Life-Work Balance

Who is working in a regular office job and doesn’t know the following scenario:
alarm clock is pulling you out of the too short sleep, a quick breakfast, if any, before you “rush” through the traffic jam to your work – why everyone has to go to office when I need to go? Meetings, emails, presentations, endless waiting for colleagues and information, quick lunch between more meetings, etc. are filling the day – if you don’t have the chance to leave your workplace and travel to clients etc., just to do eventually the same there as in your office. Evenings, filled with desire for relaxation, are used for more work, business dinners, more emails which need to be answered “urgently” despite the fact nobody is reading them before next day, and work needs to be prepared for the next day, etc. Food is taken very late, often in a rush, combined with alcohol to get some “relaxation” or release of increasing headache. Finally weekend, time for relaxation, long sleep and social activities! In reality, Saturday morning often means more work, and social activities are kept short whole weekend since the tired body claims it’s time and the desire for sleep is overwhelming. But there are still holidays to do what you really like, right? Do you leave the laptop or the phone at home or not? Work, just a bit, only checking some emails and maybe preparing some presentation for a meeting after the holidays… Sounds familiar? Is this close to a “normal” work-life balance? Well, it was close to my previous life as an employee in Germany or Shanghai.

Well, I enjoyed my jobs, which brought me to many countries in this world, and which let me see and learn a lot of what exists outside of my “German” box. But where was my life? I experienced three times in my life, that it took a lot of my physical or mental energy, my health and my happiness out of me. Not (yet) suffering from a burn out, but all times I came to a point where I felt, that can’t be the life I’d like to have. I was asking me already at an early point of my career:
Do I live for work or do I work for living? And if I work for living: Why do I allow work to “kill” me?

The first of this 3 times, I quit my job and told my new employer, that I’ll only be available 2 month later due to a long holiday (2 month to Cuba). I simply told the HR manager “I have worked hard the last years and I assume that you expect that I will work hard for you. I simply need to recharge my batteries to be ready to work 120% for you.” He most likely didn’t understand but accepted or swallowed it. In this period of life I met Salsa Cubana and my ex-wife – more about this in a future post “Salsa!”

The second time, I lost my marriage and I moved to Asia. One door closed and a new one, almost big like a gate, opened wide. The entrance to my new life – I didn’t know it yet…

The third time I decided not only not to fight but accept a notice from my employer, but to leave the corporate world for good. I had this idea already in mind when signing my (last) contract. However, my last employer “helped” me to start my new life a bit earlier by telling me that I’m redundant middle of 2008. More about this plan, how I made it true and what helped me in two future posts “Thoughts become real or Law of attraction” and “How yoga changed my perception of life”.

I decided to live! To have time to do what I like, no love to do!
This life doesn’t include much what other people to do who are in the daily grind as describe above. I assume in Germany I would be called a “Aussteiger”. Not sure if the English word “dropout” means the same… However, I had in mind that my life consist out of 340 days holidays and 25 days of work per year …

“But, what are you doing every day, if you don’t work?”
“Isn’t it boring?”

My answer to the second question: No Way – Never!!! How can it be boring to do what you love to do???

The first question, well, a “normal” weekday looks as follows:
I usually start my day around 8:00 with a shower and some yogic cleansing techniques, followed by a 60-75 min Pranayama practice (yogic breathing) if I have no class to teach. After this practice or after a morning yoga class I do my own Asana practice (yoga postures). If the weather is fine I like to have a quick sunbath at the pool – good for Vitamin D supply 🙂 -, combined with a few lanes swimming. By the way, my phone is still muted…
If you do the math, you’ll see that my “breakfast”, normally a jar of green smoothie, happens around lunch time 😉 Or I join my girlfriend for lunch near her office. After lunch and only then, I open my laptop at some days, not every day, and check my emails, do some work for my consultancy hobby or my lifestyle coaching activities. The afternoons also include some studies whatever I’m interested in. Currently I study the Bhagavad Gita, 2 books about Green Smoothies and a book about Thai massage. The first two will be topic for more posts very soon. Once in a week i get a relaxing traditional Thai massage. Or I have time for nap if the last evening ended later.
Dinner – often a huge bowl of salad with bread – is made at home and eaten around 5 or 6, sometimes outside, mostly with Indian food and preferable before sunset which happens around 7:30 in KL. The evenings include either yoga classes to teach, time with my girlfriend and her kids or activities with friends including regular Salsa parties, hiking near my condo or badminton. Occasionally I relax with a book or watch TV, mostly sport events or a good movie or I talk with family and friends overseas.
Weekends look slightly different, with more time for “family” and friends, with hiking, rock climbing, badminton, or other social activities, and definitively less laptop time.

Sounds good? Like a “normal” holiday? Well, that is the Life-work balance I have chosen. What about you?

Now I spent most of my time with what I love most to do! Are you doing the same?

If not, what stops you, what keeps you away from your dreams?

It might be difficult to make a big change as I did immediately. But why not starting today? “Make an appointment with yourself everyday“, as I was told my teacher’s teacher Sri Tiwari has often said. Time for practice, for a hobby, for family, for personal. And you’ll find a healthier work-life balance when you do it. If you don’t know what to do, call me and we figure out together. Take me by that word.