Good work-life balance habits

During successive trainings and meetings focused on time management, we noticed a significant trend. When asked about the greatest challenge they face, training participants most often pointed to implementing a balance between work and personal life.

“Regeneration is also often a challenge, when we simply cannot recover after significant physical or emotional effort. Let’s try to unpack this issue.

Oprzemy się na teorii J. Loehra i T. Schwartza, która wyróżnia cztery rodzaje energii, jaką posiada człowiek:

Physical energy, responsible for the body’s fitness and performance
Mental energy, on which our learning abilities and cognitive performance depend
Emotional energy, which encompasses stress resilience and self-control
Duchową, która odpowiada za poczucie sensu i wewnętrzną zgodę z samymi sobą.

For each of us, this energy will look different—and recognizing the best ways to restore it affects our well-being and the potential to increase personal and professional effectiveness. Daily stress limits our ability to recover, which is why it is important to know your personal methods for regaining vitality.

Energy and its restoration

Standard ways of recovery are instinctively known, but it is worth recalling the less obvious ones.

When it comes to physical energy, it is important to note that marathons are not beneficial for our body.. It works much better organizing effort into short sprints, interspersed with restorative breaks. Small portions of intense effort are easier to fit into your work-life balance plan. Remember, any movement, even the smallest, is better than none!

When it comes to emotional energy, focusing on the facts can be very helpful.. We usually tend to evaluate events based on our interpretations, which can obscure the true picture of the situation. It is also important to pay attention to the language we use. Taking responsibility by speaking from an ‘adult’ perspective allows us to communicate our intentions clearly to others. Additionally, it helps build our self-awareness when we are honest with ourselves. See for yourself the difference it makes to say ‘I choose to do X’ instead of ‘I have to do X’.

Restoring mental energy is challenging because our focus and cognitive performance depend on many factors. Battling distractions that create a ‘sawtooth effect’ while simultaneously trying to regain control over attention can be a significant effort. It is important to remember the basics: – We handle critical, high-priority tasks much better when we have clearly defined goals. –Being aware of why we are doing something and where we are in the process helps us cope with difficulties and makes functioning easier. It is worth grouping tasks to avoid multitasking and focusing on one at a time—this will help us organize our own work-life balance.

mother-father-playing-puzzle-pieces-with-their-daughter

Spiritual energy is the most difficult to recognize and take care of. On the one hand, it can seem hard to grasp; on the other, we all know the feeling of aimlessness when the tasks we take on appear to lack meaning. Spiritual energy is restored by aligning with our inner compass: our values, the sense of importance of what we do, and the role we have chosen to take on in life. As our sense of purpose grows, so does our motivation—not only in professional life but, above all, in our personal life.

During our time management trainings, we ask participants: do you take sufficient care to restore energy in each of these areas? How do you work on improving your efficiency and resilience? At these moments, it often becomes clear that the habit of taking time to rest and recover is not widespread. We frequently forget that every daily, weekly, or yearly plan should include designated time to regain energy. School holidays didn’t appear out of nowhere!

Your personal recovery

As a method for planning recovery we recommend the Dream Map exercise.. It helps to discover less obvious ways to replenish our energy. At the same time, you can decide for yourself how much time you want to devote to them—it works well both in the short and long term. Depending on how you fill out your Dream Map, it can support the regeneration of different types of energy to varying degrees. You can create it on a piece of paper or in a spreadsheet—choose the medium that is most convenient for you.

Start by creating a list of 20 pleasures, which you can enjoy in your life. There is space on the list for each of them: include both expensive and inexpensive pleasures, long-lasting ones (like a vacation or a weekend trip) and short ones (such as having a coffee, arranging your favorite blocks or puzzles, or looking at photos). Pay special attention to activities you remember giving you particular joy in the past.
On the list you’ve created, mark the pleasures you haven’t enjoyed for a long time. These could be childhood games, old guilty pleasures, activities you avoid because you feel they are no longer appropriate, or things you’ve grown accustomed to putting off.
Uszereguj wybrane przyjemności według czasochłonności.
Now the most important part: plan which of your pleasures you will carry out in the coming week (you can consider the shorter and less time-consuming ones), and which you will carry out in the coming month (you may choose a more time-consuming one, or several smaller ones).

Such a plan brings benefits in several contexts. First, it draws your attention to the need for rest and the importance of setting aside specific time to fulfill it. This way, you can get rid of the guilt of thinking, ‘I don’t have time for this right now.’

Secondly, the way you select your pleasures gives you the chance to remind yourself of what is important to you. This is particularly significant for replenishing your spiritual energy—such a carefully calibrated set of pleasures increases the likelihood of recalling what it means for you to be in alignment with yourself. Taking a moment to reflecting on why we do certain things is a particularly good habit.

The final point on the Dream Map is carrying out the planned actions. And then— repeat! It’s important that this does not remain a one-time action. It’s worth revisiting such a map to develop a strong habit of planning rest. Another good approach is to anchor the behavior in reality—for example, deciding that a specific pleasure will be your way of celebrating small successes. You can also use BJ Fogg’s framework for creating tiny habits:

Whenever I [routine action] I also [new behavior]

This kind of ‘anchoring in reality’ will help you establish time for rest. Habitually engaging in the pleasures you’ve identified will help you develop personal ways to recover. Keep in mind that, depending on which pleasures appear on your list, your needs across different energy categories may be met to varying degrees. Pay attention to this over the long term, so you can adjust your list of pleasures to your actual needs and plan your rest time accordingly. Good luck!