Work & Life: Can we really have equilibrium?

When you went to school as a kid, one of the phrases you would have heard almost daily is “Work hard and you will be successful” or something similar. In many cultures and societies, from the early stages of life, we are taught to occupy our time with activity. Being idle goes against this very thought ingrained in us.

Work: Does it spark joy?

Marie Kondo’s ways of living took the world by storm a couple of years ago. According to her, you should only keep those things in your lives that spark joy, that make you truly happy. We can put this approach in the context of work too.

In 2010, Christopher Hsee (Chicago Booth Professor), Adelle X. Yang (Antai School of Management), and Liangyan Wang (Shanghai Jiaotong University) published a research report titled ‘Idleness Aversion and the Need for Justifiable Busyness’. This report about some rather interesting experiments by the trio. In one of these, the participants had the choice to stay idle or to do something. They were told that they could either sit and wait in a room for 15 minutes before the ‘actual’ experiment starts or they could walk for 15 minutes to get to another venue for the same.

Unsurprisingly, the number of participants who chose to walk to another venue was lower. Yet, it was found by researchers that those who did displayed significantly higher levels of happiness than the people who chose to remain at the primary location.

Eudaimonia is a Greek word which literally means the state or condition of 'good spirit', 'happiness' or 'welfare'. In simpler terms, it is the happiness you get from working up to your full potential.

So when Samuel Smiles said, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but all play and no work makes him something worse.”, he was pretty on-point. It is the satisfaction of working well that sparks true joy in your life.

The age of workaholism

Now, you might think, “Okay, work makes people happy. So what? That doesn’t mean I’ll devote my entire time to it.” Alas, for some folks this is exactly what happens. The serotonin boost they get from the validation received upon a job well done starts to fuel their purpose. Getting more and more work done becomes their sole motivating factor, to the point that work can be labelled as an addiction.

Like every other addiction, this too affects your life detrimentally. Stress and anxiety levels increase exponentially and there is no lifting your leg off the pedal. You are full on, all the time. Your mind seems to be constantly occupied with thoughts of your ‘to-do list’ and it becomes harder to sit back, reflect and enjoy life experiences.

In a recent survey, 7 in 10 Singaporeans found 2021 to be most stressful year ever. This makes the question of establishing a sustainable work-life equation essential to both the individual as well as the organisation. Self-awareness is key if you want to set yourself on a path to get rid of workaholic habits, regardless of the reasons for it.

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How to create an optimal equation?

There is no formula to cracking the secrets of this equation. You may well need to try out a lot of different things, wander around a bit while you do things that might seem and feel pointless (but they aren’t), and just have a whole trial-and-error experience before you figure out what works best for you.

Here are some tips to get you started.

"Do not wait until the conditions are perfect to begin. Beginning makes the conditions perfect."

~ Alan Cohen

- Set time limits: Before you get started on a task, try to determine the amount of time it will take you to get it done. Decide a time as a self-imposed deadline and make sure you stick to it. If the piece of work demands 5 hours, there’s no need to give 7 hours to it.

- Leave perfectionism behind: Nobody is perfect. Doing yet another edit for that presentation won’t make much difference to it, but the combined weight of extra workload will affect your mental health greatly. You need to understand that the healthier option is to strive not for perfection, but for optimal performance.

- Unplug from an online life: Let’s be honest, staying chronically online is one of the greatest troubles we face today. When you spend an excessive amount of your free time on social media, you end up exhausting yourself even further. So go on, take a real break.

- Review and reflect on your day: A workday is an amalgamation of a vast number of experiences. Each day, you come across things that affect you, consciously or subconsciously. Thus, it is a good practice to take some time out at the end of the day and reflect on what happened. Give yourself the opportunity to process, respond and make peace. This, in turn, helps you establish a healthier equilibrium of work and life.

- Learn to say ‘No’: This world is a busy one. We all have commitments; priorities and we need time for ourselves too. We all know we don’t have an infinite store of time nor energy for everything that comes our way. Thus, it is vital to be able to say ‘no’. It is part of how to develop yourself as a leader and of personal excellence. Read of an earlier blog for ideas.

Establishing a healthy work-life equation can feel daunting. Yet, it is also something very necessary for your long-term wellbeing. Once you have internalized it and made it part of your habits, the path becomes vastly easier. All the workplace stress management workshops and processes won’t be of any use if you don’t have the right foundation.

So, don’t wait for the ‘perfect time' to start experimenting. Spend some time to discover what works best for you. Start building the boundaries that will serve you now and in the future. And when you are on the road to equilibrium, you will start to reap the rewards of happiness and joy in work and life!

BONUS TIP for reading till the end! The flowprofiler® psychometric assessment helps teams combine self-awareness and self-management for personal excellence. Contact us if you’d like to know your team better and start 2022 with better clarity.

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