Tuesday, December 02, 2008

The life balance challenge Day 2 or one can't have it all

So, exercise, sleep and having a life outside of work has moved to the top of the list. It's surprisingly difficult to make these things a real priority. As in actually taking time off work to go running and to relax at home without feeling guilty. There are always things that should have been done or ought to be done right now, and making the decision to let work things slide to make time for myself is harder than I was aware of. But I've done it today. I went running and did some yoga, and spent time this afternoon connecting with some long distance friends on facebook. Writing on the other hand have so far not even made it to the list. I had to be in the office early for some meetings and spent the afternoon doing all this healthy for-me stuff and now it's evening and I've got a talk to prepare for tomorrow. It's a mystery to me how succesful people manage to work long hours, exercise, sleep and have a life at the same time. I seem to able to do one or the other, but not all.

3 Comments:

At 4:30 PM, Blogger Amanda@Lady Scientist said...

It's very hard to make those a priority. Top priority is even more difficult because of outside enforcers. I know that if I let work stuff slide, then I'll hear about it from Advisor tomorrow. Whereas if I don't exercise, I won't hear about it until my next doctor appointment.

Not to discourage you or anything... I'm just justifying my own reasons. I'm really rooting for you! :-)

 
At 6:07 PM, Blogger saxifraga said...

I totally agree and I have exactly the same problem that the work life is always driven by external deadlines or expectations and sometimes it's just not easy or impossible to let those slide without consequences. What frightens me a bit though is that I've been living by this type of external deadlines for something around 10 years (not continuously under major pressure, but for most of the time and definitely for most of the time for the past 4-5 years. I'm a bit afraid that something in my work life really has got to give in order to have a good life in the long run.

 
At 8:48 PM, Blogger Amelie said...

If you find out how to have a good life next to academic work, let me know. I don't feel near any solution, but I don't like this in the long run, especially considering that I would like to have a family and the day still won't have more than 24h.

 

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