You have all the tools you need to manage your 168: self-reflection, avoiding surprises and the brick wall (and knowing what to do when you encounter them), building new habits, and becoming more planful. Now it's time to bring these tools together and in real time. This is where things get interesting and challenging.

It's like when you first learn a dance step. Going through the moves slowly, it doesn't seem that hard—left, right, left, turn. Then they put the music at tempo and you can't figure out where you are. That always happens to me when I take part in a Western line dance. As soon as the music starts, I'm the guy facing the wrong way, and there is an army of dancers marching toward me. (Julie has to come to my rescue, turning me in the right direction.) Or it's like when a football coach marks out a play with xs and os for where the players are supposed to move. But when the ball is snapped, suddenly what looked so simple on the coach's diagram becomes very real—and four huge defensive linemen are ready to mow you down.

And so it is with life balance. You're trying to become more planful, but new priorities keep popping up—as well as many distractions. You are trying to build new habits, but that takes so much energy when you're overwhelmed. Welcome to life!

In this chapter, we're going to go deeper into life balance in real time, amid all the pressures and unexpected things that can potentially derail us if we're not self-reflective and self-aware. Life balance doesn't just happen; it requires the ability and willingness to be flexible and adaptable. However, the payoff is being more in control of your life and enjoying those things that are most important to you.

KEEPING YOURSELF ON TRACK

Everywhere I go, whether I am talking to students, executives, academics, religious leaders, or any other group, I hear people express the desire for greater life balance. And I hear the same complaints: “I'm having trouble balancing my life.” Maybe they are working full-time and going to school. Or perhaps they're single parents with small children, or they have a sick relative in the hospital. So many people are overwhelmed by mounting responsibilities. The only way to manage all these pressures is by practicing self-reflection. By continuously reflecting on our priorities and what matters most, we keep ourselves on track and course-correct toward better life balance.

At the same time, you need to recognize that often you will be out of balance. One area or another is going to consume far more time and effort than all the others. You could be in the middle of a significant work project; for example, your company is making an acquisition and you are part of the team that's working seven days a week for six weeks. Conversely, you or a loved one is facing a health crisis, and suddenly that becomes the top priority. Or maybe you're training for your first marathon; in the four weeks leading up to it, you're not at work as much as you usually are.

Life ebbs and flows; that's normal and natural. We don't want to be robotic about it. But over time—usually measured in weeks or sometimes months—you can pursue better balance by allocating your time to what matters most to you. Yet most people don't see it that way when they're in the thick of it. For example, among my MBA students who are going to school and working full-time, there are those who decide that life balance can wait. They tell me, “I am graduating soon, and then my life will get simpler.” That might sound good in theory, but I've never seen that happen in real life.

As time goes on, life usually gets more complicated—not less. Let's say an MBA student is single and 28 years old when she starts the program. She's in a long-term committed relationship, gets married, and maybe has children. Her job is five times more complex than when she started working, with broader responsibilities and international travel. It's simply not realistic to assume that somehow life is going to slow down. You're on an express train, and the pace is only going to get faster. Admitting that reality is the first step in pursuing life balance.

Equally important is being able to recognize when you're out of balance. For most of us, imbalance starts gradually, then escalates. You skip your exercise routine one day and then a second day; before you realize it, a week has gone by and you haven't exercised at all. Or you stay up very late, working well past midnight to meet a deadline, telling yourself that one night of lost sleep won't hurt. Then the pattern repeats night after night, until you're living on caffeine and running on fumes. You reschedule plans with family or friends, saying, “We'll make it up soon.” Now it's three weeks later, and there never seems to be enough time to keep that commitment.

Along the way, there will be signs when life is out of balance. Often those signs involve our emotions. We get triggered; we feel overwhelmed or angry. We lose our temper more easily. We catastrophize, imagining the worst possible outcome. We tell ourselves we're just stressed. Then someone makes a small comment, and we fall apart—or blow up. Sound familiar?

Here's how it sometimes happens in my life: I start out with a long to-do list and three top priorities I am absolutely committed to doing. I know what needs to be accomplished—first, second, third. Then, all of a sudden, I have five more things to do. Usually, I am very planful and good at prioritizing. I can look at the eight things on my plate and decide what must get done immediately and what can (or must) wait. But I confess there are times when I get overwhelmed. When that happens, everything feels like a top priority, especially if some things have to be done at the same time. I need to finish a project, I have a board of directors' call in a half hour, and one of my children needs to be picked up at the airport.

I'm the type of person (and there are a lot of us like this) who hates to let other people down. When I say I'm going to do something, I'm going to do it no matter what. My automatic response is usually to tell myself that I just have to go faster. Suddenly, I'm racing all over the place and becoming even more overwhelmed. Thankfully, Julie is there to step in at times like these. She tells me, “Slow down a minute. Maybe someone could help you.” (Sometimes, she has to say it more than once.) Then she suggests that one of our older children can go to the airport, and she can run an errand that I had promised to take care of. Now, my to-do list is more manageable, and I can see my priorities more clearly.

There are two takeaways from this story. First, know the warning signs that you're out of balance. When you feel panicked, do you get short-tempered? Do you become a deer in the headlights not knowing what to do? With greater self-awareness of those advance warnings that you're out of balance, you can intervene with yourself. Sometimes it just takes five minutes of self-reflection. “What's going on that has me so worked up? What conflicts am I facing? Of all the things vying for my attention, what is really most important? If everything seems important, then what's the most critical? What is non-negotiable for me?” By slowing yourself down, you'll see and think more clearly.

Second, when life gets completely out of balance—whether for a day or over a longer period of time—you need someone in your corner to help you. It may be your spouse/partner, a close friend, a coach, or a mentor. This person knows you well enough to recognize when you're out of balance and is willing to tell you to take a time out. I've been fortunate in 40 years of marriage that Julie is this person for me, as I am for her. She recognizes when I am taking on too much or I am not devoting as much time to some of my life buckets because I'm overly concentrated in one area.

Even a short check-in with a confidante can help get you back on the right track. I was reminded of this when reading an October 2019 Wall Street Journal article titled “When These Executives Want Candid Advice, They Text,” which described women executives who form ad hoc “text board of directors” to ask questions, seek advice, share ideas, and give answers. As the Journal noted, “What makes these text-based exchanges significant, proponents say, is that more professional women are gravitating to them to swap information immediately in a medium that encourages brevity, honesty, and a certain degree of vulnerability.”¹ The same text board, I believe, could be useful for anyone needing a quick check-in or some instant advice on prioritizing.

TAKING A LOOK AT YOURSELF

Self-reflection does involve asking yourself a very probing question: is the way you're living your life aligned with what you say is most important? This is a moment of truth when you are accountable to yourself for living a values-based life.

There are times when we take a step back and see just how out of balance we are. Thankfully, nothing bad or permanently damaging resulted. We just have to laugh at ourselves. I find this to be extremely healthy. We shouldn't take ourselves so seriously—we are works in progress. And the humor makes it easier to see how and where we've let things get out of hand.

I travel a lot—several times a month for several days at a time. To keep myself organized, when I park my car at the airport, I always write the location of the parking space on my ticket, which I tuck away in my wallet. It's a routine that I follow every time.

One night, after flying home from Los Angeles, I couldn't find the parking ticket anywhere. I started to worry, but I remembered distinctly parking my car on the third floor. I walked that entire floor of the parking garage at O'Hare Airport—row after row of hundreds of parked cars. I couldn't find mine anywhere.

I was supposed to meet Julie for a late dinner in downtown Chicago, and I knew I was going to be late because I couldn't find my car. When I finally gave up looking and called Julie from my cell phone, she said calmly, “Harry, I have your car. When you left for Los Angeles the other day, you took a cab to the airport.” (No wonder I couldn't find the parking ticket.)

We had a little laugh about it. Later that night, as I engaged in self-reflection, I began to ask myself how I had become so out of balance. Clearly the amount of traveling I was doing at the time contributed to it. I also saw that I had become so overwhelmed that I was on autopilot. Thankfully, a “missing” car that wasn't really missing was the only result.

Awareness is half the battle. If we don't catch ourselves when we are out of balance, we're in danger of thinking that imbalance is normal or to be expected. You may be in a job where occasionally you have to work 80 or 100 hours in a week. But if that continues for a longer period of time and it becomes a problem for you, it needs to be addressed before you're surprised (see chapter 2) or you hit the wall (see chapter 3). This is life balance in real time, using self-reflection to see where and how you are neglecting parts of your life and what you can do about it.

Everyone is different. Some people have three life buckets; others may have ten. Most people, I've noticed, have six in categories such as work (career/education), community/family, spirituality and mindfulness, health, fun, and making a difference. Your life buckets (see the introduction) reflect what is most important to you at a particular time. Work may be the biggest bucket at one point in your life and family in another. Leisure may be greatly reduced during certain periods and then take on more importance as you have more time, such as in retirement. There's no prescription or judgment here, only the advice to be mindful about how you allocate your time and energy to your buckets so that your 168 reflects your version of a values-based life.

Let's say you're an avid runner but your work and travel schedule prevent you from running for a week. There will be a point at which you say to yourself, “I have to run!” If you don't put yourself in motion soon, you're going to be miserable. You may feel the same way about yoga, playing music, writing in your journal, creating art, or any other activity that nourishes you. These are important outlets that make your life meaningful and reflect your values. Although you may have to put some things on hold from time to time, if it happens too frequently, you will be way out of balance.

SETTING BOUNDARIES AND SAYING NO

Sometimes getting your life back into balance comes down to one word: no. It's not a comfortable word for those of us who have busy lives, have multiple commitments, and don't like to disappoint people. However, there are times when the only way to bring ourselves closer to balance is by saying no. I had one of those moments just recently.

It had been a very long day that started with a meeting at seven in the morning, followed by a speech at ten, and then meetings all afternoon. Now it was evening, and I was driving in rush hour traffic to attend a black-tie dinner in downtown Chicago. To be perfectly candid, it wasn't an event that was important to me or that I was particularly looking forward to. It was one of numerous invitations that I receive. As I was driving, I asked myself, “Why am I going? There will be 300 people at this event. Will anyone notice—or care—if I'm not there?”

The answer was no. And with that, I got off the highway at the next exit and turned around. I went to the gym, exercised for an hour, and then took a late-evening walk with Julie. Balance was restored in the moment. Understand that I'm not advocating breaking commitments, but it's easy to get so caught up in what you think you should do without really thinking through whether it makes any sense. You may be on autopilot without even noticing it.

Unnecessary pressure and unrealistic expectations can affect all aspects of our lives, especially work. If we don't set reasonable expectations for what we can do, we allow ourselves to become overwhelmed and out of balance. The more self-aware we are, the sooner we can catch ourselves before we're significantly off the rails.

An example of someone who uses self-awareness to balance her life is Anna Budnik. I've known her for many years; she was an MBA student in my values-based leadership class years ago, and I have given several talks at her company. Today, Anna is a senior executive for Willis Towers Watson, where she heads Retirement for the Global Services & Solutions Practice Area. Thinking back on her career, Anna reflected that one of the things she had to learn was that not everything had to be done right now. “When I was younger and just starting out, I was always worried about getting in trouble if I couldn't do something or had to reschedule,” she said.

That led to many late nights in the office—even staying there overnight—and going in on weekends. Fortunately, her manager pulled her aside and explained that not everything was a crisis. “My manager told me, ‘Not everything is a priority—we're not brain surgeons.’ That had an impact that lasted throughout my life, allowing me to prioritize and to know that it's okay to ask a client for a little more time.”

With experience came a better sense of her priorities, Anna explained. A simple example is her email, which may at times include as many as one thousand unread messages. “But I know which ones I can skip and the ones I need to respond to immediately. I keep the unread messages until I have to get to them,” she said.

The bottom line, she said, is ensuring that you're communicating with people inside and outside the firm, making sure that people have the information they need and a clear understanding of the deliverables. “At the end of the day, if you have the reputation for delivering, it allows you to prioritize. That's what I wished someone told me earlier when I started my career. That would have been a valuable perspective,” she said.

WHEN YOUR LIFE PLAN CHANGES

Over the long term, your life will change, personally and professionally. For many of us, life gets more complicated because there are more moving parts. Our priorities and commitments change, as do our interests and how we want to spend our time. In addition, opportunities arise that take us in new directions.

Along the way, our life balance changes. To manage these changes, we need to be self-reflective. Most important, in my experience, is being willing to be open and flexible, which enables us to become more balanced.

My friend Karen May, whose story I shared briefly in chapter 5, is one of the best examples I know of someone who has been adaptable as her life changed, while pursuing balance in areas that are the most important to her, including career, family life, health, and leisure. For example, early in her career, while Karen was a CPA with a major accounting firm, her husband, Robert, announced that he had a great job offer—in New York. But Karen's job was in Chicago—the city they had agreed, as a couple, to live and work in. But being flexible, and with Robert's encouragement, Karen approached her boss with the possibility of a transfer. “Within five minutes they said yes,” Karen recalled. The result is what Karen calls an important lesson: if you don't ask, you will never know.

At that juncture in her life, Karen's career bucket took precedence as she pursued the goal of becoming a partner in a public accounting firm. With open communication about their mutual life goals, Karen and Robert were partners to help each other advance.

Their life kept evolving, and with each major change, there was a shift in what Karen saw as most important. She and Robert were both back in Chicago when Karen decided she did want to have children. (Earlier, as related in chapter 5, that had not been part of her plan.) After returning to work following the birth of her first child, Karen was the only woman at her level at the firm trying to balance parenthood and a career on the partner track.

She asked for a little bit of flexibility. Her plan was to manage her biggest client, Baxter, which accounted for about 95 percent of her time. The other 5 percent, she requested, was for “flexibility as a new working mom.” Even though Karen was essentially working full-time and had more billable hours than some full-time colleagues, the firm considered her a part-time employee.

“For the first time, I felt like I didn't belong there.” Her next decision was to look for new opportunities, which she found within Baxter. Working three days a week (but the equivalent of nearly 40 hours), Karen worked a reduced schedule for the next several years, including job-sharing a VP-level role with another working mother. This arrangement, which was very unusual at the time, gave her the flexibility she needed to balance her life as a working mother while still building her career. That was another important life lesson, crucial for pursuing and maintaining life balance: plant yourself where you thrive and feel that you can be yourself.

“I didn't sleep a lot during that time in my life, but I learned to juggle my roles of a mom, a wife, a daughter, and still have a meaningful career,” Karen recalled.

To put Karen's story in perspective, it's interesting to look at the research about women who pursue both high-powered careers and family life—particularly what was true for women when Karen was active in her career. Sylvia Ann Hewlett, an economist and expert in gender and workplace issues, published research findings in Harvard Business Review in 2002 that delivered a sobering reality at the time. “When it comes to having a high-powered career and a family, the painful truth is that women in the United States don't ‘have it all.’ At midlife, in fact, at least a third of the country's high-achieving women—a category that includes high wage earners across a variety of professions—do not have children.” In addition, Hewlett found that women who were raising children suffered “insurmountable career setbacks.” The data painted a bleak picture: “for too many women, the demands of ambitious careers, the asymmetries of male-female relationships, and the difficulties of conceiving later in life undermine the possibility of combining high-level work with family.”²

In today's work environment, corporate policies and technology enable more flexibility in where, when, and how work gets done, which has resulted in some improvement in how both women and men balance home and careers. Nonetheless, we still have a long way to go.

After Karen had been with Baxter for several years, I asked her to consider working in human resources. It was a department she knew little about, as she kept reminding me. But I had faith in Karen's abilities, her proven track record in building and managing relationships, and her knowledge of what it took to be successful.

That night, she told Robert about the opportunity to go into HR. “I explained that, with Harry as CEO, instead of going ‘warp one’ speed, we'd be going ‘warp ten’ speed.” Karen knew that meant working full-time—with a six-year-old, a three-year-old, and a newborn. Robert surprised her with a plan of his own. He had been contemplating taking a break from his job, so he encouraged her to go full-time while he became the stay-at-home parent. That willingness, on both their parts, to be flexible opened up more possibilities for them across multiple aspects of their lives.

“You have to give things a try to see if they will work for you and your family. What works for you may be different than what works for your neighbor,” Karen advised. “Whether you're taking on a new job or work arrangement or hiring a new babysitter, try it for a month or so, and see how it feels. After a few months, check in on how things are working—not just what you think about things, but also how it feels in your heart and gut. Then make the necessary adjustments.”

A key element to pursuing balance is understanding where you are trying to go, whether as a person, a couple, a unit, or a family. Karen and Robert have a common understanding of what they are trying to create together—the kind of home environment they want, their values, what they wanted to teach their children, and financial security. It wasn't a “you do this, and I do that” type of relationship, as Karen described it. Rather, it involved the “right constellation of decisions” that helped them achieve their goals.

THE HORIZONTAL LIFE PLAN

One way that people undermine themselves in their pursuit of life balance is to look at their goals separately, not as part of the greater whole of their 168. I've seen this among men and women, students and executives alike. They seem to look at each life bucket as if it's the only priority they have. (We see this in myopic planners in chapter 5, who go deep into one area and ignore the rest.) This is guaranteed to backfire because the goals (multiple and usually quite ambitious) that they set for themselves in each area are very difficult, if not impossible, to pursue in isolation.

Karen uses a simple framework with three columns (in conversation with her daughter and future son-in-law, Karen drew it on the back of a napkin over lunch). One column is for personal goals, one for professional goals, and one for financial goals. “So many people work on one column at a time, working vertically and deeply into each category. But you have to work horizontally, because a goal in one column influences the others,” Karen explained.

She gave a hypothetical example of someone who wants to work two days a week, become a CEO, and be a millionaire. “That's probably not going to work,” she said with a laugh. “Some people have trouble knitting their goals together. But when you work horizontally, it forces the trade-offs and helps you get deep alignment across all parts of your life.”

Over the years, there were things Karen didn't want to give up but had to do less frequently. She couldn't garden like she wanted to, and she wasn't available to walk with a group of her friends every Saturday—only once a month. But in the context of the bigger picture, Karen had peace of mind and a sense of balance that she was making the best choices she could for herself and her family across the three columns of personal, professional, and financial goals. “Make thoughtful and conscious choices about what you're doing—and not doing. That helped me feel in control of my life balance. Those choices will, and should, ebb and flow over time as your work and family situation changes.”

BUILDING TRUST AND TRANSPARENCY

Trust is a cornerstone in life balance, particularly in allowing yourself to be successful at work and present for what matters in your personal life. It starts with self-reflection and learning to trust yourself. Trust is built as you prove to your boss and colleagues that you can be counted on to get the work done. In many situations, it doesn't matter when or how long you work, provided that you meet the deadlines. That encourages better life balance, in juggling everything from client meetings and projects to soccer games and school plays.

At the same time, trust between you and your boss gives you the confidence to speak up and say what's going on in your life that requires more flexibility. It may be a significant personal event in your family (a graduation, a wedding), or it may be a sudden shift in family priorities because of an illness. With mutual trust, you can speak openly and bring your whole self into the conversation.

During Karen's career, she was open with her team about her schedule, personally and professionally. This helped others on her team do the same. As she saw it, it built trust and fostered greater transparency. When someone needed more flexibility, others stepped up to help, knowing that one day, they would probably need the same support and assistance.

When I was CEO of Baxter, I always encouraged my team to take the time they needed when they needed it—and it wasn't because I was trying to be a nice guy. I also wanted to make sure the work got done. I knew that when people were given flexibility, they were more likely to be incredibly loyal. There was another reason as well: striving for life balance has brought me great satisfaction, personally and professionally. As I look back on my leadership roles at Baxter, I am grateful I had the opportunity to be a role model for life balance.

I can remember being in meetings at five o'clock, and no matter how important the discussion was, I had to tell people I was leaving because I had to coach 20 first-grade girls who were waiting for me at the local baseball field. I tried to set an example that balance was important; as a result, many people wanted to work on my team. Even though we pursued balance, we still worked hard to get the job done.

Where there is transparency, trust is strengthened even further. People can move beyond the fear about “what are they going to think?” in order to ask for what they need. Unfortunately, people can get locked into their fear and don't give themselves any chance of finding a flexible solution. For example, I knew a guy who, when his wife broke her arm, was too afraid of what his boss would think to tell him what was going on at home. When his boss asked him on very short notice to fly to New York for a meeting, the guy agreed, even though his wife was home alone with three young children, trying to manage with a broken arm. Could he have gotten out of the meeting? Could someone else have gone in his place, or could he have called in from home? Very possibly, but fear of saying something to his boss paralyzed him from exploring other possibilities. Had he been open and transparent with his boss all along, speaking up about a family emergency would not have been an issue.

LIFE BALANCE AND PERSPECTIVE

Now retired from working full-time and with her children on their own, Karen is building a new life balance. Although she serves on public company and nonprofit boards, Karen has more time to pursue gardening and other leisure activities. Karen looks back on her life with satisfaction, but also with a realistic view that not everything was perfect. She recalled some great advice she received from a pediatrician many years ago who told her, “You will not be great at everything every day. If you ask yourself every day, ‘Was I a great mother? A great spouse? A great worker?’ you will drive yourself crazy.”

Instead, she did the best she could while relying on others—her husband, Robert, and her colleagues at work—to help manage what was most important to her. As Karen reflected, “People have the tendency to be very critical of themselves and think they have to do everything perfectly. If they are not 100 percent in everything, they feel like a failure. Because of this, you need to watch your self-talk and set your standards against your unique 168. Give yourself the grace to be confident in what works for you. Your definition of success should be based on what works for you and measured against your goals, not someone else's.” Through self-reflection, Karen learned how to trust herself to do the right thing and to do the best she could.

When pursuing life balance in the moment, day to day, or over the long term, this is wise advice. You can't live anyone else's life any more than you can be true to someone else's values that are not your own. You need to know your values, set your standards, and live the values-based life that matches what is most important to you. It will not be perfect or easy. At times it will be messy and frustrating. But even in the most challenging moments, it can be rewarding and lead to great satisfaction.