Juggling Work, Health, and Family: Strategies That Actually Work
Have you ever felt like the squeaky wheel gets the grease, but the squeaky wheel is always someone else?
I remember feeling like a piece of seaweed in the ocean, being tossed around by the waves and tides, having to put out fires everywhere I looked. I wasn't the only one. Clients often tell me, "I can't catch a break."
It usually feels like life is happening TO us, and we have no control.
This unintentional thought pattern will quickly lead us to feeling overwhelmed because there will always be more tasks than time or energy.
However, years ago, my coach gave me a simple decision-making tool that was a game-changer. She asked me to list my priorities. I wanted to place myself at the top of my list of priorities, followed by marriage, kids, friends and family, and work. She subsequently asked me to list the ways I was spending my time. When she reviewed my list, it clearly showed work was the priority, followed by kids, marriage, family, and friends. I'm not sure if I was even on the list.
I decided to make my "ideal priority list" my new decision-making guide.
I learned that if I said "yes" to one thing, I would have to say "no" to something else. If I said yes to a work event in the evening or on the weekend, I had to say no to spending time with my family. Because family is more important to me, I noticed that I would feel resentful or guilty while at the work event.
Something needed to change. So, I began making decisions according to my priorities. There were exceptions, like hosting a staff appreciation event once a year in the evening, that I really enjoyed and felt was beneficial for my staff. However, monthly evening meetings for a work committee were a no. We either had to find another time, or someone else would have to attend the meeting.
When I focused on my true priorities, Saying "no" to everything else to put my family first started getting easier.
To get myself to the top of my priority list, I had to figure out what to say yes or no to. I began asking myself, "Why am I doing this?" When someone asked me to do something, or if my brain offered a suggestion, was I doing it because I really wanted to, or was I trying to be liked?
At first, I wasn't sure, so I started to ask myself if the event felt heavy or light.
If it felt heavy, it was a no; if it felt light, it was a yes.
As I worked on my grounded confidence, I stopped saying yes to people-pleasing because I realized I'm already enough, I don't have to hustle for my worth, and I don't control what people think of me anyway.
I still struggle at times, like a few months ago when I found myself agreeing to the date of a parent council meeting that conflicted with a quarterly meeting with my friends when I really wanted to change it. Unconsciously, I was trying to be the perfect parent council chair but sacrificed an opportunity that I genuinely wanted to partake in. I was worried that people would think I wasn't dedicated or perfect. Had I put more thought into it, I would have asked to move the parent council meeting, as there's no harm in asking, and other parent council groups do it. Next time, I will!
Here's what that would look like: I'd have thought that people would think I was unprofessional or selfish if I were to ask to meet on a different day. This is ironic because we're all volunteers. I would fear that I'd feel ashamed if they judged or questioned me.
While this may or may not happen, this way of thinking is not helpful. It's not helping me get what I want or even look at this issue from different angles. What I would like to feel is confident and empowered, so thinking thoughts like…
"Others may not see this as a selfish or unreasonable ask."
"People are free to say 'no' if they don't want to change days."
"I can always delegate the chair duties to my vice-chair."
"I'm allowed and entitled to make requests."
"I cannot control other people's thoughts and feelings."
"Are the opinions of this group really important to me?"
"I'm allowed to prioritize fun over duty sometimes."
In many cases, we need to set boundaries, and we first need to start with ourselves.
I never used to give myself work hours; I would work until the work was done, or I would be too exhausted to continue. That didn't last for many years because it led to burnout. I had to start setting a schedule for myself, and my priorities had to go on the schedule first. My schedule needed to include time with my husband and kids, exercise and physio appointments, hobbies, and time with friends and family.
Then, I set definite work hours with scheduled breaks. This made me more efficient, but also uncomfortable when the end of the day arrived and I didn't finish everything on my list. I had to manage my feelings about that but then schedule priorities for the next day so I wouldn't worry about forgetting to do those things. I use a scheduler called Todoist that helps me keep track on my computer or phone instead of using endless sticky notes, and I can even add flags that help me prioritize the things on my list.
A big piece of this juggling life and work journey is getting very critical about our capacity.
While we can increase our capacity and efficiency, I recommend constraint first. Many of us are quite unrealistic about how much time and energy things take. We often underestimate how much time we need and overestimate our time and capacity.
When writing a to-do list, especially for the weekend, make sure you rank everything on that list as to it’s importance. Then, see what you can reasonably accomplish without pushing yourself to your limit. You may even decide to experiment and see what you can do at a leisurely pace. Then, look at your list and see what's left, and ask yourself if it's a want or a need. Would it be nice to bake a cake for your child's teacher or do what's absolutely necessary, like getting groceries?
In a perfect world, it would be nice to do everything everyone asked of us or everything we would like to do. However, we live in physical bodies that aren't capable of doing it all.
Get very intentional about crossing things off the list that aren't vitally important.
This will give you practice at feeling the discomfort so that when you say yes to something, you're sure it's a priority and not just a nice one. You can eventually make exceptions, but learning to set and keep excellent boundaries with yourself is foundational to learning how to set boundaries with others.
The last piece of this puzzle is learning to delegate. I often told myself that delegating would take more time than doing it myself or that I couldn't trust others to do it as well as I do. I often hear moms tell me that the kids don't fold the towels properly, so they don't get the kids to help with laundry. I can totally relate.
Even though asking for help feels like weakness, like admitting we don't have our shit together, it's actually a sign of strength. If we invest time and energy into delegating to our family and colleagues or hiring people, it will pay off in wonderful ways. Not only will we be able to focus on the things that we can do, but other people will also get to learn skills and experience the joy of helping us. My kids may not find folding towels joyful, but they will feel proud when they move away from home and know how to cook, clean, and do their own laundry.
Here's another decision-making tool that you may find helpful and avoid the "mere-urgency" effect: the psychological tendency to prioritize tasks perceived as urgent over those that are more important, even when the normative reasons for prioritizing importance are considered.
"Who can define for us with accuracy the difference between the long and short term! Especially whenever our affairs seem to be in crisis, we are almost compelled to give our first attention to the urgent present rather than to the important future."
— Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1961 address to the Century Association
In a 1954 speech, Eisenhower quoted an unnamed university president who said, "I have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.
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