Why everyone believes Work-Life Balance is the holy work grail is beyond me. Take a moment to picture the act of balancing. Is it restful, or is it stressful? Is it something you can permanently hold, or is it continually shifting?
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ThriveWithNancy Podcast addresses the tricky points you run into daily as a woman executive. Nancy Fredericks shares all the secrets she’s acquired as an experienced thought-leader. She’s passionate about sharing practical, insider solutions with women executives to tap into on your way to achieving all of your career hopes and dreams.
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Speaker 1:
Hey, are you feeling overwhelmed with everything on your plate? Both personally and professionally, if you can relate, keep listening. Welcome to thrive with Nancy. It's a podcast dedicated to hardworking executive women who want more from their careers, but not at the cost of losing their personal life will be focusing on screw balance. I don't mean to be blunt, even harsh, but more often than not. You need to break up concepts that no longer support your journey to greatness as you jet a thriving career. Why this podcast now during a mastermind program, one of the women shared how she was drowning in overload. I looked her in the eye and suggested we have an off session call to strategize ways to alleviate some of the pressure she was experiencing. The, this bright, intelligent woman looked at me with defeat radiating from her eyes saying how I don't even have time to calendar a call with you, my heart breaks. And she represents the feelings of countless executive women. I encounter all the time. Today's idea. Won't solve all your problems yet. It is the foundation for beginning the journey and a really solid foundation. I don't know any executive live, who doesn't feel overloaded, overwhelmed, and outta control. Do you a survey by the American Institute of us confirms this reality when they found that 83% of us workers suffer from chronic work related stress, 83%. When you drill down to the root issue, today's workforce is searching for what often feels like the holy grail, a balance life. Why am I saying screw balance? When so many people are in pursuit of it, it's because you are chasing something that only exists in moments of time, all the while thinking that it will resolve the problem of emotional overwhelm, why everyone believes we're work, life balance is the holy grail is beyond me. Take a moment to picture the act of balancing. Is it restful or is it stressful? Is it something you can permanently hold? Or is it continually shifting? You know, even the great flying Wallendas could not remain perfectly, still perfectly balanced for anything more than strung together moments at a time high wire equilibrium requires vigilant attention and continuous adjustments. And even then with all their attention, many WOS unfortunately failed in their balancing act and fell to their death. Can you picture the Woda act in your mind's eye right now? Can you remember their forced to smile? Well, more of a grim as they walk that tight rope across some impossible cavernous canyon with the wind shifting every which way do you remember the tension with each micro muscle on the body making adjustments to return them to balance? So they didn't fall down, down down. Hum is that the state you're hoping to achieve? Think about it. I can envision you right now, your work life, high wire, everyday balancing act overstressed, striving for the perfect balance. I see someone overtaxed fighting for calmness in the middle of your endless must get it done projects. Every muscle in your body is tight. Trying to maintain equilibrium between your four pay work and personal life. The image doesn't conjure up the existence. Most of my clients want to create. I intend to introduce you to a wildly distinct approach. It requires a massive change in attitude that only you can generate. And I know you can do it if you choose to my mind, a healthier metaphor for all of us to incorporate is living a harmonized career and life. A helpful visualization for this harmonizing concept is to think of your life as an extraordinary beloved musical piece. Each note draws you in as it sores higher than at any other points. At another moment, the song becomes tumultuous and louder in its, but, and instill another instance. What starts out as a whispery note rises to a magnificent crescendo. It is all perfect. You enjoy the highs and lows as a natural part of the melody. Why am I enrolling you in this new, more potent perception? Because how you interpret and experience determines the impact it has on you. It is a far more sustainable long term lifestyle model. This concept has you accepting the tilts, twists and turns necessary to generate blending business and personal we're work and play giving and receiving. It is for each of us individually to determine what is the most beautiful music score for us and to appreciate all its depth and all its sight and all its lows balance adds to your stress. Whereas harmonizing as you embracing your life's natural up and down flow, sometimes business is all consuming and at other times, your personal life requires a more significant portion of your time and your calendar. And this is what makes up a fully alive, fully lived life. Won't this more realistic, robust, far, less stressful metaphor support you in a healthier mental mindset. And for my women clients transforming they and you relate to this issue is imperative as not surprising to you. I'm sure. According to Gallup, 62% of women are more likely to experience higher daily stress as compared to 52% of male workers for many clients, simply visualizing the experience of harmony as a descriptor for quality of career in life relieves the additional stress produced in an attempt to be perfectly, perfectly balanced. Yes, a certain level of short burst stress can help you increase productivity or maintain in focus. But we all realize that too much stress is harmful to our production, health, emotional state, and so much more. This almost intuitive knowledge is confirmed by the YY DOD law, which shows that performance when faced with physiological or mental stress. But, but only up to a point when your stress levels are up, it's detrimental and your performance decreases while women experience high levels of stress daily, we pile on even more by living with a goal of balance where we twist ourselves into knots, attempting to achieve the unattainable. Can you imagine how you would feel at the end of the day, if rather than getting tense, when your efforts to attain a work life balance, go awry. You are living an acceptance harmonizing concerto, one that sings to your heart and gives you the quality of life you are looking for. Simply changing your emotional state to one that supports you requires a new mental frame of reference. Life takes place first in your mind. And then in your newly born actions, stop fighting. All that is going on around you. And instead become the master welcoming this perfectly imperfect beloved musical life of yours. It is after all the only one you have will practicing a harmonizing life and career, make everything better, not entirely, but you certainly won't be adding unnecessary stress with a never to be at ambition of balance. Try it. I bet you will find joy in embracing and finding value in all you experience. Executives are insanely overloaded, which is why you wanna get your emotions aligned to support you rather than defeat you through balance. So replace it with the practice of harmony. Our podcast today is simple. It asks you to do one thing differently, change a word, start living and thinking, bring work life harmony to the forefront of your mind, because this is the only life you have. Please subscribe and pass along this podcast to your friends and peers so they can benefit as you have. Thank you so much. Hey, and by the way, if you're for more help, I'd be delighted for you to check out the, your strategic edge coaching program. You can partner with me an executive coach who has aided thousands of men and women in unlocking secrets for expanding their career. And yes, bringing in a Harmon life as well. I can do this for you too together. We explore diverse ways to bring possibility into being for you. Check out www.thrivewithnancy.com/executive/. I'd be delighted to support you. Remember no one ever makes it to the top or even arrives at their next harmonized destination alone.