The Great B.S. Fairy Tale: Work/Life Balance & four things you should be doing about it!

Work life balance doesn’t exist, it never has, and it never will!

I was a young student in College in Alberta, Canada and I remember sitting in on a lecture being given by one of my Psychology Professors about Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs and the theory behind “Self-Actualisation”.

The idea behind self-actualisation is that we are so fulfilled as human beings, that we have created and fulfilled our base potential, that we are free to maximise our personal achievements full potential through creativity, and a strong grasp of what is going on in the world.

He then went on to tell the class that he was lecturing that there was only one person in the whole of the College that he had met that he truly believed had achieved Self-Actualisation, to our surprise, he had said that it was the Janitor!

So I went on a mission, I wanted to find this “Janitor” and after three days of asking around for this man we will call “Bob”, I eventually found him in the Trade Wing, quietly mopping up the floor.

I approached him, and asked him if he had known my Professor? He said “That they had been friends for years!” I then went on to ask him a few relatively appropriate rapport building questions before moving in for the kill and asking him “If he knew what self-actualisation was and why our Professor had thought he was “Self-Actualised”?”

He laughed and had told me that he had been married for years to his High School sweetheart, his parents passed away and left them a home, and he had many brothers and sisters, he was very close, successfully, to all of them!

He had also told me that his life afforded him a tremendous amount of stability, he lived below his means for the majority of his days, he pursued his hobby in fly tying and fishing when the weather called for it, he had wonderful children whom he had provided a good life for, AND he had the best job in the world!

Now, I was fucking confused, because here I was, a young, 20 something punk ass kid who didn’t know his head from a hole in the ground, trying to chase dreams of being a stock broker through a Finance and Economics program! I was chasing something MASSIVE, I wanted to be rich, and famous, and have champagne and women pouring off of me at any given moment (I still do, whatever…), I was definitely not in a state of “self-actualisation.”

So I began to ponder what made this guy so freaking content with his life?! I almost couldn’t stand it! So I had to know more! I went back and I asked him; “How he managed it all? How he found balance?”

He told me that it wasn’t about balance, not at all, that he falls out of balance all of the time, that he was “self-actualised” and that there was a most definite difference!

In telling me about his struggle with balance, he had to keep things in perspective and always maintain everything that was important to him, but that everything, everything he ever did, was important to him! That he had grown into his own two shoes and suddenly, and quite simply fallen into a state of contentment that allowed him to become excellent in his “fly tying” efforts, the hobby he loved so much, loving his wife and children intensely, and enjoy his job to the level that he did!

I finally broke and asked him in my youthful arrogance “What gave? I understand the wife, the kids, and I understand the hobby, but what gives?! How on earth is it you found serenity in a terrible job?”

He looked at me with a slight smile on his face, to this day I think I offended the man, but he said to me “I love my job and everything that it has given me over the years, some day, you’re going to discover that for yourself….”

And he walked away.

This interaction was my first swan dive into discovering more about goal setting, more about happiness, more about contentment, and more than I ever could have imagined about balance.

What have I learned since about balance that I think of every time I reflect back on this moment in my life?

There is no such thing as balance, it doesn’t exist, and that’s ok:

Society tends to demonise the idea that work life balance is mandatory, that there is some middle ground between doing your work, and finding balance for everything else, family, church, leisure, kids, and hobbies. That somehow being able to balance all of it is the MANDATORY station designed for every human life!

This simply isn’t true, if you’re anything like those of us that actually enjoy getting out of bed to go to work every single morning then you know that spending a little extra time working is a form of fulfilment! It is a way for to pursue your purpose toward self actualisation and overall happiness! That if you love what you do, oftentimes, you aren’t out of balance at all!

You see, there isn’t such a thing as work life balance if you truly enjoy what you are doing when you are working! Being able to get up, spoil yourself with the grind and genuinely want to spend some time making some more money for yourself or your company because you truly love what you are doing, that doesn’t tend to lend well to the “idea” that you have to have a work life balance!

You see, work life balance doesn’t exist in a world where you have found joy in what you do, so that brings me to my next point, what is actually defined as “work”?

Everything that you do, is work, it’s how much joy you find within it that matters most:

You see, I’ve spent so much time really asking myself what it is I enjoy doing the most, what it is I’m going to pursue that day that is going to further my path toward “self-actualisation”, what the pursuit of “contentment” actually meant! Lo’ and behold, somewhere along the lines, and only in the last 3 years I think I have found the real answer.

Everything that you do, is work. No exceptions.

Spending time with your children and truly being in the moment, that takes work! Spending time with your wife/ loved ones and keeping the fire alive, that takes work! Making sure that you’re physical and spiritual well being are looked after, that takes work as well!

It’s all a tremendous amount of work at the end of the day. Pursuing the things that you want in life, is all going to be work. Most people miss this and think that a happily ever after life is somehow just suddenly going to come their way and they wont have to do anything to keep it and maintain it!

Sure, for some of us, being physically attractive has made it easy for us to have a significant other in our lives. But even the most physically attractive of us have to work like hell in order to maintain the relationship! In order to keep the other person happy! In order to keep the relationship hot and moving forward! It’s work!

So that takes away again from the bullshit theory that work life is somehow what we should be striving for! If everything that we are looking to achieve in our lives is work, then how is it that you are supposed to bring a balance to it? Truthfully, if that model of “everything is work” comes into play, then certainly there cannot ever be such a thing as work/life balance can there?

You see, life, for me anyways has been about over the top maintenance and focusing most on what I love, and dropping the things that aren’t making you happy, helping you achieve your internal sense of peace, and ultimately, striving for inner contentment every single day!

Which bring me to my next point…

Re-focus and hone in on what we love:

I’ve seen an unfortunate and tremendous number of people doing exactly what they don’t love to do, it not only kills them on the inside, it kills me to watch!

I understand however, that many of us have responsibilities that don’t exactly allow us to globe-trot around the world, build companies, risk bankruptcy, and be responsible to nothing but ourselves — spoiled bastards!

I’m a dad, there was a time where I couldn’t afford the luxury of not working for someone else, and it took me leaving a job to finally realise that I wasn’t a good fit for working for someone else, that I had to push my own products into the marketplace!

It took being sick and tired of the same thing, day in, and day out to realise that working for someone else, just wasn’t for me! It was a scary time! But I knew that if I consistently pushed myself into the market, every single day, something was bound to break, I was bound to collect enough clients and as a result, I was bound to have a successful Business!

I had a moment of re-focus, of doing what I loved, of pushing for the things I really wanted in this world more than anything else, but that took YEARS of frustration and struggle before I realised that it truly was going to be the best thing for my family!

Working in something you absolutely HATE doing, is not balance. Spending the majority of your day doing something that you know isn’t quite the right fit for you, isn’t balance!

You simply have to find the work that you love most in this world, like my janitor friend who was incredibly happy with his job because of what it provided for him, that is a pursuit trodden to unleashing your creative self, becoming something more, treading to the freeing depths of self-actualisation.

Take an audit, every single year, I want you to fire yourself from your life, and I mean everything, your job, your relationships, your hobbies, your activities and every bill you have. And I want you to ask yourself, does this [insert thing here] contribute to my overall success, my overall vision of what I want my life to be? Does this contribute to my overall purpose of contentment and self-actualisation?

Taking the time to even do a single audit every year, is going to have a tremendous impact in the overall framework of your life! Personally, if you can do it more frequently, then do it more frequently, it will only serve to re-focus your path in life, re-direct you, and have you chasing what it is that ultimately is most important to anyone, peace of mind in knowing you are doing the right thing and making the right choices!

Giving 110% to absolutely everything we should “balance”:

The last point that I’m going to touch on is what you should consider doing after you’ve completed your audit and rooted out what is most important to you, is to consider your time management principles and adopting a mentality of 110% on everything all of the time!

I’m often asked how I manage to work with clients, build my company, write, take care of my daughter, and still have time for an active social and love life.

Step 1. I eliminate the crap and treat everything else as the most important thing in the world.

Step 2. I make sure that “the most important things in the world” have time for me every single day!

Step 3. Come to terms with the fact that you are going to fall off at some point, that it is up to you to simply get back on with it and carry on with life!

It’s really that easy! But if you’ve truly eliminated the things in your life that are detracting from your state of contentment and perpetual creativity then the next step of focusing in, scheduling your day, setting goals, and really becoming a champion of your success should be simple!

Simple, but not easy!

You see, I’m not going to feed you a line of bullshit, the execution is the tough part, planning your entire day with purpose, and setting a structure that allows you to focus on what you have defined as your most successful attributes is not always easily done! Life gets in the way! We all have surprises that spring up and that’s ok! Man plans, and god laughs — this is ok as well!

The important thing to remember is that you keep your vision of self-actualisation in perspective and you find a way to hop back on the band wagon the NEXT DAY, not next week, not next year, but the next day!

I remember a friend of mine telling me once how he managed to stay in shape and keep working out.

He said “That it was more about finding new ways of staying motivated, than it was about actually exercising, and riding that motivation out until the very end, and then finding something new all over again!”

That was insight like I had never witnessed before, I had come to understand that our purpose isn’t to maintain the original motivation we once had, but to constantly be searching for new ways to get the job done, for new ways to get out of bed and accomplish more!

You aren’t always going to be excited by the thing that got you going in the first place, you have to master the ability to find something more, to constantly find new ways to contribute to that 110% model and continue to crush it every single day, you see, there is no such thing as work/life balance, that’s a fairy-tale, you simply have to find new ways to eliminate waste, and stay motivated to the cause of your grande vision that will ultimately lead to your contentment!

Summary:

• There’s no such thing as work life balance, and that’s OK! Your true vision should be toward self actualisation, contentment, and unleashing your creative potential.
• If you adopt the mindset that “everything is work — and should be worked towards” you stop demonising work entirely — that matter becomes looking for things that you enjoy most, and working your tail off to grow in those areas.
• Hone in on what you love most, eliminate the waste, and focus on what matters most to you. Take the time to do an audit of everything, your job, relationships, the activities you do, and even the bills you pay. Ask yourself if it is helping you achieve your ideas toward a grander vision.
• Balance doesn’t exist — there is the 110% model. “Give everything you have, to everything that matters!” The idea and practice are simple, but not easy. Find new ways to stay motivated, and new ways to jump back on the horse!

Matthew Gourley is the CEO and Founder of Salestraininc.com — A company that specialise in making you money, growing your Business, and helping you achieve the freedom you deserve!

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