4 Questions For Perspective and Balance

Finding perspective and balance for your 24/7 life one minute at a time.

With so many distractions in our lives – including always-on technology – it can be easy to lose perspective.

This doesn’t have to happen, though. By taking a moment here and there to prioritize what’s important and what’s not, you can reduce stress and gain better balance in everything you do.

Technology such as tablets, smartphones, the cloud, Wi-Fi and more allow us to be in multiple places at the same time. We can talk to a client while picking up our children, work while lounging on the beach and check on  production output while waiting for a flight. Technology – and the speed of life it enables – offers great opportunities, but it also has the potential to take over your life if you’re not careful.

Stress Is on the Rise

I’m not sure if stress is really on the rise or if it only seems that way. Many surveys report the constant access to technology and the pressure to respond to and monitor it can indeed be stressful.

But there has always been some new “thing” that has caused distraction and brought new stressors into the lives of people. Perhaps what’s different today is that we’re actually hearing about stress from more people more of the time.

It could be the stress of leaning about new technologies, the pressure to constantly adapt and re-evaluate your business or career, or the growing need to learn more – and faster – that’s creating the inability to maintain balance.

Small Adjustments Can Make Big Changes

Finding and maintaining perspective is an important skill to acquire, and creating balance keys on gaining perspective.

You know the major components of your life: your physical, cognitive and mental health; your family, friends and significant relationships; your job, career or business; your financial situation; your education, training and skills development; your community; your home; your beliefs; and your activities, hobbies and interests.

To achieve balance, some people reevaluate their lives and make significant adjustments. People struggling with addiction, poor health, anger-management issues or other significant challenges may need to make significant adjustments.

Most of us, however, will find it’s the small adjustments that make the difference. Most of us don’t need to quit our jobs or leave our spouses or downsize our lives to reduce stress and achieve balance.

We just have to gain a better perspective and make a few different choices each day until we change unhealthy, unconscious patterns to find balance.

3 Quick Steps to Gaining Personal Perspective and Balance:

1)    Inventory what you have, need or want.

2)    Dissect the components of what you have, need and want.

3)    Prioritize what’s important so you understand what you really have, need and want.

This process of inventorying and prioritizing doesn’t require hours of time on a regular basis.

At any given moment, you have the ability to stop and take stock. At any given moment, you can change what you’re doing and shift your priorities. These don’t have to be seismic shifts, but smaller ones in the moment that contribute to balancing the scales over time.

Conscious Choices

Much of our lives are spent in unconscious mode. Our fast-thinking, instinctive brain puts us on autopilot as often as possible to conserve energy.

If you’ve gotten into the habit of prioritizing work over health or family, it’s easy to remain in this mode – so much so that you may not even realize you have options. Once you miss one dinner at home with the family or skip a week of exercise, your brain begins to make the adjustment to lower these priorities, which makes it easier to not even notice they’re missing.

This unconscious pattern applies to whether you respond to the notifications on your phone, work late for extra hours, play too many video games or anything else that’s become habituated. Once you stop thinking about why you’re doing them, you just keep doing them.

Perspective and Balance and 24/7 Connectivity

Finding balance can include working from home on Saturday afternoon so you can spend Monday sneaking off with your child or spouse for a picnic in the park.

Balance doesn’t mean working 9 to 5 and clocking out. It doesn’t mean never checking your phone or email notifications. It means knowing when to work and when not to work, when to shut down and when to turn back on, and what you’re doing and why.

Get Started Today

Get into the habit of regularly asking yourself:

• What am I doing and why?
• What can wait and for how long?
• Who am I with and why?
• What’s important right now and why?
• Considering these questions can occupy only a minute of your time, giving you the opportunity to stop and change your perspective. Over time, you’ll habituate a new pattern that involves stopping and asking yourself what’s important and being mindful of the moment you’re in. By doing so, you can start changing your perspective and regain your ability to make conscious choices about your life.

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