Hi there! I’m Georgia, Owner and Lead Content Developer for Marketing Sweeet LLC. Every person, business, relationship, success, or failure has an origin story. Marketing Sweeet’s story is rooted in the failure and sweeet success of relationships and the failure and success of businesses. However, the team’s story is ultimately one of personal balance, mindful business, and the sweeet life - our core values.
In early 2015, my less-than-a-year marriage was struggling, and I was miserable at my day job. I felt stuck with my professional growth, unappreciated by colleagues, and I absolutely resented my 2-hour+ round-trip commute. My ex-husband was floundering at work and going through depressive episodes every Sunday night. My body and brain were showing signs of prolonged stress and burnout. I need a plan to “fix” everything.
By September, my personal balance plan was in motion. I sold my townhouse and most of my stuff. Then I moved into a converted 40 ft. school bus and drove to the Oregon Coast with my ex-husband, dog, and cat. I was chasing the tiny nomadic lifestyle. I had arrived at a personal balance. My life would be perfect. In reality, living on a bus down by the river and taking care of chickens was a short-lived dreamy lifestyle. And it taught me a refined definition of work-life balance.
First, let’s call “work-life balance” a more appropriate name. Most employers would prefer the paradigm where work is its own bucket. Everything else (health, family, finances, friends, hobbies, and happiness) is in the second bucket. This is not reality. How do I know? Take a look at the rising rates of depression, anxiety, burnout, quite quitting, and obesity. We’ve inherited an outdated social construct where work is one of two priorities in your existence.
A more accurate phrase to describe the balance we need in our life is personal balance. You are a person comprised of multiple parts. You are not your work. You are not your relationships. You are not your hobbies. Don’t get me wrong, all of these components and more influence how you experience the world, but they do not define and limit you. As soon as we attach ourselves to these identities, we limit our capacity and, ultimately, our ability to find contentment. This cultural attachment to over-identifying with work has led to an imbalance in entire populations.
At this point, you might be saying,
“Okay, Georgia. This is great and all, but I have to work to pay the bills.”
“I happen to like my job. The people are nice, and I get great benefits.”
These are fair comments. We need to pay bills, and some people find great joy in their work. Which further supports the term personal balance. Everyone on this planet is unique with their own experiences, environments, and perceptions. No one person is the same. Personal balance is the practice of ensuring your life is balanced between four key areas that support your biology and lived experience to achieve contentment.
Work. It is so named because it is…work. You trade your time, skill, knowledge, or product for compensation. Some people love work; some people don’t. Either way, it is a reality of the modern consumer culture in which we live. One needs money to survive. However, I recommend continually reevaluating your relationship with work, no matter how you feel, and finding ways to prioritize work equally to the next three facets.
Play. As in developing children, play has a critical role in the health and growth of an adult. We must all strive to create playful moments in our lives. Play lowers stress, improves brain function, improves relationships, and stimulates creativity. Without play, our work becomes dull and unengaging. How do I play? Snowboarding, remodeling my home, and living room dance parties with my two 60 lb. dogs.
Rest. Rest is not a Miami Vice on some far-flung beach. While delightful and exciting, it's a distraction. Rest is the hours of sleep your body needs to stay healthy. Study after study shows that lack of sleep is killing us. “Science has linked poor slumber with a number of health problems, from weight gain to a weakened immune system.” Healthline.com How are we going to create amazing content or hit our sales numbers if we continue to prioritize work over a good night's sleep?
Growth. What do the Yoga Sutras and Tony Robbins have in common? They both encourage continual personal growth. Study yourself. Study new things. Our brains evolved to learn, and a healthy, elastic brain is achieved and maintained with life-long learning. “Education and lifelong learning help us use our brains to their maximum potential by stirring up our curiosity and intellect,” said Dr. Lagoy, Verywellmind.com
Fast forward from 2015 to 2023. The bus died, my marriage ended, I moved back to Colorado, and I never went back to full-time office work. What started as a rebellion against a life that was grinding me down turned into a journey of self-discovery and a mission to redefine how I and those I lead think about their life. I strive to grow Marketing Sweeet with this core value clearly in focus. As a team practicing personal balance, we operate at our best for our communities and our clients.
In Part 2 of Marketing Sweeet’s Origin Story, I will cover Mindful Business. You’ll learn about how I developed my personal business ethics and burned a few bridges along the way.
A Note on COVID
Before COVID, it was less common to see work-from-home self-employed individuals successfully steering their careers. I often ran into curiosity and sometimes resentment at my remote work. If there is one thing to be grateful for regarding COVID, it's the expanded definition of the workplace. This expanded definition has led to a greater understanding of personal balance and created a surge in introspection among the American workforce.
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