Work Life Balance
Okay, I pulled one of my favorite cards for you guys: Balance Career and Home Life
This is one of my favorite cards because it’s the reminder we all know we need but brush under the rug.
Let me tell you how I passed up a trip to Hawaii because of this:
When I was working in Chicago, I was basically always booked solid every day.
I never took breaks because when you work in the beauty industry, long breaks slow down your momentum. The majority of us prefer to work straight through 10-hour days with 10–15-minute breaks between clients to clean our station and shove food in our mouths like chipmunks.
Although this is my preferred way to work when at the salon, I would come home and feel so depleted because I hadn’t given myself a break.
To add fuel to the fire, I would look at the upcoming week's schedule and feel overwhelmed because I was once again booked solid.
(Can I just say, this is a beautiful problem to have, and I felt very fortunate. It was my own imbalance causing the problem)
The irony is you want to be booked all the time because dolla dolla bills, ya’ll, but there’s always something screaming in the back of your mind that says slow down, sister!!
So, when I pulled this card for you, I got brought back to that time in Chicago when I turned down a trip to Hawaii.
When my husband and I were dating, he had to travel for work all the time, and he had a project in Hawaii.
He asked me to go, and I told him I couldn’t. Because of work.
I KNOOOOOW I KNOW….
He still brings it up to this day.
At the time, I would look at my schedule and think, there’s no way I can physically move all of these people in order to go on this trip, or if I go, my clients get mad at me and find someone else because I’m unreliable.
Okay, Aly, chill out.
Looking back, I regret not going because it was such an insane thing to freak out about.
At the end of the day, the clients that love me will always stay with me, and there may be a time when they may need to go to someone while I’m balancing my career and home life, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world.
If I lost them as a client, were they that devoted to me to begin with?
Remember in one of my earlier blogs when I talked about envying my roommate's schedule because she had the whole “balance thing” figured out?
Well, hello, my name is Aly, and I have the perfect work life balance thanks to putting it in my universe.
Living in Florida, I’ve created the schedule I’ve always wanted that gives me the perfect work life balance.
I essentially have 3 (working) jobs:
Esthetician (owning my own business)
Managing my parents Airbnb
Writer (yep, this is in my universe - welcome!)
While working three jobs, I’ve never felt more balanced in my life, believe it or not.
I wake up organically.
I walk my girls.
Go to the gym a few times a week.
Work at the salon.
I write when not at the salon.
Between writing and working at the salon, I’m running back and forth between stays at the Airbnb, responding to guests, and other back-end details that running a short-term rental requires.
And yes, I have plenty of time with my husband, and I see my parents, friends, and extended family multiple times a month and even week.
I enjoy all of this because I’m able to have the schedule I want with the career(s) I want.
Some time back, I told the universe, I would love to have multiple things going on at once when it comes to work.
I don’t want to be tied down to one thing.
I want to go to one place of work, work out, and then go to the next thing.
I want to be able to go out for lunch and have a beer in the middle of the day.
I want to have one job this day, and one job that day.
Maybe it’s the free spirit of the Aquarian in me, but having freedom is essential, and that comes with having options.
Who says we have to do just ONE thing?
Certainly not me.
Consider me the butterfly floating around booping on all of the things.
Wherever you feel lopsided in your life, the universe is always waiting for you to give it the command to help with the balance you want.
PUT IT IN YOUR UNIVERSE:
Your job is to tell the universe where you want the balance:
Do you work 60+ hours a week and feel trapped?
Excellent, now tell the universe how grateful you are for a 40-hour work week and how you love a slower paced schedule. Visualize it and be thankful for it as if it’s already there.
Do you have 4 jobs and no social life?
Wonderful, tell the universe the number of jobs you want and thank it for the ease in which it comes, allowing you to have more time with loved ones.
Are you unemployed and feel unfulfilled while your loved ones are at work?
Totally, so tell the universe your dream job and follow the steps the universe will 100% give you to get there (follow each and every hunch).
Do you feel like you’re glued to your desk/computer and want more time with loved ones?
I bet! Now tell the universe how happy you are that you get to walk away from your desk/computer with ease every day and how spending time with your loved ones is giving you more energy toward your job (“the more time I get with my family, the better I am at my job because I’m balanced”).
