This article details why work life balance is important.
Without the correct work life balance, many working parents and carers end up feeling tired or exhausted, which can often lead to burn-out.
When we are tired there are many things that can go wrong, (but potentially unnoticed) throughout our day. For example:
- We may not hear or read instructions properly and can easily tune out in conversations with our partners, children, family members, managers or colleagues.
- Losing motivation and the sense of joy we can feel in our interactions with family and at work.
- We may end up taking more time on a project that is needed, which can potentially impact the rest of the team.
Essentially, tiredness can lead to a lack of joy and making mistakes.
And what about exhaustion?
When we feel exhausted, which is the next level on from tired, things can easily become a fog. This is when emotions such as frustration, resentment, anger, and or giving up can start to set in. These types of emotions can arise even when we are well, however when exhaustion has set in, we tend to have less capacity to respond to them rationally, creating unnecessary complications in our work and family relationships. This is when it's important to reach out to someone and talk through what might be missing in your life that's contributing to the exhaustion.
The next step in the downward spiral away from wellbeing is burn-out. Burn-out is when everything described above becomes so severe that it affects the body's physiology, particularly our endocrine system, and subsequently our sleep and waking cycle is interfered with. Burn-out requires medical attention and should always be taken seriously.