Our community is filled with hard-working, high achieving entrepreneurs and creatives and so work-life balance is a complicated, but highly relevant topic. We’ve shared some responses from the community about work life balance and how their views have evolved over time below.

Erika Thomas | Brand Director & Mother

Balance is so important to me, I’m a Libra sun and rising, after all! Haha. In all seriousness, the idea of work/life balance is so elusive, the first step to finding it was to really determine what that would look like for me personally. Of course, that has evolved over time. In high school, I worked at a surf & skate shop so I could listen to great music, have a relaxed environment, and enjoy my off days at the beach. Fresh out of college, it was a job that would give me guaranteed 3 day weekends every week, and another one with a CEO that valued using PTO (and even beyond that as unpaid vacation if you needed it). Read more>>

Chris Jordan | Content Creator

Work life balance is essential. In my teens and early twenties I was a bit of a workaholic. I was so focused on moving up in my career and scaling my business that I often forgot about how important it is to carve out time and just enjoy life. At one point I became so burnt out that I had no choice but to take a step back from everything that I was involved in and reevaluate how I wanted to spend my time. Read more>>

Lolita Lee | Mobile Coffee Bar Barista

I have realized that over time, life without balance leads to chaos. Imagine a scale that is uneven on both sides, it tends to tilt and create an imbalance that isn’t beneficial to either side. Well, the work life balance works the same way. Initially, when I was starting my business, it was the only thing that I could talk or think about. However, it wasn’t until I realized why I started the business that the order and realignment came into focus. Before I began my new adventure as a stay-at-home mom, all I ever knew was to work, come home, take care of the children and husband etcetera and as many know this cycle was placed on repeat each day. Read more>>

Jannine Krause | Naturopathic Doctor, Acupuncturist & Host of The Health Fix Podcast

As a young doctor I slept on average 3-4 hours a night and pulled 14-16 hour days 5-6 days a week while working to build my practice. Over the last 15 years of practice I’ve slowly reduced my work hours and yet sleep was always a struggle for me. It wasn’t until the last year that I truly learned the importance of work and life balance. I know I was addicted to stress and thrived off of it for many years. Sadly, it took battling with paralyzing anxiety attacks and bouts of insomnia to get me to wake up and put myself first. Read more>>

Bianca Havens | Jewelry artist/metalsmith/owner

When I first began my career as a jewelry artist 8 years ago after taking the leap and hoping I grew wings from working full time in the medical field. I can say that work life balance was a huge struggle for me. We are so accustomed to earning a paycheck and living on a schedule. I didn’t know how to not work because I felt overwhelmed to constantly be producing in order to bring money in to pay bills and reorder supplies. Read more>>