Doctor’s Desk: Creating A Healthy Work-Life Balance

Being successful in the field we love brings us a lot of happiness. It also brings us a substantial pay check at the end of the month-which allows us to provide for our family, cater for our personal needs, go on vacations and have a nice life generally.

However, the craziness of meeting deadlines at work or satisfying a client just keeps pushing us to do more, most times down to our limits.

Life is too short, some would say-and you’ve got to figure out how to make each day count, not just as a career person but as an individual to have necessary balance you unconsciously yearn for.

A little guide to help you utilize your limited free time while putting some balance into your lifestyle.

1. End your working day at fixed time

Don’t let making a living prevent you from making a life. It is impossible to have a work-life balance if you haven’t figured what drives you as a person. You could work all you want and still find out that your life is so empty. You won’t be capable of doing much more than falling on your bed and sleeping off till the next morning.

So do you want to have enough energy to have a life separate from your career? Try ending your workday at a fixed time, so that you can find time to organize your other schedules better.

2. Plan your next week during the weekend

We tend to make a lot of plans for the following week, but often forget about them-even when we have written them down. How could you possibly solve this? Take an hour or two to organize your life during the weekend. Have a journal or a-to-do-list. When you sit down on Saturday or Sunday, don’t forget to go through your journal and messages and check if you agreed to do something over the weekend you possibly are forgetting

3. Learn to say “no”

When you say ‘yes’ to others, make sure you are not saying ‘no’ to yourself. You don’t have much time after work to do everything you want to, so you need to learn to say “no” to things that won’t help your working week. I’m sure you want to see your friend, parents, fix something around your house, and spend quality time with your family after work; unfortunately, the day is really short, and you cannot make it all happen. If you cannot make it, don’t force your plans, but tell your friends or family that you’ll inform them on what dates works for you.

4. Know your priorities

In order to better utilize your time, you need to know your priorities. Don’t let the major things be at the mercies of the minor ones otherwise you will pay dearly for it one way or the other. If you really want something-make it happen! The best way to make it happen is not to let other things get in the way.

5. Have a healthy life

All work and no play make you a dull-unhappy person. Create time to be with family, that’s the greatest asset next to life. Asides this, do your favorite hobby. Make out time for one or two events. Create time to exercise before work.

By exercising before work you will leave more time after work to dedicate to some other responsibilities, try jogging or working out in the morning. You’ll certainly increase your productivity, as those endorphins will help keep you cool and focused.

6. Ignore social media and turn off your laptop

This has certainly happened to you at some point- scrolling your news feed or chatting with your friends, and when you look at the watch you realize you’ve been doing that for an hour or even more. This is a really bad habit, as you waste a lot of time on something pointless. When you come home from work, and you immediately start logging into all of your accounts, you begin to slowly distance yourself from reality and you lose track of time.

If you want to be productive, use the time spent on Facebook or Twitter to promote yourself or your relationship better and keep it short when necessary.

7. Don’t plan too many things

People become chaotic and disorganized when they want to squeeze all of their plans into one evening. By using your priority formula and the saying “no” strategy, you can easily decide what plans you’ll go through with, and which ones will have to be postponed or even cancelled.  If you don’t, you’ll sacrifice one thing for the other and only be in a hurry the whole time.

In conclusion, there is really so much happening in our lives. It’s really hard to keep track of them most times. However, you need to think about your family, friends, and yourself in order to be able to organize well and utilize your time after work in the best possible way. Rest for at least thirty minutes every day asides from your sleeping hours and know that give or take, life will still continue the moment you stop breathing, so make use of these tips to create a reasonable work life balance while you can. And that’s our little advice from our doctor’s desk to you today, enjoy!