Find Balance this November

This month we are focusing on finding balance. All throughout this year, we’ve been all about what we have to get done, what goals are being accomplished, what tasks are being done. This month, we want to take a chance to reflect on what we haven’t been doing, and perhaps consider putting time and attention toward them. Many of us focus on career success which may result in neglecting our health or family and friends, or any other iteration. This is because juggling all the aspects of our lives is a balancing act, and making sure we’re getting enough of, and giving enough to each aspect is the key to balance and also to life satisfaction.

Reconsidering and revisiting our Key Questions:

• What aspects of my life do I currently need to work on?
• What am I avoiding?
• Who and what do I neglect in times of stress? Success? Sadness?
• Have my sacrifices been worth it?

This may be the hardest goal throughout this year as Balance is a never-ending, constant activity. This is because every person has multiple aspects of their life—a personal life, private life, social life, work life, and more. Each may be key to our sense of fulfilment but not necessarily needed in the same doses. And these doses may change as our lives change, or even more rapidly through the course of the week.

Keeping in touch with your emotional and physical needs is important in knowing what we need at any given time. Therefore, it’s important to give ourselves small moments in which to reflect—yet another thing to balance into our busy schedules! See, balance can be difficult.

While the greater goal of this month is to find balance, a large step for many is making sure to give room in ourselves to find it in the first place. This may begin with cutting out the negative, and secondly assessing whether we are bringing undue negativity into our lives on our own. Sometimes it may be hard to admit, but we’ll come out stronger on the other side.

Many people in caretaker roles such as new parents have to navigate the balance between needs of oneself and those of others relying on us. Let this month be a simple reminder to remember not simply the things in the future we want to achieve, but also those things in the present that make us fulfilled and happy.

Try out this article on the PERMA model, created by a man often called the Founder of Positive Psychology, Martin Seligman. He contends that there are 5 important aspects of life we must cultivate in order to maximise our sense of well-being and satisfaction:

• Positive emotions – feeling good
• Engagement – being completely absorbed in activities
• Relationships – being authentically connected to others
• Meaning – purposeful existence
• Achievement – a sense of accomplishment and success

You can read more of the article to get a better understanding.

The University of Pennsylvania’s Authentic Happiness Center provides an array of research-backed surveys you can take to learn more about yourself. We recommend the PERMA Questionnaire. It may be helpful in determining what you may be missing out on.