Do you know the feeling of being out of balance – where everything seems difficult and complex? Most of us are familiar with this place, and at times we get stuck there. We lose our energy and foresight, and everything seems to go wrong. We are desperately aware that the more we lose our balance, the worse things get.
We tend to think that if only we could sort everything neatly we would regain our balance. Needless to say these moments are rare in life.
Despite this fact most people live a life waiting for everything surrounding them to flow smoothly, expecting balance to come from this place. It actually works the other way around though – when you are in balance things get sorted out more easily because your capacity to relate, solve problems, see new strategies, etc. is simply better. That is why maintaining your balance must be your #1 focus.
So… you can choose between waiting for balance to happen or start making it your top priority.
How to make your balance your #1 priority
First of all, it is important to recognize that your balance does not depend on how your life and job look from the outside. If you find that idea overwhelming, I can assure you that it also means tons of freedom and self-empowerment. From here you can be the co-creator of the one thing that gives you access to your most important asset s – your balance.
This shift in focus is the most important part of the process. A life lived out of balance is filled with unnecessary struggle and hard work, but rest assured that you don’t have to live this way. To ensure that you don’t, every time you are out of balance your primary focus should be to get yourself back on in a place where you are in balance and thus feel free and have access to all your resources.
Your goal is to feel safe and peaceful even though things are turbulent. I can almost hear the people in my coaching practice quickly argue that I am asking for a utopia… This is only for people like the Dalai Lama or Mother Theresa. But I know that once they start practicing this shift they will very soon experience the truth of it. So when you find yourself out of balance I want you to start being focused on keeping your balance instead of taking care of the items on your endless TODO lists and hoping for your balance to eventually emerge.
Bringing focus to your balance starts by taking care of yourself and doing what is good for you. You’ll need to examine what it looks like when you are in balance and when you lose it, and – equally as important – how you will get back in or keep your balance. This is your foremost responsibility especially when you are leading others, whether a small team or perhaps even an entire organization. If you are not in balance it will affect your decisions, priorities and your execution in general. In other words, your imbalance is contagious and will spread quickly through any team or organization.
NB! Let me be clear – this is not a new thing to strive to be perfect at. It is not another excuse for you to be hard on yourself every time you get out of balance. You simply need to recognize that this is your goal and that your balance will be your guarantee that you will handle relationships, tasks and situations in a way that reflects the best combination and expression of your resources.
When we are in balance everything works smoothly.
What to do to start making your balance a focal point:
- Find examples of situations where you are in balance. Describe this state for yourself. How does it look and feel?
- Observe which things bring you further away from balance and which things bring you closer to balance. Maybe you can get support from your personal values/GPS (Press Link)
- Whenever things are going awry, implement some of the things from your positive list you made from number 2 (above) instead of starting out by working even harder on your TODO lists.
- Start using tools to balance yourself when you are under acute pressure (Taking deep breaths down in your stomach, building yourself up with positive self-talk and maybe even take time outs by removing yourself from the situation either mentally or physically).