Balance is another term that we often mistake for meaning “equal”. Work/life balance is not about spending the same amount of time and energy on work and “life”. It’s finding an equilibrium, a still point that allows for a sense of stability, even though things are still in flux around us. Likewise, equilibrium does not mean “equal” - where the equilibrium point is could be 80% of A and 20% of B or any other combination. It simply means that there is a stable quantity of each.
Freezing office? It impacts more than just your wardrobe choices. It's time to speak up. It’s July, which means that pretty much wherever you are in America, the corporate overlords have set the thermostat to somewhere in the range of your average refrigerator/freezer. If you’ve noticed that it feels harder to concentrate in your freezing office while furiously rubbing the goosebumps on your arms, it’s not just you.
Life is too short and we spend too many hours of that life at work to settle for something that we don't love doing. Here's one shift you can make to move in the right direction. Throughout our careers, we seek the elusive “dream job” that will check all the boxes and be the perfect environment where we get the chance to “do what you love and love what you do”. The problem is that if we’re waiting for someone to create that opportunity and send us an invitation we’re going to be wasting a lot of valuable time.
ou’re maxed out on tasks that you now see will have no benefit to your promotional path but feel stuck doing them anyway. People see you as the “go-to” person for extra assignments and you only say no when you’re so overwhelmed it comes out as hostile instead of strategic and confident.
If this sounds all too familiar, you may be wondering….
How can I break the pattern?
Change is inevitable and if our only plan to stay on track with our goal is to have everything go perfectly, we’re in trouble. It’s important to keep track of what we are working towards and WHY it’s important, preferably somewhere easily visible so that in the midst of chaos we can come back to our center. What we need is a clear and simple statement that reminds us of what we are striving for and how we can best attain it.
Imagine being able to ride the waves of drama and frustration in the office with a sense of calm, like a rock that stands tall among the waters. That urgent project is a source of focus instead of stress. You feel compassion towards the coworker that used to annoy you, and you don’t take anything personally. Does this sound like an impossible dream? It can happen for you with a daily meditation practice, truly!
One of the first signs that I was burning out in my teaching career was when grading a stack of lab reports went from taking 2-3 DAYS to 2-3 WEEKS. Even the easiest tasks seemed to take extreme amounts of energy and effort. In order to get your mojo back at this stage, we need to put what we learned through defining our Beliefs and Loves into Action.
It’s hard to answer questions about vision and passion when you’re having to scrape yourself off the couch to do the most basic tasks. The irony is that one of the most effective ways to move out of burnout is to have a future-focused motivation that aligns with your passions. Identifying the activities that fill your energy tank is the best way to gain momentum that will get you out of the fatigue zone.
Holding back pieces of ourselves deprives the world of our unique perspectives and leads to feeling unfulfilled and exhausted. I think this is something that we all grapple with, whether it’s doing the personal growth and exploration to uncover who we are, or finding ways to honor that authentic self in “the real world”. Here are some resources for uncovering and embracing authenticity.
