The secret to a happy life is to live a balanced life. A balanced life ensures personal effectiveness, healthy living, peace of mind and living well and when you look at the most successful people in the world, you will find that they have all achieved balance in their life.
Life is a balancing act, much like walking a tightrope in the circus, where we are always just one step away from falling. While we are all trying to move forward towards achieving our goals and dreams, we must try to keep the balance in all different areas of our lives, because as soon as one element needs disproportionate amounts of energy, we have to shortchange another area of our life.
It is important to keep in mind that nobody can balance our life for us. Nobody can feel, think, experience, see, love, breathe, smell, touch or die for us. It is up to us to keep the balance of all the different aspects of our lives and juggle work, family, health, social life, money, mental growth and spiritual development to live a fulfilling, healthy, balanced life.
So how can we achieve a balanced life in the midst of our crazy schedules? Here are TOP 10 strategies to balance it all out.
#1 Evaluate Your Life Right Now
Before you start to restructure your life, take a good hard look at your life as it is right now. Do you feel physically strong or are you exhausted all the time? Are you emotionally stable and continuously grow mentally or are you stagnant and emotionally overwhelmed? Do you enjoy the company of your social circle? Do you have meaningful, close relationships? Is your work challenging and satisfying? Are you a workaholic? Do you feel spiritually aligned? Answer these questions honestly, it will give you great insights into whether your life is balanced or out of balance and how you need to re-allocate your time and energy.
#2 Set Goals in Every Area of Your Life
Examine what your values are and decide what is most important to you. Then set goals for every area of your life and set clear boundaries so that you avoid becoming overwhelmed by taking on too much. Remember, your ultimate goal is to live a well-balanced, healthy life, so go over the most important aspects of your life and set specific goals for your job, career and finances, your relationships and social circle, your physical health, your emotional well-being, your mental development and your spiritual alignment. Keep in mind, depending on what stage you are at in your life, your focus and energies will be different, so revisit your goals on a regular basis.
#3 Create an Efficient Mindset
In order to keep your life balance, be organized and plan ahead. Take some time in the beginning of the week and look at your schedule. What needs to be done, what kind of upcoming appointments, impending meetings or presentations do you need to prepare for. Do you have quality time with your family and friends scheduled? Do you have plans to dedicate some time to your favorite hobbies and activities? What are your possibilities to get intellectually stimulated and grow mentally? Be sure to make time for every area of your life as well as recharging your batteries so you have the energy to get everything done and you are well on your way to living a balanced life.
#4 Be Willing to Take Risks
Being willing to take a look at our lives and assess ourselves and then take the risk to change will tremendously improve our lives. But not only that, you will feel a lot more energized and develop an expanded awareness of what life is really all about. Acknowledge that life balance is essential and restructuring your life to make that happen is definitely worth the risk.
#5 Prioritize Physical Health
Our 21st-century life is pretty sedentary, so it is essential to make physical health a priority and absolutely necessary that you make time for adequate physical exercise. In the short term, working out is a great stress reliever and helps to keep our mind more effective in terms of processing information and problem solving. And in the long term, keeping our body healthy will extend our life expectancy and gives us the energy to pursue our goals and dreams. Make sure you workout regularly, find an active way to get to work like riding your bike, walking or rollerblading and when it’s too far, get off the bus or subway one stop early or park your car further away, ensure that you get enough good-quality sleep and eat a healthy, well-balanced diet.
#6 Seek Intellectual Stimulation
It’s important to keep your mind stimulated and even if you are already doing a lot of work for your mind at work, don’t limit yourself to just one area or particular field of study. Expand your horizon and venture out into the unknown. Talk to people outside of your social circle, learn a new language, keep up on current events, read books on different topics, learn about science, art, history or fashion. Whatever sparks your interest, learn something new and seek intellectual stimulation any chance you get. And if you are worried it might take up too much of your time, listen to an audio book on your way to work, while you work out or when you clean your house.
#7 Broaden Your Social Network
Life is not about working day and night. And similarly, socializing doesn’t mean partying all the time. However, it is important to meet with your old friends, make new connections and work on broadening your social circle to keep your mind healthy and away from all the troubles, worries and work. You may want to consider joining a volunteer organization, a sports team, a choir or a public speaking club to enrich you personally and socially while expanding your network.
#8 Expect the Unexpected
Life never goes exactly as planned, so instead of getting upset or stressed out, learn to go with the flow when something unexpected happens. Things happen, your computer could crash, you could get stuck in traffic, you could get sick… We’ve all been there and the best way to deal with the unexpected is to accept that anything can happen at any time. This way you will be less likely to be thrown off your game and are able to adjust to changed circumstances. Also, keep in mind that living a balanced life may not always be possible, for example when a career or family crisis demands your immediate, undivided attention. Whenever that happens, do whatever it takes and once things go back to normal, make sure to take some time to recharge and rejuvenate yourself.
#9 Maintain a Positive Attitude
The best thing you can do to have a positive day and stay balanced is to make the intention of making the best of each day every morning. Sure, the day may not always go as planned, but if we maintain a positive attitude and put things in perspective, it will go a lot more smoothly. A big aspect of living a balanced life is to learn how to deal with uncertainty, adversity and unforeseen events and if you can learn how to not let things negatively affect you, you will not only be able to live a balanced, less stressful life, but at the same time you will learn to live in the moment. Be prepared for what’s to come in the future, but don’t worry about it.
#10 ‘NO’ is a Complete Sentence
Nobody likes to turn anyone down, whether that’s at work or in your personal life, but in order to achieve a balanced life, you are going to have to learn to say ‘No’ every once in a while. We all have only 24 hours available in a day and we can’t possibly do everything we want and on top of that do everything that everybody else wants us to do. So in order to live a more balanced life, it is important to know your priorities, protect them and cut down on unnecessary projects and tasks.
Finding balance in life isn’t always easy, but everyone has the power to decide for themselves where, when and how to concentrate their energies. You may need to have a good hard look at your life and your priorities and employ some critical thinking and problem solving, but in the end, when you achieve a well-balanced life, it will be so worth it.
LIFE BALANCE BOOSTS YOUR HAPPINESS, SUCCESS AND WELL-BEING
Joschi & Monika
#BoldNaked