Life is supposed to be about balance, but realistically, some areas of our life grab more of our attention than others. It’s inevitable; but it’s not impossible to shift our focus a little to those underactive achievers that we may really wish to enjoy more of in our routines.
Typically, the main areas of our life include (in no certain order):
· Family/Friends
· Health/Exercise
· Play/Hobbies
· Romance/Adventure
· Spirituality
· Work/School
Of course, this list is not exclusive to everyone; however, they are generally the main areas most consider as part of a “life pie.”
Using the concept of a life pie, how do you figure out where you are at with your sense of balance?
First, evaluate where most of your time and energy is spent. List each of the items above on a piece of paper, adjusting the wording and categories to suit your life.
Then, assign a percentage of time you think you spend on each over the course of a week.
Draw that into a pie and visualize where more areas are consuming and where others are lacking. It doesn’t have to—and won’t—be symmetrical across the board, and that is perfectly fine. You may find that you spend a lot of time on health and exercise and less on play/hobbies, and that may work for you. But, if you feel a twinge that you’d like to play a little more, that’s where this assessment can come in handy.
Great….now what?
Take those areas that are overpowering and consider where you might be able to cut back some to make room for growth in other area. Maybe you spend too much time on social media and email for work and could regulate the number of times you check in online every day to free up time for meditation, dating or golfing (for example).
In the areas where you would like to allocate more time, make a plan for how you can work this area into your daily or weekly life. Need some more self-care in the form of massages or manicures as part of your health area? Perhaps if you frequently hang out with friends, either replace a social outing with a date with yourself, or suggest your friendly outing be focused on one of those wonderfully indulgent health goals.
Give yourself a few weeks to see if you can re-work your life balance, and then do this activity again to see how your pie might be aligning better with your personal goals. Check in every so often when you are feeling stressed or overwhelmed, and this might just be the ticket to alleviating life’s pressures by tapping into an underutilized slice of life!
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