As a professional woman with two amazing kids, I have often struggled with work/life balance. At one point in my career, I was truly convinced that this was an illusion, created by some HR guru with no kids of his or her own, to make the rest of us believe that we were slackers for not finding personal or professional contentment in 12 hour professional work days followed by 6-12 hour personal work days. Come on- be honest, YOU have wondered the same thing.
A friend of mine from law school accurately described what work/life balance means for most of us- "It is like suddenly becoming a C student in everything you do" As over-achieving professional women, C student is a tough pill to swallow- trust me, I have tried!
In my own career, I found that work/life balance was more of a priority-yo yo rather than a static state. My professional life would take off, growing by leaps and bounds but I would miss out on an important family event. Desperate to have my priorities in order, I would cut back on my hours in the office, delegate more work, re-arrange my meeting schedules and spend more time at home. And then inevitably, something would fall through the cracks or a member of my staff would leave and suddenly the work portion of the work/life balance was out of whack prompting another prioritization shift and more schedule rearranging to allow more time for work. This was my life, a constant state of back and forth, back and forth in pursuit of the evasive work/life balance. Eventually, exhausted and truly convinced that it was impossible to be a professional woman and a good Mom, I left a dream job to pursue a job with fewer responsibilities only to discover that work/life balance was still out of my reach.
And then ... I hired an executive coach! I will admit, I was extremely skeptical of the idea of an executive coach, after all I was used to being the over achiever handing out the coaching tips. Plus, I thought coaching was only for hippies and baseball players. However, after speaking to my potential coach, explaining my work/life balance dilemma and learning that not only was my new coach a professional woman and a Mom herself but that my dilemma was so common that she had created a group class just for professional women- I decided to give a shot.
100 days later and a graduate of the Honoree Corder- Short-Term-Massive-Action Plan (http://www.coachhonoree.com/), I had found the holy grail- work/life balance that lasted longer then 5 minutes and a strategy for recreating the balance after those inevitable swings that bring life out of balance! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Who knew life could be so good? The creation of balance was not immediate, it took implementing new tools, and redefining my own goals so that I understood what I was truly chasing. But- I did it and it was much easier than the yo-yo approach that I had been using! I was so inspired by my own transformation, that I am now teaching Honoree's method myself.
The moral of the story- if you are chasing work/life balance you are not alone. Although elusive, work/life balance can be achieved but it may mean adding a few new tools to your arsenal. Lets face it, we all went through training to enter our respective professions, it only makes sense to acquire training to learn work/life balance. If you are tired of chasing the illusion of balance- tip the scales in your favor and find a class, a book, or a coach to acquire the missing skills. If you are not sure which skills are missing- think about the following areas: 1- Attitude (sounds silly but its hard to achieve work/life balance when you are feeling awful about work or life) 2- Personal and Professional Organization (are you really running at optimum performance?) 3- Time Maximization (need I say more?) 4-Consistent, effective, & efficient marketing (don't forget- growing your business is part of work/life balance) 5- Support system (never under estimate the power of girlfriends).
I hope the next time you hear the phrase "work/life balance" it will describe your current state or you will be actively working on acquiring the skills to achieve this for yourself.
Until next time... Powerful Ladies Unite!
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