I, Definition.

Sacrifice has two meanings, the first one is dead (stopping all activities of the body), the second meaning is liable for damage or loss of material benefits and spiritual or any part of the body to a higher purpose or a nice ideal. Sacrificing means both a consideration into action and thinking rationally and emotionally to achieve benefits for an individual or collective and minimize damage to yourself or at least for a group of possibilities.

According to Dictionary.com, sacrifice is "the surrender or destruction of something prized or desirable for the sake of something considered as having a higher or more pressing claim."

II, Sign.

Sacrificing certain areas of your life for your career is necessary to an extent, but sacrificing too much can lead to an unbalanced and unfulfilling life. Ignoring one important aspect of your life to focus on another doesn’t work. Imagine neglecting your family for a year while you focus entirely on your career. It would do irreparable damage to your relationship with your spouse and children. The example may be extreme, but there is no doubt that neglecting an important area of your life, even in small ways, can have far reaching negative effects.

Your health, family, friends, passions and career are all connected. If one area is neglected it will negatively affect others. On the other hand, if you find a balance between all areas of life that are important to you, they will support one another and flourish. For example, good health can help you be more productive at work and pursuing your passions can make you a happier individual and role model for your family. Balance is essential to a fulfilling life.

Here are 4 signs that you may be sacrificing too much for your career:

Sign #1:  You regularly miss family meals and activities

It’s common to experience busy times at work that require more hours than usual, but this should not be a regular occurrence. Working late and missing family dinners or activities are sure signs that you’re working too much. At the end of your life will you look back and wish you had worked more, or spent more time with the ones you love?

Sign #2: Your health is deteriorating

Do you find yourself grabbing fast food lunches and making poor food choices throughout the day because you’re too busy or tired to cook? Do you lack the energy or the time to work out? Is your health deteriorating? Your work life balance may be the culprit.

Sign #3: You don’t have the energy to pursue your passions

We would all like our careers to be our passion, but the reality is that for most people we work primarily to support our lifestyle or family. Doing work that we’re not passionate about can be very draining and can leaves us with little energy to pursue other passions outside of the workplace.

Sign #4: You dream about your career

Are you always thinking about your job? Do you daydream about work? Maybe you literally dream about your career as you sleep. If you are constantly preoccupied with your job, chances are you’re sacrificing other important areas of your life.

III, How to balance your career and life.

The biggest challenge many of us face is how to balance the demands of family, friends, and career. While we want happy and fulfilling lives outside of work, we have to make personal sacrifices in order to achieve our career aspirations. How do you balance those sacrifices so they don’t greatly interfere with your personal goals? How do you fit roles such as wife, mother, and friend into an already hectic schedule? Since time is precious, keeping a balance between the two worlds can be a challenge

#1: Set your priorities early

The first step to achieving balance is to get your family to agree on what the priorities should be. Realize that business success often requires long hours and travel. In these instances, support from your family has to be there. Additionally, when children are involved, many people discover that they have to re-balance their lives so they have time to spend with the kids.

#2: Consider what is right for you

When placed in identical situations, no two people will make the same choices. Each person has to evaluate the event and then make a decision based on what is right for her at the moment. Just because an outcome worked for one person, doesn’t necessarily mean it will work for another.

Prioritize your own commitments. Decide what is most important to you. Where do you want to spend your time and energy? How important is your career in the scheme of your life? How do you define success?

Every day we hear of increasing numbers of people who reach the pinnacle of their careers and decide it’s time to embark on a new stage of life. They quit their jobs, start a family, change careers, or take an extended leave. Others start businesses out of their homes so they can be with their families.

Some companies are reluctant to support a person’s career advancement if they don’t know the person’s goals—both personal and professional. Therefore, once you know what you want, communicate it to your management and get support. If the company will not support your personal goals as well as your professional ones, then it’s time to evaluate whether this is the right company for you.

#3: Balance points need consideration

Before you make any drastic changes to your personal or professional life, consider the implications of each decision and how you plan to integrate the changes into your schedule. For example:

What effect will having children have on your life?

How much time do you want to take off when you have a child?

Do you want to come back to work full-time?

What support systems exist to help you?

Will leaving at 5:00 allow you to get your work done? If not, are you willing to take work home?

How much control do you have over your workload?

Different jobs have different requirements. What about your current position? Study your field to see if it meets your goals and aspirations. If not, it may be time to consider a change.

#4: What’s your balancing decision?

We all make sacrifices to get what we want. Most top executives do not sleep eight hours. Many of them work on weekends. These are choices they make in order to have what they want. Think about where you want to be in 10 or 20 years and what it will take to get there. What choices and sacrifices will you need to make today to achieve your goals tomorrow?

IV, Conclusion.

A great career often means that you have to sacrifice. But job, position, money is only the material elements – family is the most sacred. Don’t neglect your family because of money or social status. They are the people that you come to share when you have problem as tired, bored, difficulty and failure. So, you have to find ways to balance career and life.