SERIES: Taking Care of YOU! Maintaining Balance in Your Life

About the photo.  A few years ago, I attended a conference in San Diego and during a lunch break I took a stroll along the shore and came upon an insurmountable structure that fascinated me.  At first, I thought it was just a stack of rocks cemented together and that free balancing numerous sizes and shapes was impossible. Suddenly a man appeared with a armload of rocks and begin stacking them. For an hour I watched him delicately balance the rocks creating the repetitive columns you see.  To ensure that this wasn’t a figment of my imagination I just had to capture a photo of this man with a unique talent of showing his way of maintaining balance.

How are you doing in maintaining balance in your life? Are you taking care of YOU on a regular basis? Are your needs being met (if so, hopefully in moderation)?

A balanced lifestyle includes separating your work from your home life. If you allow work stress to interfere with your home life, then you are not experiencing a work life balance. What happens at work should stay at work and what happens at home should stay at home.

When you maintain a balanced lifestyle, you are in a better position to handle stress. And for many, the holiday season is stressful for various reasons. Don’t let symptoms of anxiety increase to the point that you lose control. You CAN maintain balance during stressful times.  Examples: taking breaks (reflecting on positive opportunities); lowering your expectations (being real about your situation; staying within your budget on seasonal purchases); eating healthy (moderation on the seasonal sweets and other delectable temptations); exercising; easing up on those holiday drinks that can increase your anxiety; spending some time helping someone that needs assistance; avoiding anger; and many other ways I’m sure you can think of to deal with anxiety.

Maintaining balance in your life will prove to impact your performance in much that you do in a positive way.  Take care of YOU and strive to maintain a healthy balance of life.