Balance

How do you create a workable work-life balance?

Part of my job (yes, the one that is one morning a month in an office, and any spare hours at home) is doing the wages for a small company. I created our own spreadsheet to record hours and create payslips. I have learnt about HMRC's NI and PAYE calculator. I have learnt about year-end tasks and now know what to record to make my life easier next March/April.

But I don't know how to do databases. I mean, I'm competent enough to be able to find my way around the software, but the actual logic of relationships and what needs to be in what tables and linked to which other tables, just flummoxes me. Totally. I just can't figure out the best way to do it. At all. But on the other hand, now I've got my filemaker trial, I'm at least learning how to create the things, even if the logic is still beyond me at the moment.

And therein lies the problem. I'm enjoying this challenge so much, that when I have to stop what I'm doing, I get irritated, annoyed. It's like an addiction. I am addicted to whatever chemical is produced in my brain when I am challenged in learning something, figuring something out. And poor little Ben, he gets the sharp end of my tongue, for no fault of his own. Just me being irritated that I have to stop what I am doing, or can't go and do what I want to do, because he needs me to be mummy. So I am being challenged in a different way. Where do I need to make that divide, between work and motherhood?

I don't feel like I can live in both worlds, with the divide as it is at the moment. I'm not able to put the hours in to really be able to give my boss the results that he needs and wants; and I'm not being fair to Ben either. So what do I do? What can I do? I feel like I either need to find a better balance (which I'm not sure how to do, given yesterday's real-ness about hours in the day and lack thereof etc), or I need to stop trying to split myself in two and give myself 100% to one or the other. Either way, I need to do something because life as it is at the moment isn't fair on me, Ben, Steve, or my boss. Although my boss doesn't notice really because whatever I manage to pull out of the hat, it'll be better than anything we have at the moment!

Must find Balance. It must be achievable. It must be.