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Once you tell yourself you are going to make it work, get out your calendar. Make a list of each thing you would like to do that day. Using the calendar fill in what you will do when. Actually make a place for each item on your calendar. If an item cannot fit into the calendar, it cannot be done. This activity makes it real and clear that there are so many hours in the day. When you have a to-do list and cannot find spaces for the items on your calendar it makes it real and clear that having it all may mean doing 8 things during the day instead of 12. This is balance in the real world. Balance in the real world means doing what you can in the time available and cutting yourself a break when you don’t get 16 hours worth of things done in the 7 hours you have available.
If you want to balance all you have to do for work and home, stop thinking about things being 50/50.
Time is a finite thing. You cannot balance your obligations at work and home by trying to cram 30 hours of work into a 24 hour day. When you attempt to do that, you are setting yourself up to be miserable. You also cannot balance work and home by simply dividing your waking hours 50% work and 50%. That is not smart or practical. In the real world, sometimes you will need to spend 80% of your day on personal matters and 20% on work matters. Other times, you will need to spend 70% of the day on work related matters and 30% on personal matters. If your days require these kinds of splits, dividing your day in this manner is balance. The idea that dividing your time evenly among your various responsibilities is a myth. That is not how you are going to balance it all. You balance it all by dividing your day and your life as needed in each circumstance.
Most of all, stop trying to follow everyone else’s ideas for how to balance work and home. Instead look at your life, look at how thins work in your real world and make balancing decisions based upon your life. The life of “experts.” celebrities and television reporters makes very little difference in your world. You know what your obligations are. You know what is negotiable and what is not. So the next time you get frustrated about how you are going to have it all and do it all, step back, pull out your calendar and accept the fact that if you cannot find room for it on the calendar you cannot do it and cut yourself a break.
If you would like to read more articles about work-life balance, check out the following:
It is fantastic to run a business where the employees have learned to properly balance work and home. At least once per year this is a big uproar when one “expert” or another writes a big article on how modern women are struggling to “have it all.” Typically the articles have a lot of moaning and complaining about the need for balance and how impossible it is to balance one’s work life and home life, how impossible it is to have it all. Smart entrepreneurs and supervisors know that employees are better workers when they are not overwhelmed by their responsibilities at work and at home. Click here to read more.
As a work at home mother, I am uniquely aware of the struggle involved in trying to balance work and home. We must work in order to earn a living and at the same time, we must spend time with our families, because that is where our hearts lie. That is the reason for this series, to show that we can balance work and home and emerge happily on the other side. In order to do that, we must use careful planning strategies. Thus – the plan fail dichotomy. Click here to read more.
Balance – If You Can Do It, Share Your Secret
Learn the secret of how to successfully balance work and home and share it with others
Work Life Balance – Get Over The Frustration
Want Better Balance – Enjoy the Good Moments
It may not be possible to divide your time evenly between home and work but you can balance better if you learn to enjoy the good moments.