I don’t believe in work-life “balance”, but I do believe in work-life sustainability.
We want to be thriving in all areas of our life. If one area is off, it affects the others whether we admit it or not.
Growth and Leaks
What often happens is one area of life will require more attention for a period of time, and before we know it, another area of our life is suffering or has a “leak”.
Once we notice the leak, we want to address it. It is not a problem that there is a leak, but it does need our attention.
The goal is not to avoid leaks altogether, because there will always be leaks.
The goal is to have a close enough check on yourself that you never let one get so big that it spreads and causes damage to the surrounding areas.
For example: You have a big business event this weekend and it’s crunch time. Your workout routine and sleep may “leak” this week. It’s not ideal… It would be great if you could still workout and get adequate sleep, but it’s completely understandable that it may not happen.
You know the leak is there. You may have even planned for it. It’s ok.
Once the event is done, you can bounce back and repair those leaks. You repair the leaks by taking care of your body, resuming your workout and sleep schedule. Maybe even taking a couple days off of work to catch up on your personal life.
How not to do this: You are exhausted after your business event, but someone asks you to be available Monday. You had planned to rest, but say yes anyways. You aren’t able to work out again because you slept in and had to rush to meet this person. Tuesday comes and you don’t even feel like working any more because you ate so much all weekend and again last night. You feel bloated and just thinking about getting in your gym clothes makes you cringe! You skip your workouts all week. By the end of the week, you have a much bigger leak on your hands. It is going to take a lot of effort to resume your workout routine now.
Now you are feeling self-conscious, you are telling yourself you are a loser for being lazy all week, and it may start affecting your relationships, work performance, etc.
As you tend to each of the leaks now spouting water all over, it is a little harder to clean up and requires more effort and attention that it would have before.
It’s ok, it happens. We will never be perfect. But if we are always evaluating our leaks and aiming for thriving in all areas, we will have a stronger gauge when a slight leak begins coming on.
Remember, leaks are inevitable with growth. In fact, if you don’t have leaks, you probably aren’t growing!
What leaks do you need to plug up right now?
