One thing people often struggle with in the UK is maintaining a good work-life balance. You’ve got some people that spend all their free time working which, of course, means more money in their bank account. However, it rarely leaves them time to relax. This means no time to spend all that money they have accrued and often leaves them with high-stress levels. On the other hand, you’ve got people that spend a good chunk of their time ‘enjoying’ life and little time working. That is all well and good if you’ve got cash that you can coast on, but most people don’t. This can lead to less money, and higher stress because you don’t have cash.
The long and the short of it is that you need to find the right work-life balance. You need to be earning enough money to enjoy life but not working so hard that you take time away from having fun, nor so little that you need to keep working late into what should be your retirement.
The goal of this page isn’t to teach you how to find a good work-life balance. We want to teach you about the impact a good work-life balance can have on your health.
Better Physical and Mental Health
Those who work exceedingly hard often see a negative impact on their physical and mental health. People feel unhealthier. They gain weight (particularly if sitting in an office all day), get more stressed, and depressed, and have a higher chance of dealing with anxiety. Not to mention the fact that a high load of work has been linked to the development of heart disease.
What you have to remember is that if you work too hard, you’ll be neglecting your health. You don’t have the opportunity to eat correctly. You don’t have the opportunity to exercise. You don’t have the opportunity to socialise. All of these have been proven to impact us negatively. Sure, you’ll have a bit of extra money in your bank account, but at what cost?
It works the other way too. If you are not working hard enough, then you can also deal with stress thanks to the lower amount of income coming in. And study after study has demonstrated that one of the biggest stressors in life is a lack of cash.
So, you need to get the right balance between everything. If you can nail the work-life balance, then you shouldn’t have a huge impact on your physical and mental health, at least due to your work. Other things can have an impact, but that’s a story for another time.
More Time to Enjoy Life
We can promise you that there is nobody that ends up saying, ‘I wish I worked more’. Life is for enjoying, and you only get one shot at it. If you can nail that work-life balance, it means that you have more time to enjoy the things that you want in life. This might be enjoying the sun abroad, or just kicking back and watching a show on Netflix, or gaming online and playing your favourite slot machines at Online Slot UK.
Some varieties of slot machines can be linked together in a setup sometimes known as a “community” game, and having a social aspect in your life is always beneficial.
When you have a good work-life balance, you don’t feel guilty doing the things that you want to do, since you have the time to do them and you have the funds to enjoy doing them.
Now, we know that some of you might not have the job and cash flow to fund everything that you want to do in your life. That is something that probably applies to just about everybody. However, you probably have enough cash rolling in to find at least one thing that you enjoy doing. Something that will take your mind off work.
Increased Work Productivity
So far, we’ve talked a lot about how a good work-life balance impacts you outside of the work environment. However, it will also have an impact on your work environment too. When you are working too hard, you’ll often find that your productivity plummets. Trust us, despite what some of the richest people in the world say, there is nobody who can work 16-20 hours per day without any impact on the work they produce. Most people would struggle to be productive beyond 8-10 hours per day, and only for a few days of the week. We do want to point out that this has been proven, too. Some companies in the UK have found that their employees are just as productive doing a 4-day work week as they are a 5-day work week.
So, if you don’t maintain a good work-life balance i.e. you are working too hard, then the quality of work that you produce will suffer. Sometimes, it is good to have a bit of time away from work to replenish your mental health, get some good food into your system, etc. It’ll help in the long term. You will become a far, far better worker.
Better Relationships with Friends & Family
A common trope in classic 90s movies was ‘parent works too hard, kids feel neglected’. While this is a theme many movies have started to veer away from nowadays, it is still something that rings true. If you are spending all your time working, then you won’t have time for your friends and family. This can kill your relationships.
So many marriages have broken down since somebody spends far too long at work. Many children have felt neglected because their parents don’t have enough time to spend with them. Lifelong friendships have been eradicated because one person no longer has time to socialise properly.
You have to remember that, as humans, we need to socialise. It is who we are. Socialising improves our mental health. Don’t work so hard that you neglect those around you because, while you may end up with a lot of money due to your work, you’ll be a very lonely person later in your life. Oh, and no. Most of the time, your work colleagues are not your friends. You might stumble across a few people at work who you can get on with, but you’ll be surprised at how few of these relationships continue outside the workplace.
Lower Stress Levels
Finally, a good work-life balance has been linked with lower amounts of stress. Stress can impact us in multiple ways, neither of which is very good. If you are feeling too stressed due to work, then this will have a long-term impact on you. As we said before, this can mean anxiety, depression, and even physical conditions.
One of the quickest ways to lower your stress levels is to get a good work-life balance. It may even help to repair some of the damage that long-term stress has caused to your system.
