by Christine LaRocque

I’m a working mom. I’m out of the home and away from my children 10 hours a day, five days a week. Consequently, I write a lot about the challenges of being away from my children and my quest to manage it all and manage it well. It’s who I am, what I do.

The expectations I have of myself can be overwhelming. Yet, this is the life I choose, the life I know I am meant to be living.

For all of that, I know there is a better way. I know I’m only doing an average job of carrying it all off. And I also know that the pressure I put on myself is self-inflicted and largely unnecessary. That’s why I’m working on changing, on adapting and becoming someone who is more comfortable in her own skin, someone who has better balance.

So you can understand why my interest was piqued by an article published a few months ago in the The Globe and Mail by Judith Timson: Work-life balance? Can that cliché.

Always on the lookout for answers, I read it immediately. You see, while I have a strong desire to find better balance, there are days when I think it would be easier to just capitulate to chaos.

I’ll admit I was a bit put-off when I read Timson’s description that balance is a bore. My initial response was that she just doesn’t get it. I wondered briefly if maybe she has too much balance. But as I read on, and discovered that what she really meant was that the time crunch we all experience as mothers is actually a life stage and not a way of life, I became more interested.

She writes:

There are simply periods of our lives when the burdens will be intense and, especially for parents of young children, we’re going to have to demonstrate by doing it that we can be both excellent workers and excellent parents.

 Burdens. Intense. Yes, I get that. I’m living it now. Everyday.

She goes on to argue:

But work-life balance itself has become a cliché, an all-purpose catchphrase, and a way of avoiding personal responsibility for making healthy choices.

This is where I beg to differ.

By definition, a cliché is a saying, expression, or, in this case, an idea that has been overused to the point that it loses its original meaning or effect. Balance has been a buzz word for many years. Arguably it is so because it’s so elusive. We live busy, programmed lives, in some cases by choice, but sometimes by necessity. Arguing that it’s simply a case of “avoiding personal responsibility for making healthy choices” simplifies the issue to the point of absurd. From my perspective, the need to find balance has become more important and harder than ever, not less so, cliché or not.

Sometimes how we live our lives is more complicated than simply being able to make “healthy choices” to change it.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not negating that there is some importance in what she says. I only find fault with the logic of the presumed simplicity. Our lives are busy. Many of us have full-time jobs and then come home to our second full-time job. Our days starts at the crack of dawn, and then race to the finish. We work endlessly to meet our responsibilities. We have to. There are bills to pay, we are trying to raise happy, well-adjusted children. We have to be available to support and help friends and family. Our responsibilities go on and on.

Are these choices? At their root I suppose they are, but once chosen, the choices become infinitely less available. We simply have to measure up.

So here is where I offer my own interpretation of balance. In reality, I don’t think it’s an all or nothing, a choice of one thing over another. I think it’s all about moderation. Focusing on what needs to be done, doing it when it needs to, but allowing responsibility to slip when you need, so that you can regain your equilibrium.

The counter-balance is different for everyone. For me it’s about a few hours to read or write, or coffee with a friend. It’s getting up from my desk at work and having a leisurely chat with a co-worker. It’s about a few moments sitting on my front porch chatting with my husband. Yes I’m making choices. Some are healthy, some maybe not, and all in moderation, because sometimes I simply can’t do everything. Sometimes duty calls and calls and calls.

It’s about not losing yourself completely in all the have to dos, and not giving in entirely to what you want to dos.

So is balance elusive? I don’t think so. Is it a cliché? Perhaps. Is it worth pursuing, absolutely!

How do you find balance?

Christine LaRocque is a full-time communications professional, wife, and mother to two under 5. While trying to manage a hectic lifestyle filled with long commutes and two unruly boys, she discovered that sometimes when you are trying to do everything, you are really doing nothing at all.