What is a ‘balanced life’?

Living a balanced life means determining what is most important to you and expending your time and energy accordingly.

It can be easy to normalise working long hours or being under an extreme amount of stress and once in a while we need to take a step back and reassess what is important to us and how we are prioritising expending our energy and time.

Assume that you will be happy and fulfilled if you can find the right balance in your life.

Different priorities in your life

Everyone’s life is made of different priorities. It could be aspects of your life or roles that you play.

For example, various aspects of your life could be

Health, Family, Friends, Career, Financial, Spiritual, Mental Disposition, Socializing, Personal relationships, Environment/surroundings, Personal Appearance, Education, Sport

Or various roles you play could be

Parent, Teacher, Manager, Sports Player, Community Leader, Colleague, Partner, Friend, Carer, Child, Sibling

Identifying the key aspects/priorities in your life and how content you are with each of these dimensions is the first stage in examining how balanced your life is.

• Think about your life and identify 8 dimensions that matter to you. They can be a mix of any of your priorities. Label each on an axis .

• Consider each dimension in turn, and on a scale of 0 (low) – to 10 (high).

• Give each dimension a score on the appropriate spoke of the circle below. Depending on how ‘happy’ you are with this dimension.

• Now join up the marks around the circle.

• Does your life wheel look and feel balanced?

• Now you have a visual representation of your current life balance now plot your ideal life balance.

• Where are the gaps? These are the areas of your life that need attention.

• Are there areas that are getting too much attention?

• Identify the areas that need attention starting with the neglected areas, what things do you need to start doing to regain balance?

• In the areas that currently sap your energy and time, what can you stop doing or reprioritize or delegate to someone else?

• How will you start to decrease the gaps between your current balance and ideal balance?

• The Jar of Life

• Mental Health Foundation

• Anna Freud 10 Steps to school Staff well-being

• Building blocks of good mental well-being