I was with a group of leaders recently who were discussing whether work/life balance is possible.  Some said it was, some said it wasn’t.  What do you think?  Is it possible?

I fall unequivocally onto the affirmative side of this argument.

If work/life balance isn’t possible then life is just a bummer and then we die.  If work/life balance isn’t possible we relegate ourselves to a stressed out, overwhelmed, hopeless existence of drudgery.   I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to live that way.

So, what is work/life balance?  What does it look like?  First off, I think it’s going to look different for different people.  There is not a set definition for everyone.  What is a good work/life balance for you may not be for me.  One thing is for sure: all work and no play is not good, nor is all play and no work.

Work is the primary means by which we contribute value to the world, so a balanced life will always include work – whether paid or volunteer.  However, a life solely comprised of work is unsustainable.

Life is far more than work.  Life consists of family, friends and relationships of all sorts; music and art, sport and recreation; hobbies and myriad passions; gardening, boating, hiking, walking, woodworking, movies, mountain climbing, dancing, fashion, poetry, auto racing…the kind of things for which we work.

There’s a key question we need to answer if we’re ever going to have work/life balance:

“How much is enough?”

If your answer is, “A little more”, then you’ll be chasing something that will forever elude you.  Nothing will ever be enough: you can always make more, do more, accomplish more, acquire more and achieve more.  You will push yourself to live at a pace that’s unsustainable.  You’ll not know balance.

In attempting to establish work/life balance in my own life I needed to consult with three important relationships:

1. My wife
2. My close friends
3. My self

My wife and I needed to come to agreement in regard to how much work time was appropriate in the different seasons of our lives.  When our children were preschool age I was launching a business – a very intense time of work.  We came to an agreement in regard to how many dinners I needed to be home for each week; how much work time was acceptable on weekends; how much holiday time we needed to take as a family; and what alone time we needed as a couple.

I also needed to get the input of close friends who gave some perspective on my activities.  At one point in my life I had some close friends tell me definitively that I was involved in too much.  In their opinion I was running too fast, my pace was unsustainable and would ultimately lead to a breakdown in health, and/or my marriage.

We have an amazing capacity for self-deception, that’s why we need to be open to the input of those who love us, who can provide some objective perspective on the pace at which we live.  Those who care about us can often see with more clarity than we the areas in our lives that are out of balance.

The third key relationship we need to consult with is our self.  We are body, soul and spirit.  In order to be balanced we need to appropriately feed our physical being, our mind, will and emotions, and our spiritual being.  We need exercise, we need rest, we need nutritious food, we need water, we need relationships and activities that feed our soul and emotions, and we need to commune with our maker.

Discover the kind of activities that make you come alive, that breathe life into your heart and energize you, then book time into your schedule for them.  Walking, gardening, boating, reading, whatever it is, set aside some time to restore your soul.

Work/life balance is possible, but it requires the ability to define how much is enough, to say “no” and to say “yes”, and the willingness to trust the perspective of those who care about us.

Don’t give up on it, work/life balance is worth your effort.