Work, Life and the Balance

There is never a shortage of discussion around work life balance and as long as your system works for you work life and personal life, great. Live your best life.

I have never really looked at my life in buckets. Life for me is a continuous process. I chose to live in the now, what ever that may be. When I am at work, I’m at work. For the most part the rest of the world doesn’t exist for me. I have a few life superseders that trump everything, which includes my wife and my daughters, but other than that my system is to be where you are when you are there.

For example, my family and I just took some time and vacationed. I intentionally created an environment where it was no way I could communicate with my job without a considerable add cost.

1. No work computer
2. No work cell phone
3. No international plan on my personal phone
4. Bought a camera(yes a real camera), so I would not have an excuse to carry my iPhone around with me everywhere.

In the end it’s discipline that keeps me living in the now, but there are always little things I do to make it inconvenient to drift.

Work is similar. I create an environment that makes it difficult for anyone (except for superseders), to reach or distract me.

1. Limit email to twice a day, (working on trying to get it to once a day).

2. No to anything that is not standard work.

This one is tricky, and I am still fighting this battle on a daily basis. For many of us it is not realistic to totally turn off all the noise.

Creating balance in the end is not the goal. In this guys perspective, the goal is full engagement in the moment. What ever that moment is, be fully engaged. The amount of time will not be equally divided among the many different areas of life, but it doesn't have to be. Being present will not deliver balance, but it will deliver completeness.