These
days, work-life balance can seem like an impossible feat. Technology
makes workers accessible around the clock. Fears of job loss
incentivize longer hours. In fact, a whopping 94% of working
professionals reported working more than 50 hours per week and nearly
half said they worked more than 65 hours per week in a Harvard
Business School survey.Experts agree: the compounding stress
from the never-ending workday is damaging. It can hurt relationships,
health and overall happiness.
Work-life
balance means something different to every individual, but here
health and career experts share tips to help you find the balance
that’s right for you.
1. Let
go of perfectionism
A
lot of overachievers develop perfectionist tendencies at a young age
when demands on their time are limited to school, hobbies and maybe
an after-school job. It’s easier to maintain that perfectionist
habit as a kid, but as you grow up, life gets more complicated. As
you climb the ladder at work and as your family grows, your
responsibilities mushroom. Perfectionism becomes out of reach, and if
that habit is left unchecked, it can become destructive.
The
key to avoid burning out is to let go of perfectionism. “As life
gets more expanded it’s very hard, both neurologically and
psychologically, to keep that habit of perfection going,” she says,
adding that the healthier option is to strive not for perfection, but
for excellence.
2.
Unplug
From
telecommuting to programs that make work easier, technology has
helped our lives in many ways. But it has also created expectations
of constant accessibility. The work day never seems to end. “There
are times when you should just shut your phone off and enjoy the
moment,” says Robert Brooks, a professor of psychology at Harvard
Medical School and co-author of The Power of Resilience:
Achieving Balance, Confidence and Personal Strength in Your Life.
Brooks says that phone notifications interrupt your off time and
inject an undercurrent of stress in your system. So don’t text at
your kid’s soccer game and don’t send work emails while you’re
hanging out with family, Brooks advises. Make quality time true
quality time. By not reacting to the updates from work, you will
developing a stronger habit of resilience. “Resilient people feel a
greater sense of control over their lives,” says Brooks, while
reactive people have less control and are more prone to stress.
3.
Exercise and meditate
Even
when we’re busy, we make time for the crucial things in life. We
eat. We go to the bathroom. We sleep. And yet one of our most crucial
needs - exercise - is often the first thing to go when our calendars
fill up. Exercise is an effective stress reducer. It pumps feel-good
endorphins through your body. It helps lift your mood and can even
serve a one-two punch by also putting you in a meditative state,
according to the Mayo Clinic.
Puder-York
recommends dedicating a few chunks of time each week to self-care,
whether it’s exercise, yoga or meditation. And if you’re really
pressed for time, start small with deep breathing exercises during
your commute, a quick five minute meditation session morning and
night, or replacing drinking alcohol with a healthier form of stress
reduction.
“When
I talk about balance, not everything has to be the completion and
achievement of a task, it also has to include self-care so that your
body, mind and soul are being refreshed,” .
These
exercises require minor effort but offer major payoffs.
Psychotherapist Bryan Robinson, who is also professor emeritus at the
University of North Carolina at Charlotte and author of the
book Chained to the Desk, explains that our
autonomic nervous system includes two branches: the sympathetic
nervous system (our body’s stress response) and the parasympathetic
nervous system (our body’s rest and digest response).
“The key is to find something that you can build into your life that will activate your parasympathetic nervous system,” says Robinson. Short, meditative exercises like deep breathing or grounding your senses in your present surroundings, are great places to start. The more you do these, the more you activate your parasympathetic nervous system, which “calms everything down, (and) not just in the moment,” says Robinson. “Over time you start to notice that in your life, your parasympathetic nervous system will start to trump your sympathetic nervous system.”
“The key is to find something that you can build into your life that will activate your parasympathetic nervous system,” says Robinson. Short, meditative exercises like deep breathing or grounding your senses in your present surroundings, are great places to start. The more you do these, the more you activate your parasympathetic nervous system, which “calms everything down, (and) not just in the moment,” says Robinson. “Over time you start to notice that in your life, your parasympathetic nervous system will start to trump your sympathetic nervous system.”
4.
Limit time-wasting activities and people
First,
identify what’s most important in your life. This list will differ
for everyone, so make sure it truly reflects your priorities, not
someone else’s. Next, draw firm boundaries so you can devote
quality time to these high-priority people and activities.
From
there, it will be easier to determine what needs to be trimmed from
the schedule. If email or internet surfing sends you into a
time-wasting spiral, establish rules to keep you on task. That may
mean turning off email notifications and replying in batches during
limited times each day. If you’re mindlessly surfing Facebook or
cat blogs when you should be getting work done, try using
productivity software like Freedom, LeechBlock or RescueTime.
And if you find your time being gobbled up by less constructive
people, find ways to diplomatically limit these interactions.
Cornered every morning by the office chatterbox? Politely excuse
yourself. Drinks with the work gang the night before a busy,
important day? Bow out and get a good night sleep. Focus on the
people and activities that reward you the most.
To
some, this may seem selfish. “But it isn’t selfish,” says
Robinson. “It’s that whole airplane metaphor. If you have a
child, you put the oxygen mask on yourself first, not on the child.”
When it comes to being a good friend, spouse, parent or worker, “the
better you are yourself, the better you are going to be in all those
areas as well.”
5.
Change the structure of your life
Sometimes
we fall into a rut and assume our habits are set in stone. Take a
birds-eye view of your life and ask yourself: What changes
could make life easier?
Puder-York
remembers meeting with a senior executive woman who, for 20 years of
her marriage, arranged dinner for her husband every night. But as the
higher earner with the more demanding job, the trips to the grocery
store and daily meal preparations were adding too much stress to her
life. “My response to her was, "Maybe it's time to change the
habit,'” recalls Puder-York. The executive worried her husband
might be upset, but Puder-York insisted that, if she wanted to
reduce stress, this structural change could accomplish just that.
So
instead of trying to do it all, focus on activities you specialize in
and value most. Delegate or outsource everything else. Delegating can
be a win-win situation, says Stewart Freidman, a management
professor at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton
School and author of Leading the Life You Want:
Skills for Integrating Work and Life. Freidman recommends
talking to the “key stakeholders” in different areas of your
life, which could include employees or colleagues at work, a spouse
or a partner in a community project. “Find out what you can do to
let go in ways that benefit other people by giving them opportunities
to grow,” he says. This will give them a chance to learn something
new and free you up so you may devote attention to your higher
priorities.
6.
Start small. Build from there.
We’ve
all been there: crash diets that fizzle out, New Year’s resolutions
we forget by February. It’s the same with work-life balance when we
take on too much too quickly, says Brooks. Many of his workaholic
clients commit to drastic changes: cutting their hours from 80 hours
a week to 40, bumping up their daily run from zero miles a day to
five miles a day. It’s a recipe for failure, says Brooks. When one
client, who was always absent from his family dinners, vowed to begin
attending the meals nightly, Brooks urged him to start smaller. So he
began with one evening a week. Eventually, he worked his way up to
two to three dinners per week.
“If
you’re trying to change a certain script in your life, start small
and experience some success. Build from there,” says Brooks.
