Is this a lion, tiger or bear for you?
Hallo!
Wow winterish weather arrived with a slap dash here in Central Oregon.
We need it! Cold. A little rain and snow on the mountains. Yummy.
How about you?
And---work-life balance
This topic has been nudging and tapping at me for awhile.
Ack. I’ll be honest. I’ve never been drawn to this particular picture of balance.
It sniffs of hamster wheels and cages.
Of capturing time
and holding hostage life energy to
meek out the juice and pulp of
half an orange instead of
a whole one.
What I am very curious about, as you may already know (smiling), is how language is a part of what shapes reality in the modern world, and when a phrase becomes a slogan or a buzz, and is used again and again, it becomes a norm or a mantra or a belief that then can tethers us to a story that may or may not ring true.
And here is the clincher---
I’ve gotten lost a thousand times, because I wasn’t contemplating and examining how words were shaping, I simply was shaped. Sucked into language that creates a story that doesn't ring me very alive!
This past summer I was sitting at a large picnic table beneath tall alders and big leaf maples. I was checking in with some dear friends. Many of them work over 40 hours a week, many of them striving to find work-life balance, as they phrased it. It felt tightly heavy in the air. The idea of finding some kind of balance, a dim light in the distance.
I asked if I could share some feedback.
They agreed.
I shared my concern and confusion about using the phrase work/life balance.
That placing work next to life seems to elevate work to being equal to life.
Separate from it somehow.
Moving it from a part of life, to a whole half of its own.
And it can, in some minds, become either/or.
Binary bits.
Is it possible because it’s become such a buzz phrase, and we see it all the time, on top of how we use the word “work” about so many of the other areas of our life, that work is over inflated in value?
And in the times of productivity being a strong identifying characteristic of “doing the right thing” it can take us down all sorts of hidey holes if we aren’t careful.
Work as our worth.
Our identity.
And productivity as the key to a good life.
Or so we’ve been told.
And balance, as in a scale of sorts, we can maneuver to fix it.
Language is an energy, it’s a created form, it oozes stories and narratives that live beneath the underbelly of the beasts of modernity.
A few questions to wonder and wander with:
Are I/we really striving for work-life balance or is it seemingly disparate, because work hours for so many have become longer and longer, which means the balancing act in itself is a ruse?
And if I/we are not looking to balance something that isn’t separate in the first place, how do we want to reframe time for ourselves?
How does “work” (Workouts, housework, homework, yard-work, personal growth work, workshops, relationship work, work ethics, and on and on!) eek into how we perceive our playtime, relaxation, relationships, joy and visions of more love in the world?
Were we brought into the world to be workers or livers, lovers of life-ers---which perhaps gives us the opportunity for a much more nuanced existence?
Who might we become without the word “work” laden in so much of how we give and share time?
(And---Yup, this is how my becoming rolls--- rapid fire questions, questions, questions bouncing around inside this body of mine!!)
So lets:
Pause.
Breathe.
How does what I’ve shared feel in your body?
What’s the story you tell yourself?
Is there something you want to defend, resist?
Consider or reflect on?
Some last thoughts---
The invitation to get playful!
Instead of calling what you do to make an income “work”, how about naming it what it is (nanny, IT specialist, grocery store clerk, nurse…) or my career, my joy, my labor of love, manual labor, my calling, what I do to make an income, my creative side, what I do for 8 hours a day five days a week, the drudge…or?
Me---
I’ve decided to explore taking the word “work” out of my vocabulary for a while. To play with words that bring more life to my living instead of work to my doing!
Maybe you’ll join me.
If you think this post would appeal to a friend please forward it.
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Peace, love and wonder!
Carol
P.S. This is the coolest thing! An income comparator. You can compare yourself worldwide and in the U.S. It was a good eye opener for me!