How to balance your work life?

While being a freelance IT professional offers flexibility, ceaseless project demands can make one's life end up with wear and tear. Here is how to strike a balance

Sophia Lorena Benjamin

Do you work to live or live to work? Freelancing for IT professionals may have started off with offering a great deal of independence and flexibility to complete projects as per their own schedule. However, ceaseless project demands can make one's life end up with wear and tear. As we all know, we become emotionally disrupted when we cannot get enough balance between work and lives. Below are some tips to help you to strike a much needed balance between work and life, so that you can be, technically speaking an optimal functioning human being.

Make time to exercise! You would probably agree that most Freelance IT Professionals lead quite a sedentary lifestyle. When you spend more than three-quarters of your waking hour sitting in front of your computer, it's easy to become physically out-of-shape. Everyone knows you might get all sorts of health problems like cardiovascular diseases, obesity, etc. Exercise improves your immune system, which means that you will be less likely to fall sick. Physical health aside, keeping fit has also been proven to improve one's mental health in terms of mood, cognitive functions like memory and concentration, which are all crucial components of work productivity.

Spend quality time with friends and family Everybody needs social support from friends and family, but the question is how much and whether you are getting it. If you have a family, it's important for you to maintain good communication with them on a regular or even daily basis. Even if you are at home working on your projects most of the time, it doesn't mean that you are spending genuine quality time with them. Your attention is on work more than anything else.

Go for vacations Taking a vacation is a perfect way to recharge you from the drudgery of work. As much as you may love what you do for a living, focus on work day in and day out can tear down anyone's passion and energy. For occupations involving creative problem solving, it is in fact essential to open up our mind and perspectives to find inspiration for work. If you follow a rigid schedule every day, spend most of your time at home working, it is hard to gather creative ideas. Yet, when you travel to a foreign environment, where there is something out of your comfort zone, you can experience new culture and formulate new ways of thinking.

Engage in hobbies One thing about working hard without giving time to yourself to explore is that your life can become too monotonous. It's hard for you to become more creative if you are exposed to the same thing every day. To strike a balance between the time you're working and the time you're not, you can find something else that you really wish to do. You will not only see the world in the perspective of your job alone, but instead you will also appreciate it from different angles based on what you're learning. Of course, one of the benefits of engaging in hobbies or learning something new is that it frees your mind from work alone. If you have several other activities which you are involved in, then you have more options to indulge yourself with. It's just like having a television with several channels versus a TV with only a single one. You can always switch to another when you're bored with the one you're watching.

Daily reflection time Finally, you need to have time for yourself every day. Spend time alone with your own thoughts. We all need some amount of time for ourselves no matter whether we are an extrovert or introvert. It doesn't have to be too long; fifteen minutes per day would be enough. It is time for you to be conscious of your goals, your dreams and your life purpose. Another benefit from taking time to think and reflect is that it allows you to temporarily distance yourself from work and other stressors.

(The writer is an image consultant & motivational trainer. sophie@sophiesschoolofconfidence.com)