Balancing Work, Family, and Fulfillment Without Losing Momentum
I had a two week hiatus from writing the Sunday issue and I’ve missed getting to connect with you here.
But in all honesty, life has been full in the best ways and I gave myself full permission to immerse myself in it all.
We had my cousin and his in-laws in town a week and a bit ago.
I’ve had friend dates, book club nights, neighborhood hangs mixed with PTA stuff and volunteer duty at my kids’ school.
Our bi-monthly Friday girls date; post lunch bookstore pick up; on tour guide duty
We’ve tried to use the school closures this month as an opportunity to knock off some of our family fall bucket list activities before it gets too cold; my sister comes to visit next week and we’ve finally wrapped up getting our house ready for Halloween.
We’re officially all set for Halloween
I share all of this to serve as a reminder that showing up powerfully for your commitments doesn’t have to look the same each week.
I love getting to write these more personal Sunday editions, but in the midst of shorter work weeks, and a lot that I wanted to show up for in my personal life, I had to be malleable and make decisions about what was most important for me to safeguard in the hours I did have to work.
Because here’s the thing:
When you build buffer and flexibility into your work rhythms…
When you’re clear on your essentials and needle drivers…
And when your plans allow you to make traction without having to show up perfectly, highly motivated or the same way each week….
You never have to rebel against your business or the plan, as a result of feeling stifled.
A new-age Spiderman with his kids on tow
We want to create rhythms in our businesses that are based around our actual lives, not just around those ideal weeks when we don’t have anything else going on.
The more workability we layer into our plans and the more wiggle room we give ourselves, the less mental drama we have about making time for the things we say we want more of and the less propensity we have to feel bad or as though we’re “falling behind”.
As I was coaching some LFB students this past week, when your plans are workable, you find yourself showing up more often than not, which creates a self-concept that aligns with that.
Therefore, in the moments where you do consciously choose to drop something, it doesn’t set you back, make you wobble or create a narrative about it in your mind.
You’re able to simply pick back up – and it’s that willingness to do so that teaches your brain that there’s no reason to over identify with a break and that you can simply keep going and pick right back up, even in the moments where you fear that you may have lost momentum.
The important part is to consciously make the decision to prioritize one thing over another and then rally your energy behind it and allow your plans to be fluid and flexible in that way.
All of which is a big part of what we dive into in the Align section of LFB and the Map Your Quarter live experience.
This month’s book club (we read All Fours by Miranda July and had a lot of thoughts about it) and an impromptu week day lunch date with Mike at our favorite local Japanese spot
On the topic of these past few weeks, I was talking to a friend the other day about finding joy in mundanity.
Because when I think about an average week in my life, there isn’t the level of spontaneity as there was in my twenties. There isn’t a whole lot of variance week to week.
Instead, there are family rhythms and routines, recurring meetups with girlfriends in my calendar, daily chats with my mom as I walk back from drop off and weekend video calls with my sisters…What I realized when I was chatting to my friend about it is that where curated or big, spontaneous moments used to do it for me, there’s something really special about the season I’m in where the life I get to love on a day-to-day basis fills me with the kind of contentment and peace that none of those things ever did.
Loving the fact that it’s still warm enough for me to drink my coffee outside
It’s the ordinary rhythms of home, friends and family and the way my life looks on an average day that fills me with a deep sense of happiness that I want to stay awake to. Repetitive, perhaps, but in the best kind of way.
It’s a choice to love your life as it is – and one that does not come naturally to me.
The lion share of my life was spent looking for opportunities to improve, to advance, to arrive… to the extent that it initially felt foreign to feel like here, right now, is more than enough.
“Shouldn’t I want something else? What’s the next thing? The next level?” was where my mind would go, trying to find anything to strive towards.
It took sitting in the discomfort and allowing all of these feelings to bubble up and simply be there to allow me to move through that cycle of “wanting” and really enjoy everything I’ve worked hard to cultivate right here.
I wonder, what’s your experience with some of those themes been?
Click reply and let me know. I’d love to hear any of your experiences with that.
Talk soon,
Naomi
Last block party of the season
The view on a rooftop on the Lower East Side
