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Automate The Predictable

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Automate The Predictable

Raising kids is all about the unpredictable: juggling responsibilities at work and in your personal life with constant shifts in your child’s mood, interests, abilities, and needs. If you leave the predictable activities — like cleaning, laundry, meal prep, and cooking — to the burden of daily decision-making, you won’t have the energy and time to deal with the true surprises, like the post-dinner temper-tantrum. When it comes to logistics — the stuff that has to get done to keep yourself, the kids, and the household running — the goal is to automate the predictable, while shrinking each system to its smallest footprint.

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Networking (In Half The Time)

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Networking (In Half The Time)

Networking is vital to a successful career in almost any field. Without the time and ability to engage in networking at the same level as their non-parent peers, working parents need to get creative and develop concrete strategies for cultivating professional relationships. If you’re struggling to find the time, try systematizing your approach so that it becomes a seamless part of your routine without stealing precious hours from your day with these easy strategies.

What Relating Looks Like

What Relating Looks Like

Relating to your child is probably the most irreplaceable job you have as a parent: you are, more than anyone else on Earth, who your children look to for affirmation and recognition of their self-worth. Ultimately, most of us “get” the need to spend time with our kids, but relating to kids at every age and stage isn’t always so easy. It helps to convert relating into tangible, measurable actions that allow you to connect with different aspects of your child’s developing personality and identity. When it comes down to it, relating can be broken down into four categories of activities, all of which provide a platform for connecting, bonding, and infusing your child with the unconditional message that they matter…

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5 Ways to Make Time for Your Spouse

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5 Ways to Make Time for Your Spouse

Once you have children, it’s almost as if you forget how to have a real adult conversation. It’s so easy to revert to talking about kid logistics, or kid activities, or kid-anything — but that comes at a cost, to the sense of connection you have with your significant other. For the health of your relationship — and your own well-being — it’s essential to make time for each other, with no kids involved. Read on for a few ideas to get you started…

Couples Who Share The Workload Have More ...

Couples Who Share The Workload Have More ...

Many of us enter this whole cohabitating thing with a lot of love, but without a clue. We get blindsided by the amount of joint-decision making there is to do — like dividing the logistics, in a way that is transparent, fair, and manageable. Because it’s so uncomfortable to talk about, people tend to just gravitate toward the things they notice — which is not the same as aligning on the workload as partners. Operating independently means work is done without recognition and resentments build over the tedious day-to-day stuff.  In the absence of direct conversation, one party ends up taking on the lion’s share of the work. Studies show that this is often the woman, who ends up feeling burdened by both the physical and emotional labor involved. The workload becomes so exhausting, there’s not enough energy left to cultivate the relationship.

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How to Eliminate Working Mom Guilt

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How to Eliminate Working Mom Guilt

Ginny loved her work. A vice president of marketing for an ad agency, in many ways her work defined her. Yet, Ginny’s passion for her work made her feel guilty. It took time away from her kids (7, 11 and 13) and often distracted her when they were together. She wondered constantly if she should put her goals and passion on hold, to be a better parent for her kids. This question — to work, or not to work — is emblematic of a struggle many parents face.

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It's Never Too Late To Hit Reset With Your Kids

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It's Never Too Late To Hit Reset With Your Kids

You may have heard that 90% of who we become as adults is the result of what happens in the first seven years of life. It would be a pretty cruel  joke of nature, if the greatest impact we have as parents is when we are least experienced. Parenting is one of the most complex jobs in the world and it doesn’t come with any training or an extension number we can dial for “technical” support. We’re all just learning as we go. We’re bound to make mistakes. Luckily, recent science has found that while the early years do matter very much, the later years do too.

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Micro-Bursts of Self-Care

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Micro-Bursts of Self-Care

We all desire self-care. More importantly, we’ve all come to understand that we need self-care. The physical and psychological benefits of self-nurturance have been scientifically proven, time and time again. It’s no longer a revolutionary concept. But we often struggle to attain and sustain it because, well, life happens, getting in the way of our best laid plans. So what can we do? It’s time to reframe our thinking on self-care.

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Rethink Your Exercise Routine

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Rethink Your Exercise Routine

Many people think exercise means 60-90 minutes three times a week, at the gym or in a class. And it can be difficult to break out of that notion; it’s how most of us used to exercise before we had kids. Now, as a parent, you may have adopted an all or nothing mentality: you know it’s impossible to exercise as much as (or in the way) you once did, so you stop altogether.  It’s time to rethink your exercise routine. Let’s envision a new approach to fitness.

Don't Do It All Alone

Don't Do It All Alone

Whether you were organized or not before you had kids, arranging logistics for family life is different and more complex than organizing for a single person. Engaging every member of the household in arranging tasks, including kids from an early age, is a good thing. It promotes a sense of responsibility and belonging; imparts the value of caring for others in relationships; and teaches critical life skills that will benefit your children into adulthood. A simple conversation with your family may be just the thing you need to hit reset on your household’s division of labor.

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