Emotional Separation | Life?Work?Balance

We've all have heard so many times that it is important to achieve a long-term balance in life and have a clear life work separation. What happens when certain moments at work or at home become tiresome, troublesome, irritating?

The answer is: we end up taking these issues to the other side and replicate the same environment. The solution to this issue is clear and clean-cut Life-Work Separation.

Most of us don`t like to introduce any drastic changes in our life to achieve a balance in life and separate the work from home and vice versa. If you don`t like making drastic changes, using this very simple technique will help you in your social life, with your friends and family and change your life as it changed my life forever.

The key is the desire and commitment - to never allow your work cross over into your personal life and to keep your personal life well and truly clear from your work. Life is not a routine: It's the continually expanding circle and you never know what life has in store for you. Positive attitude towards life is paramount to all of us. To keep opening new doors, It is not enough just to change our routing but also beliefs which create new behaviour.

To live in peace, harmony and love. we create a mental image of peace, joy, pleasure and harmony. To make life beautiful, cheerful, exciting - such mental image and belief have to be built within. The same applies to pretty much every element of our life. The mental image of that separation needs to be built within in order to achieve the perfect separation and balance.

My customer service career started with a very interesting event. This event changed my life forever starting from my attitude towards life, my work career and desire to become a true leader in customer service and frontline management.

I hope you will use the same method, and I promise you, if you follow it to the letter, you will feel great. You will see improvements in your life from the very first day. However, it will not work without your desire to change and commitment to succeed.

On the very first hour, of the very first day of my customer service career, my area manager’s invited me to his office for briefing and induction. While waiting to meet the manager, my team leader introduced the area manager as an idol to all employees. He was talking in terms like “ Leader” not as Manager.

A leader with the main focus on his staff and customer service delivery. A leader that works with his staff and working on the front line. A leader that understands, motivates, empowers and works on individual goals of each and every employee. Values, behaviours and attitude are of paramount importance to him. A leader that has an ‘open-door policy’ and a “no question is a stupid question” attitude. A leader with a focus on creating a customer service culture within the organisation whose culture was let's say highly diversified.

In the middle of our conversation, we were interrupted by a man in his 50’s, warm smile on his face, clean-shaven, short grey hair and uniform that looked like it came from the dry cleaner 5 minutes ago.

He introduced himself as Tony and he repeated my name on 3 occasions in 2 minutes from the start of our conversation. He expressed heartfelt welcome and invited me to his office for a chat. The very first thing, he gave me a blank piece of A4 paper, a black pen, red and blue pencils, a glass of water and asked me to draw a line in the middle of the sheet.

Life-Work Separation | The perfect balance

Life-Work Separation | The perfect balance

So I did and it looked something like this:

He said: “Write on the right side " Life " and on the other side ‘Work’. He asked me to colour one side red and the other blue.

"Now, remember what I am going to tell you for the rest of your life and make sure you practice that"- he continued. "Always remember that your work colour is blue and life as red. Keep the colours separate, safe from each other and dry at all times. The only thing what separates them is a very thin line that can get blurred very easily. If you don't, this will happen.."

He splashed a bit of water onto the paper. Colours started dissolving: Blue went onto red, red onto blue all while creating smudges, blemishes, covering the middle pen line and an entirely new purple colour started emerging.

He asked," What do you see?" All I could say is: A total mess.

He said: "My point! Don't let yourself be in the middle of it. Once you close the door of your house on the way to work, leave your personal life behind that door, seal it, lock it and pick it up once you get back home. Once you arrive at your parking lot, before you open the gate, pick up your work life where you have left it at the end of the last shift. Time spent between pickups is your pen line - cleaning or call it a buffer zone. Spent that time to clear your mind and to revitalise the barrier between your family and your work. Do not break the barrier to allow either side to leak over that line. NEVER - EVER!

I have followed his advice to this day. I guarantee you if follow the pattern and you will be happier and healthier. Your family will be happier and they will not carry the burden of your work. Your co-workers don't care about your family adventures, problems and issues for the duration of their shift. Your fellow co-workers are coming to work for the same reason as you are; to make a living and to put the food on the table for their families. They have enough troubles on their own and really don't need someone else problems in their life. One day, your family issues might be just the last thing to push someone over the edge.

You know the saying "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas"? We not anymore! Now is "What happens in Vegas end up on Social media!"

Taking it one step further, I don't talk about my work with my family or about my life with my work colleagues during work. Who did what, how, why and with whom is really not going to help either party. What happened today and what is going to happen tomorrow is none of their concern.

We were a close-knit team and we would frequently socialise outside of work. However, we never talked about our work in our free time and we never talked about our social life during work.

I kept red being red and blue being blue. If you mix the colours you will never be able to separate them again!

Taking work issues home and discussing with your family is not recommended. Your family members get sick and tired of listening to your stories day in - day out. You literally end up being at work the entire time while you're awake.

During the time spent in the company, I have managed to make rapid career progress in a very short period of time. Career advancement in other companies and since maintained happy 23 years of marriage with a simple recipe: Mix of good old Customer Service principles, one A4 sheet of paper with one line across, two colouring pencils with a splash of water and two words written on it: Work | Life - Delicious recipe for life.

Off-topic: This doesn't only apply to adults. It also applies to our youth.

Unfortunately, high school students don't have subjects that actually teach them Customer Service skills. They finish high school without having a full picture of what this life has in store for them, once they finish grade 12. Our educational system is more focused on Pythagoras theorem, Algebra or other subjects the majority of the students will never use in their entire life.

In today's technology-driven society we need to emphasise on communications skills. We came to the point where 2 kids sitting in the same room, on the same couch texting each other rather than having a face to face open communication.

Customer service skills are not just work skills: They are skills for life and life long skills.

Empower all to learn and practice these skills, develop their logic and reasoning skills and find a job equipped with skills needed to interact with their peers and client on the Superior level.

What are some methods and strategies you use to achieve life-work peace and balance?

What skills would you teach new generations to deal with hurdles life and work environment has to offer?

For a long, happy and healthy life, Please keep these two images apart:

Please share your thoughts and views on the subject.

Thank you.

#life #health #business #success #leadership #management #workbalance #customerservice

#Life?Work?Peace