We aren’t talking about toothpaste here, though how people attack those tubes tells a lot about each person, and let’s be clear, the couple who squeezes together stays together. Is that a thing? It should be.
No, we’re talking about the proverbial rock and a hard place. Your to do list mushrooms in November and December, often to unmanageable proportions, but somehow the number of hours in a day never changes. Still…good news: handling the squeeze between work and life is manageable. Believe it or not, whole businesses devote themselves to preaching the neuroscience behind a balanced, happy work/life ratio. The happiness index cites life balance as now being more important to employees than salary. Read that again. Life balance is even more important than salary. Good news for you—office politics and traditional job pitfalls are not a problem for you!
Begin by capitalizing on the pluses. You work for a company with ultimate flexibility. Yes, work is required to pay the bills, keep the electricity flowing and put groceries on the table, but you exercise the option of which days to devote to your schedule. Huge plus.
Huge.
Being grateful for what you have is a first step in achieving the Zen principle of happy employment.
That flexibility becomes a double-edged sword if you don’t employ a few hacks to keep yourself on track and get the job done. That’s the squeeze. Managing life and work expectations is easier when you employ a few hacks.
Make lists.
Begin with a list, or several. Track your work-related chores, gift lists, grocery lists, even the steps required to achieve a ginormous goal. If you have nimble fingers, by all means use your phone. Many prefer a small notebook fitting nicely in a pocket or purse. The idea, though, is to carry it with you. Add to it throughout your day. Embrace the almost orgasmic joy that comes with crossing items off your lists.
If you prefer to track all of your line items in one list, color code the areas of your life. The perspective of seeing how much of your life is prescribed by work or by family helps you monitor the balance you desire. Gettysburg College cites work as being a full third of the average person’s life. Is that true for you? You can reduce the time you spend on work by being more organized and managing your stops throughout the day. Lists will help you do that.
Create the perfect day.
Plan out your route as you visit stores. Find a cute place to take a break and eat lunch. Factor in breaks and rewards. Remember, no one is prescribing your workday. No boss is looking over your shoulder. You exercise control of which day you venture out and how you fulfill your obligations. Don’t make your work unbearable, and if procrastination is an issue for you, reward yourself for work accomplished. Chocolate, especially dark chocolate, is almost a food group. From enhancing heart health to cancer-busting flavonoids, it’s almost as good for you as your peas & carrots. It grows on a tree is as close to a vegetable as you can get without actually being called a vegetable. The point is that you get to plan this perfect day, so make it special.
Look at these fifteen tips espoused by Forbes to both create and maintain a healthy work-life balance. Number one on that list is exercise. Park across the lot when you visit a store and work those steps into your day. Number twelve is a biggie: eliminate distractions. Silence phone notifications and answer texts later. Focus on a task and get ‘er done!
Prioritize what really matters.
Sometimes your flow of work is disrupted by caregiving, health issues, and all the minutiae that accompanies families. We recognize and affirm your commitment to those priorities, and provide you with a stretch in which you can earn your income while still taking care of life. Psychology Today acknowledges that life presents you with challenges, but encourages you to be more organized. Keeping all your work-related items in one handy portfolio or small tub and stashing it in your car means never looking for what you need. It means when you pop into a store to stock the racks and report your work, everything you need is at your fingertips.
Embrace the inevitable.
So how did we get from toothpaste to planners and portfolios? By recognizing that a certain tension will always exist between life and work. Your tube of toothpaste may look like it has been through a war before the last drop of minty goodness has been squeezed out, but your life never should. Recognize this one truth: the work, the chores, the mounting to-do list is a part of the minty goodness of life. Learn how to extract every last pleasure while still getting the job done. If you do, you will eliminate the dreaded squeeze.
