Often, it’s not about becoming a new person, but becoming the person you were meant to be, and already are, but don’t know how to be.

Heath L. Buckmaster, Box of Hair: A Fairy Tale

I am here in my bed at 11:34PM on this beautiful 18th January night, straight out of 16 hours of work, 4 deliveries and writing this blogpost. Sleep? No where in sight, just vibes and Inshallah! at this point in time.

This is not a rant, sorry to disappoint. This is yet another journey I am undertaking: Finding/creating balance in myself and my everyday life(activities). What do I mean by finding balance? What does a balanced life look like me?
It’s easy to get lost in the chaos of everyday life and more so, as I try to balance every aspect of my life including myself. I used to find myself constantly overwhelmed with my workload, orders and writings, and overpowered by the urgent to get it all done at the same time, leading to fatigue and burnout.

Achieving work-life balance for me involves a complete recalibration of the way I do and handle things and my own expectations. It also means pressing the reset button on what I view as normal. A drastic but needed change in the way I handle the situations around me in a way that reflects my values and my intentions. Nurturing my heart, my mind and my well-being purposely, every single day.

I feel most people in the dilemma I am facing often lack presence in their own lives, like they are living in the third person and they are just existing. I am not in that stage, currently, but I do understand how devastating it may be (usually is) on one’s health and wellness, relationships, and others.

There is a thin line between work and life, and drawing/setting a boundary between the two is very important. That and realising and understanding that you cannot be productive all the time. I find it so hard to just relax and let my brain cool down for a couple of seconds: always rushing to the next item on my agenda and my mind is in a constant state of panic that I should be doing something, anything.

I understand I cannot set balance to my life in a single day and deadlines seem too intense and would further stress me, here are the ways I plan on achieving said balance with intentionality, creativity and tons of patience:

Habit #1: Time Management || Planning ahead

Time management seems like the most obvious thing and yes, planning what you are going to do is easy, problems start at execution. Last year, I tried my hardest to write to do lists every chance I got and that really worked out in my favour. It acted as a compass through my day and allowed me to manage different aspects of my life without overwhelming myself with the details of each task. Planning ahead of my day, allows me the luxury of me-time, I know what to do next, I am aware of my surrounding and conscious on the amounts of time I assign to each task.

2022 also brought with it the writing on my monthly “wins”. A reminder to myself on my bad days that it is not a bad life, something most of us forget when life troubles our waters and rocks our boat. I am carrying over these two habits into this new year and remain optimistic on the dazzling effect of balance this will have. Subscribe to my newsletter for a copy of my monthly wins sheet!

Habit #2: Setting boundaries || Managing other peoples expectations

Learning to say “no.” to people and I know it is not easy, especially when people have grown accustomed to depending on you for their every woe. They need something, they call you. They can’t get to something, they delegate it to you.
I am in no way saying neglect your duties or don’t help around. In fact, overdeliver on your promises but take time to yourself, know when to rest, take a step back, reset, cool off, take time off, rewind and breathe. Allow yourself the luxury of meeting people at the level that you can, overexerting yourself will only lead to burnout and what use are you then?

As an employee, I do my job the way it’s laid out for me. I dot all the i’s and cross all the teas. My work balances.

As a creative and an entrepreneur, I lay out my own work in bursts that work for me and still allow me time to myself and my self care. Here, I set my own expectations, goals, milestones and progress indicators. I love my job and I love everything else about me outside of my job. What more can a girl ask for but balance between the two?

“If a man is called to be a street sweeper
He should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted,
or Beethoven composed music,
or Shakespeare wrote poetry.
He should sweep streets so well
That all the hosts of heaven and earth
Will pause to say
Here lived a great street sweeper
Who did his job well.”

– Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Habit #3: Personal time|| Health and wellness || hobbies

Personal time for me is just time away from productivity, a moment of quiet peace and serenity. It ranges from laying in my bed to aimlessly scrolling through social media as I am not a physical exercise person and find comfort in my blankets.
I have, however, been missing meals and find myself losing weight. As a person who finds joy in cooking, it’s a shocker that I miss so many meals and will have to resort to either a weekly meal plan or an eating journal. Maybe then I can keep track of what goes into my stomach and the times that it does. I have never really been conscious about my weight but as jeans stop fitting and shirts become baggy, it’s a no brainer. My meal plan is available for download below:

My hobbies will sue me one of these days for misleading them into thinking I have time for them.
They have suffered and blurred into background noise, more so with running these businesses around me. Crocheting has plummeted to an all time low and reading is just as scarce. I plan on gifting myself a knitting machine this first half of the year as I also plan on adulting 101. A bookshelf is long overdue and just so happens to sit very high on my “23 things to do in 2023” list (to be shared soon).I find solace in the fact that my writing hasn’t taken much of that hit and remains top priority in the hobbies section. A win is a win.

The launch dates of my two books can be found in the “Books by Myra” section and I do plan on collaborating with people on giveaways to several schools! I am shaking with excitement.

Finding balance, all in all, boils down to individual priorities, what you deem as important and worth your time. Tasks pile up and suddenly, you don’t know which way is north anymore and I am here to say in the voice of Nightbirde, “It’s okay if you are lost. We are all a little lost and it’s alright.” Existential crisis’ arise from lack of presence, direction and focus, something I plan on avoiding in every lifetime. I have a plan to follow, goals to tick and a vivid balanced life to live.

Let me know your thoughts on the comments and don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter to get real time updates on my posts.

Love,

A girl who dreams in colours yet to be discovered.