The Main Misconception About Work-Life Balance and How to Achieve It
Have you been trying to balance your work, personal, and family life, but it seems unachievable? Are you starting to believe that having a meaningful work-life balance is unattainable for high-achievers like yourself, who believe anything is possible and figureoutable? Most ambitious career women who are also parents do. One of the main challenges ambitious working moms have is to create a meaningful work-life balance that leaves us personally and professionally satisfied, more at peace, and fulfilled.
The main misconception that most of my clients (who are ambitious career women and moms) have when it comes to achieving work-life balance is that it is mainly about time management. And I was there myself. Once I decided that it was time to reprioritize my time, I started chopping up my schedule better to incorporate my time across different aspects of my life. It makes perfect sense for those of you doing the same. It’s the most logical thing because we have a limited amount of time, and to do more of something we want, like spending more time with family or on self-care, we need to take that time from something else like our business or work. Very logical. However, when it comes to creating meaningful work-life balance, we need to look beyond time management and go deeper. The paradox is that focusing on time management alone both orients us in the right direction toward balance and also keeps us from fully embracing a truly holistically balanced life.
Most of my clients experiencing challenges with achieving meaningful work-life balance have tried reprioritizing their time to fit in more of what they desire. Mainly it is to spend more time for themselves, with their loved ones, or any activities that bring them joy. Thinking that If I spend less time on work and more time on something else, I will experience less stress, and my life satisfaction will go up. That sounds logical and makes perfect sense, and it does work up to a certain point, but for some, tension starts building again. So why do some of us still feel drained, stressed, and unfulfilled even when we start incorporating work-life balance? So what is going on? You may even start to wonder whether work-life balance is attainable. So what's missing? Time reallocation is a consideration of creating work-life balance but for it to be meaningful, we need to go deeper.
Achieving a meaningful work-life balance that increases life satisfaction and leads to personal fulfillment is more than equally splitting time between work and other activities; it has much more to do with managing our own energy.
So, the more important question to ask ourselves before figuring out how to manage our time better to achieve work-life balance is: what gives me the most energy, and how do I allocate my energy to what's meaningful? What gives you the most energy professionally? What kind of activities bring you the most energy with your family? What kind of self-care is truly revitalizing and rejuvenating for you? In other words, what makes you feel alive? And when we look inside ourselves for the answers and have the courage to be honest, you may be surprised at what comes up.
When we give attention and are honest with ourselves about what an energy drain is and what an energy gain is, we will make better decisions, leading to a more meaningful balance between professional, family, and personal life. So when we shift our perspective from time to energy management, we start getting clarity, and with that clarity, we are empowered to make more meaningful decisions when it comes to creating work-life balance. Let's go through some examples.
My Personal Example
There was a time when I truly treated everything professionally and personally as a challenge to be overcome. Something to push through, to prove I’m up for it and can do anything regardless of how I felt about it. As someone who is an introvert and thrives in small groups and 1:1 interactions, who gets easily sensory overloaded and overwhelmed by open spaces, I used to work for over a decade in an open-floor office, giving weekly presentations to new clients, to existing clients, facilitating week-long workshops, while juggling multiple projects and was committed to producing high-quality work amongst dooming deadlines, while trying to maintain positive relationships with colleagues and clients. I traveled across the country to facilitate week-long workshops, even though I hate flying and being away from my family. But again, it was perceived as just another challenge to overcome and grow from. Then, I’d come home and spend the last ounce of energy I had with my daughter. Most nights, after reading her bedtime stories, I just fell asleep next to her crib while she held onto my hand, just soaking in any closeness I could with her. I’d wake up still exhausted and then beat myself up for not having the energy. I’d go back to work and rinse and repeat. Needless to say, I experienced severe burnout a few years ago, which led me to introspect and realign myself with my true self and my own core values.
When I was compulsively doing things at work and in my family life based on what I thought was expected of me and treating myself as my limits and needs didn’t exist or didn’t matter, instead of owning what truly aligned with my own core needs and values I became drained, physically, emotionally, mentally, relationally and the worst part is that I judged myself for it. No matter how many books, articles, and friends I had told me to stop expecting myself to be a superwoman, I still had that subconscious unrealistic ideal to live up to. Now, I’m here to tell you, in case you are finding yourself experiencing the same, burnout is not something to be ashamed of, nor is it a badge of honor. It’s a serious, loud signal for you to take your power back and realign the entirety of your being and what you do to what is truly most meaningful to you. Managing your time accordingly will be a natural byproduct of attuning to yourself and your own needs, and work-life balance will naturally blossom into what it means for you. But first, you need to permit yourself to honor what your energy is telling you. And that is easier said than done, but it’s the way to a genuinely fulfilling life.
Work-Life Balance and Time Management
Let's say that you professionally like to give presentations or enjoy the thrill of signing new clients. It could be any task that you are leading or performing in your workplace that leaves you feeling energized. Let's say that in your family life, you may not enjoy loud kids' birthday parties or activities with your kids that require you to be around lots of people for extended periods. It could be any activity that leaves you feeling drained. You don't have to say it out loud, but you know what it is. Allow yourself to admit that you know what it is. Let's say you are reprioritizing your time to create more work-life balance, and you decide to delegate some of the presentations or potential new clients, and you decide you will take your two kids to most of their games and birthday parties and will take them to amusement parks over the next several weeks.
As you are reprioritizing your time and decide to let go of the energizing work activities and end up spending time on family activities that you know will take a toll on your energy levels, guess what? You will feel that as stress. It is like your battery is being drained without being recharged. Now, if you judge yourself for not feeling happy and satisfied when choosing to be with your family in the name of work-life balance, that amplifies the stress, that is like your battery being double drained. Energizing activities are like your phone being plugged into the power socket. You can use it for normal functioning, and at the same time power is flowing in because the activity itself is energy-giving. It’s both giving and receiving at the same time.
Now, to clarify, I am NOT suggesting or advocating never to take on things that you find challenging and to ALWAYS only say yes to highly energizing activities with your kids. You need to be aware and consider your needs as you decide where and how to spend time and energy. AND to become aware of the guilt that is a double drain when it comes to being intentional with how we spend time with our children.
Work-Life Balance and Energy Management
Let's say that professionally, you travel a lot, and even though it is part of your job and you enjoy some aspects of it, you find it quite draining. You find airports frustrating, hotels are not as fun as they used to be at some other point in your career, and you don't like being away from your family for too long. Now, when it comes to your family, you really enjoy sports and art activities, and you enjoy teaching your children new skills. So you decide to ask for less travel even though that may impact your perceived performance, and you sign up to be the kiddo's new basketball coach and sign them up for some family art workshops. So, every weekend, you will spend time with your kiddos doing activities you both enjoy, helping them build new skills, and your needs are being simultaneously met. You connect deeper, and you end up feeling really great. Since you consider your needs from a deeper perspective, you will likely feel more fulfilled despite the perceived "negatives" of taking on less responsibility at work. This is an example of truly balancing work. This is when your batteries are not being drained, and you are not running on empty at the end of the day, like having to recharge your phone because it’s dead. You are plugged into the power socket, and energy flows to you by the sheer intention of including your own wants and needs in the activity.
Being energy versus time-focused when creating a work-life balance is akin to being quality versus quantity-focused. Being energy vs time-focused makes work-life balance independent of how much time we spend on something, but it’s more about the quality of our experiences.
In no way am I suggesting not challenging yourself or not doing things for your kids, even if you don’t like it. To have a meaningful work-life balance, we must be intentional about how we spend and receive energy. Become aware of your energy levels, what gives you life, and what drains you of it, and unapologetically start prioritizing your time to include energy-giving activities.
Give yourself permission to like and dislike things.
First, start by giving yourself permission to like and dislike things. It’s okay to challenge yourself and stretch your limits, but when it comes to creating meaningful balance, it’s more important to recognize that you have limits, likes, dislikes, and needs that are unique to you.
Old conditioning that makes you believe that giving yourself permission is wrong and selfish keeps you from doing so. But if you continue denying your own limitations, wants, and needs and continue to achieve from a place of compulsion or belief that you need to go against your own needs, burnout is inevitable. It is not an act of selflessness but an act of self-neglect.
When you give yourself permission and admit your likes and dislikes regarding certain things and activities related to your job or your family life, you are starting the process of getting to know yourself. And that is not selfish; that is basic self-hood, the care of the Self.
Attune to your body, mind, and heart.
We need to start attuning physically, emotionally, and mentally to start noticing how we respond physically and emotionally in certain environments. That involves putting your attention on your body, attuning to your sensations, and labeling your feelings physically and emotionally without judgment. Aligned activities will have an energy of lightness and brightness. Misaligned energy will feel heavier and more constricted quality. Frustration, anger, and dissatisfaction despite great sleep and spending time on the things you think you love will be pretty dominant when you are misaligned.
What brings you Joy? Own it.
Learn what energizes you. To do that, we need to let go of the belief that every challenge is worthwhile and a growth opportunity not to be missed. Some professional interactions are energizing, and others are draining. There are also family activities and interactions that are energizing and draining.
Again, I repeat that I am not saying to do things that are uncomfortable or that are stretching your limits but to intimately get to KNOW within yourself what energizes so you can make more aligned decisions by choice and if you choose to take on a challenge that it’s coming from a place of clarity and awareness, not compulsion. It’s knowing yourself and what to do to equilibrate your well-being. Considering our energy is akin to knowing when to water your plants, how much water they need, and how to thrive.
By owning your energy, you will avoid overwatering or underwatering your plant that is you. You will gain the self-knowledge necessary not only to help you prevent burnout but also to create a life that orients you toward thriving filled with satisfaction, peace, and joy.
Set boundaries to protect your energy.
Learn how to ask for what you need and set boundaries to protect your energy.
Many of us don’t set boundaries because of so many misconceptions and disempowering beliefs around boundaries. Work-life balance without ability, skill and comfort of setting boundaries is unattainable. It’s like wanting to have a healthy body, weight and muscles without going through the discomfort of regular exercise and healthy eating habits.
Once we learn what boundaries really are and how to set them with confidence and grace, they become second nature.
