Instead of striving for a rigid work-life balance, which can feel like a zero-sum game, CEO Lance Baldo practices "work-life integration." He strategically incorporates work into his personal time, such as waking up early on vacation to clear his inbox, which allows him to be fully present with family later. This reframes executive time management as a fluid, personalized system.

Effective work-life balance is not about doing everything at 50% capacity. Instead, it's the ability to oscillate between extremes: to be fully engaged and sprinting when working, and to be fully disengaged and resting when not. This dynamic approach is more sustainable and effective for high performers.

For passionate founders, work-life balance isn't about stepping away from the mission; it's about sustaining the ability to achieve it. If you burn out, the mission fails. Taking care of yourself is a strategic imperative that enables you to better serve your team and community.

Conventional advice about work-life balance to avoid burnout is counterproductive for founders with extreme ambitions. Building a massive, venture-scale company requires a level of obsessive focus and sacrifice that is inherently unbalanced. For this specific phase of life, prioritizing the company above all else is necessary for success.

When learning from successful people, model the obsessive work ethic they had during their rise, not the work-life balance they enjoy after achieving success. Their current state is the result of past imbalance, not a template for getting there.

After burning out, Bumble's founder returned with renewed purpose by reframing the company not as an app, but as a "vehicle to deliver love." This elevated, mission-driven perspective—seeing the company as a means to a greater societal end—can be a powerful tool for leaders to overcome fatigue and reconnect with their work.

The concept of "work-life balance" sets people, especially women, up for failure, shame, and guilt. A more effective frame is "work-life harmony," which focuses on intentionally arranging the pieces of your life in a way that is uniquely satisfying for your current life season.

The pursuit of a "balanced" life is often futile. A better aim is "coherence"—the conscious alignment of your identity, beliefs, and actions. A highly coherent life can be radically imbalanced for a period, and that is not just acceptable, but purposeful.

It's easy to want the results of success (the 'life'), but you must genuinely enjoy the daily process (the 'lifestyle') to persevere. If you aren't willing to pay the price of the day-to-day grind, you won't stick with it long enough to achieve the outcome.