By definition, burnout is a work-related phenomenon — but our health in other areas of our lives contributes to our vibrancy at work. It's an important part of work-life balance. Having positive outlets can help you get through a stressful or frustrating time in your career.
How to improve work-life balance
Taken from: https://www.betterup.com/blog/how-to-have-good-work-life-balance
The truth is, there’s no prescription that will fit everyone. You may have to play with what feels most relevant to you. With intentionality and a little creativity, you can reset your work-home balance.
Here are 12 tips to have a good work-life balance:
- Plan ahead. Plan ahead to combine work activities with leisure, social, or fitness activities. If you find yourself with several virtual meetings back-to-back, try taking them while you go for a walk. You could also make a call outside (if ambient noise allows!).
- Embrace the way your brain works. Use productivity hacks like avoiding multitasking, taking short but regular breaks, or turning your phone off. Block out all other distractions so you can make the most of your time.
- Set blocks of time for different tasks. Designate a time to check (and respond to) messages, a time to take meetings, and a time to do mentally intensive work. It helps to anchor these tasks around the times that you are personally more productive.
- End work at a certain time. There’s a saying that “work expands to fill the time allotted,” and when you work from home, it’s even easier to let work spill over into personal time. Set a time to end work for the day, and reinforce it by powering down work-related devices, locking your office, or scheduling something afterward.
- Enlist technology to help you unplug. Use an app to block distracting websites during the day, and then block work tools after hours. If you can, restrict work to one device, or try to keep one work-free device so you can disconnect completely.
- Go out for lunch, or enjoy lunch with coworkers. Even if you’re working from home, you can go out for your lunch break or connect with colleagues. The change of pace will be refreshing — and, of course, will remind you to actually eat something.
- Take time off. When you’re home all the time, you tend to try to work through illnesses that certainly would have kept you home from the office. Time off, including sick time, personal time, vacations, and bereavement, are important ways to nourish your well-being.
- Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness makes imbalance hard to ignore. When you practice mindfulness techniques, like meditation or breath awareness, you become more in tune with your emotions and physical sensations. Paying attention to these feelings helps you learn how to notice when you might be suppressing a need in order to work. It’s hard to return to that spreadsheet after you notice your stomach rumbling.
- Find something you love outside of work to engage in. If you have something that you’re excited about doing after work, it will make it easier to disconnect from work messages or end your day at a predetermined time. Our hobbies boost our energy and vitality. When we play and feel creative, we bring our fresh selves back to work.
- Reconsider work that makes you yearn for balance. If your work feels completely unrelated to the activities that stir your interest, enthusiasm, energy, and sense of meaning, you may need to look at how you can change the work you do or the way you do it. While work doesn’t need to (and can’t) satisfy all of your needs for purpose, meaning, social connection, and challenge, we can expect work to provide moments of satisfaction, accomplishment, and connection.
- Communicate with your manager. Poor work-life balance is often exacerbated by the fear that we’re not doing enough. Talking to your leaders can help you prioritize where to spend your time.
- Work with a coach or therapist. If you feel overwhelmed, stuck, or don’t know where to begin to disconnect, working with a professional can be invaluable (even when you are a professional in the same field). A coach or counselor can ask the right questions and help you identify which changes will make the biggest impact and how to get started.
One word of advice: start small. Although you may be anxious for your work-life balance to improve, your work habits have been built over time and likely won’t change overnight. If your goal, for example, is to reduce screen time, trying to restrict yourself to a certain number of hours will probably just frustrate you. You’re more likely to stick with a new habit if you start with a smaller target — say, one five-minute tech-free break a day.
Recommended Book to Read
Dear Work: Something Has to Change by: Sara Ross