Most people understand how difficult it can be to balance their work and home lives. It seems in this day and age the pace of life is just getting faster and more hectic. I myself have struggled with this in the past and know how down in can get you. Well no fear my friends, there is hope and today I am going to share it with you. I have figured out five tips that are great options to help with balancing work and home.
Make and Use a Schedule
The best thing to do when trying to balance work and home is to make a schedule. Know how much time you have and schedule your work time and your home time. Then, you will know when you need to schedule work and home events.
We personally use Remember The Milk to do this. It is a great way of keeping our lists organized and our time productive. Plus it is mobile so no matter where we are we can use our time effectively.
A schedule will make your life significantly easier and you will know which activities fit into which time frame. There is one glith though- make sure you stick to your schedule.
Share Responsibilities and Be a Team
Many times work and home responsibilities can become overwhelming because one spouse is handling more of the responsibilities than the other. So, learn to share responsibilities at home and each spouse can be responsible for their work.
I have to admit my hubby and I are a great team. We split everything. If one is doing the dishes the other is doing the laundry. We tackle each days list together and split whatever tasks we can. Then we share the rest and spend some time together while getting them done. Having a team mate is huge when it comes to being motivated to get things done and in saving energy.
Don’t Bring Work Home
Balancing home and work can be difficult because it is so easy to take work home. I used to do this. I was in a really stressful job a few years ago and I constantly brought the issues home. It was such a waste of my time and energy. If you really want to balance work and home then you will always leave work at work and keep home a sacred place for family and home activities. Remember you work to live not live to work.
Dedicate Weekends to Activities at Home
A great way to keep home and work separate is to always focus on home activities during weekends, or at least on days off from work if you happen to work on weekends. When certain days are home days and other days are work days then it makes balancing work and home considerably easier.
Make a Plan
The best way to balance work and home is to always make a plan. There are tons of tips that will help you, but there is nothing like making a plan and then following the plan to really balance work and home. It might be difficult, but if you have it planned out and follow the plan you will be surprised how easy you can find a balance.
These are just a few ways you can balance your work life and home life better.
Readers, what have you found helpful in this area? Are you living a balanced life?
while we don’t keep an explicit plan (there’s only two of us), I’ve found that having a pretty specific routine helps delineate time well. If you almost always work 9-6 mentally you start to fit work into that slot and resist deviations beyond that.
@ No Debt MBA. Sounds like a neat way of doing things. I am glad to hear it is working for you. Our time management and work life balance is still a work in progress but in time I am sure we will feel more under control. Thanks for sharing the tip.
Great advice! I often find myself trying to balance out the jobs that need to get done both at home and at work. For me, making a detailed schedule, as well as a short term and long term plan, helps me accomplish the tasks at work while also staying on track at home. The most recent adjustment for me was including budgets within my planning and bill payments and savings deposits into my schedule in order to stay on top of bills while accruing an adequate savings.
@ Smart Money Planning. Sounds like you have a great system worked out. What a great example for all of us. We too try to keep a schedule as best as we can but we do fall off the wagon sometimes. We also have included our finances in our schedule so that we know every week we are still on track.
For years, my husband and I would work every weekend when his business was in the early phases. Now, we take the weekends and relax, spending them however we want. That has made a huge difference in the quality of our lives. Now, if I can just get through the next semester of school, then I’ll have my evenings to myself once more. 😉
@Little House. Glad to hear how good of a relationship you two have and how your support each other so well. I am jealous that your weekends are full of fun and relaxation. I haven’t reached that point yet.
As far as school goes, just keep your eyes on the finish line and you will hit it before you know it. Good luck.
Lists keep me organized and focused. It helps me to accomplish more and therefore I can keep things separate easier. I reserve weekends for fun, rest and rejuvenating myself.
@Krant Cents. I wish my weekends were just for fun. I am working on that very thing but it is a work in progress. It is a real time challenge when you both work full time days.
We like lists too. We find checking things off the list really motivating.
Great tips! I think when we’re young, we can put a lot of energy into work and career. Once we’re a bit older, we want more out of life! I don’t stress out about work much anymore.
@Retireby 40. Good for you. I know so many people young and old who stress about work. While I used to stress a lot more about work, I have now found other things to put my energy toward. I do sometimes still have my moments though.
Before we retired, we’d take Fri. night & all day/night Sat. to totally take a break from work/school. Family activities and just kicking back seemed to fill a need to recover from the past week. Sun. was for getting clothes ready for the coming week, organizing, making lunches. The kids worked on their homework & everybody had a nice calm day. Worked well for us.
@Square pennies. Great ideas. Thanks for sharing. This is opposite to what I am used to. Saturdays are like another work day getting errands done etc. The issue with this is it then feels like you are working 6 days in a row. Maybe we need to try your method.
Just wanted to add that our grown kids seem to folow this routine with their weekends & we’re glad it still works for them. Then again, maybe our family just needs more “down time” than most people.
@square pennies. We all need down time and it is inspiring to hear that you family has figured out how to get this on a regular basis . Far too many of us are lacking this needed rest.
Working hard, long hours is for young single people just starting out in a career. With a family at home, finding the right balance is key to long-term survival. No one will be on their deathbed saying “you know, I wish I’d spent more Saturdays at work”
@ 101 Centavos. You’re right. Nobody says that on their death bed. I do agree that younger people do end up working more in the beginning. However I have seen many middle aged people still in that rat race. It seems that once you start it is hard to get out of.
I like your tip about sharing responsibilities! My husband likes to mow the grass while I prefer to take out the garbage. We both have no preferance about other tasks: we both do dishes and laundry and cook and clean pretty evenly, but since I work part-time, I prefer to do a little more of the household tasks. S’all good!
while we don’t keep an explicit plan (there’s only two of us), I’ve found that having a pretty specific routine helps delineate time well. If you almost always work 9-6 mentally you start to fit work into that slot and resist deviations beyond that.
@ No Debt MBA. Sounds like a neat way of doing things. I am glad to hear it is working for you. Our time management and work life balance is still a work in progress but in time I am sure we will feel more under control. Thanks for sharing the tip.
Great advice! I often find myself trying to balance out the jobs that need to get done both at home and at work. For me, making a detailed schedule, as well as a short term and long term plan, helps me accomplish the tasks at work while also staying on track at home. The most recent adjustment for me was including budgets within my planning and bill payments and savings deposits into my schedule in order to stay on top of bills while accruing an adequate savings.
@ Smart Money Planning. Sounds like you have a great system worked out. What a great example for all of us. We too try to keep a schedule as best as we can but we do fall off the wagon sometimes. We also have included our finances in our schedule so that we know every week we are still on track.
For years, my husband and I would work every weekend when his business was in the early phases. Now, we take the weekends and relax, spending them however we want. That has made a huge difference in the quality of our lives. Now, if I can just get through the next semester of school, then I’ll have my evenings to myself once more. 😉
@Little House. Glad to hear how good of a relationship you two have and how your support each other so well. I am jealous that your weekends are full of fun and relaxation. I haven’t reached that point yet.
As far as school goes, just keep your eyes on the finish line and you will hit it before you know it. Good luck.
Lists keep me organized and focused. It helps me to accomplish more and therefore I can keep things separate easier. I reserve weekends for fun, rest and rejuvenating myself.
@Krant Cents. I wish my weekends were just for fun. I am working on that very thing but it is a work in progress. It is a real time challenge when you both work full time days.
We like lists too. We find checking things off the list really motivating.
Great tips! I think when we’re young, we can put a lot of energy into work and career. Once we’re a bit older, we want more out of life! I don’t stress out about work much anymore.
@Retireby 40. Good for you. I know so many people young and old who stress about work. While I used to stress a lot more about work, I have now found other things to put my energy toward. I do sometimes still have my moments though.
Before we retired, we’d take Fri. night & all day/night Sat. to totally take a break from work/school. Family activities and just kicking back seemed to fill a need to recover from the past week. Sun. was for getting clothes ready for the coming week, organizing, making lunches. The kids worked on their homework & everybody had a nice calm day. Worked well for us.
@Square pennies. Great ideas. Thanks for sharing. This is opposite to what I am used to. Saturdays are like another work day getting errands done etc. The issue with this is it then feels like you are working 6 days in a row. Maybe we need to try your method.
Just wanted to add that our grown kids seem to folow this routine with their weekends & we’re glad it still works for them. Then again, maybe our family just needs more “down time” than most people.
@square pennies. We all need down time and it is inspiring to hear that you family has figured out how to get this on a regular basis . Far too many of us are lacking this needed rest.
Thanks, I don’t claim it’s the best way, but it has seemed to help us. If you try it, I hope it works for you!
Working hard, long hours is for young single people just starting out in a career. With a family at home, finding the right balance is key to long-term survival. No one will be on their deathbed saying “you know, I wish I’d spent more Saturdays at work”
@ 101 Centavos. You’re right. Nobody says that on their death bed. I do agree that younger people do end up working more in the beginning. However I have seen many middle aged people still in that rat race. It seems that once you start it is hard to get out of.
I like your tip about sharing responsibilities! My husband likes to mow the grass while I prefer to take out the garbage. We both have no preferance about other tasks: we both do dishes and laundry and cook and clean pretty evenly, but since I work part-time, I prefer to do a little more of the household tasks. S’all good!
@Christa. Glad to hear you have a team going too. It really makes all of the difference when it comes not getting overwhelmed with household tasks.