I wonder how many people this year will have considered a New Year's resolution around improving their work/life balance? According to Wikipedia Work–life balance is a broad concept including proper prioritizing between "work" (career and ambition) on the one hand and "life" (Health,pleasure, leisure, family and spiritual development) on the other.
What does this really mean?
Are we to assume that the world of "work" and the world of "life" are really two completely different spheres?
Really?
What is happening at work? Are people so focused on their career and ambition they are forgetting to live? or so focused on their health, pleasure, leisure and family and spiritual development they are failing to work?
The government is even launching a work life balance week so that we can all address this obviously pressing issue. You can attend training courses that enable you to re-balance your life with your work or your work with your life.
What if we've got it all wrong?
What if one of the primary tasks of effective leadership is to dispel this pervasive myth? What if, we've just got one life that is lived both inside and outside of the world we call "work"? What if the work we are all called to is to live fully irrespective of context or focus?
What does it mean to live fully?
I would suggest that to live fully is to be the best expression of yourself.
Meaning?
That as we discover and give expression to who we are and as we live out what we value in a congruent way, we balance our energies in a way that is automatically life enhancing whether we are doing what we call "work" or not.
Balance then is a byproduct of living an authentic life that is congruent with our values and beliefs.
Are you saying I wasted my money on that work life balance or time management course?
Most courses worth their money will encourage you to consider and reflect on what is really important to you (your values) make some form of assessment about how your time is currently being spent, and then evaluate the difference and give you some useful strategies for re-ordering your priorities. But they are in my view all based on a fundamental flawed logic that assumes that life is divorced from work.
I personally love the Jewish toast L'Chaim which means "To Life" - it's a great toast and perhaps reflects a universal truth. So, you could invest this year in a great work life balance course, and collect a few more strategies or you could just embrace your life, who you are and live out what you truly value and you may experience more balance than you had previously considered possible.
Many people think I work too much, what they do not see is that I am constantly learning, creating and growing myself, and thereby making more of me available for others learning and growth. This is not work to me, it is my passion. If I read text books it is perceived as work, whilst a novel is considered leisure; I don't experience it that way Yhe late great Joseph Cambell said that for him, meditation was underlining sentences in books (me too). My work is a great source of joy and pleasure to me.
ReplyDeleteI think there is a tendancy to compartmentalise one's life in certain kinds of employment rather than in others. Compare for instance the public sector official carrying out their statutory duties and their corresponding performance management culture to the self employed person who may have so much more choice and freedom in what they do. For them going in at the weekend for instance is not a burden but a choice as one's stake in the business is so much greater. They are more likely too to have a real passion and vision for their business than the Local Government Officer or Civil Servant. I have spent the last 39 years in public service, and the last 21 years in a variety of management positions, and had it not been for my taking on a professional caring role as a Social Worker, this time could have been very dry and tedious. I chose to train in Social Work because of my Christian faith and this has allowed me a measure of personal,faith-based and professional integration in a more holistic expression of working and living than many of my colleagues. Visiting a vulnerable client in their home rather than time spent on office-based administration has made me feel much more fulfilled, and praying for them dispels that dividing wall that so many of us have constructed between our private and working lives. Despite being a manager I have always tried to stay close to practice and service users. No courses on work/life balance for me!
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