Work Wednesday
I thought I'd blog today about vacation (we're in the Magic Kingdom right now!) as a counterpoint to Work Wednesday. But it would be difficult, if not overly deliberate, to disregard the proximity of the New Year on this penultimate day of the decade that ends at midnight tomorrow.
A decade that, for me, has been all about finding, creating, and refreshing, work-life balance. So, I'm going to pass on the temptation to make my own working mom's New Year's resolutions or compile my own list of top parenting trends. Instead, I'll offer a few (just a few, remember, I'm on vacation!) personal reflections on a decade that started with imbalance and ended with (rough) equilibrium. At least for the moment.
Finding. At the beginning of the of the decade - actually, the millennium (remember Y2K?) - work-life balance was barely in my consciousness. Except to the extent that I knew that I was working too much. And that it was somehow standing in the way of other parts of my life.
So in January 2000, I left my law firm partnership and, after a month or so of traveling, I began a new job with the federal government. And found not only a new career and a cause that I cared about, but a husband, my husband, three doors down the hallway. (Actually, we lived in the same apartment building and had met before but that's a tale for another day.) While work could still sometimes be wacky, the change of job allowed me to have a saner, if less lucrative, lifestyle.
Creating. After my professional change of course, parenthood presented a new path. And a raft of work-life balance issues. When our first creation - our lively, engaging, daughter - arrived, my husband and I started making adjustments - some painful, some easy - to the way we lived and worked. I moved to a four-day-per-week schedule and my husband and I felt our way into new roles and responsibilities.
Creation two, our sweet and joyful son, challenged our new equilibrium at first, but we adapted to becoming a two parent, two child family. We revised our work-life arrangements. The result- an often chaotic, frequently improvised, imperfect balance that works most of the time. Except when it completely falls apart, e.g., sick days, snow days, and travel.
Refreshing. In a way, refreshing is nothing more than re-creating and re-balancing the push and pull of work and life as the years go by. Especially as my kids grow older, busier, and more independent. This year, for example, I again changed my work hours and schedule to mesh better with my daughter's entrance to elementary school.
But refreshing is also about making sure that I take on new challenges at work so I don't stagnate. And that I find pursuits that renew and restore me. Like writing this blog, spending time chatting with close friends, planning a special adventure with one of my children, and exploring new places and ideas with my husband.
It's the realization that work-life balance isn't static or fixed. It's something that evolves, with effort, over a period of time.
Like a decade. Looking back over the past ten years, I'm reminded of my pediatrician's nutrition advice. That it isn't what my kids consume every day that matters. Instead, it's what they eat over the course of a week. It's an approach that makes sense. (Except when you're on vacation!)
While a week certainly is too short a time frame to assess how I've done on work-life balance, ten years is. There is, of course, no way to quantify or measure it. Nor would I want to. But for now, I'll give myself a passing grade, and make a promise to continue finding, creating, and refreshing in the decade ahead.
Happy New Year! I wish you a year - and a decade - of joy, love, health, and work-life balance.
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