Work / Life Balance

Sometimes it seems like we are trying to “Cut a bucket of water with a knife" when it comes to work/life balance as creatives. Hopefully these tips will help.

The Problem:
One thing that separates most creatives from some other occupations - is that our identity is wrapped up very closely with our career (ie. I AM a photographer / I AM a music producer) so the notion of what is work and what is “life” is a grey area. So this means on vacation - do I bring my camera? And if so, is it still even a vacation?

Couple this with work-from-home challenges of your office being in the middle of “life” responsibilities, or maybe even in the bedroom and it makes things very tricky.

Recipe for burnout if we can’t separate the two

Here are the 3 Tips for Work/Life Balance!


1. SET PRIORITIES & EXPECTATIONS

• Setting realistic expectations lets us know how much work we can get done in a session.
• To-Do lists that are achievable in a single day (can keep weekly/monthly ones too)
• Our Vision Statement / Long Term Goals will lead to short-term goals and projects. Those give us our daily priorities and tasks
• Tackle the important thing first every day/work session - NOT THE EASY THING!

2. REDUCE DISTRACTIONS
This helps tremendously with focus and productivity.
And when we are more focused and productive with our work time, that can create more time for our personal life. Four bonus tips for reducing distractions:
• Leave your phone in the other room.
• Have a clean work/creative area that contains only the essentials
• Use music as a focus tool (no vocals, mix up the playlists). And use Noise Cancelling Headphones!
• Working from somewhere else (coffee shop, co-working space, etc)

3. SET BOUNDARIES
These come in 3 flavors.
• Personal Boundaries - Client time vs. personal creative time, time to work ON the business, not IN it, self-care structure
• Interpersonal Boundaries - Friends and family - Conversational and reply time expectations, "office hours" in the home office
• Client Boundaries - work hours, project revision limits, setting deadlines, etc.