What is Work Life Harmony and where did Work Life Balance go?

As with all things in life, concepts come and go, or morph into something new. It wasn’t so long ago that having a work-life balance was the best thing since sliced bread, but it has proven to be unrealistic – creating the perfect balance between work and home life

Work-life balance is limited. It implies there is equal distribution of time and energy between work and personal life, and this is not always possible. Imagine a seesaw with work at one end and your personal life at the other. In the perfect world there would be even weighting for both – always separate. But what if you suddenly get an urgent project with a short time frame, or your child needs additional support before a big exam? That balance would not be achieved, adding additional stress.

Work-life harmony is about blending your professional and personal life, which can be more fulfilling and sustainable. It’s about fostering overall well-being, by reducing stress and enhancing mental wellbeing. It recognises that your priorities may shift dynamically, and to work with this you need to be flexible and adaptable. When you work to align your values and priorities, you can seamlessly choose what takes precedence at any given time.

It is fair to say that how we work and how we live have moved on exponentially in the last few years. The digital age has blurred the boundaries between work and personal life, as we can pick up work emails at the weekend, and receive personal texts in work time. For a great many of us, we are working from home, or at least hybrid working. This makes it hard to avoid a chat with the delivery driver, or to hang out the washing on a coffee break. These changes were hastily brought into reality by the pandemic in the early 2020’s – there was a mad scrabble to initiate new IT, new ways of having meetings, new systems for home working. Although organisations had no choice but to change, I think it is fair to say that leaders embraced these changes at a varying pace!

HOW WELL IS YOUR LIFE SEESAW BALANCED?

Our lives are totally individual, and we have our own specific challenges and responsibilities to manage. Sometimes it is easy to lose sight of how we are managing to maintain the balance between work and our personal lives.

Do you feel:

- Exhausted

- Frustrated

- Stressed

- Guilty – for not being able to prioritise personal issues during the working day

- Out of balance – feeling as though work is always the priority

THE ESSENCE OF MAKING WORK-LIFE HARMONY WORK FOR YOU

Life is not always easy, we are juggling too many plates and trying to excel with every one of them. We know that work-life harmony supports your total well-being, reducing stress and overwhelm, whilst fostering a sense of control and satisfaction. This is achieved by being adaptable, navigating your way between personal commitments, variations in workload and those unexpected challenges. But how easy is it to achieve? Surely taking time to make it work just adds more pressure to your busy days? Shifting towards work-life harmony takes time and requires practical strategies that avoid causing stress or guilt.

The key is finding strategies that blend the two realms of your life, rather than keeping them separate. The areas are:

- Flexibility to let go of rigid routines and expectations and embrace a more fluid approach to managing your day. Test out how it would work for you personally – are you comfortable making up for lost working hours in the evening? Think about the impact on yourself and those you live with if this happens regularly. Alternatively, taking an hour at lunchtime to do a fitness class or meditation may be a massively valuable health benefit for you.

- Effective communication is vital. Ensure friends and family, as well as work colleagues understand your approach. This manages expectations and helps them understand how it all works. For example: just because you are stepping out of work mode in the day to make a personal call does not mean you are available for lovely long chats about the family holiday or the health of the cat!

- Experiment with blending personal and professional activities. Does it feel ok to check your emails in bed in the morning whilst enjoying a cup of tea? Does vacuuming the living room at lunchtime, having the house looking nice when you sign off work, and getting your heart rate up feel good?

- Flexible boundaries need to be present to prevent burnout. You might set some specific times when you are unreachable for work matters.

- Self-care and healthy routines are imperative for your personal and professional success. Ensure you prioritise eating, moving, sleeping, relaxing, and connecting within your days.

- Leveraging IT tools can make managing tasks and time more efficient - and doing a time audit occasionally can ensure you are monitoring the good use of your time.

- Outsourcing and delegation – whether work or home related – you don’t have to do everything!

LUCY’S PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE

Work-life harmony has been a game changer for me. I have worked from home for several years now, and rather than a conscious effort to model this system, it was more of a natural adaptation. It has enabled me to take responsibility for ensuring my work got done (and well), but also meeting the needs of me and my family. As a single parent to four adult children, being a carer, running a home and being the only breadwinner, the stringent boundaries of the 9-5 would have broken me. In fact, they almost did on a couple of occasions – but I was fortunate enough to be employed at the time, and able to step away briefly to ‘reset’ myself and return to work.

Before stepping into the work of being self-employed, I witnessed the mindset of two managers who really understood that trusting their employees to manage themselves responsibly produced the best outcomes. The evidence that this worked was in my results. I generally worked 8-4, but made up the time if I had personal responsibilities that needed my attention during the day. I would hang the washing out as the kettle boiled for my coffee, I could walk the dogs in my lunch break and I could attend a medical appointment without the additional stress of worrying my boss would be ‘put out’ by the ‘out of office’ on my emails.

Now I am my own boss, I am probably even more aware of the need to ensure my seesaw is well balanced, and I have the resilience to bounce back if one area of my life requires more of my attention for a while. I will continue to adapt to this new way of working, to maintain my work-life harmony.

Do you identify with the high-stress balancing act of trying to manage everything, with the resulting exhaustion and frustration you feel when you fall into bed at night? Do you wish for a more fulfilling life where you can experience personal joy and professional success harmoniously?

The route to balance and harmony can be challenging, but the rewards of having a richer, deeply satisfying life are well worth it. It takes a conscious effort to shift your thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, adapting and reviewing along the way. If you would like some support on this transformative journey, book a discovery call with me. Remember, it is in your power to live a life of joy, blending work and personal priorities.

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