Finding the balance of life can be quite difficult. If you ever feel burned out and overwhelmed you know exactly what this means. We have a lot of things happening in our lives and it can often feel like a complex juggling act.
Some people believe that you can achieve work-life balance, and other people think that it’s a total myth. In order to explore balance in life fully, we have to look deeper into the six sectors of daily living – career, finances, relationship, health, spirituality and personal development.
The first sector of life is your career. We ultimately want to find a job that we’re happy about. Because most of us spend a lot of time at work, if we’re doing something that we don’t enjoy, then that’s going to affect us deeply and the other sectors of life too.
When you’re exploring the career sector, it’s important not to approach it as a black and white question and appreciate all aspects of your job that make you happy. You might genuinely love the substance of what you’re doing but you could also get joy from the financial rewards it provides, the relationships, travel or growth opportunities it gives you.
Many of us need a job to survive financially, but these days, if you look closely enough, there’s so much potential to really do what you love. Always maintain a growth mindset and take some time to assess the pros and cons of you career path to make sure what you do brings you joy and enhances the other sectors of your life too.
The second sector is your finances. When your finances are not functioning properly, you are in a state of constant stress. If you have debt, try to figure out a long-term plan to get out of debt. Another principle to abide by is to never live beyond your means.
This is tough with all the advertising and marketing out there that tells us we need bigger and better things. But keep in mind that if you get caught up in this, it could be a never-ending cycle that you’re trapped in. The more you spend, the more you’ll have to work to maintain it which is not a sustainable situation, especially if you’re looking for balance in life.
Lastly, make sure to always pay yourself 10% before you pay anybody or anything else. This 10% is going into an account that’s basically for your retirement. It’s never too early to start saving for the future.
The third sector of life is our relationships and this is where the gold of life is. With the busyness of life, we can get wrapped up in a place where we care more about career and finances than relationships. But most people who’ve had near-death experiences will tell you that the only thing they thought of in the moments closest to death were people, and not jobs, money or other material possessions.
Relationships are the greatest spiritual practice. They teach us so much about life and what matters in life. So even in your busiest phases of life, make sure you take the time to nurture and cultivate core relationships. One day you might find yourself with immense financial and professional success, but if you have no one you want to share it with, none of it will matter.
The fourth sector of life is health. This is the most fundamental sector of life – if your health goes down the drain, everything else goes down the drain too. This is why we say your health is your greatest wealth and it’s so important to prioritize it.
When you’re thinking about your health, in addition to eating good quality food and drinking good quality beverages, you want to think about how are you exercising. You can always have too much of a good thing and that applies to exercise. You want to do it in a balanced way that’s sustainable for the long term.
It’s important to incorporate the four pillars of fitness – strength, balance, flexibility, and stamina- into your daily life in a sustainable way. This is what’s great about power yoga, it has all four pillars. If you’re not healthy, you’re not going to be able to manage stress properly, then all other sectors of your life are going to diminish and suffer.
The fifth sector is spirituality, and what this really alludes to is that we need to have time within our day, within our life, where we are connecting to a force that’s bigger than our own limited self. This can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. For some of you, it may mean going to church. Others of you, it may mean going to temple. It may mean going out into nature or even just meditating at home.
When we incorporate these practices to move beyond our ego, we move beyond feeling limited, separated and disconnected from this beautiful universe that we are a part of. When we connect back into that, we can be inspired and find joy and balance.
The last sector is personal development. This comes back to challenging yourself and having progress in your life. Life is fluid and in order to find balance in this ever-changing life, we need to also adopt a growth mindset instead of remaining stagnant and clinging to what already is.
What do you want to learn? Maybe it’s learning a new language. Maybe it’s learning a new instrument. Whatever it may be, maintain a growth mindset and listen to your soul. Even if it’s 20 or 30 minutes a day, going to a seminar or training once a quarter or indulging in an annual retreat, you want to continue on this path of personal development to show up in a more joyful and powerful way.
To summarize, in order to find the balance in life, it’s important to constantly revisit and reassess your six sectors of life: career, financials, relationships, health, spirituality, and personal development. These six sectors like the six spokes of a wheel. If any one of those spokes is broken, then the whole wheel is going to be broken, and you’re going to have a bumpy ride.
Below are some recommend practices to help you cultivate balance in life:
