International work life week was last week, and the fact that I’m writing this today probably says it all!
A recent survey showed that 1 in 4 brits average over 40 hours a week at work (not including unpaid breaks, lunches or voluntary overtime), and 64% of office workers stay behind after work at least twice per month. Not only that, but nearly half receive emails at home and 38% have worked whilst on holiday. Sounds like we should be reaching breaking point but in fact, 72% said they have a good work life balance so if we're OK with it, then why?
The survey also showed that things such as working from home, job sharing, flexitime and compressed hours make such a difference allowing us to fit work around life that we're willing to work at odd times or extra hours for the convenience.
My daughter's class is taught by 2 teachers who job share, I work from home a lot of the time, and my husband quite often goes in at odd times to suit the needs of a 24 hour business (and also giving us a bit of useful time together as a by product)...its vastly different to my childhood where my dad had to go away for months at a time and once came back to a toddler who didn't recognise him.
Losing him and my father in law actually became the motivation for starting Lelloliving, as family became the most important thing to us and prompted those of us left to move in together (which meant we ended up with 6 Jack Russell's in the one house!). Adding small business goals into the mix just adds to the chaos.
As a consequence I’ve not quite achieved the massive list of business goals I’ve set for myself as I end up bathing the one that rolls in fox poo, or chasing the one that runs away instead of settling down to write a blog or finishing products on schedule. It means we’ve now got a whole series of Christmas cards which if I’m not careful will totally miss the boat and generally progress has been a bit slower than intended.
But you know, I’m not too upset because we’ve learnt that life can be shorter than you expect, we can catch up at odd hours in the day and sometimes life has to triumph over work.
Don't sweat the small stuff!