Integrated

I spent much of my life trying to achieve "work-life balance," which means I spent most of my life deeply frustrated.

For the past thirty-five years, I've been engaged in multiple roles every day, including husband, father, teacher, musician, writer, and coach. I used to believe each role was a bucket and that all the buckets had to be filled equally.

Even if I grouped all those roles into two categories, personal life and professional life, balance was never achieved.

Work-life balance is a delusion and an invitation to shame and suffering, at least in my experience. What about you?

Things really turned around for me when I decided to show up everywhere simply as myself. What I mean is, I started living my values in every situation. This reflects my virtue. Whatever I find myself doing and whomever I am doing it with, I represent both who I am and who I wish to become.

Finding the points of intersection and alignment in my roles and duties along with the facets that complement each other helps me achieve integration. I'm not defined only by the role I'm playing or what I'm doing. The content of my character, who I am, matters at least as much. In my mind, it actually matters more.

I no longer feet like Scott Perry, husband when with my wife, or father with my sons, or guitarists on the gig, etc. I now simply show up as the Scott Perry I am now, and through the relationship or task at hand, leverage it to become a better version of me. 

Why? So I can better serve the soul or situation in front of me so that I can leverage that involvement to become a better version of me. It's a virtuous cycle that enhances my life while I try to do the same for others.

What about you? Are you fractured and moving from role to role in your day-to-day? Or, are you integrated?

Let's keep making a difference together!

Scott - Difference Maker at Creative on Purpose

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