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The host of Love Life Legacy podcast talks about work-life balance, sharing her personal struggles and challenging traditional ideas. She emphasizes the importance of integration over balance, managing priorities, setting boundaries, and understanding energy levels. She discusses how to prioritize tasks, differentiate between urgent and important, learn to say no, and recognize what energizes and drains you. She encourages embracing imbalance when necessary and emphasizes the individual nature of achieving harmony in life. Welcome back to Love Life Legacy, I'm Tse Tso, and today we're diving into work-life balance. How to do it and should you even try? I know balance is something we all talk about, but in reality it often feels like a myth, right? So in this episode I want to share my own journey, challenge some of the traditional ideas on balance and hopefully leave you with a new way of looking at it, right? So let me start with a quick life update because that really will set the stage for why this topic matters so much right now. So I'm currently in the middle of an MBA, which means long nights, group assignments, endless readings. I'm also a mom of three. I'm navigating the school runs, parenting responsibilities. And then on top of that, I'm a product manager, which is a full-time, high-pressure job. I'm also seeing someone, someone I really like and someone I think really likes me. So when I say balance, I mean, all my balls are up in the air, literally. So some days, honestly, I feel like I'm dropping more balls than I'm catching. And that's exactly why I wanted to talk about this today, because if I'm wrestling with it, I know I'm not the only one. So is there a myth? Is there reality to this whole work-life balance thing? I don't know. We've all been told that balance is the goal, even though I personally haven't seen anyone who can split their life into proper, equal chunks. And luckily, when I started my career, my mentor told me immediately that, you know, that thing isn't a thing that's ever going to be a thing. All the people that I was looking up to at that time, she was just like, all those people, just know that they don't have any work-life balance. They're either, they've got house, stay-at-home wives, that everything, or they are littered with help. And she even said that this whole thing of, oh, Beyonce has the same 24 hours. Don't fall for that. Beyonce has a chef, has a million nannies, a million au pairs. Her life is sorted. When she's in studio, she's in studio knowing everything else is taken care of. You don't have that luxury, so don't even go there, right? So yeah, so yeah, so sometimes, especially since starting the MBA, I realized that balance is not a thing that you should aspire to. Rather, aspire to integration, to say that with everything that I have going on, you have a podcast as well, can you integrate it into your life? Rather than, if I integrate it, will it balance everything else? Because it's really, really, really hard, right? So this brings us to the question, and of course, today's title, should you even balance? And I don't think the answer is always yes. I think there are some seasons in your life when imbalance is necessary. Right now for me, studies and career are taking up a lot of space. Am I the best mom all the time in terms of what kind of mom I was when I was a stay-at-home wife, and I was a housewife and I was available to them all the time, catering to their every need? Absolutely not. That's not the case. I now have to be a little bit more deliberate. Like yesterday, for example, I took them to Total Ninja so that we have a full day of activities with just me and them. Today, I'm taking them to the movies, and then we're doing a beach picnic later on, just so that I integrate the fact that I'm a mother into my busy schedule, right? So it's okay that if you're a new parent right now, your family's taking center stage. It's okay if you're trying to run for promotion, your career's taking center stage. The truth is, every yes is also a no. And that was a big lesson for me because the inverse is also true. Every no is also a yes. So there are certain sentences that have taken a bit of a backburner, and that's because I said yes to integrating something else. When somebody's child is like, oh, I like you, I want to be in your life, and I said yes to being a girlfriend, that was me also saying no to being the friend that is going to be the therapist friend to every single friend group that I have. And does that work for me? Yes. Same as saying yes to my MBA. Saying yes to my MBA meant saying no to all those dinners that I performed at work. So it's also saying no to some leisure time, those dinner dates that I used to be able to attend, and that extra glass of wine. When you say yes to the gym, you say no to something else. You say no to only enjoying your junk food and that drive after work where you pass by KFC and you enjoy your favorite meal. So it's not balance. You can't balance being super healthy with also enjoying your cake, right? You can integrate it because you like cakes, have a slice of cake every now and again and enjoy that. But to balance it 100%, I think balance isn't universal. I think it's deeply personal and you know what that looks like. So rather than looking for balance being an equal split, maybe don't necessarily look for the equal split is the point that I'm trying to make. And also what I'm saying about integrating my love life doesn't have to be true for you. You might be somebody who's already married and you're already prioritizing your family and you want to integrate your friends. That's absolutely okay. And that also means that's also saying no to certain things when your kids are like, oh, we have to do a full teacher day every Tuesday. And that takes up a lot of your energy and your time. You can say no to that. Right. So anyway, how to balance in the definition of integration. Right. Sorry, I am feeling like I'm powering through some of these points and it's deliberate. I know our attention spans have all reduced quite drastically since we had COVID and TikTok. We all just can't pay attention. And I want to make sure that I don't take up too much of your time so that you can continue and balance on other things as well. So how do you balance or how do you intentionally imbalance? A big part of it is you being okay with the fact that not everything is going to balance. I was looking at my school marks and right now I'm sort of a B student, like comfortably sitting at a B. And I realized that I'm actually okay with the fact that in this season of my life, I'm not a student shooting the lights out because that means that I wouldn't be happy and in deep, deep, deep, deep affection and intimacy with my partner. That would mean that I'm not necessarily even being able to make time for my kids. That would mean that at work, I'm really, really dropping the ball. Right. So I'm okay with the fact that there's that, like that I'm not an A student. I'm not the perfect mother. I'm not the perfect girlfriend. I'm not the perfect friend. I'm happy to kind of be it out in everything or be an A in other areas of my life because when I'm done with my qualification, I would still love to have rich, meaningful relationships with the people that I say I love. Kids, friends, everyone included. So I do try and make time and I'm okay with that imbalance. So if balance isn't about a perfect split, then what is it about? Right. For me, it's about managing priorities. Right. Setting good boundaries and understanding your energy. I think we'll start with prioritization. Right. And I ask myself every day, what's urgent and what's important? It is so important that you know how to do this because especially when it comes to schoolwork and at GIV, we work in syndicate groups quite a lot. So it's a lot of teamwork. And what might happen is there are people that have the sense of urgency when it comes to everything, and then they just cause a lot of anxiety in the system unnecessarily. Yes, the assignment is important, but it's due two months from now. Is it urgent? No. Is it important? Absolutely. Absolutely. And sometimes when you're looking at everything and it's important, right, because we're trying to be leaders. And sometimes when you're looking at everything, it all feels like everything is urgent, but it really isn't. Even at work, you look at your tasks. Sometimes it's being asked by your boss. It's urgent. Look at it and decide if it's urgent or it's important. A project that's going to move the business needle forward is absolutely important. But we don't work in a hospital. It's not urgent. So know that there might be something else that's quite urgent, that is broken, that needs fixing, that's going to cause you a lot of pain in the long run if you don't fix it immediately. Once you can establish what's urgent versus what's important, you quickly can even let go of things that are neither, because some things are really just noise. So the second thing is boundaries, right? Like I said earlier, I really learned to say no. And I've learned to also stop working at certain times, even if my to-do list isn't done. I know it sounds crazy. I write things in my urgent and important priority. There are other things in there. But if I don't get to them at that time, I don't get to them. And it's actually quite funny because for me, when it's time to sleep, I go to sleep. I don't do that thing where I'm gaslighting myself into believing that if I work until 2 a.m., then I'm this amazing student and I'm working harder than everybody else. No, I have a cutoff. And your boundaries are a good description of where you are with yourself. You need to be really, really good at setting those boundaries. So the third one is energy management. This is very important. What I do is I pay attention to what drains me and what energizes me. And then I plan around that, not just around the clock. And this is so important because women and men are different. I'm seeing this now that I'm with a partner that is quite supportive, organized, and understands themselves. I think men, and I don't mean to generalize, but because they're not cyclical. We have cycles as women because of our hormones, right? And we cannot look at men and think that we can excel by doing what men do when we are fundamentally wired differently. For me, for him, he can work around the clock, right? He will not stop chewing on something until he feels comfortable that it's that. Whereas with me, there's just times when I'm just not in the mood. I'm not in the mood to do it. And because I'm not in the mood, I don't have the energy to do it, I don't do it. Because then I'm not going to give it my best shot, right? So I only work on things when my energy is right. And this means that I also need to pay attention on what drains me and what energizes me. And then I plan my life around that. So I know, for example, if I go to the beach, it's going to energize me. And I also know that there are certain people when I'm done with that conversation, it drains me. So those hard conversations that have to happen because this is life, I'm not going to plan to have those conversations at critical times when I need to deliver. So when people are trying to call me during my workday, I'm very deliberate. If you're the kind of person whose energy doesn't feed me and doesn't breathe life into me, I am not answering that call. I will deal with you when my day is over and I'm tired. That's probably almost all the time anyway, because I'm working, right? But I make sure that I prioritize those conversations around my energy levels. This is not an emergency. It's not urgent. And there's no reason for me to put myself in that space because I know that I'm an empath. I know that I won't just listen to people's problems without feeling them deeply. So I work around that. And then, of course, there are integration hacks that maybe you can adopt, like studying with the kids around so that they feel like a part of my life. We're actually laughing about this with my person the other day about how I'm sure other kids hate seeing their laptop coming because they're like, ah, this just means work. And because I was tempted to do a bit of working while I was out with the kids and that conversation, I happened to say, hey, maybe don't do that. Maybe be fully in the moment with the kids. But of course, day to day, I can sit with my laptop while we're watching the TV and it feels like mommy is still in the room because the way my kids are now, except the little one, they're so excited to see me for the first five minutes and then they're over me. But it is me being there and life still happens with mommy still being around. Right. So sometimes I also schedule, like, family time immediately after, like, a serious MBA block session. And as we say this while I'm podcasting, my baby is calling me. Yes, Azzy, just hold on. Just hold on. I'm coming. And, yeah, so just, yeah, it's kind of helped me during block knowing that, okay, I can go fully into my studies for the next 10 days. And then I know that the weekend after that, fully get into my kids. Non-negotiable, my kids get my time. Then my assignments also get my time. Yeah. Everything else flicks around, whatever is a priority around that. Right. And sometimes, some weeks it works out beautifully. Other weeks we are just surviving. And it's okay to know that that's normal. Right. So, yeah, so the big message, I guess, that I'm trying to say is we need to reframe balance. Right. So here's the reframe I'm kind of reading on lately. Balance isn't about a perfect fit. It's about alignment. Am I living according to my values as a person? I had this conversation with my friend where I liken my life to either a piece of cake or pizza that you split. And the big thing I was talking about there was including me in that split. There's a part of me that's a partner. There's a part of me that's a mother. There's a part of me that's a daughter. There's a part of me that's a friend. And then there's a part of me that is for me because loving you, spending time with you is just as important for me. I just make sure that whatever I'm doing and whatever I am integrating into my life is aligned to my core values. And a big part of my core value is also being in love with the life that I'm creating. It is so important. Yesterday I heard a phrase where this lady was like, the love of your life should be the love of your life. And it just hit me like loving your life is the ultimate love of your life. You need to make sure that you're falling in love with the life that you're creating. So even in this desire for balance, more look at alignment. Every day, am I loving this life that I'm creating? Am I in love with the person I'm becoming? So looking at that, then I know that this is aligned with that core value of me of I want to create a life that I love. And having somebody who pours into that means something to me. Doing my studies so I grow myself means something to me. Spending time with my kids so that we have good memories. It's very much aligned to my core values of love, respect, kindness to everyone around me, but also to myself. And the legacy that I'm trying to create. And then am I making guilt free choices? Knowing that if I sacrifice in this one area, it's because I'm investing in another. So as much as I get along with so many people as an individual, we didn't be psychometrics. And yes, there's that big aspect of myself that is quite social. So there will be moments where, you know, I want to be part of certain experiences in people's lives that I want to celebrate big moments. But saying yes to those is also saying no to another aspect of my life. And there's not going to be a reality where I let myself down. And I think we've spoken about this whenever we talk about people pleasing. Most of the time when you're choosing to please other people, you're doing it at the expense of someone. And that someone is you. And the question is, do you love you? And if the answer is yes, then hey. And then another thing is I have to that I have to ask myself when it comes to alignment is am I remembering that life has seasons? And in each season, different priorities rise to the top. When I started looking at balance this way, I think I felt a lot more freedom around my choices. Right. So integrating other aspects into my life and also making sure that everything I choose to incorporate and every choice that I make is in alignment with who I want to be. I don't want to die and have regrets. I'm sure it's the same with you if you're listening to this podcast. And so anything that you're doing, just make sure it's in alignment with who you want to be. Sometimes you're trying to appease in-laws so that they perceive you in a certain way and then you'll feel nice and gooey inside because the world validated you. But do you validate you? Are you validating the choices that you are making about your life, about your time, about your energy and attention span? Right. So here's what I want you to take away from today. Right. Balance is not a one size fits all formula. It's a personal definition. You decide what balance means. You decide what balance looks like for you in this season with your set of circumstances. So ask yourself, what matters most to me right now? Not forever. Not for the rest of your life. Just right now. And right now. Oh, I just saw a mini butterfly flying in. That is so cool. Anyway, so what matters to me right now in this season of my life where I'm employed, I'm a mom, I'm seeing someone. Yeah. It has to be. It's this season. So be a season where maybe I'm more settled. I'm not in a new relationship. Something else doubles to the surface. Right. So, yeah, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please share your balance struggles or your best balance tips with me. You can drop me something on my Instagram. You can respond to this TikTok or write a comment on YouTube. I don't know where I'm putting this video yet, but you can also send me a question so that I can answer that question in the next episode. Anyway, thank you so, so much for spending this time with me today. Remember, balance doesn't have to be perfect, but it can be purposeful. Until next time, guys. Take care.
