How I maintain a balanced Work and Life Routine

I have been working from home for many years and I am often asked how I maintain a balanced work and life routine. It sometimes might seem like I have it together but in all honesty, there is no such thing as a perfect work-life balance, it’s all about making what you’ve got work for you. When I started working in corporate over 10 years ago now, I loved the idea of Flexi-work but struggled with it. I would wake up on time but after lunch, I would be bored and struggling to keep my eyes and ears open.

People who often don’t work from home think working from home is great and all you do is wake-up whenever don’t have to rush through traffic and bam – you start to work and because you are home everything is honky dory. But, this more often than not is far from the truth – sure, you can wake-up whenever but the sad part is that because people know you are home, they set meetings up early morning meaning you still have to wake up early. For those new to working from home, I am sharing tips on how I maintain a balanced work and life routine and hope you find it helpful.

How I Maintain a Balanced Work and Life Routine

When you are fortunate enough to work in a job that you love and allows you to work from home, I find that its easier to find that work-life balance. But, if you work in a job you don’t enjoy and even with the perks of working from home, it can feel like torture in some respects because you would much rather do something else than that job, making everything pretty much boring. I learned this over a course of many years and even in a boring job, you find ways to make it work for you.

The first time I learned of this concept of Flexi-work was when I was interning at one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the world. I was happy to learn, I could work from home, didn’t have to come into the office at the crack of dawn and could still do the same hours but in my comfiest clothes ever. This sounded like a dream to me until the novelty wore off and found it harder to concentrate at home and preferred spending more time in the office than at home. Don’t get me wrong, working from home is not all that bad but it is a lot of work and requires discipline.

With that being said, here is how I maintain a balanced work and life routine.

Set your working hours & Space

I work a 9-5 job in the pharmaceutical industry which sometimes seems more like an 8 to 8 job due to the amount of work and meetings I find myself with every single day. As much as I love working in the comfort of my own home, it has often been my experience that a mixture of work from home and office is better than either alone. I found myself much more productive being in the office than working from home but unfortunately for me, I am now 100% home-based. I had to change my way of thinking and my working style as well, I had to be productive inside and outside of the office. I found that setting your working hours not only fosters discipline but makes you think you have actually ‘gone to work’.

Allocating an area of your home to be your workspace or office is the best thing I ever did for my professional life. Working on the kitchen table, living room sofa or bed is often a bad idea (at least for me). I found the kitchen table too busy and distracting, the sofa made me want to watch TV (I did) and the bed made me nap (I don’t even like napping). I found myself much more productive in my office, shut off the world and focused on performing my day job. Setting you a workspace is not only getting a nice chair and desk but also items that allow you to be more productive like a printer/scanner and the like. I made my home office feel like my work office with all the trimmings and this allowed me to be more productive.

Learn to Unplug & Prioritise your Health

In our current climate and the technological advances we enjoy these days, it is even more paramount for us to learn how to unplug. Working from home can burn you right out because you are home all the time and can stay online longer to do more work. If you don’t have a strict routine and structure, you can find yourself burnt out fast than tea light candles. In my early years of working from home, this happened to me and I fell ill because of it so, I encourage you to unplug as often as you need it. One thing you can’t skimp on these days is your health, take care of yourself and take necessary breaks.

Even though I work 9-5, there are many days when people from various timezones want to meet at 6am my time or even 8pm my time. Once a week I accept such meetings but not more than that, every day I block off 8-9 as my ‘refocus time’ and lunch time around mid-day. This has allowed me to have a breather, take stock of my health, my workload and prioritise accordingly. I have also taken to switching my work phone off at 6pm and I switch it back on around 6am, it is easy for me to reach for my phone when it buzzes so to stop that, I switch it off and lock it in the office or another room.

Create a to-do list & prioritise your work

I am a to-do list orientated person and I function best when I take 10-20 minutes of our of day to prepare my to-do list for the day and week. Most of us, our work are filled with deadlines, I like to work on the easiest thing first and allocate time to each task I have for that day or that week. I often have projects every week, month, quarterly so I always dedicate half a day each week to just work on that project and nothing else.

I know sometimes it is hard to focus only on one task but I have found that if I gather all the material that I need, I can work offline and switch off my phone to reduce distractions. I am someone who ensures I complete my tasks long before the deadline and don’t like working last minute. Over the many years, I have learned which tasks take me longer to do and which I can complete quickly and I allocate my time wisely. This can take months or even years to coin but once you do, everything falls into place and you learn what you can work with.

Take time off and Exercise

I am a habitual traveller and every free minute I get I book the next flight out of London to wherever I fancy but this year has been different. We have found ourselves unable to travel to our favourite destinations meaning we spending more time at home doing nothing but work. Like most people, I don’t like taking time off and doing nothing but this year I have learned I need to take time off and do absolutely nothing, its good for my health and mental wellbeing.

Until recently, I only found time to work out once I finished my work but more often than not I am super tired (mentally) and I just want to sleep. I figured out that if I worked before I started work or during lunchtime, I actually found I felt more energetic for the rest of the day and in the evening I spent that time catching up on my favourite shows or reading some of my favourite books. I definitely recommend taking time off to do absolutely nothing, not even decluttering the house, just nothing and free your mind.

Make time for You, Friends & Family

The work-life balance is a tricky monkey especially for those with children to look after. I have found that if I make the effort to allocate time in my day for friends and family, I actually spend time with them (even virtually). I speak to my mother almost daily, I chat with my friends daily and my sister and I talk every single day even though we live only 10-minutes away from each other.

Whilst making time for friends and family is so important, another important person you need to make time for is you. Every weekday I plug into my calendar what I call ‘refocus time’ this can be anything from drinking a cup of tea, reading a book or watching a nice video that makes me happy. I make time for me and do things that uplift my heart, it can be things like watching a music video or playing on my Nintendo Switch. At the end of the day, I make time for people who are important to me and that includes me myself and I.

The tips that I have shared in this post are those that I implore every single day, week, month, quarter and year. Not everything will work for you in this post but this is how I maintain a balanced work and life routine and it works for me. How do you maintain a work-like balance?