Post written by Marlon Ribunal.
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Sometimes, we just don’t know enough about what we are trying to achieve.

- Stuart Wilde

Losing balance in our life and career can be detrimental to all the things that we care about.

Our sanity depends on how well we keep our balance. We always complain about the lack of time being the source of the imbalance.

Time is an important element in our life and work but it could hardly be the source of our  tumult because time never ceases to exist; and it does so as long as we don’t lose the heavenly bodies that guarantee the space and time continuum.

We cannot “blame time” for our “lack of time”.

If you read my “How To Dig Yourself Out of the Productivity Pit” post you might have noticed the personal tone that I have written that upon.

Those 5 R’s are my formula that I hope would work for all the things that I am trying to achieve.

If you looked deeper, those five things can be readily adapted to other situations.

If you want to achieve something (maybe you’re trying to get a new job or embarking on a new venture), go back to those and let your situation be translated through those five principles (I am sometimes using the word “phases” depending on the application).

I don’t claim expertise on most of the things that I write. The thoughts and concepts – the bits – I am sharing with you are the life-lessons that I have learned and trying to live by.

I have already said that Focus, Act of Doing, GTD, 5R Formula and other things are the keys to productivity.

None of those would work in the absence of balance. Here are few of the things to consider if we want to keep that Balance:

Lack Of Time is a Myth

There is no such thing as a “lack of time”. You might have learned that from the GTD system.

The things that haunt us the most are the open loops – our commitments, promises, broken relationships, unfinished projects, childhood dreams, etc.

It is not really the “lack of time” per se that afflicts us – it’s the lack of persistence.

We always find ourselves making the lack of time as an excuse to not doing the things that we meant to do.

Once you stopped persevering time will always be an issue.

Practice the 80/20 Principle

I have briefly described the Pareto Principle in a previous post. The principle states that “80 percent of your output is produced by 20 percent of your input.”

You don’t have to master that principle. It only takes some consistency to make that principle work to your advantage.

The 80/20 rule is a powerful lifehack that you can use to accomplish the things that you’d initially thought you don’t have time for.

Maybe you want to learn a hobby or another skill that is not related to your job.

You can find ways to tweak how you work to lessen your effort without cutting corners or compromising the quality of your work, and you can start from little things.

But you must always keep a good attitude – you want to lessen your effort in some areas so that you can devote some of your time to other meaningful stuff.

Separate Concerns

Mixing life and work can be overwhelming if we are not focusing on the things that matter.

The thing is we should draw the demarcation between work and home, personal and non-personal, short-term and long-term, yin and yang, etc.

The separation may not essentially be physical.

We should logically separate our concerns on all aspects of our life.

A very practical example of this is how we manage our emails. Just imagine how messy it could be if you have your work and personal emails on the same inbox.

If you are like most sane people, you would agree that doing that is a suicide. The same is true with all other aspects.

You have to distinguish the different types of relationships that you are engaged in.

I am not suggesting that you put up different personality types to adapt each situation.

What I am saying is that you should learn to play the rules appropriate to the particular interaction.

Establish Your Own Rituals Around Your Goals

What do you do in the morning before going to work?

What do you do before going to bed? Stopping by Starbucks to grab a cup of joe on their way to work is a custom for some people.

Some cannot leave for work without reading the day’s headlines on the newspaper.

We have our peculiar rituals - things that we often do automatically or unconsciously (if that is possible at all).

Our rituals are the cornerstone of the things that we do on larger scale. Our character is built from our rituals.

If you want to cultivate a new skill, you can integrate that to your daily rituals and you’ll be surprised of the outcome.

Allotting few minutes toward learning that new skill before you go to bed, for example, can contribute a lot to the learning effort.

Failure Happens Even to the Best of Bests

It’s not enough to say that “failure is not a choice”. You can always promise yourself not to fail but it happens all the time.

You can have the perfect plans but failure happens nonetheless.

The more you try to avert the possibility of failure the closer you get to committing one.

Many people fail because they plan to avoid failure and not plan to reap success.

Until we accept the fact that we can fail in our effort to become successful, we will continue to experience the pain of failure.

So…

The ideas above are only the few things to consider when faced with balance-life issue.

Personally, I believe that the things I mentioned above can really help one in whatever situation he or she is in.

Maybe you are currently under some form of transition, do you find the ideas above helpful?

Maybe you are jobless and still struggling to find a job after many months of unemployment, do you find comfort in knowing that there are changes that you can make to alleviate your circumstances?

Share your experiences, thoughts and passion now!