I’m often asked about how to achieve work/life balance and I think the first step in doing that is reframing what balance looks like. Instead of looking at things at the micro-level, it’s often helpful to pull back and reexamine the issue as a whole.
Consider these glasses of water. Our natural instinct is to often think that only the middle glass is balanced. In reality, all three glasses are full. One is full of a small amount of water and a large portion of air and another is in the reverse, but all three are full.
Balance occurs over time, not just in the moment.
At one point, your life may look like the glass on the left with more time focused on the “air” instead of the “water” but I’ll venture a guess that at other times it contained the opposite proportion as well. Instead of expending your energy trying to maintain an unrealistic middle, afford yourself the grace and perspective to recognize that your life is comprised of a full glass all the time.
