Yesterday I told you about Australian nurse Bronnie Ware's book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. I talked about the first regret of the patients she worked with in her palliative care nursing: living a life others expected rather than the one that was true to self.
The second regret is another goodie: "I wish I hadn't worked so hard." That's a good one to remember in this day of busyness as a competitive sport! Careers are so demanding—and never more so than now when people are just grateful to have a job even when many positions actually combine two or three jobs in one because of downsizing or "rightsizing."
I don't advocate sloughing off or doing mediocre work. But there definitely is a fine balance, isn't there? A balance between work life and home life/relationships. As with anything you try to balance, this isn't easy. It requires lots of thought, intention and tweaking—and, no doubt, the ability to say "No" from time to time. Balance or walking the highwire requires real focus, as I mentioned in a recent blog.
It is worth doing, however. You and I don't want to get to the end of our lives and regret that we were all work and no play—or that we neglected the important relationships of our lives just so we could work harder.
Ask yourself what steps you can take today to insure that you don't end up with that regret. What will you change before you die?
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