Living in the fullness of beauty and balance is the condition with all strive to obtain and maintain. Unfortunately, many are living in the shadow of burnout and breakdown… too consumed with life to feel like they can stop and adjust.
It’s true, life moves quickly.
In fact…
“Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it”
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
Failure to stop and look around “once in a while” … regularly … results in burnout and breakdown. Performing a reality check to ourselves on a regular basis reminds us how fallible we are, yet how well we have been engineered to recover and rejuvenate.
Most of us have experienced burnout or breakdown to some degree in a t least one area of life at some point. These experiences happen not only to teach us how to keep ourselves in check, but to also help others who may need that gentle reminder.
When we live too fast for loo long, we will at one point, be forced to do a reset. Rather than wait until that happens, let’s take one now.
I suggest doing this at a minimum twice a year, however once a quarter would keep us on track with more sustained results.
Prior to jumping into the reality check process, we first need to understand why this is so important. We typically, are independent, self-sufficient people. It is quite often a challenge for us to admit our weaknesses, seek help, change deeply ingrained ideals or addictive behaviors such as busyness, too much work.
Changing behaviors, patterns, ideals, schedules, thoughts, beliefs, or actions can prove extremely difficult. Go easy on yourself. This is the best time to reflect and adjust as well as learn how to give yourself grace as you learn overall balance.
The Reality Check Process
Just as we have warning lights that go on in our vehicles, life provides us with warning lights that we need to pay attention to. Regular checkups will help us maintain overall balance and wellness.
Here are seven areas that we need to perform a reality check with along with a few critical areas to think about.
Physical Warning Lights:
• Health issues
• Exhaustion, Lack of energy
• Difficulty sleeping
• Poor nutrition
Mental Warning Lights:
• Concentration is hard – easily distracted
• Obsessive over thinking about current/past issues
• Forgetfulness
• Feeling negative all the time
Emotional Warning Lights:
• Feeling sad … a lot (maybe even helpless or hopeless)
• Lack of laughter
• Pessimistic vs optimistic
• Hard to see others’ happiness
Relational Warning Lights:
• No delight in current relationship or relationship status
• Irritable towards partner, children, parents, siblings
• You are limiting your time with partner, children, parents, siblings
• Withdrawing from social circles or friendships
Vocational Warning Lights:
• Working more hours but producing less
• Your joy for your work has been lost
• You are falling behind in projects, so you cut corners
• Procrastination increases, motivation decreases
Moral Warning Lights:
• You are shading the truth
• Self-medicating – over-indulgence
• Creating inappropriate relationships
Spiritual Warning Lights:
• Not cultivating your belief system
• Putting material activities over spiritual ones
• Yoga turns into nap time
The questions are simple, however depending on the answers your follow through may not be. The beauty is in the outcome. Answering these questions (and perhaps you need to add more, change some around, whatever you need) should result in awareness.
Awareness results in balance when appropriate actions are taken.
Processing The Results
After you perform your reality check, it is time to process the results. Processing is simply answering three questions in each area.
How Many
How Deep
How Long
If you are not living a healthy balanced life, either you must slow down and conduct a reality check / readjust where needed, or life will demand you slow down.
Processing your reality check also means to think practically, give yourself some grace and sympathy, and find again hope and joy.
Every journey starts with one step. Balance is no different. Wellness is wonderful. Our bodies are designed for balance.
Where are you in your journey towards balance? Share in the comments. Let’s connect and grow together.