Does Your ‘Life Balance’ Work For You?
Photo credit @photoholgic via Unsplash
30 years ago, I don’t suppose anyone really talked about “Work / Life Balance”. Life was simpler. When I was growing up in a market town in Somerset, dads went to work and provided, and mums looked after the house and made sure everyone was fed.
Our dad pretty much worked for the same company for 30 years until he took early retirement on medical grounds.
Sure, our mum worked a bit. I vividly remember that she had a cottage industry of ‘making boxes’ – even 9-year-old me could tell the piece rate was ridiculously low and she was also a childminder for time too.
Life felt a bit uncomfortable in the early 1990s but somehow dad was one of 3 out of 30 or so ‘at risk’ to survive a redundancy round.
One thing is certain it never felt like dad was always ‘at work’.
The signs of a changing world
We didn’t know any gangsters, so my dad was the first person I knew who had Carphone (back when The Carphone Warehouse seemed like the obvious name for a business).
He was surveyor, out on the road in Somerset – calling in his reports over the phone to be typed up in the office. But despite the technology there was never any danger of being ‘always on’.
In fact, my dad even had flexible working – he scheduled his own diary of house surveyor visits and frequently made his schedule fit the away sports matches my brother and I were involved in on Wednesday.
To state the obvious, life has changed…
The pressures are different - our parents didn’t have to cope with emails on their phones, data at their fingertips. Everything requiring their action.
If you’re a working dad, it’s important to make sure your work life balance is right for you and for your family. Long standing traditional gender roles of Men = Provider, Women = Caregiver serve many couples very well and can provide certainty in life. Giving opportunities to experience deeply accepted elements of masculinity and femininity.
But it doesn’t work for everyone.
Maybe your partner wants to build her career and would prefer not to be tied to endless parenting ‘duties’?
“I am not a parent yet, nor have plans to be in the next couple of years… I'm particularly keen for my hubby to be a 50/50 parent. I already get push back from him how that will be difficult!”
Maybe you are one of the many men who wants to spend more time as a parent - even if this means foregoing progress at work.
It’s time to Assess Your Work Life Balance….
Ask yourself which category do you fall into?
Be honest - how do your family feel about your ‘work life balance’
A = Everyone is happy with my work life balance.
B = I’m happy with my work life balance, but my family aren’t.
C = My family is happy with my work life balance, but I’m not.
D = No one is happy with my work life balance.
(E = I’m not sure what they think)
What does this mean for you and your family?
A – This is the perfect situation - everyone’s a winner.
Photo Credit @juniorferreir_ via Unsplash
🏆 It doesn’t matter how you do it - this is what you want.
It might be that you work long hours, doing a job that you love and that provides you and your family with the life you all want.
✅ Perfect! Keep doing what you are doing - make sure you don’t inadvertently slip into B though…
B – This could easily become an issue.
❌ Here’s a couple of warnings… to jolt you out of complacency.
Imagine it’s your work anniversary on LinkedIn… among the notes of colleague respect is a comment from your wife:
“Congrats, let’s catch up”
I hope you don’t need me to tell you you’ve got a problem here and it’s time to do something about it before you face what Toby' faced…
❌ Toby and his wife are separated and to a large extent due to a failure to sort out their work life balance.
“If there's one thing I wish we'd done better, it would have been to have those really honest discussions - rather than the more off-hand comments and observations - about the work life balance for both of us, including as a couple and as parents.
But hey - we live and learn, eh?!”
B is not a good place to be.
C - tricky one
Maybe your kids aren’t bothered if they see much of you as long as they get a new Xbox for Christmas?
Your partner likes the lifestyle you are able to provide.
If you want to reduce your hours, be more flexible or change jobs - how will this impact on your family - what you might see as good thing, they may only see the downsides.
✅ Open and honest conversations are key here - you need to be honest about how your current situation is affecting you.
✅ You will need understanding and practical and emotional support.
D – what are you waiting for?
Time to do something different today!
E – Definitely time to find out
Hopefully you've assessed your work life balance as an A, but as you can see above B and C aren’t great places to be.
Please don’t wait until the stress and anxiety gets too much, grab your free “5 Ways To Achieve Your Ultimate Purpose” download via the button below and make tangible steps to future that works for you.
