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In the thirteenth century, Dante listed the Seven Deadly Sins on the pathway to Paradise: Gluttony, lust, greed, envy, pride, anger and sloth. Now, almost eight hundred years later, people are still committing these seven sins in Work Life Balance.

 

Don’t try to be all things to all people. If you try to please everybody, you will end up satisfying nobody.

The secret to being successful at balancing life is to allow yourself to be human and release guilt from your life. Everyone gets wound up at times, when you notice it happening simply acknowledge where you are and move back to doing something more balanced. Don’t give yourself a hard time or anything-just keep moving forward.

Focus your time, money and energy on the things that matter, not just those that catch your eye right now. This doesn’t mean an endless quest for Mr. Right, but it does mean that you don’t have to settle for Mr. Right Now.

When it comes to balancing your life, this means stop buying a new thing every time you feel stressed or unhappy. Shopping has become the latest way that people try to make themselves happy. You keep buying stuff that brings happiness for a very short period of time and when this wears off you’re back at the shops again.

Go for things that really make you happy like time with good friends compared to short lived shopping trips for more dust collecting stuff.

When you first get started living a balanced life, there’s a temptation to do everything at once. But if you chase two horses, you’ll catch neither of them. The best way to get started is to choose one activity that is likely to give you high value, do that well, and then move on to the next.

That’s not to say that you should only be doing one thing at a time. But just be sure that everything you do is done well. Go for quality not quantity.

4. Envy: Copying tactics that don’t fit your strategy:

A Russian soldier stationed in West Berlin after the Second World War wandered into an empty house and saw an electric light bulb for the first time. Fascinated by this magic light-generating globe, he cut it off with his bayonet and put it in his knapsack so he could carry around the light with him wherever he went.

The same is true with living a balanced life. Don’t just do what somebody else tells you to do, unless you know why they do it. If they are successful, what they are doing is just one part of their strategy. You can’t just pick up that one thing, put it in your knapsack, take it somewhere else and use it to light up your world.

By all means, look around to see what others are doing, but don’t just copy their tactics without understanding how and where they fit your life. Get the whole picture and then implement it as a system.

 

gluttony: 暴食    

sloth: 懒惰     e.g. Sloth is mother of poverty.

be all things to all people: 满足所有人

gimmick: 伎俩，小手段

settle for: 勉强接受（尽管不满意） 

e.g. We settled for the apartment although its location is not satisfactory.

wear off: 磨损

bayonet: 刺刀 

knapsack:（士兵或者徒步旅游者使用的）背包

The same is true with…: 同样的道理也适用于…

 

      早在13世纪，但丁在通往天堂的路途中列出了七宗罪：暴食，欲望，贪婪，嫉妒，骄傲，愤怒和懒惰。如今，近800年以后，人们在平衡工作生活的过程中仍旧犯着七宗罪。

      不要试图取悦所有人，否则你会取悦不了任何人。

      和谐的工作和生活秘诀在于生活地更人性化，学会缓解自己的负罪感。每个人都会有受挫的时候，当你注意到这点时，只要简单地看清你处于什么位置，退后一步使自己更平衡。不要难为自己—直需向前进。

     把你的时间，金钱和精力花在真正值得的事物上吧，而不只是那些立即夺人眼球的噱头。这并不意味着你要无止境地寻求你的白马王子，但也是在说你不必现在就勉强接受他。

      在生活平衡方面，这点指的是不要在一感到压力和不快时，就去购买新的东西。购物已变成人们愉悦自己的最新方式。你买来的那些东西只能在短期内给你带来快乐，而一旦东西消耗完了，你只好又回到商店去了。

      去寻求那些真的会让你快乐的东西吧，比如和好朋友一起度过的美好时光，比起那些购来不久就去积灰的东西，实在值得多了。 

      当你最初开始过上和谐的生活，你会有一种冲动马上做一切想做的事。但鱼和熊掌不可兼得。最好的方法是选择价值较高的其一，好好做，然后转向下一个目标。 

      这不是说同一时间内你只能做一件事，而是确保你把任何事都处理好了。我们追求的应当是质量而不是数量。 

      二战后，一个驻扎于西柏林的俄罗斯士兵闲逛进了一所空房子，第一次看见电灯泡。他对这个会发光的小球很痴迷，于是用刺刀把它割了下来，放进自己的背包，他觉得这样他就可以把光带到任何他想去的地方了。 

      和谐的生活也是这个道理。不要别人说什么你就做什么，除非你知道他们这么做的理由。如果他们成功了，那么他们的方法只是整个计划中的一部分。你不能只截取一部分，放进你的背包，然后把它带到别的地方，用来点亮你的世界。