The Balanced Life

For years we have been talking about work-life balance. Corporations have spent millions of dollars, often demonstrating solid return on their investment, on establishing work/life balance programs. Yet that balance seems to elude us.

Just the other day, I was speaking with a coaching client who recently became unemployed and she was telling me about how she is spending her days. "I thought I'd have some time to do a decent job search and maybe even catch up on some of my reading but honestly, I don't know how I got anything done at all when I was working. I barely have enough time to just do the chores!"

She's not the first person to experience how busy life can be even without work. How much time is enough? Forget the question. It the wrong question to ask.

People don't naturally balance their lives if given sufficient time. It is true that balance is highly individual but there are some general principals we can all apply to achieve a greater sense of balance in our lives.

Balance happens both internally and externally. The working world looks at the external factors in a person's life and tries to accommodate it. Responsibilities, Obligations and commitments take up hours in a day and work/life balance programs try to accommodate them. Got to pick up the kids, go to the grocery store for Mom, take Dad to the doctor's office, then go to the dry-cleaners, order dinner from the restaurant, take Daughter to her soccer game and Son to his Scout meeting. But without internal balance, you really don't have a chance at balancing the external.

Internal balance is composed of five aspects: physical; intellectual; social; emotional and spiritual. (Order doesn't intend significance.) Each has their place and if we can accommodate them, find our internal balance, we are very likely to be able to more effectively cope with and balance the external factors in our lives.

Over the next five weeks, I'll be talking about each of these aspects individually and I hope to get some real input from you. So subscribe to the blog if you want to be reminded of new entries or send me an email and I'll put you on my update list.