Prior to starting her own coaching and consulting business, Wayne’s Ana Welsh spent 15 years in the corporate world. “In my early 20s and 30s, my balance was heavier on the career side—I worked really hard, long hours,” she says.
Things changed dramatically when her two young children came along. “I’ve seen some people call the concept ‘work-life harmony’—balancing being professionally successful with being personally fulfilled,” she says. “I coach many early-career go-getters. When appropriate, I share that your life is a series of seasons. What do they envision for their season once they marry or once they become a parent? How do they envision spending their time? Then we determine what they should focus on to achieve that.”
Spend a little time on social media, and you may convince yourself that you can have it all: a successful career, a meticulously kept home, homecooked meals, quality time with the kids and a restful eight hours of sleep. But does an ideal work-life balance actually exist?
“There’s always going to be a balance, but it’s not actually going to be balanced,” says Shelly Hughes, a mother of two and owner of the Media-based marketing firm Nolia Roots. “In some seasons of your life, the scale is going to look like 60-40. In others, it’ll look more like 70-30.”
The key to true happiness might be the simple understanding that a 50-50 balance doesn’t really exist—at least not 100% of the time. “Sometimes we desire more work, and sometimes life forces us to focus more on life than work,” says Laura DiFrancesco. “Self-reflection and listening to your biofeedback are fuel for your fire. The more you give yourself what you need, the more you can succeed.”
If you follow DiFrancesco on social media, you may think she’s perfected the work-life balance. She’s the founder and CEO of Dean Street Law, West Chester’s Flourish Coworking Space and the 72-acre Ethereal Farms in Chester County. She also competes on the pageant circuit, hosts the We Grow Together podcast, and invests in startups run by women and minorities. Check her Instagram feed, and you’ll find DiFrancesco reading a favorite book, designing her next evening gown or hanging out with a horse and a few goats.
Acknowledging that her work-life balance may change daily, DiFrancesco tries to stay in tune with her moment-to-moment needs. Sometimes it’s an art project or time spent with family. Other times it’s completing large tasks for her businesses. After a recent car accident, she had to prioritize rest more than ever. “That’s OK,” she says. “It’s a phase of life, and we all go through phases for various reasons.”
Hughes and DiFrancesco like to call this concept “lifestyle design.”
“Understand how you want to live your life,” says Hughes. “What’s your end goal, and what are you OK with living with?”
After a recent car accident, Laura DiFrancesco had to prioritize rest more than ever. “That’s OK,” she says. “It’s a phase of life, and we all go through phases for various reasons.”
The same week she started Nolia Roots back in 2020, Hughes found out she was pregnant with her oldest son, Tucker. Six months after giving birth, she’d often find herself nursing her baby while taking Zoom calls from the neck up. “Once, I was trying to fix a problem with my bank. Tucker needed me, and I was trying to respond to an email. I had a complete mental breakdown,” recalls Hughes. “That day, I promised myself that if I was with my kids, I was not working.”
The reality check forced her to redefine her priorities. “Different responsibilities are like juggling different balls at once. You have to decide which of those balls are glass and which are rubber,” she says. “If you drop a glass ball, it shatters and it’s pretty detrimental to your entire well-being. A rubber ball, when dropped, will bounce back up at some point.”
At this point in life, Hughes’ glass balls are her family, her employees and her health. Her social life, however, is another story. “I’m going to drop it. It’s going to roll under the couch, and I’ll get it in a few months when my life adapts,” she says. “In different stages of your life, you can transform things back to rubber for a little bit, then back into glass.”
To keep her family-focused glass ball in the air, Hughes transformed an old barn in her backyard into an office space for the Nolia Roots team. These days, her 10-month-old son, Otto, is often the centerpiece of the conference table. “Being so close to home allows me to be a better mom for my babies,” she says.
DiFrancesco has found it useful to imagine life as a blank slate. “Start filling in a calendar. First, add your biggest commitment, like when you have to be at work. Then go backward to determine your wake-up time and bedtime, which should be at least eight to nine hours,” she says. “Sleep is the most important ingredient for health and success.”
As you continue to fill your slate in from there, you may have to make some hard decisions and let go of a few things—your rubber balls. That’s OK. You can catch them on the rebound.
Always remember: Work success does not define your identity. “At my funeral, no one is going to say, ‘Ana was so great because she responded to my emails even when she was on vacation,’” says Welsh.
And don’t be afraid to reach out for support. “This may mean asking a family member to help with laundry one day—or even asking a friend to take the kids for a play date so you can have two hours to catch up on housework,” Welsh says. “Many times, our egos get in the way, and we want to do it all ourselves. That mentality is the antithesis of work-life balance. It indicates that you don’t believe in the strategy and would rather drown in life alone instead of taking the lead to spread out all the moving parts.”
Perhaps the most important strategy to finding your own balance: Stop comparing yourself to others, especially on social media. “No one’s life will ever be the same as yours,” Welsh says. “Shed the guilt and stop playing the comparison game.”
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