Work-Life Balance is a Myth

“Don’t bring your work home with you.” This sounds nice. I strive to do this but unfortunately it is not really possible. 

I have one life. I can try to compartmentalize my life all I want (work life, home life, social life, farm life, outside life, time-with-family life, time-for-myself life, bathtub life) but at the end of the day, whatever I experienced in every different “life” throughout that day will affect my whole life. It doesn’t matter if I had a stressful day at work, or if we ran out of hot water for my bath, the emotions that come as a result of my experiences will still be with me no matter what “life” I am in because I only have one life.

Stress from work will be brought home and stress from home will be brought to work. There is no way around it; I don’t become a different human when I enter a different building. One trick to deal with stress is to pause, breath, find inner balance and enter every life situation from a place of gratitude.