I’m pretty sure my life would be easier if I didn’t have kids. The sacrifices I made would mostly be mine and mostly for my own advantage, not because of a promise I’d made to one of the kids or hopes I had for their future. Without children, I’d have one less (or in my case two) distraction from reaching my goals. Traveling would be less expensive, and it’d be easier to focus on writing if I only had myself to feed.

At the same time, I suspect my life may also be easier if I chose to be a stay-at-home mom. I’m not saying all SAHMs have it easier than working mothers, but I think sometimes that my life would be simpler if I didn’t have my work to distract me from keeping house and enjoying my kids.

And yet, I am so grateful and thrilled that I get to have both of those “distractions” in my life.
Read the rest of this entry

The first decision I made as a mother was to drop out of college and get a job so that I could offer my child a better financial future. Not only was that decision short-sighted (and financially unwise), but it set me on a path that I see many working parents walking: our primary purpose when we’re outside of the home is to improve life in the home.

When we read about work-life balance, we discover tips for how to be good parents and wives while also managing a work schedule. Our days and our Pinterest boards are divided between home and work – be crafty, organized, and nurturing or productive and successful. What’s missing from these pictures is a frivolous pursuit that has nothing to do with home or money making: a hobby.
Read the rest of this entry

I start my days as a mother. The drill is a familiar one to most mothers: make wake up call, encourage teeth and hair brushing, check children’s clothes for obvious stains or tears, check backpack for homework and papers that should have been signed the night before, slobber kids with hugs and kisses as they run out the door. My goal is to help my kids begin their day on the right foot, well loved and appropriately dressed. What happens next determines how prepared I’ll be for my own day.
Read the rest of this entry

When I signed on four years ago to write this column, my intent was to discuss the constant quest for a work-life balance. I imagined sharing my best productivity tips as well as commiserating about the days when those tips inevitably failed. Over time, I also began sharing how my definitions of "work" and "life" were evolving . But while the balls changed in shape and color, the desire to keep them aloft always remained. Recently, however, I’ve begun to question my understanding of balance itself.
Read the rest of this entry

I spent Sunday working on a gallery wall for our living room. That meant plotting the size, shape, location and color of 21 frames, painting said 21 frames, and then taking a trip down memory lane in order to choose 21 perfect photos. It was a cross-country trip, because I decided to focus on pictures from our family’s year-long road trip around America . As I flipped through hundreds of digital images and asked for my husband and kid’s input on their favorites, I got a nice refresher course in what matters most to our family.
Read the rest of this entry

I think we all know – or at least have been told once or twice – that unplugging now and then is a good thing . Step away from the screens, the email, the Wi-Fi signal, and the 4G network and just… be. Be in the moment , be with your loved ones, be on your own without the constant net of technology. It sounds blissful, but being able to actually do it has proven virtually impossible in my real life. I think I’ve found the solution, however: I need to buy a watch.
Read the rest of this entry

I believe that mindfulness can help us be happier people, better parents, and more productive in our careers. And yet, this post was partially written in my head while I scarfed down a bowl of cereal and scanned my to-do list. I’ve switched to another tab on my computer twice while writing this paragraph. Multi-tasking is the opposite of mindfulness, but it’s a habit I struggle to avoid when life gets extra busy.

It’s an easy trap to fall into. The busier I get - or more specifically, the more things that have to be done in the foreseeable future - the more likely I am to buy into the myth that moving quickly and doing many things at once equals efficiency. Efficiency, obviously, is the key to not falling behind, to getting it all done in the appropriate time frame. I forget that multi-tasking often means every task takes longer.
Read the rest of this entry

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how learning about my Myers-Briggs personality type helped me get more done by pointing out my natural weaknesses. We’ve also talked a lot about how working parents can’t be expected to do it all. In order to get it all done without doing it all, we’re often told to delegate, but what does that look like in a real household?

It’s easy to say that we need to delegate, to hand out tasks for others to complete, but many working parents find that easier to discuss than to actually implement. In reality, poor delegating leaves kids with dry cereal for lunch and laundry piled up for weeks. Any control freak will tell you that the reason they maintain a tight hold on everything is because past attempts to recruit help have ended in disaster, with reports needing to be redone and apology phone calls needing to be made.

I’ve been experimenting with delegation for a few years now, and I’ve learned a few things about how this and other tricks can make up for my natural weaknesses - without sacrificing the end result of a happy, functional home and work life.
Read the rest of this entry

As a working mother, I often feel like I spend the bulk of my life answering questions and making decisions.

"Where’s my Spanish book?"

"Has anyone seen my song sheet?"

"Can I join ski club?"

"When can I have a play date with Amy?"

"When would you like to schedule your son’s doctor appointment?"

"Who’s picking up the kids today?"

"When can you get those pages back to me?"

It’s a reality for anyone who juggles multiple roles and responsibilities, and it can leave even the most patient person mentally exhausted at the end of the day. That fatigue can cause us to snap at our loved ones, make poor decisions in haste, and feel too wiped out to handle the commitments that mean the most to us. What’s a busy parent to do?

Take a cue from President Barack Obama and make fewer decisions.
Read the rest of this entry

I was chatting with my friend and former Work It Mom columnist Karen Walrond recently and she used a phrase to describe her husband that has stuck with me and caused me to take a closer look at my own relationship to work. "He doesn’t live to work," she told me when I asked if he loved his job. "He has always worked to live."

Karen and I had been discussing our own passion for what we do; we both earn our incomes through work that we love to do. Our husbands - because mine seems to approach work in the same way hers does - have jobs in order to support lives that they love. I can see benefits to both philosophies and wonder if we make a choice between the two, or if we are hardwired for one over the other.
Read the rest of this entry