How many times have you felt guilt or shame because you felt your life was not in balance?
Have you ever felt bad for working while wishing you were at home with your family?
Have you ever felt ashamed for procrastinating on a project to spend time with your loved ones?
Have you ever found yourself wishing you had a better Work-Life balance?
Or had the time to cook healthier food and exercise more?
Have you ever found yourself wishing your body looked another way or you had more money, more time and energy to do the things you love?
Guess what, you are not alone!
At some point or another, every human who wants to create a life of success and significance will grapple with the infinite task of dividing their time and energy wisely. Knowing how to disperse your time and energy evenly amongst all the different categories of life can feel like a daunting task. Ultimately it boils down to this; we all want to feel a sense of control, freedom, and joy. We all want to live a life that is purposeful, meaningful and fulfilling. The problem with “perfect balance” is this there’s no such thing.
Beyond “ I AM BALANCED” being an excellent mantra and divine essential oil blend at Wellness On Whyte. Achieving a perfect balance isn’t realistic. We are bombarded with messages to “live a balanced life” to be happy, healthy and wealthy. But what does that even mean? It surely can’t be the same for everyone. So how do we strike a balance? And if you do achieve it, how will you know and what do you after?
It’s one thing to stand on your head for 20 seconds during a yoga class and feel balanced. But what about the other 365 days a year for the rest of your life? Humans live an average of 79 years. Webster’s Dictionary defines balance as the ability to move or remain in a position without losing control or falling. How can someone stay in balance for that long?
Being balanced is a blanket statement that more often than not elicits feelings of guilt and worry. It’s like a life preserver you can cling to wherever you are floating in the chaotic soup of life. But that’s just it. Balance IS where ever you are. Where ever you are, whatever you are doing, that’s the balance.
We are all unique and live individual lives and have different values and ideals. Therefore my idea of the perfect balance is most likely going to differ from yours. The thing you need to understand is that everything is in flux. Everything is constantly changing. Nothing is permanent, not even that tattoo you got in your 20’s. Can I get an AMEN for laser tattoo removal?
No single human body is perfectly symmetrical. Even the Vetruvian man, Leonardo Devinci’s depiction of two superimposed images of the ideal man shows inconsistency’s from left to right. No one’s life will ever be in perfect balance. And that is OKAY! It’s better than okay. The scales of life are moveable. That’s what makes life interesting.
When you’re sitting in perfect stillness during a profound meditation, the earth is hurling through the universe around a gigantic ball of flames. So rather than fixating on being imbalanced, shift your focus. Otherwise, it can be hella overwhelming. So don’t worry about chasing balance, in the famous words of Borat. ” You will never get this!”
What you can do instead is be inflow. Now is where the balance is. Relinquish worry and guilt and create positive reframes for where you are in the present. Instead of wishing you were at home with your family, celebrate your achievements at work, let go of the guilt of not doing enough and allow yourself to experience joy now.
That doesn’t mean you can’t reminisce about or learn from the past. You can still plan and dream about the future. You don’t need to put blinders on and solely live for the moment. To be balanced requires consideration of all aspects of life. First, you need to know that there’s more to life than your career and your finances.
Take a big time out and contemplate the three big questions for each of life’s categories.
Question #1: How do I want to Grow?
Question #2: What do I want to Achieve?
Question #3: How is it that I want to Contribute?
1. Health and fitness
2. Intellectual life
3. Emotional life
4. Character
5. Spirituality
6. Financial life
7. Career
8. Quality of life
9. Friendships
10. Love relationships
11. Life’s vision
Seriously contemplate these things and consciously decide how you want to live your life. If you do, your subconscious mind will utilize your brain’s reticular activating system to filter out the time-wasters, and weed out the energy vampires you have on the path to living your ideal life. If you envision it and believe that reality already exists with complete faith, your mind will actively seek out pathways to manifest that reality.
Envisioning your perfect day, what you want your life to look like a year from now and three years from now, every single day will undoubtedly bring more balance into your life. Energy and time ebb and flow and perhaps not every single day will go according to plan. However, the adaptation of your consciousness will evolve. How you react or respond to whatever life circumstances come your way will grow stronger.
By establishing healthy boundaries for each category of life, you’ll be able to make decisions swiftly and experience better outcomes. Your time and energy will shift from sacrifice to investment.
You can believe balance is hard to achieve or that the world is already in perfect harmony. Whatever lens you look through, one thing remains true.
There are things we can do to reduce stress in our lives. There are things we can do to free up our time and put it to better use. Time management, for example, if you fail to plan, plan to fail. Starve your distractions and feed your focus. It determines your reality. Be extra picky with your environment, avoid negative people and events, avoid negative media, surround yourself with positive people and schedule in time to fill up the joy tank with activities that make you laugh. When it comes to your health, evaluate your habits, eat well and exercise often. Collaborate; life is better together. No one can do it all. So team up, outsource, join a mastermind and don’t be shy to ask for help.
