Many people are stuck with a lack of balance in their life. There are many areas of life including working or taking action, learning, taking care of our health, spending time with loved ones, and just relaxing. When you focus too much on one area and forget about the rest it can negatively affect you by encouraging stress, anxiety, and health problems to come along.
For example, if you work too much you may not take any time to relax and enjoy life, and this can burn you out and cause you to become sick, frazzled, and even depressed. Relaxation and recuperating is important in life in order to be happy and feel balanced.
On the other hand, if you take too much time laying on the couch you can let life pass you by and forget about your dreams, goals, and health. This can have a negative affect on your health and ability to be happy as well, because you are not focusing on things that will make you feel accomplished and alive.
Balance may not be the same for everyone. One person may feel balanced when they put more focus on work and less on relaxation, but they still put focus on other areas of their life, and that's the key to balance. You have to enjoy a well-rounded life that doesn't just consist of one thing or the other.
Some Tips to Help You Create Balance
1. Learn To Listen To Your Body
Your body knows when it's time to take a break and when it's time to get moving. It's craving that balance that it needs. You just need to tune into your body and listen to it!
If you have been working too hard you will get signals that you need to relax. You may feel stressed which is a sign of not taking time to relax and recoup. You may feel like you are drifting away from your family which is a sign of not spending time with loved ones. You may be gaining weight which is a sign of sitting behind your desk too much. There are many signs that you may be getting and once you tune into them you will find it easy to understand what you need in order to feel balanced again. The trick is actually doing it!
2. Learning to Say No
It's not going to help much if you listen to your body but don't take action on what it's telling you. Often this is because you are afraid to say no. For example, even though you know you need to relax and recoup, your boss asks you to work extra hours, so you say yes instead of taking the break you need.
Another common example is that you may feel as though you need to get out and exercise but your favorite TV show has come on and you don't want to miss it (or say no) so you ignore your body and watch the show instead.
You have to willing to listen to your bodies signals and respect them if you want to create balance in your life. Your health and happiness is more important than a few extra hours at work or a TV show. Keep that in mind when debating to say yes or no.
3. Create a Balance Checklist
I have a balance checklist sitting right beside my computer. It contains a list of all the things I think are important to create balance like working, learning, exercising, meditating, and spending time with my husband. Every day I try to do each thing on my list. If I'm successful I feel always balanced at the end of the day, and if I'm not successful it's usually because I got signals to work more for the day or relax more for the day, which makes me feel good as well.
You can create a balance sheet by listing all the things you think are important to you in life. Then create a table of Monday to Sunday and put your list under each day. As you go along with your week make sure to pay attention to the list and check off the individual tasks as you go along. Your objective should be to check off as many things on your list as you can.
Not only will creating a list to maintain balance help you stay balanced throughout the day, but soon you will find that creating balance in your life will become a habit and you will no longer need your checklist.
