Working women would definitely relate to this one! and the men too…
Have you ever found that going on a dream vacation and coming back refreshed and ready to take on the world once again is sort of a myth?
Does your nature help in getting work-life balance?
Want to check out yourself?
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You are not alone!
Moving back from seeing the extraordinary comforts of someone cleaning up our rooms, and making beds every day to doing endless loads of laundry to meeting workplace deadlines can be a wake-up call.
The reality of what lies ahead of us in our “real life” is intimidating, to say the least.
I find that many of us struggle to reconcile our desire to do great work and be a great spouse/parent/daughter/friend. We might in the name of work-life balance aim for perfection in every area and fall short, sometimes spectacularly so, and on a regular basis.
Work is not only the creative outlet we so desperately seek, but it helps us support our family in a meaningful way.
As a working parent, you would have experienced the fact that every minute you spend at work is the time you are not spending with your kids and family, and there is a certain amount of guilt and frustration that comes with that reality.
Work from home as many would have thought would bring in the much-needed balance in their life ended up being no more than a ‘mirage’. Being surrounded by noisy kids, elders, and family, in general, demanding your attention has been draining, to say the least for many.
For working women, possibly the time away from home and the commute to the office would have been such a welcome break daily was suddenly taken away. They seem to be now the first and the last to get in and out of bed, what with massive amounts of laundry, meals to be made, floors to be kept clean, making beds for others and the chores are endless. This has not changed much as even for those who have had house help handy. Supervising them and getting all of it done would have been more frustrating than managing employees and/or colleagues at work.
Many I know of have done away with such help as they always felt that the work done was not according to the standards that they have in mind.
This problem was accentuated for all those who have ‘Perfectionism’ as a personality trait. It is starting to take a toll on their physical and mental wellness.
It is also resulting in increased levels of absenteeism at work leading to piling up work and stress.
Do you ever experience a day where you feel as if you have provided your kids with the love and attention they require, in addition to delivering excellent work and getting some time alone to unwind and recharge? The answer may actually, be a no.
On numerous occasions, one or two of the topics have been addressed while the others have been neglected. More often than you’d like, you would have found yourself losing your temper with children, and possibly have trouble concentrating fully on your work.
I frequently get the impression that we could never realistically attain decompression and recharge.
The hardest lesson in all this is to learn on this quest for balance is that you can’t be flawless. The true fallacy is that balance is a kind of perfection in and of itself.
Giving 100% to everything all the time is out of balance; you need to take from some areas and contribute to others to balance them. That has been a hard truth for most to accept.
Can you truly achieve the elusive work-life balance? Is it a mirage that you have been chasing?
One way I have been able to get a semblance of balance is to not expect a perfect life. I would like to take life as a continuous journey where I am able to soak in the experiences as they come along. The breaks for me are just pitstops to cool the engine down and not as another means to goals like having a bucket list (aka to-do list) as some would have it.
Balance can be achieved by doing nothing – a sort of ‘stillness’. It is like the handheld weighing scale held by the street vendor. He has to hold it ‘still’ to get the measurements right.
There could be many more ways to understand whether you truly can accomplish the so-called work-life balance or what could be potentially coming in your way of dealing with this mirage.
Becoming self-aware and understanding what in your inherent nature/trait contributes to your sense of well-being and of the environment you live in.
By the way, it’s not just the working women but men too who have been at the receiving end of this elusive mirage.
DM me for a self-assessment if you are one among many who seek balance!
