Work-life balance is a lie
But thankfully, choices are very real.
I admittedly get a little snarky the second I hear the phrase “work-life balance.” What even is balance? Is it a state of perfection that you achieve and then keep forever? What happens if you have a tight deadline at work? What happens if you change jobs? What happens if have a kid? What happens if you have to start caring for an elderly parent? What happens if you or your partner are dealing with a health issue?
Work-life balance? Nah, I don’t buy it.
Our lives are constantly evolving - and honestly, how cool is that? And as these demands in our jobs and our lives evolve, so can our choices.
Work-life choices? Now that’s something I can buy into.
Let’s talk about the beauty of choice. Today, women (and yes, men!) have the choice to be all-in career, all-in parent, or a combination of the two. Women (and yes, men!) have the choice to work an intense job or a more laid-back job. We all have the ability to make these trades for ourselves and our families, and our choice doesn’t have to be the choice for life. If we are brave enough, we can choose over and over and over again based on the seasons we are in.
The Grind, Part 1.
After I completed grad school (which in itself was all-in career) I chose to compete for a leadership role at work which I knew would be all-in career. I was leading a team of fifteen people and managing well over 30 projects. I had an amazing boss that was making big changes in our organization, and I was excited to do that with her. Under her leadership, I was ready to tackle the challenge of revamping the portfolio of work the team had been doing to streamline our efforts and align the outputs with customer needs.
Getting buy-in from team members, coworkers, and leadership can be tough when you’re doing a full revamp. A lot of people don’t like change. A lot of people don’t appreciate accountability. A few people get loud about not liking change or accountability, and those few people can make your life very, very miserable.
My boss saw that despite those challenges, I was capable and ready to take on more. And so I did - all in the name of making our team and organization “better” and of course, my own career development. I was being groomed as a rising leader. I was supporting each team member on their efforts with individual biweekly calls. I remained responsible for the advocacy and success of our 30+ projects (with the help of my team of course). I took on additional administrative roles, led the design of a new building for several teams, and became the sole project manager for the highest dollar program in our organization.
It felt good to feel like I was making a difference, and my efforts did not go unnoticed. I received the Civilian of the Year Award at a high level. Oh… and did I mention that I took close to three months of maternity leave that same year? Oh… and did I also mention that was 2020?
Work-life balance? LOL NO.
I was pregnant for the first time. My hormones told me it was a good idea to get a puppy. That puppy was an absolute terror. I then I gave birth and my body took a major hit. And then I had a newborn. And then I was back to work, hot potato-ing said newborn with my partner that was also full time with a start-up company because childcare wasn’t a thing in 2020. I had doctor appointments. My kid had doctor appointments. Did I already say our puppy was a terror? Oh, and the sleep regressions! ☠️☠️☠️
But wow, the joy. On a personal level, we experienced so much freaking joy in that season.
On a professional level, I hit burnout.
I’m not sure one can fully appreciate what burnout is until they hit that rock bottom feel of knowing you cannot keep going. After my PhD, which was funded by a department of defense (DoD) scholarship, I owed the DoD four years of work. I was nearing that four-year mark when I had my biweekly check-in with one of my more challenging team members and essentially caught him in a lie by omission. I found out that he - along with six of my trusted colleagues - had orchestrated his involvement in a program that I had explicitly asked him to stay out of. His workload was already high, and our revamped portfolio was now targeting entirely different priorities.
Now, this is kind of a BFD on its own in my humble opinion. But when you’re doing too much for too long in all aspects of your life, something sets you off.
I - freaking - lost - it.
My empathetic spouse (Jared) sat patiently with me as I had a full-blown mental breakdown. After about half an hour of bouncing between yelling and hyperventilating and weeping, he calmly asked, “do you know what today’s date is?”
It was exactly four years after I had completed my PhD. I could leave the DoD without financial consequence, and I was ready to make that choice.
The Step-Back.
You may have deduced that no, I did not actually leave the DoD - but hear me out!
Within a week, I let my amazing boss know that I had made the choice to step away from leading the team I had poured myself into for the past three years. I spent a month thoughtfully transitioning my workload to someone else who, I might add, only stayed in that leadership role for four months (which later felt like all the validation I needed). And I leaned hard on my mentors - my personal “board of directors”1 if you will, for guidance on what to do next.
When you’re in burnout, it’s probably not a great idea to be making drastic life changes on your own - in fact, there are a lot of articles, books, and podcasts that point to that (here’s one to send you down this rabbit hole).
After talking to my people, I chose to take on a new DoD role in an entirely new organization doing entirely new things without leading a single person. I started therapy. We enrolled our now toddler into full-time daycare (seriously, daycare teachers are saints and I love all of you). And I chose to put myself first as I navigated my way out of burnout.
Now, this didn’t mean I had to quit my job or quit parenting. But I made my work-life choices so that I could prioritize my mental health in that season, however long it would last. I actively worked in therapy to learn how to not give all of myself to my job. Just because I could do more, didn’t mean I had to do more. I started focusing on healing my postpartum body. And I made a conscious effort to feel zero guilt when I took leave to get a five-hour haircut while my child was in daycare 👑
Bonus: I really enjoyed my new job! I threw some elbows and stayed away from leading people. I got to work on some really cool, cutting-edge technology. I loved my new boss. I loved my new coworkers. I still exceeded expectations while setting boundaries on the time and energy I devoted to work.
How? Well… I think you get to that point of burnout that you know if you don’t do something, you’re not going to make it. For real. My boss pitched the idea of my leading a few folks on the team. My response? Absolutely not. I told him I’m all for doing what’s best for the team, but me in a leadership role right now is not that. He saw my value and heard my please and said, “okay let’s do something different then.” I wanted to see my kid off to daycare and I wanted time with him and my spouse before his early bedtime, so I (admittedly boldly) ensured that my boss knew I was getting more than my fair share of sh*t done at work and as a result, did my hours really matter?
This was a sweet season of rest while still doing great things in my career and family - it just looked different than before and I felt good for the first time in literal years. But the all-in career itch crept back in. I wanted a new challenge, and so I found one.
The Grind, Part 2.
When you are invited to be a visiting scholar at the elite Air Force Academy to teach cadets Electrical and Computer Engineering, you say yes. You take the risk, you uproot your family, and you dive right the eff in (more on that here).
I think the beauty of having hit burnout so hard was that I never wanted to go back there again. But I also wanted to crush it in this new role. I made the choice to go all in, but this time with awareness and the ability to confidently set boundaries.
I’ve talked about how intense my time at USAFA was in previous posts, so I won’t go into that again. What I will go into though are the choices my spouse and I made together to deal with that intensity now that we were a family of four (yes, I count my dog).
We aren’t going to play and say “we split all things 50/50” - that’s about as unrealistic as work-life balance. What we actually do is what is necessary to keep the house running, keep our kiddo and doggo healthy, and keep our careers on track. That looks different for both of us across seasons.
In The Grind, Part 1 season, we were in full-on survival mode. It was chaos and we both just did what it took to stay afloat. If everyone was fed and we weren’t getting fired and the house was still standing, we called it a win. There was no organization. We couldn’t see the floors. We were a hot mess. I think this season - while joyful on so many levels - was not one that we would choose to relive ☠️
In The Step-back season, I made the choice to take on more household and life admin duties. Jared chose to level up in his responsibilities at the start-up company. I chose to dial it back at work. We both chose to set aside a few hours in the evenings to be together as a family. We chose to share daycare drop-off and pick-up. We made these choices together, and it was a great season for our family.
In my first two semesters at USAFA, well… I chose to do exactly zero household duties, opted out of daycare drop-off and pick-up, and literally just showed up where Jared told me to for social engagements. I chose to go all in on my role as an instructor and mentor at the Academy. Jared had settled into his role at the startup and chose to take on all the household and life admin stuff for us. We made these choices together, and it was also a great season for our family.
Then my final two semesters at USAFA came. I had settled into my role and chose to take some of the life admin stuff off of Jared’s plate so that he could step out and start his own business. He made the choice to put a lot of effort into that while still maintaining many household and life admin duties. We made these choices together, and it was also a great season for our family.
Real Talk.
Did I ever have work-life balance in any of these seasons? Short answer: no. But we did what was best for us and I had peace once Jared and I started working together to make work-life choices amidst the ever-evolving demands of our lives and careers.
Work-life balance is bullcrap. Work-life choices are the real deal.
Life and careers evolve. The demands of each change over time and that change is not linear. We all have the ability to make choices to find what works best for us alone. That best is not perfection - it’s whatever we decide we need for ourselves and our people. But we have to be bold enough to say, “this isn’t working, and I need a change” and then make the choice to change.
Huge caveat: partnering with the right person makes meeting these evolving demands possible (for both of you). This requires an immense amount of mutual respect for one another. This also requires an appreciation for all roles and responsibilities across life, home, and career. You can’t think taking care of dinner is less meaningful that delivering a big presentation or vice versa. You can’t compare your current workload and life load to your partners. You both have to buy in to the idea that all of it matters and you’re a team. Neither person can be “above” any task. And then you have to find ways to communicate when the partnership roles need to be adjusted (preferably before you lose it 😁).
Work with me to normalize choices, seasons, trade-offs, and genuine teamwork.
The WTF.
So… did you catch that my time at USAFA ended? Did I tell you I currently do not have a job? Did I tell you that we are relocating to Orlando but don’t have a house in which to relocate? Did I tell you this also means we don’t have childcare?
The work-life choices we made and re-made in Colorado are officially out the freaking window! Our partnership rhythm has been thrown into disarray - and you know what?? That’s okay. We are in another cycle of re-choosing, together.
Whatever season you’re in, make your choices with confidence and be ready to make new ones when life and work shift again. Friend, you’ve got this ✨
I love your sweet little family! There will always be new seasons of life. You embrace them very well!