Prioritise Your Worlds
At times, your family life will be more important than your work life but at others your work life may come out on top.
If you’re trying to work on both at the same time, it is easy to create stress and conflict. Instead, decide which one is more important at that time and put it at the forefront.
You can determine your own priorities and there isn’t a wrong or right answer. They are likely to change on a regular basis depending on the situation at hand.
Get Your Family to Help Out with Chores
When you’re trying to work and raise a family, everything can stack up. Get your family to help out in your home life by giving them set chores to do; even toddlers can help.
Get them to tidy their own rooms or do the vacuuming around the house. Give your partner chores to do if he doesn’t usually to help you out.
Delegate Tasks at Work
If you are in a position of power, delegate your own tasks in the office. If you freelance and have taken on too much work, outsource it to other locations and deal with the editing when it gets back.
This will help you meet deadlines and focus on your family life when you need to.
Write Goals for Both Lives
Make a list of goals for both of your lives. Your boss will usually give you your work goals – unless you are the boss!—but you will need to create the home goals yourself.
By having them written down, you can create steps to get there and make sure both worlds get the same amount of attention and you reach all the goals you have in mind. Keep these goals realistic.
Set Time for Your Family Where Possible
This is especially the case if you are your own boss or you work from home. It’s easy to let work commitments take over but you need to set some time to spend with your family.
Start with an hour or two in the evening for dinner and help with homework. As you learn more about balancing, you will be able to set longer periods during the week.
Learn to Manage Your Time
The best way to create a balance is to have great time management skills. Develop these if you don’t have them already and improve them if they are rusty.
This will also help you clearly end your working day to enjoy your home life.
Turn the Phone Off
When you get in from work, make it a habit to turn your phone off and avoid your emails. If your boss wants to get hold of you, he can wait until the morning.
This is your family time. Of course, if you are freelancing or are the boss, you may have to do this for a couple of hours at the most.