Do you feel like you have no control in your life?

Balance means that we can fully engage in what we need or want to do without that nagging guilt or worry that we should be doing something else. And it means really understanding our own boundaries and needs so that we have the freedom to pursue all the various roles and identities we have or want to have in life. Finding balance leads to greater life satisfaction and well-being—which improves your ability to find balance in the future.

Balance is individual. For example, some people need a lot of down time to relax, while others like to be busy much of the time. Some people like being more connected, while others appreciate more time on their own.

Here are some tips that can help you daily:

• Play to your strengths
  Don’t try and be all things to all people. Focus on your strengths and outsource the others. If you’re not a whiz at accounts or graphic design, outsource them instead of wasting time.

• Prioritize your time
  You may have a to-do list with 50 tasks on it, so you need to prioritize those tasks into four categories.

• Know your peaks and troughs
  Are you a morning person? If you are, assign tough, high-concentration tasks to the mornings. Don’t leave the tough tasks until its night time and vice versa.

• Plot some personal time
  When personal issues arise, it can be tempting to bury yourself in your work. Don’t do it If you don’t make time for your personal life – your “me” time, including your family and your health – you won’t have a business to go back to

• Have set work hours – and stick to them
  Set work hours for yourself and do everything in your power to stick to them. Otherwise, before you know it, you’ll be working until midnight every night.

• Find time for your finances
  Whether you work for yourself or not, it’s important to feel confident about your finances. In order to do this, you need to get some accounting software in place and use it from day one.

• Include family commitments – such as holidays, birthday parties, etc. – so you don’t forget that you are unavailable for work on those days.

• Make your workspace work for you
  Working for yourself does tend to require long hours and not much downtime, so invest in equipment that will support you.

• Make exercise a must-do, not a should-do
• It’s easy to cancel the gym, the evening run or the yoga class because a client wants something done yesterday.

Remember these are some of my favorite tips. Achieving balance is a daily practice.
Good Luck!