“Work–life balance is a concept including proper prioritizing between ‘work’ (career and ambition) and ‘lifestyle’ (health, pleasure, leisure, family, and spiritual development/meditation),” according to Wikipedia.

The concept gets lots of attention in the legal arena. It comes up frequently when discussing attorney depression, substance abuse, etc. It’s an important topic, and I don’t mean to minimize it in any way.

However, it’s important to note that work-life balance only comes up when projects aren’t sufficiently epic (I stole that phrasing from somewhere, but I can’t locate my source).

Seriously, we never think of work-life balance when we’re loving the work.

• If you love to litigate, you don’t think of the balance when you’re soaring through a huge trial. You’re giddy.
• If you love to negotiate, you don’t think of balance when you’re hammering out the huge deal.
• If you love to mediate, you don’t think of balance as you bridge the huge gap between parties separated by an overwhelming divide.

When the work is epic, you find meaning, value, and energy. Your team members come with you. They’re not just along for the ride; they’re flying high as, together, you overcome the challenges on the road to epic achievement.

It’s only when the work isn’t fulfilling that the work-life balance discussion takes on a life of its own.

The solution might not be finding the balance. The solution might be finding something to do that matters to you.