3 Ways to Make Work and Life More Integrated and Less Stressful

Work-live integration

Source: monkeybusinessimages/iStock

If life is like putting a bean in a jar, each bean representing a year that you have lived, you don’t know when your last bean will be counted. This is life’s mystery, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do to predict when, how, or what will end the counting of the beans. That is why it is necessary to find a realistic balance between life and work.

It is understandably challenging to balance work and life in a world where you stay connected 24/7 on your devices on social media. The habit of going to bed with your cell phone and laptop in case of emergency doesn’t make achieving a work-life balance any easier.

Neither does it help to stay up late worrying about your young, adult children or to turn on a tracking location device to monitor their movements for safety. Moreover, struggling with whether to read your young adult’s text messages to know who they are talking to and going out with is stressful to your internal systems.

In addition to all that, making sure your own well-being is in balance and bills are paid on time can be a bit too much for your body and mind to handle, because the mind can’t tell which stress is which.

Whether in the boardroom or in the bedroom, the struggle is real. Stress doesn’t care about your location or status. Simply put, stress is everywhere, and has no respect for people. Sometimes, in the quest to find relief, people turn to books on how to balance life and work or TV shows on how to handle societal pressures.

Others turn to alcohol or other substances. Yet, most solutions to your challenges do not come from other sources but from your inner voice.

In 2021, an estimated 1.7 million suicide attempts were recorded and 48,183 Americans died by suicide, making it the 11^th cause of death in the United States. In addition to the heavy toll of suicide, reactions to stress cause incalculable mental, emotional, physical, and psychological problems.

While there are no magic pills to pause everyday stress, there are ways to negotiate with the effects of stress without allowing it to ruin your well-being. The way you perceive stress determines how you handle the events that bring stress into your environment.

Three simple ways to manage the effects of stress are: knowing when to unplug and reset; taking a self-inventory; and surrounding yourself with trusted people that care about your well-being.

Knowing when to unplug and reset. Knowing your limit is one way to create balance because if you don’t know your limitations and your capabilities, you are a danger to yourself and others. It is possible to push beyond your limitations, but at what cost and for what cause?

Common sense suggests that if you are working so hard to achieve a particular task to the point of getting only three or four hours of sleep for a long period of time (days and weeks), a mental, physical, or emotional breakdown is inevitable. At that point, you are compromising your health over a goal. One option for pursuing a goal without sacrificing sleep is to prioritize what is essential and what is negotiable.

Knowing when to put away all digital devices and other unhealthy distractions will help to reset your mind and psychological well-being. Scheduling to take a break from a hectic world is absolutely necessary because without giving your body and mind a sufficient cooling-off period, the alternative could be unappealing.

Taking a self-inventory. Simple questions can help in taking a self-inventory:

• What exactly am I pursuing?
• Why am I pursuing it?
• What will I fulfill if I achieve it?
• And will it matter 10 years from now?

These are some of the questions that can provoke healthy self-reflection. Every now and then, these questions flash through your mind, but you don’t really pay close attention to them.

Self-reflection is a way to revisit these questions in ways to arrive at workable answers. In reality, it can be frightening to confront these questions, but the earlier you do so, the earlier you can start taking a more meaningful inventory of the next step to take. Once you reach an understanding of what these questions mean to you, it makes sense to seek a trusted accountability partner to support your well-being.

Stress Essential Reads

New Research Confirms Dogs Really Don't Like Being Hugged

Gut-Brain Treatment Goes Viral

Surrounding yourself with trusted people that care about your well-being. Healthy living is found in the community, not in isolation. That is why having a support group is important. Sometimes feedback from others helps crystalize questions that could be difficult to answer alone.

Also, through interactions with others, you can better understand that you are not the only one on the planet who is going through this particular challenge. All it takes is to look and ask around and you will find your tribe to help you through life's difficult challenges.

Professional support groups are well-trained individuals who have studied situations like yours and tested solutions that work and are ready to share them with you in a humane and friendly atmosphere. These days, you can reach professionals through telemedicine or virtual meetings. And the option of a traditional appointment for a face-to-face interaction with a qualified helper is still available.

Creating a balance starts with one person, you. First, go inside your inner self and ask this one question: "What do I want?" Spending time with the question can open doors for other probing questions that could lead to clarifying your situation and making a decision to reach out to individuals who are willing to join you in managing stress in healthy ways.

This starts from knowing that stress is not an event. It is a reaction to an event. Once this declaration is made, taking control of the situation with a trusted support group can become a reality. Although you are not made to go through life alone, it is up to you to decide to go through life with others and reach your highest potential.