How to ride the Work-Life Balance Bicycle

I usually show people how to ride the brand-building motorcycle. You see, I grow people who grow brands.

But during the world-wide lockdown, I was flooded with requests on how to Work From Home.

Initially, the requests were for How to run Zoom Meetings. And even how not to have to cancel a Convention. Or How to run Online Workshops. Easy peasy, really.

Soon people figured out how to use Zoom. Or Microsoft Teams. Or Google Meet. Or any of the apps that make Working From Home possible. After all, they were locked in. They had to work it out.

We, who had been our own bosses from the ICQ and Skype eras, transitioned quite easily.

However, no one seems to have yet worked out an app that makes Work-Life Balance possible while working from home. Or from an 'office', for that matter.

Now I am not an app designer. I only know how to make people more creatively productive. So here's my blueprint for such an app. If you love gaming, you can put this "app" together for yourself. The software to do that is already on your digital device.

You can put to practice Work-Life Balance just by using Google Calendar and Excel well.

So here's the How to...

I've already written about How to do an 8-hour job in 5 hours. But, whether you are working from home or not, you really have a double-shift. Work. And Home.

The trick... is how to enjoy both!

Here's how you can get an extra 2 hours of joy out of your day. Yes, a 24 hour day can now become a 26 hour day.

You will suddenly have more time for Work-Life Balance.

Tip 1: Schedule all 24 hours of your day. Including Rest and Recreation.

8 hours of Rest. 8 hours of Recreation. 8 hours of Revenue Creation.

Sleep gives your life balance. And a lot of joy. Schedule those hours first. If what you enjoy doing the most is sleeping, reward yourself with that kind of me-time once you are doing well on the "Work-Life Balance Score Card" that I am going to help you put together.

Stay with me as I take you through the guidelines of that oh-so-rewarding life game. The Work-Life Balance Game. So that you enjoy life to the full.

First, plan your sleep.

Those of you who know me will know I have developed a very unusual sleep cycle. It's true that each person should have their own sleep cycle. Reward your body with sleep. You will be a much happier person.

My body clock has adjusted to what I call my US Hours (2230 IST to 0130 IST). And my Australia Hours (0430 IST to 0730 IST). But that comes from years of working from home in India and being paid in dollars. (I was working from home since 1998. Which is why I could move back to the city I love, Kolkata, in 2001.)

But the important take away is that I schedule my appointments with Mr. Sleep at 0145 to 0415 IST (3 hours); 0745 to 1045 IST (3 hours) and 1400 to 1600 IST (The last used to be scheduled in my calendar as appointments with Mr. Nap. Seemed impolite to be sleeping in the middle of the India workday). So, still, a good 8 hours of sleep, with deep REM sleep between 2 am and 4 am.

Those who have attended my residential workshops know I also have the ability to go two to three days with just two hours of sleep a night and then have my body catch up over the next three days.

Now, you don't have to follow my sleep patterns. Sleep, when your body prefers to sleep. The important thing is, fix those appointments first. For the entire week. At least 56 hours a week. And then reward yourself with more, if you want to, if you are doing well in the Work-Life Balance Game. Or spend more time with your loved ones.

Tip 2: Plan for 5 hours of Quality Recreation Time a day. With the people you care about. This could be your family, your friends, your work colleagues, your fellow hobbyists.

My other passion is theater. I spend an average of 3 hours a day doing something I enjoy, even though it brings me no revenue. I find it very therapeutic.

Hey, watching Netflix together can also be therapeutic. To each his own.

(By the way, I know this part of my work-life balance is currently akilter. During 'lockdown', I have been spending more than eight hours a day producing ePlays. Which is why I am giving ePlays a break for a month or so. And then will gradually bring it back to an average of 3 hours a day on theater. Something I enjoy doing.)

Tip 3: Plan for 5 “exciting revenue creation hours”. Especially if you want a productive 8 hour day of Revenue Creation. Appointments with yourself. Appointments with people you care about. Meetings that end on time and exude a lot of positive energy.

Once your work colleagues also become the people you care about, suddenly revenue creation can also double-up as your recreation hours. Because it is time spent with people you like being with.

More importantly, it is time spent doing something you care about.

And this is where the crucial brand-building question kicks in.

What business are you really in?

If you really want work-life balance, give this serious thought. Or choose work that fulfills a purpose in your life.

Once you work out your purpose in life and that's what you do for a living, you will be a happier person.

If your purpose is solely to make money, you will always have a problem with work-life balance.

There's more about that in the Purpose of Profit.

Tip 4: Include House Work in your daily Things-To-Do list

Now you suddenly have 16 hours available to plan. And in a moment I am going to show you how the most boring of house-hold chores can become the most creative times of the day.

Follow the tip of leaving items 3 and 8 in your 10-item To-Do-List blank. Even for the Things-To-Do in the House. See How to do an 8-hour job in 5 hours.

Yes, new things-to-do in the home have a way of cropping up during the day.

Now, with up to 10 Things-To-Do for Work and 10 Things-to-Do for your Home, your life is already sure to feel a bit more balanced.

Just like you would for your 8 Revenue Generation Hours, plan appointments with people you care about during your 8 Recreation Hours. Co-ordinate calendars with family members and friends to spend quality time together.

Just like for your Work-Hours, a lot of the Things-To-Do in your Life-Hours are going to be the same old same old.

Chores. Routine things you have to do every day.

Here's how to turn chores to your advantage. You can get up to two extra hours out of the same 24 hour day.

Tip 5: Use your chores to grow your idea bank.

Once you develop this ability to multitask, you will be able to get a lot done in your day.

And generate time to spare, in the process.

Of the many idea-generation-techniques I have up my sleeve, this is one of the most productive. Because most people come up with their best ideas when they are DOING something else.

I found that that is often how I came up with my best ideas. While I was washing dishes. Or having a bath. Or cooking. (I just came up with three good ideas while preparing mashed potatoes for the family dinner.)

Here's the recipe for The Idea Chore-us:

1. Distill the problem or challenge to a key phrase
2. Now gather all the items you will need for your chore.
3. Connect the most mundane part of your chore to the key challenge you want to solve
4. Time yourself to come up with at least three ideas. For the start, the middle and the end of your chore.
5. Tick off from the Things-To-Do list that the chore is done. And put the three ideas into your idea bank for the problem or challenge you had to solve today. Two things are done, at the same time. And that's how you add hours to your 24 hour day.

You don't believe that really happens?

Here's what happened when I took 15 minutes off from writing this article to mash potatoes for the family dinner tonight.

1. Distill the problem or challenge to a key phrase. I need to come up with an idea for an ePlay that will attract a worldwide audience.
2. Now gather all the items you will need for your chore. Boiled potatoes; bowl for mashing; butter; milk; salt; pepper; fork for mashing.
3. Connect the most mundane part of your chore to the key challenge you want to solve. Peeling gave me Unpeeldom - a play about finding ways out of being locked-down; Salt gave me Salt & Pepper - a play on how black lives matter; Mashing gave me Black & Blue - how spouses were resorting to domestic violence in these pandemic times. But frankly, that was a theme I was already thinking about. But I got a title out of mashing potatoes.
4. Time yourself to come up with at least three ideas. For the start, the middle and the end of your chore. I have a feeling you've worked out which play idea came at which stage of preparing mashed potatoes. Unpeeling; Salt & Pepper; Black & Blue.
5. Tick off the Things-To-Do list of the chore done. Mashed potatoes, done. Three ideas for the problem or challenge you had to solve today. Three play themes ready for the next Zoom ideas review.

All in the course of 15 minutes of chore-time.

Yes, you have to practice this to become good at it. Yes, you have to believe that you can come up with ideas. Yes, you have to be living in a culture of innovation. Just how to get there in this article.

Work-Life Balance is simple. I didn't say it was easy.

It's about as tough, or as easy, as learning to ride a tandem bicycle.

One last piece of advice. Be your own competitor.

You can make this a team challenge. Or an individual challenge.

• You start the week with 1000 points.
• Deduct 100 points for every Thing-To-Do you started off the week with but did not get done by the end of the week.
• Deduct 100 points for every hour you slept less than 56 hours for the week. Deduct 10 points for every hour you spent sleeping more than 10 hours a day.
• Add 10 points for every appointment with yourself, or others, where the agenda got completed on time.
• Add 100 points for every hour that you were able to reward yourself with because you finished your 8-hour workday in less than 8 hours.
• Deduct 100 points for every hour you spent more than the 40 hours you had agreed to do as part of your revenue generation job.
• Add 200 points for every time you generate an extra hour of time for yourself you created by converting a chore into a creative think time.

Track your score each week and you will know how well you are riding the Work-Life Balance Bicycle.

You are welcome to customize the scoring depending on your own interpretation of Work-Life Balance. Have fun!