What a Life!

It’s been a crazy week. Every morning that I have valiantly tried to get up early and have some time to myself, those precious peaceful moments have only lasted about fifteen minutes. Either I sleep too late, Ben gets up, or Joey insists that he wants to be awake. So no time for Tana to just relax and knit and wait for good ideas to pop into her head. It’s those good ideas that energize me – way more than a cup of coffee ever would – and that’s how I make it through my day. Towards the end of the week, I was getting pretty worn down and discouraged.

The thing about working for yourself from home is that the lines between work and not-work tend to blur. As a mom, I don’t get a break from fixing meals or changing diapers on the weekend. With owning my own business, I struggle with taking “time off” because I fear I might be turning business away. So I’m always in this ready mode and never seem to get a break.

This has bothered me a lot since I became a work-at-home-mom after Ben was born. I’ve tried changing the daily routine on the weekends, and that helps some. But even then, I still feel sometimes like I never get a break.

I came across a thought-provoking article recently available over on David Allen’s Getting Things Done website. The question was from people who wanted to know how often they should check their work email while “on vacation.” David’s answer was quite interesting.

One comment he made was that one of the benefits of working for yourself is that you can take a day off during the middle of the week and go sailing. In that case, you would still obviously want to keep in touch via email, but it is that ability to keep in touch is what makes it possible for you to spend the day sailing rather than sitting behind your desk.

The other comment he made that I found quite interesting was in regards to not being able to get work off your mind while you’re on vacation. His response was that if you love what you do, chances are the change of pace is going to allow for ideas to pop into your head and that you should by all means capture those ideas so that you can act of them when you get back to the office. He followed that remark with the comment that if you don’t like what you’re doing and you really don’t want to think about it while you’re gone, then perhaps you need to find a job where you do enjoy what you are doing.

I came across that article a couple weeks ago and quickly adopted that thinking toward my business. I do enjoy doing Mary Kay. Why slow myself down if I enjoy doing it? If I’m having fun, by all means, carry on. After practicing that attitude for a couple weeks, I must confess that I am amazed at how much non-Mary Kay time I have to do as I please.

I used to feel like I did Mary Kay all the time. I mean, most people who do Mary Kay do it alongside a fulltime job, so it makes sense that when you’re not at work, you need to squeeze Mary Kay into every posslbe spare minute that you can or you will not get anywhere, and you really shouldn’t be doing non-people tasks like paperwork during people time or you will be squandering what little time you have. But doing Mary Kay as a stay-at-home-mom, I am not going to work my business twelve hours a day (people time is from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.). So the typical time-management mentality that I practiced while I worked doesn’t work anymore.

Finally, I came across this thought provoking article Thursday morning. It’s said too well on that blog for me to summarize it here so go read it there.

Thursday evening, I was tired. I had gotten lots done this week. I organized my digital photos online. I cleared off the desk. I cleaned the house. I conquered Mt. Washmore. I got all these things done that had been hanging over my head for seemingly forever. So on Friday I decided to “take a break” and look out a different window. The weather was bad so we didn’t go to town as we normally do on Friday. Instead, I dressed in comfy clothes and spent the entire day (essentially) knitting.

Needless to say, this morning I woke up very refreshed. Now that was a good vacation.