
You name it, it certainly seems to be a common topic of conversation amongst friends, family, clients and networking associates these past couple of months.
The thing is, these are similar complains to what I was hearing before the pandemic,
so surely that can’t be the root cause?
I’ve already heard people worrying out things ‘going back to the crazy times’, as if they’re presuming that’s a given. I’ve seen others already getting caught up in the hamster wheel of kids after school clubs every evening of the week and sporting fixtures at the week. And I count myself as really fortunate that I no longer have to commute for hours up and down the M1 and around the M25 in peak hour traffic (which I hear became the normal once again literally overnight on the first day of lockdown restrictions easing!).
Hitting the Pause/Reset Button…
Yet if we’re to learn anything from the past year, surely it’s that hitting the Pause/Reset button was much needed?
Having an, albeit enforced, break from the hamster wheel that life had become for so many, was viewed as such a blessing this time last year! Remember all those social media posts everyone was sharing, saying didn’t it feel great to not have to rush everywhere? To not feel obliged to attend every social gathering held? To spend more quality time with our families?
And so it brings me back to that all-important word…
Balance!
Because it doesn’t have to be all one way or the other. Some may say “all things in moderation”.
I like to think of it as identifying what’s important to me.
What are the things I enjoy doing, that light me up and fulfil me?
What and who help me feel nourished and nurtured?
Whose company do I feel great being in?
When we’re clear about these things (as well as their opposites), it makes the decisions about what deserves to stay in our life, and what perhaps is ready to be spring-cleaned out, so much easier to make.
And I encourage my clients to start the process by first laying strong foundations from which to build their new, balanced lives:
- Remove the stressors
- Become more aware of your emotions and triggers
- Incorporate some self-care into your routines
Once we’re feeling more balanced and at ease in ourselves, it makes it far easier to make positive changes to our external worlds.
If you’d like some support in improving your work-life balance, I’m sharing my Stress and Anxiety Management guided hypnosis audio here completely free of charge.
You can also get in touch for a complimentary 30 minute Strategy Call if you’re ready to start building those strong foundations and creating a happier, more fulfilling life that you thrive in.
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