3 Ways To Find Balance

Feeling imbalanced and off-center in your day-to-day life is stressful. Feeling unable to juggle all the parts of your life keeps you in a constant state of tension and anxiety which is bad for your mental health and overall happiness. We all want to feel more balanced and centered in our day-to-day lives. The problem is most of us focus on the wrong things to get it.

I used to think balance meant a perfectly equal split of my work/life time, and energy. My fantasy: I’d seamlessly compartmentalize these two things, bounce back and forth between them, I’d sit down and make lists of to-dos, set priorities with percentages… and ta-da, I would execute! I also had idyllic fantasies of women smiling as they diligently typed, ran meetings, then left work (still smiling) arriving at home promptly at 6pm, ready to cook, eat, spend time with their kids, or rush off to happy hour then start over again. The reality? Not even close.

Why did everyone make it look easy when it was impossible day after day for me? Why was I so good at logistics and planning professionally, yet couldn’t seem to create any balance in my own life? Why did it suck?

Because lack of balance often has little to do with practical tactics, and (mostly) everything to do with our ability to keep a strong center of gravity in the midst of the outside world’s pressures, tasks, and challenges.

Balance is understanding and managing our emotions and feelings that prevent us from taking control, and taking a stand in all facets of our life. Balance requires clarity in your life’s priorities AND the confidence to choose, then enforce them, which is hard work! Balance requires that you dig into your beliefs, your self-judgments, and feelings about who you are, how you’re living, and what you really want. This process can be scary, draining, daunting, and discouraging BUT eventually, it’s empowering, and calming once you dig into them!

I work with a lot of clients on balance. The ones who find long-term success; health and happiness, prioritize focusing on their own feelings wrapped up in this myth of work/life balance, “having it all”, rather than the tactical prioritization at first. 

If you really want balance in yourself, and in your life for more calm…more control, and better mental health, try these three things that most overlook and avoid:

Stop punishing yourself

Being nice to ourselves is a difficult thing. Whether you’re internalizing “you can have it all!” messages, feeling stuck in a broken system, see images like the ones I described in my work/life fantasy, you’re a new mom figuring shit out, or a person who wants to accomplish amazing things in their career in this chapter…of course you’re going to feel defeated, shitty, or guilty when you’re not feeling aligned with those exact messages, or when you’re falling short on some days.

Be kinder to yourself, and try to sit with the emotions and feelings that come up as they do vs. punishing yourself for having them and “failing”. Having it all is a myth. Work-life balance as we’ve been taught it is a myth. What is realistic, is being exhausted after a long day of calls, meetings, deadlines, parenting, and doctor appointments, or pulled in 5 directions; overwhelmed and frustrated for the many things you have on your life plate. Being kinder to yourself, and normalizing your feelings, is a way to find more balance.

Develop comfort with ambiguity

We want to control everything, but what happens when things like sick kids, friend fights, flat tires, or work crises pop up in the middle of our carefully balanced work week? We spiral. We panic, and we suffer because things aren’t going according to our pre-established plan. Then, we’re disappointed in ourselves and unmotivated to create the balance in our lives we need. Balance requires flexibility. So change your relationship with control; your fear of being out of control, by trying to understand why control is so important to you. Things are going to fall through the cracks, but if you can develop comfort in accepting things when they do, you’ll feel far less shitty when things come up and don’t go according to plan - and you’ll be more resilient. 

Refocus on yourself

Focusing on yourself can be uncomfortable. You may feel selfish. Lack of balance often comes from you feeling pulled in more than one direction, wanting to please others and prioritize their needs before your own. Yes, you’re caring and thoughtful, but you’re also over-reliant on others and their experiences. Sometimes it can serve as an excuse; a way to avoid accountability for saying no to people or things, or asserting your needs at work, in your relationship - or even digging into exploring what those needs are. Turn your attention to your own needs, and why you need them. Take accountability for your decisions, indecision, or unwillingness to speak up, to push back, and set boundaries. Once you takes actions that enable you to find balance, you will also start to believe you deserve balance, and more of it will come more naturally.

Are you ready to start finding balance in your life? Click the link below to setup your free discovery call to learn how I can help!