Your thoughts about work-life balance

Is it me, or can work-life balance seem like just another unattainable ideal that we're supposed to add to our already tough expectations of ourselves? Maybe it's just the phrasing that makes me think of some kind of perfect place -- an everyday heaven or Nirvana -- that I'm supposed to be shooting for, or of those old vaudeville acts where the lady balances eight place settings of china dishes on her head.

Most days, though, I think I'm able to keep most things in balance, and I agree that living here helps tremendously (see Saturday's column: "Making a living, making a life").

Here's what Facebook friends had to say when I asked for their thoughts last week:

Anthony: Work to Live or Live to work --- It's hard. I live and breathe my work, because it's my passion...so is that living to work? Yet I go out and play because I work so much...so is that working to live? 

Steve: For me I always hard to balance speed and enthusiasm with pace. I go only as fast as I know I keep going and going, otherwise burn out rolls in quick and hard which is hard when people offer so many ideas for what I can, should, ought to try.

Kurt: Seems like 3 full-time jobs is about my limit... 

Jennifer Hemmingsen: Steve: So for you it's a matter of self discipline?

Steve: yep, as a "creative" worker some might say, everyone has an idea for me to try and consider, people to contact etc etc. at some point I realized I'll never last at this rate, file and use what I can, some people burn through jobs I suppose and like it, I've been going at mine for 20 years now.

Sara: Is anyone really able to find balance? Really? 

Tony: I think it's a perception argument. There are those who feel like they are achieving it and those who don't. And all of us are right.

Joe: Seems to me it's like physiological balance...even when we get it pretty close, there's always other forces/demands/responsibilities acting on us, so constant adjustment is required....tweak tweak here, nudge nudge there....

Lonny: You must find balance or you will miss many special events with family and friends and lose opportunities to create a lifetime of memories.

Katie: It's taken a long time, but I feel balanced. It took being really out of balance to get perspective and I had to set rules, follow them and ask my partner to help me follow them 

Amy: No balance here! 

Jody: I recall buying a book on Work/Life balance years ago when my kids were young and I was working nearly 60 hours a week. I wanted my money back when I realized the advice was sounding like "quit THAT job and work from home". I wanted the magic formula that showed me how to get 42 hours out of a day. Even though I rejected it at the time, I found that only when I did productive and satisfying work (I'm talking about the kind you get a paycheck for) from home did I feel I achieved that balance. I think I grabbed the pendulum and have swung it way in the other direction now! I'm cool with that though.

Linda: Balance comes when you make time for yourself along with a busy day. Taking the time to go to a baseball game to watch your kids or grandkids play or just walking through the park. No matter how much you have to do, it will eventually get done and it won't seem so much like work if you have taken time for yourself.

Beth: I'm the worst at this. I logged 86 volunteer hours in June on top of my regular job... and as a result didn't plan a party for my now 7 year old. So I promised to throw her a party for her half birthday. Check back in January to see if that happens:)

Buffy: I like www.workingmomsbreak.com for thinking about work/life balance from a political/feminist perspective.

Pastor Richard: You ought to talk with Deere employees who are sent all over the world to,do their job and disappear for weeks at a time into places like India and china. This is a huge change and has a significant impact in their lives.

George: I was a semi truck driver while my mother was in a nursing home. I had to quit because she was getting worse. Being gone was not worth it. I spent the last year of her life with her everyday. That's how I found balance. \ I will never regret that.

Terry: Being on disability has me unbalanced at times. What is my work?