Our community is filled with hard-working, high achieving entrepreneurs and creatives and so work-life balance is a complicated, but highly relevant topic. We’ve shared some responses from the community about work life balance and how their views have evolved over time below.

Yulia Kirillova | Actress, Producer, Model

That’s actually on elf the main things I’m working on in my life. Being an actress and a model in LA, I had a typical lifestyle, living house around 7am, breakfast, hiking, auditions, classes, meeting people, events and getting back home just to go to bed. Last October I got pregnant and we were not planning it, I mean we were dating just for two months at this point. Good thing that we were both into it and I was very happy but scared as well. My baby is 3 months right now, I haven’t work in so long and worried when I will get back to work. For women in Hollywood every day counts almost as a year especially if they put you in a certain “box”, type. Read more>>

Talia Dalton | Musician, teacher & Creator

As I’ve gotten more serious with my career in music, my balance has rocked back and forth between procrastination, over working and moments of balance and functional work flow. It’s a true and real challenge to have a healthy work relationship, especially when you work for yourself. I’ve been homeschooled most my life and find that’s greatly assisted me in being accountable for myself and deadlines, but even then, it’s a completely different relationship. With work always at my fingertips – two feet from my bed – the line between work day and day off blend together. Read more>>

Tiffany Asamoah | Founder of BOLD Swim

Work-life balance has been an increasing priority in my life in the last 6 years. I’ve always been in leadership roles and worked a variety of shifts to lead teams. When I met my husband it became clear we wanted more time together and to achieve the things that were important to us. That included pursuing our dreams as entrepreneurs, traveling, and having more family time. The balance we craved was not in the state we met, so we moved west to California. This state is built for dreamers and creatives. We thought of the balance as a necessity for us to thrive individually, as a couple, and as a family. Read more>>

Charlize Diaz de Leon | Actress & Singer

For so long I thought acting was the only thing I had to look forward to in my life. I missed all the small things that make life worth wild. Although acting is my biggest passion, and my career, I also realized there needed to be a separation between work and life. My perspective changed completely during quarantine. It’s going to sound completly cheesy but I watched the movie Soul; which if you haven’t seen is about a struggling musician named Joe who finally lands a gig of his dreams when he suddenly finds himself trapped in between Earth and the afterlife. Read more>>

Stacy Wong | Maker + Creative

At the beginning of my work career, I thought a perfect work life balance was possible and essential for success. But how exactly does one achieve this was the question. I have now realized, many years later, that a perfect work life balance is nearly impossible without unlimited financial resources and people/family assistance. Today, my idea of the work life balance has changed. It means focusing on what’s important for yourself and for those who matter most to you. For me, my work life balance changed for the better when I left my corporate position and decided to focus on my creative work. Working creatively allowed me greater flexibility to support my family and their needs. It allowed me to be more present in the moment and attend my boys’ school and extracurricular activities without feeling guilty. Working creatively also provided me time to dedicate to things I wanted to do for myself, such as daily exercise and cooking. Read more>>

Nikki Lau | Potter/Maker

I initially had a career coach at the start of my business. The best prompt she gave me was: “In great detail, tell me about your perfect day…now that you’ve written that all out, how do you design your life to make that happen.” My perfect day involved a mix of work, social time and exploring curiosity. I have worked really hard to let go of perfectionist tendencies, and that’s freed up a lot of my time. My mantra is progress over perfection. I stop and take breaks when I notice I’m tired. I intentionally setup my week around social time/exploring and then I plan work around that. This is my ideal balance. It’s not always consistent, but its a model to strive for. Read more>>

Dean Ichiriu | Illustrator & Designer

By chemical makeup, I’m a person who puts my head down to grind – believing that quantity yields quality. Of course, in some cases it does. I would spend hours trying to force out answers or ideas, but I might not have truly believe in what I was working on. Even then, I had worked so hard that my ideas were precious to me, and I’d be torn if they didn’t make the cut. Needless to say, I was only working. I didn’t have a life outside of design. As I continued to work, I grew tired and uninspired. Read more>>