When I posted the previous post Why Work Life Balance is NOT for the Self Employed it prompted a number of discussions with some of my twitter followers on the whole work life balance concept. One of the questions that I got asked was:

Why is Work Life Balance so hard to achieve?

In order to answer that question, let’s start (in true Stephen Covey style) with the end in mind? Ask yourself this:

Imagine you have achieved your ideal work life balance. What does it look like? What would it give you that you don’t have right now?

I am talking about what you specifically want to have happen. Imagine anything is possible. Imagine there are no limitations. Imagine the ideal is there for the taking. Be specific. Dare to dream.

Think of the things you listed down in answer to that question. Those are the things you should be focussing on. Those are the things that should be driving your goals and actions plans.

Focussing on those specific outcomes is much more likely to deliver the results you want than chasing balance

Chasing balance is like taking the wrong motorway. No matter how fast you drive, it will never get you to where you really want to be.

And that is why work life balance seems so hard to achieve – because what we want the end result to be is different to what focussing on balance delivers.

I would argue that it isn’t balance that we want at all. It is a life built on our core values. It is protecting our family life, relationships, quality of life and what is most important to us.

Remember this – you get what you focus on. Focus on what you really want. Not some outdated and flawed concept.

If this is something that resonates with you, join me and the growing number of people who are ditching the quest for work life balance in favour of designing work, life and success on our own terms. Sign up in the box below for weekly tips on designing a successful home business, family life and lifestyle on your own terms.

Then leave a message in the comments below on your views on the whole work life balance debate.

Related posts:

• Why Work Life Balance is NOT for the Self Employed
• The Curse of Work Life Balance
• Why work-life balance is misleading.

Are you chasing work life balance?

If so, why?

Is it because everyone is chasing it so it seems the thing to strive for?

Maybe you believe it is the answer to the challenges of juggling working for yourself with lifestyle, being a parent and family life.

Whatever the reason you are chasing work life balance, stop it. Yes, you read right – stop it.

Why you should stop chasing Work Life Balance

The work life balance movement was started by organisations as a way to deal with the growing problems of the impact work was having on its employees and employees disquiet about it. So let’s be clear here, it was originally an employer led initiative.

Now, far be it for me to push on you my conspiracy theories as to why employers peddle work life balance to employees like pushers dangling the next fix. Suffice to say, as someone who peddled the corporate hamster wheel for 14 years, work life balance policies often don’t work at a practical level for the employee.

But let’s come back to the point at hand.

Why are you, as a Self Employed person, chasing something that was created for organisations?

Why Work Life Balance is NOT for Self Employed folk

Work life balance is not for you for three reasons:

1. It is a flawed concept

Striving for balance will not necessarily result in you having the life you really want. It will not necessarily protect what is most important to you. It will not necessarily deliver the results you really want.

2. The word balance leads to focus in the wrong place

It leads to focussing on creating a more even balance between roles. This doesn’t allow for the fact that some roles are far more important than others. So balancing them out isn’t an appropriate approach.

3. There is a much better option more likely to deliver what you really want

Working for yourself could and should be the ultimate in personal freedom and life on your own terms. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to grab that opportunity with both hands and make the most of it.

If Work Life Balance is not for Self Employed folks, what is?

Well, I recommend ditching the word balance and replacing it with design.

The reason being is that designing life based on your core values and what is most important to you gets you focussing on creating what you really want.

Using working for yourself as a tool to support what you want to create, rather than focussing on balance, is more likely to give you the business, family life and lifestyle you really want.

I don’t know about you, but there is no way I want work to balance with what is most important to me (and I love my work). Actually, I want a total imbalance.

I want my work life not to even come close to balancing with the family life and the lifestyle I really want. I want it to fit around it and be a tool that supports me in achieving my ideal.

How about you?

Where do you stand on this subject? Please share your opinions in the comments below.

Related posts:

• Work Life Balance – A Child’s Perspective
• The Curse of Work Life Balance
• Have work life and business become a disease?

My son - living life

My son is six and a half (so important not to forget the half!!!). It is an age of making sense of the world and the way it works. There are endless questions, a curious mind and the endearing simplicity that young kids capture with ease.

Last night while I was getting him ready for bed he turned to me and said:

Why is there five days of school and only two at weekend? That’s not fair. It should be half & half.

The kid’s got a point.

Now, I would take issue with him on the half and half thing because I don’t go along with the whole work life balance concept because I think it is misleading (check out the links to blog posts at the bottom of this post if you want to know more on where I am coming from on this point).

I believe we should design how we want work life, lifestyle and family life to be based on what we value most and our ideal life, not just try to give equal balance to it all.

But hey, he’s six (and a half!!) so let’s just ride with where he is coming from.

Once he was tucked up and fast asleep, I pondered on his perspective.

With all the simplicity and matter-of-factness of a young child, he had cut to the core of the way things work when he said “that’s not fair”. To use his childish viewpoint:

Why do we all go along with a work life balance set up that just isn’t fair?

A set up that takes away personal freedom and destroys quality of life. A set up that has us working so much more than we play that it damages family life and relationships. A set up that sucks the life out of us.

Well, I think it is because we all too readily accept the status quo. The whole work five days and have two off idea was set up many moons ago by people with a different agenda.

Why are we still accepting it now? Well, maybe it’s as simple as we have lost the ability we all had as children to question what isn’t fair, what isn’t right, what isn’t just.

Am I suggesting we need to start thinking like kids again? You bet I am.

I think it is time to start challenging the status quo.

It’s time to question why we are still jumping to the ways of operating that don’t serve us, steal our freedom and damage our family life and relationships.

It’s time to start living in the space that our kids live in – living life fully, playing full out and questioning anything that gets in the way of that.

Is it time for you to rock the status quo in your work life, lifestyle and family life?

Related posts:

The Curse of Work Life Balance

3 Part mini series – Part 1 – Why work-life balance is misleading. Part 2 – The Alternative To Work-Life Balance Part 3 – Goodbye work life balance! Hello success by design!

Why You Should Break All The Rules

Have work life and business become a disease?

3 Tips to Manage Impact of Business on Family Life

Lifestyle Freedom

There seems to be some confusion as to what constitutes real lifestyle freedom.

In fact, I would go so far to say that some folk are positively delusional about the lifestyle they have. This kills peoples chances of achieving their dream lifestyle and real freedom.

Let me explain:

What a lot of people are calling “having a lifestyle” isn’t a lifestyle at all.

They are referring to things such as a trophy home, numerous flashy holidays every year, spending shed loads on clothes every week and so on.

What they are actually describing is consumerism not lifestyle.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not being the fun police here. I like nice clothes, holidays and nice stuff as much as the next person. But not if it results in me being a slave to the business and costing me living life fully.

To me a kick ass lifestyle is about having real freedom in all areas of your life.

Freedom to only work when you want to, on your own terms. Freedom to have the family life you really want with work fitting in around it. Freedom to have enough time to nurture and keep important relationships healthy. Freedom to really life live.

Here is the point I am making:

Many people are so busy chasing consumerism (and calling it lifestyle) that it is actually costing them true lifestyle freedom and the life they REALLY want.

The reason for this is they have to strap themselves to their business hamster wheel and pedal damn hard to feed their consumerism habit.

Things to Consider

• Are you confusing consumerism with lifestyle?
• Are you having to flog your guts out in your business to feed consumerism habits?
• If so, what is that costing you in relation to lifestyle freedom? (and I don’t mean just financially!)

There is a lot of focus these days on how work life impacts quality of life, families and lifestyle. And rightly so.

But if you are genuinely looking to create REAL lifestyle freedom you also need to take a long hard look at what impact the choices you are making in your personal life is having on how many hours you have to work, the level your business has to perform at, your family life and so on.

Is your business life feeding your ideal life or consumerism?

So, I invite you to take a step back and take a good long hard at all the choices you are making in your personal lif:

• Which are keeping you a slave to working longer and harder?
• Which are really moving your towards true lifestyle freedom and a business life on your own terms?
• Is it time to make some changes?

What is your take on this? Do you agree, disagree, have an alternative perspective? Please share your views.

Is the dynamic between your work life and school holidays exactly as you would like it to be? (and I mean your absolute ideal)

Do you believe it is possible to work only when you want to during school holidays without your business suffering?

These are important questions to consider if you want to create your ideal lifestyle.

Managing Your Business and School Holidays

In the previous post 7 Tips to Manage your Home Business during School Holidays we looked at things you can do to manage the dynamic between your home business and family life during school holidays.

Those things will help you manage your current situation. But, if your current situation isn’t your ideal, you need to know the answers to the questions above to get on a path to something better.

How do you go about getting your work life, school holidays and family life to be ideal?

Here are some suggestions to get you started on designing future school summer holidays to be ideal:

1. Believe it is possible to create your ideal. If you don’t then you are not going to be in the mindset that will allow you to create what you really want.
2. Stop thinking balance. Start thinking design. Many parents are so focussed on balancing everything that it stops them from designing things how they really want them to be. For more information on this read The Curse of Work Life Balance and Why work-life balance is misleading.
3. Work out what ideal means to you – forget any perceived limitations and write down, in the present tense what you, your kids, your work life and lifestyle is like during school holidays when it is ideal. Start taking action to turn this into reality.
4. Include family life & lifestyle in your business planning – many people review and make business plans and decisions in isolation from the rest of their life. Big mistake. Look for creative ways to re-design how your business operates and earns revenue around your family life. Do this at least monthly.
5. Keep focussed on the end game – design your actions plans, schedule and what you spend your time on around your big picture.

The main point I am making here is this:

If you are not happy with the dymanic between your business, family life and school holidays, then start designing it so that you are.

It is 100% possible. And the rewards, well, they are priceless.

But it is essential to remember this – don’t wait. Start working on how you want the dynamic between your business and school holidays to be for future summers NOW. Get busy designing, then put action plans in place to make it so.

What challenges do you face during school holidays? Do you have any suggestions to add to this list?

So, here we are again – school summer holidays time.

How are you feeling about it?

- Are you are delighted at the opportunity to spend quality time with your little cherubs?

- Are you feeling guilty because you feel you have to spend all summer keeping the business going so  you don’t have much time for the kids?

- Are you not enjoying the time with your kids because you are worrying the business is being neglected?

- Are you feeling so frazzled about the whole thing that you aren’t enjoying work or family life?

Regardless of which of these categories you fall into, there are always ways to improve the dynamic between your home business, family life and your lifestyle.

7 Tips to Manage your Home Biz During School Holidays

1. Set clear, strong boundaries between work and family life and implement them.
2. Don’t mix work and family time – this doesn’t work for anyone. Keep them separate.
3. Create a schedule of what you are doing when – this will help with point 2.
4. Prioritise hard - look for stuff that can wait until September. Read Time Management – the REAL reason you don’t have enough time for ideas to help with this one.
5. Avoid Lone Ranger Syndrome – look for where you can enlist some help e.g. family, friends. To find out more read Is Lone Ranger Syndrome Killing Your Business?
6. Delegate – what can you delegate out? Doing everything yourself won’t lead to success whether it is school holiday or not. Don’t use “I can’t afford help” as an excuse. Get creative. For example, students looking for a few hours work experience could be an option, there are people you can hire on an hourly basis etc. What other creative ideas can you come up with?
7. Form a support group with other parents who run their business from home – set up a rota for play dates to give each other work time without distractions.

The point is this:

Your kids grow up very fast. Once each year is gone, it is gone for good. I speak to many parents of grown up kids who say “I wish I had spent more time with them when they were younger”. Haven’t heard one yet say “I wish I had spent more time at work while the kids were younger”.

So, I invite you to get creative and look for what things you can put in place to enjoy your home biz and the school holidays with your kids without feeling stressed, guilty and frazzled.

In the next post we will look at how you can design your business to operate around school holidays and family life moving forward. In the meantime, what tips would you add to the list above? Please share your thoughts to help other parents.

Have you noticed how many people place great importance on the ability to multi task?

It seems to me that it is viewed almost as a badge of honour to strive for and achieve. It seems to be viewed as the answer to the overload of tasks so many people seem to be trying to juggle.

But here’s the thing:

Multi tasking isn’t the most effective way to manage many tasks and can actually be counter productive

3 Myths of Multi tasking

Myth 1 – You get more done if you multi task. Not true. Your productivity actually reduces the more you multi task. You are also likely to make more mistakes. Tasks actually take longer when you are trying to complete them at the same time as other tasks.

Myth 2 – You will feel more in control of all your tasks and responsibilities. Not true. It actually increases stress levels. The more you are trying to do at any one time, the more your stress levels go up. Not good for your health. Also, it isn’t attractive to others if you are constantly a little cloud of stress hanging round them!

Myth 3 – You can get stuff done while being with your family. Not true. It detrimentally impacts family life. One of the most important things our kids (and other family members) need from us is our time and undivided attention when we are with them. It sends a very negative message to our kids if when we are spending time with them we are also juggling lots of other stuff, especially work.

The Alternative to Multi Tasking

So, here’s the good news:

It is OK to stop multi tasking. There are far more effective ways to get things done.

Here are a few suggestions to play with:

• Organise your tasks for the day into priority order and give them time slots.
• Focus on each task totally, giving you full attention until it is done.
• Remove distractions and temptations before you start each task.

The alternatives to multi tasking are much more enjoyable, effective and healthy. It will enhance your productivity levels and the quality of what you are going. All areas of your business will benefit. And most important of all, your family will love you for it because they will feel more important to you than your work because you are protecting and enhancing family life.

Now that we have busted some myths surrounding multi tasking, is it time for you to evaluate how you manage your business tasks and family life?

Do you ever have those days when despite how much you have to do you feel you just don’t want to do anything? I had one of those days yesterday. This isn’t something that happens often for me so I felt really uncomfortable with it.

Here’s what happened:

I got up early to get some work done. I love that time of day. I can get quite a bit done before my son gets up for school. So there I was, sat in my office ready to do some work when this huge wave of resistance to doing anything washed over me.

At first I was quite irritated with myself. After all, I pride myself on being a kick ass action gal and now it had deserted me. I was all ready to give myself a severe kick up the ass but I suddenly stopped.

“Hold on there girl” I told myself. I continued “Before any ass kicking goes on, what is really going on here?” I pondered on this a while. Then I realised what it was. My husband is going into hospital in three days time to have a fairly big operation. It’s been a big weight on my mind for some time and now that the time is here, it is a real brain time consumer.

You see the person sat at my desk yesterday morning wasn’t Ali the Business Owner. It was Ali the wife. The woman that loves her husband and family more than anything in the world.

The point is this:

We all have many roles in life. It is inevitable that there will be times that one role steps into the space of another role. When this happens it is easy to slip into beating yourself up and being hard on yourself for not being some sort of superhero able to have perfect demarcation between all our roles. But that is totally unrealistic.

What to do when roles collide.

Stop. It is counter intuitive, as the natural urge is to push on regardless but just stop. Allow yourself time to step back from the situation. Assess what is really going on.

Ask what is most important right now? Look for what you can put in place to be in the role that is most important at that time. Re-arrange things to protect what is most important.

Drop some balls. Forget the pressure to juggle everything. It’s a flawed concept. Sometimes it is OK to drop balls. The trick is to chose which balls to drop rather than waiting for one to drop randomly.

Treat yourself with compassion. Beating yourself up serves no purpose whatsoever. Stop it.

So, take a look at what you do when your roles collide. Is it time to make some changes?

The Curse of Work Life Balance

The whole work life balance movement has been around for a fair amount of years. Yet there is still a significant amount of people who feel that they are struggling with juggling all the balls of life and the things they value most are suffering.

It seems to me that something with the whole work life balance thing isn’t working or surely after all these years we would have the situation nailed.

So it begs the question:

What is Going Wrong with Work Life Balance?

The problem is what we are focussing on – balancing work with life. The two aren’t separate things. There is only one thing – your life. Everything else is a label for an activity you are doing within your life. So what is going wrong is that we are focussing on the wrong things – balance, and seeing work as separate to our life. This focus is resulting in sacrificing what we value most and our ideal life.

The Curse of Work Life Balance

The curse that work life balance creates is that it just gives you more of the same. You are still juggling. It doesn’t actually remove the problem totally. It doesn’t lead to you living your ideal life on your own terms.

Here is something to think about:

Do you really want to balance and juggle the things you value most with less important things that cost how you REALLY want things to be?
OR
Do you want to live a life built on the things you value most with the less important things fitting in around them?

If it’s the first option, keep focussing on work life balance. If it’s the second option, then kick focussing on work life balance into touch. Instead, make a decision right now that you are going to build the life your really want for yourself and your family.

Here are a few tips:

• Make sure you have a crystal clear picture of what your ideal life would look like. Define what constitutes a successful life for you including all aspects of your life as one.
• Is that worth fighting for? If so, start thinking “designing life” NOT balancing life.
• What would need to happen for your ideal to become a reality?
• Don’t wait, start now – even if you don’t know how you will make it all happen. Think baby steps.
• You can find more detailed tips and ideas in this 3 part mini series – Part 1 Why work-life balance is misleading. Part 2 The Alternative To Work-Life Balance Part 3 Goodbye work life balance! Hello success by design!

End the curse of work life balance for yourself. Eradicate mediocrity. Choose really living your ideal life on your terms. The freedom and fulfillment it gives is worth fighting for.

Do you have challenges with work life balance? What are your views on the whole work life balance movement?

One of the most common issues I hear from clients who are self employed or run a business from home is that they would like to work less hours.

They want to have more time to do things like be with the kids more, protect family life, improve quality of life and just live life more.

Even though they don’t have a boss dictating their working hours to them, they often feel unable to reduce their hours because of the demands of the business.

The first step to reverse this situation is to stop blaming the business.

The business operates the way it was set up. So with the risk of over simplifying the task, it is a matter of setting the business up to operate a different way and for you as the business owner to operate differently.

It isn’t about working hard, it’s about working smart.

How to work less hours

Now, I am not suggesting you wake up tomorrow and decide you are working 50% less hours and just do it and to hell with the consequences. What I am suggesting is that if managed correctly, reducing working hours is possible.

Here are some points that will infuence how many hours you work:

1. Get clear on what you really want. Exactly how many hours a week and weeks per year would you ideally like to work? (Forget, “should” “must” and “ought to” – what is your ideal?).

2. How much revenue would you need to bring in each week if you only worked your ideal number of weeks?

3. Review your business model and revenue streams. Once you have the answers to question 1 and 2 brainstorm what changes you can make that will allow you to generate revenue more effectively to meet your ideal working hours. Get creative.

4. Increase your personal effectiveness. This factor is a significant contributor in reducing working hours so you can’t afford to ignore this area. Look for ways to upgrade the areas that directly impact your personal effectiveness.

5. Review your business processes and procedures. I know this subject bores the pants off many people, but like point 4, it is one of the keys to your ability to reduce your working hours. Look for ways to automate, outsource, simplify and improve the way your businesss operates.

There are many more things you can do to get on the path to reducing your working hours but I hope these few points will provoke some thought and help you get the ball rolling.

If you have any tips and/or challenges around reducing working hours, please share them in the comments section below.