The Life Balance Trio
By Bob Moore, CMC, MCC, The Effectiveness Coach®

Word Count: 386 Words
Reading Time: Less than 3 minutes

1. Time

Time management is a misnomer because we can only manage ourselves within a fixed amount of time.  We can, however, increase our skills in the following critical areas that determine our personal and professional effectiveness:

Essential Skills to Master
- Goal Setting - Determine the outcomes and when we want to achieve them.
- Planning - When specific short-term objectives must accomplished.
- Scheduling - When the tasks required to achieve the objectives will be accomplished.
- Interruptions - Protecting the scheduled time for what you intended from distractions.

2. Stress
A certain amount of stress is essential-without it, nothing is accomplished.  There is also positive stress, known as eustress, the type that generally makes us feel good. It is the negative stress or distress that causes us pain and discomfort that can be most damaging unless relieved from time to time.

Essential Skills to Master

Experts tell us we should either avoid or reduce the distress in our life or master the following four coping skills to deal with the stress that cannot be eliminated:

- Problem-Solving - Dealing directly with, finding solutions and not avoiding problems.
- Communication - Honestly sharing thoughts and feeling to promote mutual understanding.
- Closeness - Connecting with others in a meaningful manner.
- Flexibility - Openness to and proactively responding to change.

3. Emotions
Managing emotions requires Emotional Intelligence or high levels of Emotional Quotient, the ability to sense, understand and effectively apply the power and acumen of emotions . EQ involves interpersonal intelligence, the ability to understand others and intrapersonal intelligence, the ability to understand oneself.