WorkLife Balance or a Juggling Act

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Work-Life Balanceor a Juggling Act?
R. Paul Stevens
sw-work-life balance
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A Five Minute Quiz

• Rate yourself
• 1-never
• 2-seldom
• 3-sometimes
• 4-often
• 5-always

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A Five Minute Quiz

• 1. I spend 50 hours or more a week at work
• 2. I neglect/have difficulty getting an adequate
  quantity and quality of sleep, exercise,
  hydration and/or nutritian.
• 3. I feel depressed, exhausted and/or overwhelmed
  when I think of all I have to do at hme and/or
  work.

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A Five Minute Quiz

• 4. I feel like a have little or no control over
  the demands placed on me at home and/or work.
• 5. I feel guilty that I am not meeting my
  responsibilities at home and/or work.
• 6. I neglect taking time for myself (for
  recreation, relaxation, quiet time or self-care)
  in favour of fulfilling worj and fmaily
  responsibilities.

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A Five Minute Quiz

• 24-30 Meltdown waiting to happen
• 15-23 Getting caught in the thrill of the chase
• 14 or less Great, but will it last?
• (The Office Journal June and July, 2006)

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures
• One continuous work week

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• According to the New York Times, Sixty-two per
  cent of workers say their workload has increased
  over the last six months 53 per cent say work
  leaves them overtired and overwhelmed and more
  than half expect this pressure only to get
  worse.
• Dalla Costa, 67

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• We tend to regard busyness as a virtue for its
  potential efficiency, when it is largely a vice
  for actually locking us into the churn of never
  doing enough, never catching up, never attaining
  what truly satisfies. The busyness we embrace for
  aggrandizement or success is all too often the
  straitjacket that keeps us diminished and
  unfulfilled.
• John Dalla Costa, Magnificence at Work, 147

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures
• One continuous work week
• Cultural changes

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures
• One continuous work week
• Cultural changes
• Ethical Relativism

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures
• One continuous work week
• Cultural changes
• Ethical Relativism
• The Global Economy

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CAUSES OF STRESS

• Shifts in work world
• Technology
• Relational Pressures
• One continuous work week
• Cultural changes
• Ethical Relativism
• The global economy
• Drivenness within

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DRIVENNESS

• 1. Gratified only by accomplishment
• 2. Preoccupied with the symbols of accomplishment
• 3. Caught in the uncontrolled pursuit of
  expansion
• 4. Limited regard for integrity
• 5. Possess limited or undeveloped people skills
• 6. Highly competitive
• 7. Often possesses a volcanic force of anger
• 8. Usually abnormally busy
• Gordon MacDonald Ordering your Private World, p.
  31-36

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PAUL Was he driven or called?

• Prevailing against Christians Acts 91-2
• Prevailing against Jews Acts 921-22
• Prevailing in debate Acts 929
• Prevailing against fellow believers Acts 152
• Prevailing against everybody Acts 1717
• Prevailing in the synagogue Acts 198-9
• Sometimes angry 1 Cor 421

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Balance?

• The truth is, balance is a bunk. It is an
  unattainable pipe dream, a vain artifice that
  offers mostly rhetorical solutions to problems of
  logistics and economics. The quest for balance
  between work and life, as weve come to think of
  it, isnt just a losing proposition its a
  hurtful , destructive one.

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The Problem of a Compensatory Spirituality

• Balance will not be real if it takes the form of
  private restoration outside of work (as important
  as that may be). The key is to make work itself a
  balancing reality, a melting pot for all human
  needs and capacities. The same applies to
  personal spirituality. Unless the encounter with
  transcendence infiltrates work transforms its
  aims, outcome and possibilities we are not
  really integrating presence but more compensating
  for its disintegration. (John Dalla Costa,
  Magnificence at Work, 34)

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Balance?

• Life is about setting priorities and making
  trade-offs thats what grown-ups do. But in our
  all-or-nothing culture, resorting to those sorts
  of decisions is too often seen as a kind of
  failure. Seeking balance, we strive for
  achievement everywhere, all the time and we
  feel guilty and stressed out when, inevitably, we
  fall short.
• Keith H. Hammonds, Fast Company (October 2004),
  quoted in Soo-Inn Tan, A Responsible Life
  Mosaic, March 2005.

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• Few saints or mystics speak glowingly of
  equilibrium. Instead they experience white-hot
  passion for different priorities, not so much
  taming excessiveness as giving it over as
  offering and response to transcendence.The
  mutual flourishing of contemplation and action
  inevitably involves doing differently rather
  than doing less. This is never without
  tension. (Costa, 149)

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Outline

• Stress and why the balanced life is hard to
  attain
• Who am I?
• Where am I?
• What am I about?

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WHO AM I?
WHAT AM I ABOUT?
WHERE AM I?
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WHO AM I?
WHAT AM I ABOUT?
WHERE AM I?
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Personal Design
Miscellaneous
Family Background / Personal History
Sabotage
School / Education
Character / Disciplines
Work / Volunteer Experience
Intelligence / Learning Style
Values Beliefs
Natural Talents / Aptitudes
Interests / Themes
Passions
Personality Type / Personal Style
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Who Am I?

• Strengths
• Personality
• Talents
• Spiritual Gifts
• Weaknesses and Dysfunctionalities
• Central motivation - passions

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Why Personal Design is Important

• It helps us view each of our employees as a
  unique individual that requires individualized
  coaching.
• It helps us understand ourselves our strengths,
  weaknesses, leadership style, and work habits.
• It helps us recognize and understand the
  strengths, weaknesses, needs and potential of
  others.

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Personal Style and Coaching

• How we energize ourselves
• What we observe and the information we focus on.
• How we make decisions
• How we structure our lives

Personality Type / Personal Style
Personal Style represents your innate tendencies
and preferences for how you interact and relate
with the world. These tendencies play a large
role in shaping how we lead, manage, and
communicate with others.
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DISCERNING YOUR PERSONAL CALLING
Speak Lord for your servant Is listening 1 Sam
310 Here am I Gen 462 Here am I. Send me!
Isa 68
DIRECT LEADINGS OF GOD
Dysfunctionalities that affect my freedom are
BLOCKS
Factors that affect my future service are.
CONSTRAINTS
My termperament Values I cherish..
PERSONALITY
GIFTS AND TALENTS My creationally endowed
abilities God seems to work through me in
MOTIVATION My passions are My central
motivational thrust is..
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WHO AM I?
WHAT AM I ABOUT?
WHERE AM I?
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Where Am I?

• Family background and foreground (genogram)
• Relationships and Interdependencies
• Geographical Location
• Life Stages

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Stages of Purpose
What do I want to be when I grow up? (preteens)
Why do people want me as a friend? (teens)
How will I do my living? (twenties)
What qualities do I want to centre me
life around? (thirties)
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Stages of Purpose
What is my legacy? (seventies)
Why do I get up in the morning? (sixties)
What difference am I making in my world? (fifties)
What do I want to become? (forties)
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WHO AM I?
WHAT AM I ABOUT? Values, time and priorities
WHERE AM I?
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What Am I About?

• What is the single most important thing in your
  life to you?
• What do you want your life to be about?
• At this point in your life what do you want to
  learn next?
• (from Walter Wright)

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Values

• Values you cherish

• How these values would look in your life

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Time and the Meaning of Life

• Ecclesiastes 31-11

R. Paul Stevens
Dgb-time
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The Deductive Approach

• God created time
• Time is part of the created order
• Time was created good
• The first mention of holiness is about time (Gen
  23)
• Time has been trusted to humankind as stewards

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The Deductive Approach

• Time has become twisted by the Fall
• We can experience substantial redemption of time
  since Christs coming
• The Greek language has two words for time
  chronos clock time and kairos time that is
  fraught with opportunity and consequences (Eph
  45 Col 45 making the most of every
  opportunity)

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OPTION MANAGING TIME TO GET ALL YOU CAN OUT OF
IT TIME AS A RESOURCE TO BE EXPLOITED
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TIME EXPLOITED

• Our present experience of eternal life should
  call us to question the desperate busyness which
  marks so many Christians. To engage in frantic
  activity is to become enmeshed in the time
  patterns of the world which will one day come to
  an end and is even now passing away.
• Robert Banks

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Fenwick, Benton Perkins. How may I direct your
call?
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Experiencing Time The Inductive Approach

• We experience time in seasons (31-8)
• This is not an endless round without inner
  coherence or sense (311)
• Time, like work, is an evangelist to ,take us
  beyond the present to recognize that we are being
  sought by God (311)

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Spirituality of Time

• Time is a gift of God
• We are stewards, trusted with time, but not
  owning it, and accountable to God for our
  stewardship

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Spirituality of Time

• Time is a gift of God
• We are stewards, trusted with time, but not
  owning it, and accountable to God for our
  stewardship
• We have enough time

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Priorities
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URGENT
NOT URGENT
II
I
IMPORTANT
IV
III
NOT IMPORTANT
Source First Things First, Stephen R. Covey,
A. Roger Merril and Rebecca R. Merril. Simon
Schuster. 1994
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Priorities in the Workplace
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URGENT
NOT URGENT






IMPORTANT









NOT IMPORTANT






Source First Things First, Stephen R. Covey,
A. Roger Merril and Rebecca R. Merril. Simon
Schuster. 1994
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URGENT
NOT URGENT
II
I
20 - 25
65 - 80
IMPORTANT
15
25 - 30
IV
III
15
Less than 1
NOT IMPORTANT
50 - 60
2 - 3
50 - 60
Source First Things First, Stephen R. Covey,
A. Roger Merril and Rebecca R. Merril. Simon
Schuster. 1994
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Priorities in Life a List or a Web?
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Priorities a list

• Sunday
• God
• Family
• Work
• Monday
• Work
• Family
• God

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Priorities The Web
Re-Creation
Ongoing Learning
C
Work
D
B
E
A
Family
The People of God And Ministry
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Priorities - interdependence
Re-Creation
Ongoing Learning
C
Work
D
B
God
E
A
Family
The People of God And Ministry
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The Typical Executive Life
Friendships
WORK
Citizenship
Family
Leisure
Church
Personal Renewal
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Long Term Goals
Now
This Years Goals
Life Goals

• Personal Long Term Goals
• Business Long Term Goals

• Personal Annual Plan
• Business Annual Plan

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LEANING INTO THE TENSION

• See God in all of it
• Treat it as a spiritual discipline
• Sleep faith-fully
• Plan ahead for important things
• Recognise there will be seasons
• Say no
• Keep Sabbath

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Spiritual Practices

• The Examen (adapted from Ignatius Loyola)
  particularly helpful when practised at the end
  of the day

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The Examen

• Please yourself in Gods presence.
• For what moment today am I most grateful?
• For what moment today am I least grateful?
• Review your day slowly.
• What are you thankful for?
• What do you regret?

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The Examen

• What patterns do you see over the last day, week,
  month, or year?
• What do these patterns tell you about your
  relationship to God?
• Take your observations into prayer, telling
  everything to God and asking God for
  understanding. Allow God to move you and to
  surprise you, if necessary.
• (Tim, Muldoon, The Ignantian Workout Daily
  Spiritual Exercises for a Healthy Faith (Chicago
  Loyola Press, 2004), 42-43).

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Spiritual Practices

• The Examen (adapted from Ignatius Loyola)
  particularly helpful when practised at the end
  of the day
• Developing a Rule of Life

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A Rule of Life

• Pray to the Holy Spirit for guidance and insight
• List all the things you really want.
• List all the things you need and what you do to
  attain these,
• What in the past few months has been keeping me
  from doing what I want to do, and getting what I
  want to get?

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A Rule of Life

• Formulate a programme for yourself on a daily,
  weekly and monthly basis. You will discover that
  all you want wont fit into a 24 hour day or a
  seven day week. Here you must make choices. What
  are the good things you must say no to in order
  to say yes to something better? (meeting with a
  spiritual director may help)
• (adapted from M. Basil Pennington, A School of
  Love The Cistercian Way to Holiness (Harrisburg,
  Penn. Morehouse, 2000, 93)

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The Thrive Test

• 1. I understand my values and consistently use
  them to guide my choices in life and work.
• 2. I understand my strengths and use them on a
  daily basis to energize myself and accomplish my
  goals/tasks with maximum effectiveness,
  efficiency and enjoyment.
• 3. I have a clear sense of purpose that I connect
  with on a daily basis to focus and energize my
  work and to bring meaning a to all areas of my
  life.

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The Thrive Test

• 4. I have a clear vision for my life, work and
  family and see myself steadily moving towards it.
• 5. I am conscious of my needs and am able to
  create strategies to meet my needs in ways that
  align with my values, strengths, purpose and
  vision.
• (info_at_kyoseiconsulting)