Four Ways to Adjust your Workstyle to Your Lifestyle

Work is part of your life and not vice versa. Let your lifestyle be the guidance.

photo © Bethany Legg on Unsplash

Your outlook on your work-life is going to change a bit.

It doesn’t take much to adjust your working day to have it correspond better to your style of living.

This is not about giving you some productivity hacks, so you can squeeze out “more time” for more work, for your free time or family time.

This is about recognizing the leverage you have to connect your lifestyle with your work-life.

1. Be aware of yourself

I function best when I get fresh air, can go outside in between whatever I do inside (office), have some space, and have things in order around me. So these elements have become part of my lifestyle.

Respectively I made them part of my work-life. First unconsciously, over time with consciousness. My desk is aligned in such a way that I can see out of the window (I could not work with a desk set against a wall), using a table lamp and not cold ceiling lighting, and I always have a window open (unless it’s winter), and regularly step outside.

But that’s just me.

We all tick differently. But if you know yourself and how you feel at your best, and what the important little elements in your day to day life are that make you feel better, then these things become part of your lifestyle.

Likewise, you can adapt those things to your work-life to be motivated, satisfied, and productive at work. Little steps or adjustments might already do the trick.

2. First define, then decline.

First define your way of living, your style. Then decline, respectfully, the requests or impositions that do not correspond with your lifestyle or values.

If you have your own business, you have the freedom to design your work space and time according to your lifestyle. Even in a company structure you can request, arrange, change, adjust little things.

When I was working at an ad agency, I got a company car. Very often I left the car at work and commuted with the bicycle to work because I love to bike and prefer to…