Creating A New Balance For You And The Planet

Creating a new balance for you and the planet. Hello everyone, I hope you are well. In today’s post, I will be sharing a guest post from Sid Madge, the founder of Meee (My Education Employment Enterprise) and the Author of the ‘Meee in Minute’. Sid will be sharing five simple steps on creating a new balance for you, the plant. With the pandemic slowly easing, this is the perfect time to start thinking a way forward and doing things better.

Creating A New Balance For You And The Planet

We are now returning to life feels much more normal. However, Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and social entrepreneur, has reminded us that our pre-Covid world was very far from perfect! Although it seems an age ago now, at the start of 2020, many of us were protesting for more significant climate change reform. Many more were deeply concerned that we were running out of time to reverse the damage we had inflicted on the planet. Extreme weather events had become commonplace. AI and technological disruption were already causing seismic shifts in employment. Mental health issues were on the rise. And global inequality was already appalling. Is that the world we want to go back to?

We Are At A Decision Point

Never in human history have we stood as such a critical point. We can scramble to go back to a business as usual that was often dysfunctional, unfair and damaging, or we can redesign something better for ourselves and the planet.

There are already encouraging signs of this much-needed reset. The city of Amsterdam has embraced economist Kate Raworth’s Doughnut Economics – a blueprint for redefining priorities. Raworth’s model moves us away from our toxic obsession with growth and seeks instead to solve humanity’s 21st-century challenge; how to meets the needs of all within the means of the planet.

Business needs to adapt. We need to adapt. And as we adapt, we need to define what we want our post-pandemic world to be and work towards creating a work/life that provides a healthy balance.

The Need For Connection

Our embrace of technology, home working and digital solutions is unlikely to recede completely. While the virus enforced this move, many, especially Gen X and older, have been surprised to find the technology is more than up to the task. Homeworking gives greater freedom, flexibility, and a better work/life balance.  Potentially this could mean that we become less connected, which could pose a further danger to our happiness and mental health. So, maintaining a connection has to be part of our new lives and new business models and ethos.

Human beings are social animals. Forget the new normal that has been talked about so much. What we need is ‘New Balance’. And that starts with the human being. There is no coincidence that kind, empathetic and open leaders have led the businesses and governments that fared best against the Covid storm. Think of New Zealand’s Prime Minister, Jacinta Ardern. She represents a welcome shift away from authoritative power.  During the pandemic, she held Facebook live sessions and answered people’s questions honestly and kindly.

5 Steps

With this in mind, here are five practical steps to help make this ‘new balance’ a reality in your life and those around you. Share these tips and help them create the space to turn these into regular habits:

Mastery Your Mornings

Start your day from a place of positivity. Focus on what you want to achieve that day, and take a minute or two to remind yourself what you are already grateful for in your life. Write down six things you are thankful for and six things you absolutely must achieve today. Then use these as your focus for the day.

On Your Commute To Work or College, or While You Eat Your Breakfast (if you are working from home) Read A Inspirational Book

For example, ‘Meee in a Minute’ has 60 one-minute nuggets of wisdom on how to improve your life, including advice, insights, science, short exercises, and thought experiments to ensure you start the day with positivity and confidence. Another great book is A. C. Grayling’s ‘The Meaning of Things’, which profoundly impacted my life. There are dozens of great books, so pick those that resonate with you. Many are also available as audiobooks.

Eradicate Unnecessary Work

Take some time to consider what’s essential in your life. If something doesn’t add value at work or home, eliminate it from your life. Focus on what matters most in your studies, your work and your personality. Focus on what makes you happy. And make these things the priority.

Take time out every day to get outside, ideally in nature or a local park. Walk, pay attention to what’s going on around you. Don’t cut yourself off from what’s around with music, audiobooks or podcasts. Instead, notice the trees, the bird song, the change of the seasons. Even if it’s just a few minutes, take this time to learn how to ‘be’.  Listen. Think. Spend time in silence.

Connect With People You Care About – At College, Work and Home

At work, seek to find ways to maintain some of the flexibility that became essential during Covid-19. Honour both the human being and the employee. Find ways (by using the tips above) to maintain a connection and find a balance that works for each part of your life; the work/study and the home. At home, talk to each other, eat together as a family or roommates and maintain the strengthened bonds facilitated by the pandemic.

Going Forward, We Need Human Collaboration, Not Competition

Win/win, not win/lose. Kindness, not aggression If Covid has given us anything, it is a renewed appreciation for what’s important: We are all critical. We all need appreciation, family, friends, happiness, love, laughter, safety and gratitude. These are the simple things. Human things.

I hope you enjoyed that.

Talk Soon

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sid Madge is the founder of Meee (My Education Employment Enterprise), which draws on the best creativity and thinking from the worlds of branding, psychology, neuroscience, education and sociology, to help people achieve extraordinary lives.

To date, Meee has transformed the lives of over 20,000 people, from leaders of PLC’s and SME’s to parents, teachers, students, carers, the unemployed and prison inmates.

Sid Madge is also the author of the ‘Meee in Minute’ series of books which each offer 60 ways to change your life, work-, or family life in 60 seconds.

Web: www.meee.global

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