We often hear talks about work-life balance. But why do we compile our entire life outside of work into this one category called life? Isn’t it more complex than that?
I believe that there are 10 main areas of our life that we all have to address if we want to have a balanced life. In this post we will talk about what they are and over the next few weeks we will dive into each of those areas in more detail.
YOUR Life Balance
So let’s unpack today’s topic of life balance. First, let me clarify that when I say life balance I don’t mean that you should dedicate the same amount of time and effort to each of the areas of your life.
You are the one who will decide which areas are the priority for you in the stage of life you are in. Because not only do we have different personalities and lifestyles, but we also have different desires for our life.
Life balance is a personal thing so you need to create your own version – one that makes you feel fulfilled and happy.
Saying that, you need to be aware of all those life areas and make sure that you do not ignore them. Some of them might not be a priority for you right now. But if we completely disregard them, they will start negatively affecting our lives and the areas of our lives that are a priority.
RELATED: Work-Life Balance | 5 Misconceptions That Hold You Back
Life AreasÂ
I classified them into 10 categories:
Health, Fitness, Family, Household, Spiritual, Personal Growth, Career, Side Business or Hobby, Financial, and Community.
So let me give you a brief description of what goes into each of them and then I will give you two examples to help you see how they are all interconnected.
You can also download the Life Balance Goal Planner and Tracker – it is completely free and it has the information outlined ang helps you set specific goals for each area of your life.
Let’s Dive In
Health life area will be things like making sure that we get regular check-ups, eating a balanced diet, drinking water, our mental health, and self care.
And as you can see just by me saying what goes into the health category, you can see how many different options there are. Eating a balanced diet will mean different things to different people. For some of us it will be a vegetarian diet, for other it will mean mediterreanina diet.
There is no right or wrong. We just have to find one that works best for us and our bodies. This is why the overall life balance will also look differently for all of us.
RELATED: Intentional Living - How to Get Started
Fitness life area will be ensuring that you move your body. This will include regular exercise but also making sure that you stretch throughout the day when you have a job that requires you to sit by your desk all day. It might also be ensuring that you do some physical activities with the kids to start teaching them those healthy habits early.
Family life area is basically making sure that you are spending quality time with your family. This can include things like movie nights, date nights with your spouse, or family dinners a few times a week.
Household life area can be described as household management. Think of organization projects and household systems and routines.
RELATED: How to Find Time for Everything You Want
Spiritual life area is for your spiritual health. This can include things like your relationship with God, gratitude journal, meditation, and reading the Bible.
The life area of personal growth will include vision board, journaling, attending personal development conferences, and reading personal growth books.
RELATED: Personal Growth: 3 Books That Changed My Life
Career life area is for your work. It will have things like learning new professional skills, mentoring, career advancement, and change of careers.
Side Business / Hobby life area is where you ensure you spend some time on the activities that you are passionate about. Side business part will of course include things that will allow you to develop new products or services, attending business conferences, and/or content creation. And oftentimes are hobbies turn into side businesses.
Financial life area is all about our budgets, savings and retirements plans, donations, and financial priorities.
Lastly, community life area is where cultivate friendships, participate in community events,and do volunteer work.
RELATED: How to Balance Your Side Hustle with a Full Time Job
HOW IT ALL FITS TOGETHER
Like I said at the beginning, life balance is a personal thing. What will work for you might not work for me. But we have to make sure that we address each of those life areas. Those areas that are not your priorities also need your attention – even if it is minimal. Because if you choose to ignore those areas, after a while they will start to have a negative effect on everything else.
Example 1
Iimagine that you have started a side business that you are very passionate about. You take all the training you can find to learn the business side of things. You attend all kinds of networking events to make connections with people in your industry and potential customers. And you invest money in the best quality software and development of your branding.
Now they all sounds like great things for your business. However, if you don’t look at the financial life area you might be in trouble. If you did not sit down to decide upfront how much money you have to dedicate for the initial investment you will likely overspend. Similarly, if you are not carefully tracking your expenses you will not know how much money you are spending. And you might find yourself under a lot of stress if you end up with a lot of credit card debt and business that has yet to make any money.
RELATED: How to Overcome Mom Guilt
Example 2
The second example is probably something that we can all relate to. Lets say your priorities for a given period are family, personal growth, and career. And the area that is getting the most neglected is health. You don’t really pay attention to what you are consuming and you don’t practice self-care.
How long do you think this will last before you will start seeing the negative effects? When will you start noticing that your energy levels are decreasing and you need more and more coffee each day to get to the evening? How long before you notice that you are not as productive and creative at work? Probably not that long.
RELATED: How to Achieve Your Dreams
Importance of Addressing All Life Areas
These two exampels illustrate what I mean when I say that everything is connected. And that each area of your life needs to be addressed so you at least have a baseline.
Will you be able to do everything you want in each of them right away? Absolutely not.
You simply cannot be the mom who cooks from scratch every single meal, a mom who is a president in your kids’ PTO and leads all the events, a mom who runs a very profitable side business without a team to support your activities, a mom who trains for a marathon, a mom how is working on their promotion at work by leading a high profile project, and a mom who drives her kids to all of the after school activities, cleans her house by herself, and has a very active role in her church!
Unless you are a robot that is not feasible!
So let’s start creating life balance that works for YOU. Evaluate your life areas and address what is not working for you.
Your Turn
Which life area do you tend to put on the back burner most frequently?
Getting the balance right can be so hard but with clear areas to focus on it can really simplify the process.
You’ve got a great post here that is easy to relate to and easy to make the changes needed to balance life just right x
Thank you so much for your feedback! I went through a phase in my life where my life so very out of balance and I could not figure out why. So I want to share my experience with others in hopes of helping someone in a similar situation.
I watched some training recently, which divided your life areas into about six sections. She called it the life circle, I think. You then had to mark each area out of ten according to how much attention you were giving them. It was scary to see how some things were taking over whilst others were massively neglected. I definitely need more balance! Great post. Xx
Yes! I’m working on something along those lines – an assessment that will help you figure out where you are out of balance. Because sometimes it’s hard to tell. Thank you for your feedback 🙂
You’re so right. I had no idea my husband was getting close to zero of my time. Not good. 😬 xx
Great post Marta. One of the main reasons I don’t go out to work and have my own business is so that I can enjoy that perfect balance, that suits me. I love being a mum and a homemaker but I also love working on my business. Sometimes the scales tip towards one more than the other but I’ve found that taking time out for myself on a regular basis keeps it more balanced than not. Thanks for a great post!
That is so great to hear that you were able to figure out what kind of life balance works for you! And yes, it’s will tip to one side from time to time but that is life. We stop, evaluate, adjust and keep going 🙂
Great post, i’m sooo bad at balance, I tend to get a project in my head and throw myself into it so completely I neglect everything else!
It’s so easy to drop the ball in one area, normally just through forgetfulness. You get so caught up in one area that you neglect some of the others and then it’s only when you feel wrong that you realise. It’s great to keep all those elements in mind at all times though!
I created a vison board for myself to make sure that I remember those areas. Because you are so right, it is so easy to get cought up in a moment.