What’s work-life balance? As a communication researcher, I study how people manage their work and lives, and the relationships between the two domains, particularly in the world of first responders (firefighters, paramedics, law enforcement, etc.). I’m interested in how we each understand the popular, yet elusive concept of work-life balance. After all, when two things are balanced, it’s just equal portions, a 50/50 split—so how hard can it be to have work-life balance? As popular as the idea is, actually accomplishing what we’d each consider to be work-life balance isn’t as easy as it seems, especially for those in high-stress and low-control occupations such as the military.
We can find hundreds of articles telling us the “best ways to achieve work-life balance.” Yet for such a trendy phrase and topic, many of us struggle to find balance! Well, this isn’t one of those articles. In fact, I’ve found that work-life “balance” isn’t a realistic way of describing the relationship between our work and life. It’s a myth, it’s too abstract, and it’s impossible to achieve. I suggest reframing how we think about the relationship between our work and family with a more accurate and realistic approach—by thinking about it as work-life intersections.
Learn to navigate processes and outcomes
We manage the relationship between work and life in two different ways: 1) as a process that we struggle through, and 2) as an outcome that’s hard to achieve.
As a process, our work and life is negotiated, or navigated like a map, in hopes of finding harmony between the two. It’s a messy process—with spillover from work to life or life to work—that we clean up or cope with daily. It’s a journey that’s influenced by so many different factors that make it incredibly hard to identify the best or most effective way for anyone to achieve balance.
For example, military families describe deployment as unique and turbulent. In other words, how a deployment affects your family isn’t the same for everyone, and it can be quite difficult. So, the idea of a static 50/50 equal split or “balance” between work and life, simply put, doesn’t reflect the actual experience of most people.
As an outcome, we manage the relationships between work and life by using the term “balance” as a diagnosis and subsequent treatment for when the two are in conflict with one another. We say things like, “I need to find more work-life balance,” as if it’s something we are missing or lost—and that if we look hard enough, we’ll find it. It’s a state of being “balanced,” or an end goal we strive toward. But it varies greatly among Service Members and even families.
Some Service Members might have to manage multiple roles, including being a parent, child, student, and employee—all in addition to their military role.
How do you see the relationship between your work and life?
For example, military parents differ in terms of how much detail about their deployment they want to share with their kids. And those children can experience quite a bit of difficulty as they try and make sense of the deployment and reintegration phases. In other words, what the “balanced” end goal or outcome looks like isn’t the same for everyone, and it often changes from family member to family member.
Find your own path
By now, you can see that I reject the idea of work-life “balance.” But if I don’t use that phrase, then how do I describe the relationship between work and life? I prefer the term work-life intersections as an ever-changing, fluid, and adjusting set of intersecting lines. Some days I might need to devote more time, energy, or effort to handle my family responsibilities. And on other days, I need to spend more time, energy, or effort doing tasks for work. If I envision work-life as an intersection that moves and adjusts as needed, then I’m not chasing a perfect 50/50 split—or balance—that I’ll never achieve (which is exhausting!). I can set the relationship between my work and life at any intersection I want instead. For military families, this is much more realistic as the deployment phases and many different trainings, for example, might call for a new work-life intersection.
If we imagine an acrobat spinning plates, we can continue using work-life intersections as a metaphor. As the acrobat starts to spin one plate, and then another, and then another, soon the first plate will slow and need more attention to keep from falling. Then the second plate needs attention. The acrobat must negotiate keeping all their plates spinning, and each might need more or less attention than another at any point in time. Our work-life intersection is much like the acrobat spinning plates. It’s nearly impossible to keep all the plates spinning at the same speed at the same time, yet this is what the metaphor of “balance” would have us believe we can achieve. Realistically, our attention/time/energy/effort (or whatever you want to call it!) isn’t split equally between all the plates. But rather we divide it as necessary to negotiate and manage all aspects of our world.
I encourage you to rethink what work-life “balance” means for you. I challenge you to question what that work-life border really looks like. If you have kids, how do you and your family manage the demands, responsibilities, and needs day-to-day? If at all, how has it changed over the course of your life or after major life events? Most importantly, how do you see the relationship between your work and life?
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