Work/Life Imbalanced

 

I am haunted by this quote, which I first read in a book but I understand has made the rounds in numerous settings, usually in the context of how hard it is for women in particular to “have it all”:

“If you want to succeed in your career, you have to sacrifice your personal life. If you want to succeed in your personal life, you have to sacrifice your career. If you want to succeed at both, you have to sacrifice yourself.” 

I do agree this is particularly true for women. Partly because of the biology of the mismatch between child-bearing and partly due to societal gender norms, it is generally harder for women than for men to juggle work, family, and self-care. 

All parents, and moms in particular, are faced with the challenge of bearing the time and effort for everything in their lives, relative to the finite amounts of time and effort available to do it all. Work/life balance can mean lots of things, but oftentimes we think of it in the context of working parents, which is what I’ll take as my point of reference for this post. You could easily throw in “taking care of an elderly parent” here, since it is also related to being responsible for another human life (and, obviously, some people, so-called “sandwich generation” folk, have to worry about both kids and parents relying on them). 

The quote haunts me because it is not hypothetical but real, and really inconvenient and painful. Like many modern parents, I’m trying my darndest not to sacrifice at work, or at home, or with myself, but in reality I feel like I’m constantly flailing around badly on all three fronts. Forgive me over-explaining below, it’s just what helps me make sense of the chaos that is life nowadays, is to sort the world into different buckets:

1. Folks who have a life partner who is able to handle a disproportionate load, say with kids, so that you have time to dive into work and can have free time too.

2. Folks who have sufficient material or relational resources to outsource huge chunks of parental or domestic responsibilities, trading money for time.

3. Folks whose job is just a means to make money, and whose heart lies at home and/or with leisure pursuits. 

4. Related to above, folks who make job choices and set boundaries so that work is a lighter load relative to other things in their lives.

5. Folks whose heart lies with work, at the expense of being around at home or having hobbies.

6. Related to above, folks whose work is their hobby, so there’s no need for outside pursuits because their vocation is their life passion.)

7. Folks who are independently wealthy, so work isn’t in the equation at all or is at a level that affords plenty of time for family and fun.

8. Folks who opt out of family responsibilities (e.g. choose not to have kids), so are able to dive deep into work and then reconcile non-work time with what’s fun and life-giving for them.

9. Folks who bend their family time to match up with their work responsibilities or leisure pursuits (e.g. every family vacation is at a golf course and the kids play too).

10. Folks who bust it at home and work, and subsequently have no time or energy left for a life outside of that. 

I am that last category. I choose into this, and am well suited to defer leisure until later. But you can see why my thoughts easily go to retirement, is that I long for a day when I don’t have to defer. And this  works for me, because I’m able to give it my all at work and home, knowing that I enjoy but also that there is something else enjoyable to look forward to down the road. What about you? What’s your strategy for juggling it all?