A host of factors, developments, and dynamics have made most industries more competitive than ever. As a result so many of us wonder whether there is still such a thing as work-life balance. We reached out to the community to hear perspectives on finding the right balance.

Douglas Stockdale | Artist, Educator, Editor, Science-Geek and a Book-Nerd

Keeping a balance between various life activities always seems to be a bit of a challenge, especially as I realize that probably one of the most precious commodities I need to account for is time. What helps me to keep what I think is a healthy balance is to prioritize what’s really important, such as keeping family number one on my to-do list. Early in my working career, I found that work can be a relentless black hole that can absorb a considerable amount your life if you let it. There can also be an enormous amount of peer pressure to spend every spare moment at work and or after hours with the ‘team.’ I try to keep that need for balance in mind as I set aside time for all of my activities, realizing the importance of give-and-take. Read more>>

Kate Micheaux | CEO of Armor Up

This is a great question, especially given the current climate where many of us have had to move our workspaces into our homes for the foreseeable future. When I first started in the workforce, I was a teenager and just trying to make as much money as I could, while still being able to hang out with my friends on the weekend. I think that was a pretty good balance at the time. I made money to be able to go out and spend it on a good time with my friends. As I shifted my mindset to be more career oriented over the last few years, and focused my finances on paying off my student loans, my life was definitely work heavy and socially lacking. I spent more time with my coworkers than I did my own family. Sometimes I would question why I was paying rent because I was basically living at the office. Read more>>

Nahid LaCiura | Naturaholic Founder & Formulator

Work life balance has always been one of the most challenging aspects of every entrepreneur’s life and I am no exception. There could have been a time (long ago) that boundaries between work and home were very clear. Today, however, with constant connection and working from home, work can easily bleed into your personal life and maintaining work-life balance is not a simple task anymore. What has worked for me in keeping me on track with that balance is identifying my “priorities” in life and dedicating time to those priorities on a daily and weekly basis. Pre-planning and time management has been crucial in making sure I am not missing out on family time, me time and social life. Read more>>

Guy Glikshtein | Graphic Designer & Animator

8 years ago I left the biggest love of my life, a music label I started and a design business. Friends and family. I guess I felt that even tho I had all these amazing things, I had more to explore within myself, so I decided to move to LA. Ultimately, my “work” dictated my decisions more than my “life”. I personally don’t like the concept of work\life balance. Deep down I feel like a work\life balance directly implies a bad\good balance. Work, as mandatory boredom and monotony. Life, as the light at the end of the tunnel that saves you from the stress of work. It’s a “I Hate Mondays” and TGIF mentality. At the end of the day, I am what I do. I’m lucky enough to know what brings me comfort and a sense of fulfillment, and even more lucky to be able to make a living from it. I’m also blessed with the passion of a 5 year old when it comes to getting excited about the small things. Read more>>

Ian Dale | Illustrator & Designer

Work-life balance is always a struggle for me, and it seems the stakes keep getting higher, especially now with a family. My default setting is very tilted towards work. In early adulthood it was an extreme imbalance and I grew disillusioned with work after a while. I was aware that an “all work” approach could not satisfy me as a whole person, but also feared that a more balanced life could never achieve the levels of artistic excellence I aspired to. Finding balance isn’t just a scheduling technique, it begins deeper down with questions about how life works and what is important to you. I had to sort through my values, but I was prone to extremes—was work everything or was it nothing? Over time my understanding of the role of work has gradually matured and my goals and expectations have moderated, becoming more realistic yet still a vision worth striving for. Read more>>

Nath Milburn | Artist, Illustrator, Filmmaker

Work life balance is always an ever growing thing. One of the biggest shifts was when I graduated college and art wasn’t a hobby anymore. It was a job. It took awhile for me to get adjust to that and learning how to draw for money and for fun. I’m still learning to keep that balance. Being a freelance contractor, it varies with job. Some jobs take more out of you. I’ve learned to enjoy the slower, easier jobs, using that extra time to focus on myself, others, and my personal projects. When I first started out, I kept striving for that next best job to work on, thinking that will give me more prestige, better experience. Now I strive for a fun and easy job to give me more time for myself. As long as I enjoy the people I work with or it provides enough money and time to enjoy my life, I don’t mind what the job itself is. Read more>>

Brandon Barr | Artist

Early in my artistic practice, I was pulling all-nighters, creating really intense installations that were often out of my financial means, and ignoring a lot of other important aspects in my life. This time was necessary in that I grew exponentially, but during that process I also neglected my physical and mental well-being. It also did not aid in the consistency and longevity in my practice. I knew I had to begin approaching studio from a more holistic perspective. I heard someone use the common saying “its a marathon, not a race” in regards to art and that made a lot of sense to me. So, even though I will still pull an all-nighter every now and then, my daily or weekly approach to artmaking takes into account the demands of trying to make art in 2020. Read more>>

Chad Huniu | Co-Founder & Head Brewer of Fermensch Kombucha

When we started Fermensch Kombucha, I had no idea what I was doing. I was 25. I’d never owned my own company. I had minimal production management experience. I had never had anything to do with the financial side of a business. Even when we were still in the process of starting up, looking for a place to brew our kombucha, working on branding, and so forth, I just didn’t know what to do with myself, but I had a ton of energy. I would work the entire day. I’d be on my computer researching and trying to figure out what we needed to do up to the point I would finally crawl in bed. But because I didn’t know what I was doing, my work was less than effective, you know? I was impassioned, but kind of aimless. Once we got really going and growing, it was my father and I doing everything. Read more>>

Matt Brown | Visual Creator

Work balance has always been a battle I’ve fought. When I was younger I shot every day all the time. I would shoot a full day of football then go out at night and shoot astrophotography in the desert. I’d work 300 days a year and still feel I need to shot more. As I’ve gotten older I’ve tried to put the camera down to spend more time with my wife and kids but it is a battle. I love so much to make beautiful images every day. I do believe it has made me better working as hard as I did in the beginning of my career. Working that hard has helped me develop time management skills and understanding when to work hard and when to pull down. Read more>>

Manuel L Lozano | Actor and Arts & Music Academy Owner.

This is one area that I constantly think about. It changes as I enter different stages in my life. Over time, I find that the value of money decreases for me. Meaning, that as I have become older, I strive for efficiency so I can spend quality time with my family and doing things that enrich my live beyond financials and making money. In my early twenties, i would get very excited about getting paid for “vacation time” by my employer in lieu of not using it. Now, there is no price I can put on my vacation and family time. I still have long work weeks from time to time but I ensure that if I am going to work a long work week, it’s worth the time away from family or I ensure that the work time now will free me up down the road to get more free time away from work. Read more>>

Sarah Demonteverde | Illustrator + Designer

2019 was a great, fast-paced time of growth for me as a creative, from developing more of a style/brand for my personal art, as well as connecting to an awesome community of people (especially my fellow Filipinx and BIPOC this year) that have supported me and my work as I’ve organically grown a following within the past couple years. As soon as COVID-19 hit this year, as many of us have experienced, life definitely took a “pause,” and eventually evolved into this adaptive way of life, in order for us to survive. I definitely have reprioritized my life in such a way that allowed me and my family to better thrive through these hard times, especially when it came to finding ways for us to better have boundaries as well as outlets that separated us from the daily bustle. Read more>>

Kaitlynn Redell | Artist

My work/life balance has changed drastically since having kids. Over time, I’ve learned to be much kinder to myself and allowed myself to be ok with things in the studio moving slower. Read more>>

Kimberly Jaffe | L.A. Entertainment Concierge

I am a mother of two beautiful girls, ages 16 and 21. For 20 years, I was married to a man with substance abuse problems. Therefore, I quit my career at Warner Bros. to be a full-time mom. I fundraised for charities and our public schools, as well as was very active with the PTA and volunteering. When my husband left us, and after a terrible divorce, I had to go back to work as my support was low and I needed to take care of my children. As one of my girls has continuous health problems, I needed to find a job that I allowed me to work from home. I decided I didn’t want a job, but I desired for a career, one where I was the boss. I explored my different passions, and realized that as a 4th generation Angeleno, and always being a tourist in my own town, I started my company, L.A. Any Day, and am a Los Angeles Entertainment Concierge. Read more>>

Ronald Lim | Jewelry Designer

Balance is one of the key things in life. If you overwater your house plant, which many of us have done before, it begins to die. If you have the incorrect ratio of flour, water and fat when your baking a pie you get a dense crust. As a business owner, balance is one of the things that I always strive to achieve. Working long hours is stressful but sometimes necessary when you own your own business. Taking the time to meditate helps me calm the mind and recenter myself. Then I can better focus on the challenges the of each day. Read more>>

Ariel Min | Wedding Photographer

I frankly still grapple with this one all the time. I’m sure many business owners can agree with me, but I had severely underestimated how much brain space my work would take up day and night. Especially when I was trying to get my business up and running, I spent every free minute working, thinking and planning. Now that it’s been about two years, I think I’ve gotten much better at managing work life balance – I now itemize every little thing I have to work on and assign daily tasks to myself so that once I’m done with my day’s work, I purposely force myself to do something else. Read more>>

Brittany Lee | Intuitive Healer, Transformational Coach

This topic is major for me and all of the changes flowing through my life and career! I am moving out of the “go go.” “doing” mentality and focusing on balancing that energy with more of the “being & receiving” energy. I used to work for others and take on and accomplish more than I can fathom, I did see success come from that so I developed my self worth around that mindset. I did see that it caused me to be stressed, overworked, overwhelmed and mentally exhausted. Because of that, I have been working on building my business around staying centered, focused, successful and abundant all while being aware of my mental and physical health. Read more>>

Antony J. Bowman | Screenwriter and Director

There is no doubt that the older you get the more you think about this. As a freelance, writer/director the two elements blend together rather quickly. The more successful one becomes can upset the balance of this quite remarkably. What I do is a way of life and you have to be careful how this effects family. I have a wife and one daughter… We moved from Australia to Los Angeles and, at first, it was all about pounding the streets to get the career blooming! This can be a strain on family but I was fortunate that they became very much apart of my career. These days (Covid-19) aside, I do seem to be able to manage my work/life balance very well. Some of that is to do with more success but really it’s up to you! Sometimes slowing down increases creativity. Read more>>