Life Balance Wheel: Create Your LIfe By Design

The Wheel of Life

I use a great resource that I like to share with my clients. It’s called the Wheel of Life. After answering a few simple questions, it provides you with a visual “wheel” of where your time/energy/focus is going in your life. This tool is perfect for accessing how to rebalance the things in life that are most important to us.

It begins with understanding what our life energy and time spent currently looks like, and then acknowledging what we WANT it to look like. It’s a great resource to come back to time and time again to reassess what we are giving our precious life resources to, and where we need to modify.

The Wheel of Life provides a visual reminder of where we've come from versus where we're going! I’d love to offer this resource to you and help you balance your wheel! You can access this free, yet highly valuable tool in the link below, or by contacting me directly. I look forward to working with you to helping you live a richer, more satisfying life by design!

How to balance your life

As we look at what areas of our lives we should be enriching, as well as areas that we should be minimizing, let's keep a few important details in mind by answering the following questions:

1. What portions of your life bring you the most fulfillment?
2. What portions of your life need improvement?
3. Where would you like to see enrichment? For example, areas of your life that are good, but that you'd like to take to the next level?
4. Are you giving your time and energy to the things you listed in the first question?
5. How does your current path align with your hopes and dreams?

The answers you provide above will serve as the basis to providing more balance within your daily demands.

Balance your time

We are a society which has become very good at being busy...but how much quality is behind the energy we exert in our busy-ness? Using our time wisely and efficiently towards the things that are most important to us and those things that keep us on our path to our goals is key to achieving quality results!

Time is one of the most precious gifts we can give to anyone, including ourselves!  When we are divvying up our weekly time allotment for the people and projects that are important to us, remember to make time for yourself. Keeping your wheel of life balanced means making time to recharge and renew, and allowing yourself time to recover from the demands of the busy daily lives we most assuredly all live!

One of my favorite quotes from Steven Covey is, "The challenge is not to manage time, but to manage ourselves." We all have the same 24 hours in a day. We all have the same 60 minutes in each hour. When you think about it, managing ourselves is essential to proper time management. How we use our time, what we give our energy to, and what dividends it pays out...those are the real issues. We should be looking at time as our partner, not our opponent. Time should be working with us, not against us.

Examine your wheel of life

Look at your wheel of life; does it work for your or against you?

If it’s not working for you, let’s evaluate your toolbox.

• What tools do you have readily available to help you manage your time (and self) more efficiently? 
• What tools do you need to acquire? 

The first step in answering those questions is to evaluate:  we all have the same 24 hours in a day…how do you spend yours? 

Identify how you spend your time

Make a list of how you spend your time hour by hour. Take a few minutes to really analyze the results of that list.

• What is paying valuable dividends and aligning you to your goals? 
• Which ones are you giving energy to that truly enhance your life? 
• Which ones promote growth and support your dreams and aspirations?

As you look at your wheel of life, take note of the areas that are not proving quality results, or which are not aligning you with your path to your goals. How can we make sure we find balance in each section of life for a holisitic result?

how to maximize your tools in life

Utilizing a life coach to learn exemplary time management skills can be the key that is missing from your toolbox.

To start, the three most important tools to have are the following:

1. Motivation
2. Will
3. Self-discipline

As we hit bumps in the road of life, the power of those tools wax and wane, but the more we learn to practice better time management, the more those tools stay sharpened and efficiently serve their purpose in your life.

Use those tools to streamline your life. Create habits and processes that promote your aspirations. Find inspiration in the world around you to stay motivated and forward-thinking. Contribute to your own self in a meaningful way by carving out time weekly to recharge and renew. When budgeting your time, do the most important things first. Make your time work FOR you, not against you!

I’ll leave you with one final thought, which is another one of my favorite quotes, this time from Ty Howard.  He says, “Average people wake up, procrastinate, and let time slip away. Great people wake up, climb into the driver’s seat of time management success, and blow the doors off of desired outcomes, productivity, and achievement!” 

Managing yourself into greatness is paramount to making time work for you. Make today a great day!