Self-described “former corporate warrior” and author of Fat, Forty and Fired, Nigel Marsh, points out that Governments and corporations aren’t going to take charge of fixing this for us – we need to take responsibility for the types of lives we want to lead. “If you don’t design your life, someone else will design it for you, and you may not like it,” he says.
Marsh cautions against falling into the trap of “I’ll have a life when I retire”, or in trying to achieve balance within too tight a timeframe by writing a step-by-step prescription for a perfectly balanced day. He advocates approaching balance in a, well, balanced way. Adding a gym workout to a 12-hour work day makes you “a fit office rat”, he says. “It isn’t more balanced; it’s a more fit office rat. What about the intellectual side? The emotional? The spiritual? We have to attend to all of those areas, not just do 50 stomach crunches.”