Work requires such a return from us that there is no time and energy left for a full-fledged personal life. We feel this imbalance, but we rush on without changing anything. And why aren’t you tired of living like this? asks Australian writer Nigel Marsh.
Nigel Marsh asked himself this question when he turned 40 *. The picture turned out to be unsightly: a typical “corporate fighter”, absorbed in work and practically unfamiliar with his children (and he had four of them!). Horrified by himself, Nigel took drastic measures: he quit his job and spent a whole year at home with his family. This experience did not give him much: it turned out that maintaining a balance between work and personal life is easy, only … when you do not have a job. Not a particularly useful skill, especially when the money runs out.
I had to return to work. But for the next seven years, Nigel Marsh persistently explored the possibilities of maintaining a balance between work and personal life, and later devoted his first book to this. Here are the four main conclusions he came to.
Honesty with yourself
The first step in solving any problem is recognizing the reality of the situation in which we find ourselves. Therefore, we must honestly say to ourselves: work, a career are incompatible with full-fledged and meaningful constant participation in the life of a young family. Thousands of people lead lives of quiet desperation, spending long hours at jobs they hate to buy stuff they don’t need and impress people they don’t care about.
Read more:
- Work and life: in search of balance
Full responsibility
Governments and corporations will never solve this problem for us. If we do not plan our own life, someone will do it for us (and, most likely, we will not like this “balance”). We, and we alone, must take responsibility for setting and maintaining boundaries in our own lives.
Realistic plans
You can’t plan for the unrealizable. A “perfectly balanced day” is an illusion: one day cannot contain everything that we would like. The “planning step” of a balanced life should be wider. But, of course, you don’t have to go to extremes and think: “I will live a full life when I retire / when my wife divorces me / when health problems begin.” Now the day is too short for you, and in retirement it will last forever. Look for the golden mean.
A versatile approach
Don’t forget about different aspects of life. It is not enough to say to yourself: “Now, in addition to the office, I will also go to the gym.” There are many things in life: the intellectual component, the emotional, the spiritual. Achieving balance requires attention to all these aspects.
“It may sound intimidating,” admits Nigel Marsh. – You don’t have enough time for your family, but I suggest that you also go to the gym and don’t forget to call your mother. I understand that very well.” Marsh recalls one episode when he had to leave the office early to pick up his youngest son Harry from school. Nothing special happened that day: they just took a walk, sat in a cafe, the father put his son to bed and read him a book. And the child said that this is the best day of his life.
This example clearly shows how important the little things are, Marsh emphasizes. Achieving balance in life is not necessarily associated with radical changes in it. Making a small contribution when needed can make a huge difference in the quality of your relationships and your life in general. Moreover, it can even change society. The more people follow this, the sooner the prevailing idea in society that success in life is measured by the amount of money will be replaced by a more meaningful and balanced idea of uXNUMXbuXNUMXbwhat a happy life is.
Read more at ted.com
* Nigel Marsh, marketer, head of the Australian consulting firm The Leading Edge, co-founder of the Earth Hour movement, author of Fat, Forty and Fired (Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2007), Fit , Fifty and Fired Up” (Allen & Unwin, 2012).