I recently attended a colleague's funeral, a man not much older than me. Billed as a celebration of his life, it was a somber occasion. Funerals have that uncanny way of making us pause and reflect on our lives and our own immortality. As I listened to his family and friends pay tribute to his many accomplishments, the messages that resonated the most with me were the meaning of being in tune with one's body, the significance of self-care, and the importance of work-life balance.

As nurses, we know only too well the importance of self-care in the lives of our patients and clients, and we frequently extol the benefits of sleep, rest, diet, and exercise to their overall physical and mental well-being. We are very efficient in telling others to make self-care a priority, while failing to make self-care a priority for ourselves. Mathieu (2012) concludes that "the basics of self-care are not particularly complicated. What gets in the way is the lifetime of resistance and avoidance strategies designed to keep us in denial" (p. 131). The same could be said for our feeble efforts at finding balance between our professional and personal commitments. Unfortunately, for many of us, work-life balance has become an elusive pursuit, difficult to find and even more difficult to achieve.

In all honesty, I have really struggled writing this editorial. Perhaps, I broached this topic as a selfish pursuit, in hopes that I might gain a deeper understanding of my personal challenges with achieving work-life balance. As I began to reflect on my own life, one characterized by "too many irons in the fire," I sheepishly wondered aloud "what right do I have to talk about work-life balance, when I am one of the worst offenders?" I know I am often guilty of saying "yes" to requests when I really should say "no." It is not that I can't say "no," but I often don't want to, as the things I am asked to partake in are often those things that I am most passionate about. I know I am not alone in this regard. From my perspective, as forensic nurses, we are among the busiest people I know, and the manner in which we engage with our professional responsibilities often sees us putting in extra hours, taking work home, and working on our days off-often cutting back on sleep in an effort to do more. Even when we leave work, we are "always on" permanently connected to our digital devices, frequently receiving emails at all hours of the day or night. Sound familiar?

When we take on too much, have too many projects on the go, and have no real separation from work, something has to give. Our relationships with our family and friends suffer, we age prematurely, and most importantly, our physical and mental health is jeopardized. I wonder how many of us have white boards where we work, which are so cluttered with project deadlines, memos, and "to-do" lists, that they are no longer meaningful. Conversely, how many of us have "to-do" lists on our refrigerators-as we attempt to balance both our work, family, and community commitments? Unfortunately, here again, we see how our professional lives become enmeshed with our personal lives. I received a postcard earlier this year from a friend who like me experiences the elusive pursuit of work-life balance. In many ways, it is a mockery of those of us who are list makers. The postcard has three columns where lists can be made. The first column is entitled "To do today," and the second column is entitled "To do soon," whereas the third column simply reads "Who am I kidding, I will never to this." At the risk of sounding like I am sharing my true confessions, as I read the postcard, I found myself laughing a little too loud, as the message in the postcard hit a little too close to home. When we find ourselves juggling competing deadlines, we often end up behind in everything and miserable to boot. So I ask you, where do you rank on your "to-do" list?

The relationship between work-life balance and self-care is inextricably interconnected. I am not, however, going to tell you how to care for yourself or how to find work-life balance-that would be the bane of hypocrisy. Besides, there are no end of self-help books available espousing the virtues of one approach or another. What I would like to do instead is to give you permission to think about yourself. What one change can you make today that will address your work-life balance and ultimately your self-care. Finally, in the words of Michelle Obama, "We need to do a better job of putting ourselves higher on our own 'to-do' list."

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