As an artist, a business owner, a mother, a spouse and a friend, life can get pretty crazy around here. I happened upon this blog post about working mothers and work /life integration as opposed to work/ life balance. I really like the point she is making: that we need to integrate the two and not necessarily balance the two. Integration allows for a mixing of work and life, sometimes you do more work and sometimes you do more life. Balance gives you the idea that all needs to be equal. You have to do both equally well or you end up doing them both equally poor.
Balance brings in all kinds of guilt issues, at least for me. As I enter into one of my busiest times of the year ( weddings every weekend, shoots during the week, networking, meetings, processing, marketing etc), I don’t have as much time for cleaning or spending time with family. I feel the guilt creep in as I run off to another shoot as my daughter and hubby walk in from school. I shuffle to my office after I have delicately balanced another dirty dish in the sink thinking “I really need to do the dishes more than 2x a week”
However, integration is a combination of parts that work well together. That means that sometimes I work more and me and A only hang out for an hour one night. Or my hubby stays up late just to say hi as I walk in late from a shoot. Maybe we cut out early one day and meet at the coffee shop before we pick up A from school. Its counts as a date, right?
Combining sound better than making equal.
So how do you find integration in your life and work? First get rid of the guilt! Second, share with the people in your life what is going on. Prep them for craziness in one aspect or another. Just make sure at some point you are combining and not completely removing one aspect. Yes, there are days it will happen and that is ok. Block out your time. Allocate certain tasks each day, make a schedule and stick to it as best you can.
Work on combining life and work and you may just be a little happier.
How do you integrate your life and get everything done?
