One man's story of how he fixed his work life balance.

One Man’s story of how he fixed his work life balance

It’s not easy to get the right work life balance for you and your family. But it is possible.

I’m often having conversations when people tell me

I’d love to get better work life balance but I can’t see how it is possible and I definitely can’t afford to step away from my path.

Will’s story is here to show you how, by following the key Inspiring Dad’s principles, you too can make real progress in your life.

1.       Discover Your Values, Priorities And True Purpose

2.      Develop Your Communication Skills And Nurture Key Relationships.

3.      Create A Work Life Balance That Delivers The Priorities That Really Matter To You.

Q&A with Will

⭐ Tell me what life was like for you.

Photo Credit: Ben White via Unsplash

“We had 2 children and I was struggling with my work hours. I didn’t see them in the morning, I was out house at 6am, not back before 7.30pm at the earliest

I was earning very good money, but I was doing it because I’d always done it.

When our son was 4, we didn’t get the primary school place that we really wanted. So, we decided to send him to a local private school. It was the right decision at the time, but it increased the pressure on me to carry on earning at the same level.”

⭐ How did you feel about your life at that time?

“Unhappy. So busy, too busy. And too tired at the weekends to enjoy our downtime.”

⭐ What made you address it?

“It was Easter when I said I couldn’t do it anymore. I think it was something about always seeing darkness. I decided I couldn’t tolerate how I was living any more. I could feel the signs that it was getting too much.

The thing is I knew how bad it could get – I was an alcoholic (now 7 years clean). I didn’t want to reach rock bottom again before did something about it.”

⭐ What did you do?

“My wife and I went back to barebones – what matters to us and how do we do more of it? We decided to focus on what really makes you happy – gives you joy. For us it was about being there for the kids, rather than grand expensive gestures. In contrast to me my wife loves her job and it allows working from home too.

We started by trimming our income. We spoke to our son’s private school and the primary we wanted and managed to move schools – massively reducing our outgoings. My wife increased to 4 days a week – but 2 days a week from home. This saved us the money needed to give me to allow me to retrain, but I still needed to do it quickly.

I wanted to do something worthwhile to answer the question – “why am I here?”. It needed to build on the skills and experience I already had. I decided to become a financial advisor. The industry has moved on from the hard sales mis-selling scandals of recent years.

It’s possible to be ethical.”

⭐ How is life now?

“I love my life. I’m effectively self-employed, I get to set my own schedule, to help out at Cubs every week. I’m not too shattered by the time it comes to the weekend.

The downsides are I spend something like 40,000 miles a year in the car visiting clients, we have less income, and I’m never really ‘not working’, I can’t afford to miss contacting potential clients ‘just’ because I’m on holiday.

But those are relative downsides when set against the benefits and the opportunity to ‘be there’ regularly.”

⭐ What are your top tips for other Dads?

✅ You have a choice
✅ Don’t wait for rock bottom – it’s not a lot of fun there.
✅ Identify what you what - Be honest.

It can be hard to see a way out but there are always choices, the option to take some control of your circumstances.

And hide your phone away when you are with your family – it stops you being ‘present’ and it causes you stress.

👉 To sum up

Will was struggling with his work life balance, even if his family were happy. This can be a tricky place to be, but knowing what rock bottom could mean, he knew the stakes were high. He needed to be vulnerable – to let go of the provider mentality.

His fear of rock bottom was greater than his fear of being honest.

✅ He was honest with his wife.
✅ He got her support. They communicated openly. 
✅ They made and followed through with a plan.

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Does your 'life balance' work for you?

Does Your ‘Life Balance’ Work For You?

Photo credit @photoholgic via Unsplash

30 years ago, I don’t suppose anyone really talked about “Work / Life Balance”. Life was simpler. When I was growing up in a market town in Somerset, dads went to work and provided, and mums looked after the house and made sure everyone was fed.

Our dad pretty much worked for the same company for 30 years until he took early retirement on medical grounds.

Sure, our mum worked a bit. I vividly remember that she had a cottage industry of ‘making boxes’ – even 9-year-old me could tell the piece rate was ridiculously low and she was also a childminder for time too.

Life felt a bit uncomfortable in the early 1990s but somehow dad was one of 3 out of 30 or so ‘at risk’ to survive a redundancy round.

One thing is certain it never felt like dad was always ‘at work’.

The signs of a changing world

We didn’t know any gangsters, so my dad was the first person I knew who had Carphone (back when The Carphone Warehouse seemed like the obvious name for a business).

He was surveyor, out on the road in Somerset – calling in his reports over the phone to be typed up in the office. But despite the technology there was never any danger of being ‘always on’.

In fact, my dad even had flexible working – he scheduled his own diary of house surveyor visits and frequently made his schedule fit the away sports matches my brother and I were involved in on Wednesday.

To state the obvious, life has changed…

The pressures are different - our parents didn’t have to cope with emails on their phones, data at their fingertips. Everything requiring their action.

If you’re a working dad, it’s important to make sure your work life balance is right for you and for your family. Long standing traditional gender roles of Men = Provider, Women = Caregiver serve many couples very well and can provide certainty in life. Giving opportunities to experience deeply accepted elements of masculinity and femininity.

But it doesn’t work for everyone.

Maybe your partner wants to build her career and would prefer not to be tied to endless parenting ‘duties’?

“I am not a parent yet, nor have plans to be in the next couple of years… I'm particularly keen for my hubby to be a 50/50 parent. I already get push back from him how that will be difficult!”

Maybe you are one of the many men who wants to spend more time as a parent - even if this means foregoing progress at work.

It’s time to Assess Your Work Life Balance….

Ask yourself which category do you fall into?

Be honest - how do your family feel about your ‘work life balance’

A = Everyone is happy with my work life balance.

B = I’m happy with my work life balance, but my family aren’t.

C = My family is happy with my work life balance, but I’m not.

D = No one is happy with my work life balance.

(E = I’m not sure what they think)

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What does this mean for you and your family?

A – This is the perfect situation - everyone’s a winner.

Photo Credit @juniorferreir_ via Unsplash

🏆 It doesn’t matter how you do it - this is what you want.

It might be that you work long hours, doing a job that you love and that provides you and your family with the life you all want.

✅ Perfect! Keep doing what you are doing - make sure you don’t inadvertently slip into B though…

B – This could easily become an issue.

❌ Here’s a couple of warnings… to jolt you out of complacency.

Imagine it’s your work anniversary on LinkedIn… among the notes of colleague respect is a comment from your wife:

“Congrats, let’s catch up”

I hope you don’t need me to tell you you’ve got a problem here and it’s time to do something about it before you face what Toby' faced…

❌ Toby and his wife are separated and to a large extent due to a failure to sort out their work life balance.

“If there's one thing I wish we'd done better, it would have been to have those really honest discussions - rather than the more off-hand comments and observations - about the work life balance for both of us, including as a couple and as parents.

But hey - we live and learn, eh?!”

B is not a good place to be.

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C - tricky one

Maybe your kids aren’t bothered if they see much of you as long as they get a new Xbox for Christmas?

Your partner likes the lifestyle you are able to provide.

If you want to reduce your hours, be more flexible or change jobs - how will this impact on your family - what you might see as good thing, they may only see the downsides.

✅ Open and honest conversations are key here - you need to be honest about how your current situation is affecting you.

✅ You will need understanding and practical and emotional support.

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D – what are you waiting for?

Time to do something different today!

E – Definitely time to find out

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Hopefully you've assessed your work life balance as an A, but as you can see above B and C aren’t great places to be.

Please don’t wait until the stress and anxiety gets too much, grab your free “5 Ways To Achieve Your Ultimate Purpose” download via the button below and make tangible steps to future that works for you.

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