I often hear from my private clients, “Do you think I am a good father? good mother?” As the conversation flows it is full of self-doubt, remorse and usually the ‘aha’ moment of “Maybe I am spending too much time at work?”
If this sounds familiar or is resonating with you, we’ve all been there men and women alike.
Leaving work does not mean you are not committed to your vocation or the running of your business – there absolutely has to be balance.
When did we have to start having courage to leave work with the fear of someone noticing? One of my clients told me that if your the first one in the office in the morning and the last one to leave that it gets “noticed”. Is “it” what your performance is being based on — exhaustion, doubt, stress, worry?
The “man of the house” phrase has been repeated time after time, however, this does not refer to the many women who are on their own, running the house, paying the bills, working full-time and raising their children, many of them – by them self.
Many women have and continue to rise up the corporate ladder and are also managing large corporations and demonstrating amazing leadership and tenacity at the CEO level.
Women are masters at multitasking. It’s done in the home and those skills are beautifully transferred to the workplace.
Many married couples both work and are raising their children together and also balancing home and work together as a married “team”.
Many men are now sharing the maternity leave with their wife. What a beautiful solution to split the time and give your newborn baby the best of both worlds – mom and dad. This allows the parents to return to work and begin the re-balancing of both work and home once again – a beautiful task at hand! In Canada, it’s 12 months and that is a welcome time period for many couples!
Work life balance within a marriage is like all other aspects of your marriage. Take the time to effectively communicate about all that is going on in your lives at work and at home. Make the time to share your children’s activities and have the conversations about their upbringing, difficulties, successes, etc.
Respect each other as schedules tend to fluctuate and sometimes without notice or warning and your partner needs not only your patience and understanding, but respect as it was out of their control.
Your job is one element of your life and quite frankly an integral part of your work life balance equation. It does not have to consume you, so don’t allow it to. Family time is not only important, it’s crucial and once you lose the time – you never get it back.
“Want is a growing giant whom the coat of Have was never large enough to cover…” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
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