work life balance Tag

Posts tagged 'work life balance'

Seize the Day: Are You Using or Losing Your Time?

Time is precious. Some say that time is the only thing we really have. Most people know the expressions “Carpe diem”, “Seize the day” and “Seize the present”, but only few actually live by them.

Time keeps moving forward. Often, we feel like it’s just flown past us and are out of time. So, we need to learn to appreciate the time we have and use it wisely. We all have the same 24 hours every day. We should make the most of them.

We say that children have no concept of time. My 3-year-old granddaughter has reached the stage of recognizing past and present. For her, the past is “yesterday”, and the future is “tomorrow”. That’s advanced for her age, but limited compared to an adult’s understanding of time.

But I wonder about this view.

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100 Things to Do When You Are Alone

In the previous post, Home Alone: How Not to Have a Boring Time,, I wrote about being on my own for 6 weeks, the many things I wanted to do and why being bored was not on my agenda.

Many people wait for a chance to be on their own, but when the time comes, they don’t know what to do. I think having a list of ideas can be helpful in that situation.

In this post, I have gathered 100 ideas for things to do when you don’t know how to entertain yourself. As you can see, I wrote some of the things I did recently. I could easily write 1,000 things, but I’m sure that after 100, you’ll get the idea.

You can repeat some of the activities, because you like them more than others. And even if you just pick some of them, you’ll have thousands of active and busy hours.

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Home Alone: How Not to Have a Boring Time

Recently, I had the opportunity to experience being by myself for a whole month. My son and my husband went to Africa for a drumming camp and I stayed home with my youngest daughter. She is 17 years old, independent and enjoying her time off between finishing high school and starting acting school, so I was mostly by myself, but I did not have a boring moment.

The last time Gal was away was over 12 years ago, when he went to be with his mother on her last hours and I stayed home with 3 kids. My youngest was 5 years old and I was not by myself at all.

Surprisingly, most of the people who knew Gal was away asked me how I managed being by myself. I didn’t really understand the question.

They asked me if it wasn’t boring to be on my own.

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Make Your Bed to Make Your Day

Believe it or not, if you make your bed in the morning, it will make your day. You’ll be happier, clearer and more productive. There’s research showing it’s true.

I have been on a search for family tips from the moment I had children. Almost 30 years ago, becoming a mother made me realize that efficiency can help me a lot in managing work and home, and that being efficient gave me more time with my kids.

As parents, we need to choose how to balance our time across many important things. Slowly, we tend to let go of some things we care about for other things we find more important.

In my leadership training, I emphasize that life is not hard when we need to choose between things that are very important and things that are less important. That’s an easy choice! It is much harder to choose between things that are equally important to us. When children appear, we have to do that a lot, and that’s not easy.

This post is part of 24 in the series Handy Family Tips

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Men vs. Women: 6 Stereotypical Differences

For many years, I stayed out of the “men vs. women” debate, mainly because of my dad. He is an old man who grew up in a very patriarchal and chauvinistic society, yet is the most admirable example of gender equality.

My dad cooked, took care of the kids, helped us with our did homework, cleaned the house (inside and outside), brushed our hair, did arts and craft and was never ashamed of any of it. He had four daughters and one son and I thought he was fair and equal in his attitude to boys and girls.

In fact, my dad’s behavior cluttered my outlook on life in a way, because whenever I heard someone talking about the stereotypical man, I said, “This is not true, because my dad is different”. Now, I have to admit that I was wrong. There is something true about the stereotypes about men and my dad was the odd one out.

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Save Your Marriage with Better Time Management

Relationships are a sacred thing. Some say it is the only thing that matters. At the beginning of every relationship, we dedicate a lot of time to each other and over time, it gets harder.

Every married couple with children will tell you how their life changed as soon as their first child was born. Suddenly, quiet time to hold hands or cuddle becomes a rare event that must be carefully planned. Therefore, good time management can often make or break a relationship.

I have been working with many couples who come for coaching with the hope to save their marriage. Most of my clients think that to save their marriage, we need to focus on the big things, but for many of them, the problem is time management. I know it sounds funny, but it is one of the simplest one to fix.

This post is part 31 of 33 in the series Save Your Marriage

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Assertiveness: It is better to be Wise than to be Right

What a shame! Assertiveness is not something we learn at school, so if you cannot learn it from your parents, because they never learned it from their own parents, then you can be easily manipulated and pushed over.

Everybody hates being pushed over. I see it as a natural part of life. We all do everything we can to improve our position, and if others are in our way, we push them aside. Sometimes, well, most times, we hurt people along the way without any bad intentions. Assertiveness can help us do better in life without hurting anyone.

Many of my clients mainly need assertiveness. When we do not have it and we cannot express our needs and assert our rights, we resort to either avoidance or aggression. It is the old “fight and flight” response. We see a lion or a snake and we either run away or attack. So when I see aggression or avoidance, I know that assertiveness is needed.

This post is part 1 of 6 in the series Assertiveness

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To Work or Not to Work? A Mother’s Dilemma

To work or not to work? Every mother faces this dilemma with every newborn baby. I had three kids, each born in a different place in the world and each in different circumstances, and I had the same dilemma each time.

When Eden, my 25 year old, was born, I could not really choose. I was still studying for my degree and working for a living. I had to go back to college and work a month after I had given birth to her. Fortunately for me, I could leave Eden with Gal, who was juggling his studies and his work to care for Eden. It ended up being the most wonderful experience both for Eden and for Gal.

When Tsoof, my 18 year old, was born, we lived in California, USA. This was far away from our families, after we had lost two kids. When he was 4 months old, we moved to Thailand. When he was about 10 months old, I felt like I was going nuts staying at home and we got a nanny. This allowed me to go to work, have adult conversations and keep my sanity.

When Noff, my 13 year old, was born, we lived in Melbourne, Australia. I started a business and she went to a family day care twice a week. This allowed me to fulfill my obligations to my clients.

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Choices: The Power of One Second

Life is a series of seconds that lead us in different directions. Slightly different choices can lead us towards a totally different life. One second is all it takes to make a change, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. This one second will never come by again. If we let it pass by, it will be lost forever.

If you want to know the power one second can have on life, think of the second the sperm connected with the egg that created you. One second earlier or one second later, could allow a different sperm to win the lottery of life and be the difference between you and another child.

If you are a parent, you know that every child of yours is a unique creation. The one and only option out of millions of possible kids.

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Husband and Wife Working Together (poll)

I have been in business ever since I graduated university. I was 24 at the time. Luckily, my husband Gal worked a job and supported my business adventures. When I asked him about having his own business back then, he said he liked the way things were. Over 24 years ago, he did not think having his own business was an option. Not to mention working from home and/or working with me.

About 10 years ago, we started working together, from home. We soon discovered that we are very different people who enjoy doing very different things. Each of us slowly drifted towards the things that meant more to us. I veered towards life coaching and education and he went towards systems and consulting in one way or another.

The last 10 years have been challenging and rewarding in many ways. This has gotten us asking questions about working together and working together from home. Many of my clients ask me about this.

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