Is it even possible to balance work, school and life successfully?
I don’t have human babies, only animals, so I have a lot less on my plate than some people.
The whole world is so ready to tell everyone what they should be doing, when really, they are often talking to themselves.
- You should not eat any processed foods.
- You should get cardio for half an hour a day, five times a week.
- You should do some sort of muscle building exercise three or four times a week.
- You should sleep 8 hours a day.
- You should eat a huge amount of vegetables.
- You should clean.
- You should iron your clothes so you look professional.
- Don’t forget to water your plants!
See? A million things you should be doing, and that was just a quick list off the top of my head. That list is also not remotely specific to a human with all the individual tasks we each have – that’s just a general list.
We constantly compare ourselves to other people, and depending on how old your parents are, to entirely different generations who didn’t live the same way we do now.
My grandparents were born in the 1920s. My grandmother was a teacher who quit her job to have many children and to run the household. Cooking and cleaning were her job. Today the attitude that the full-time job of running a household is somehow easy, makes very little sense. My grandmother certainly would agree. She couldn’t have maintained the same household with only a few hours at the end of each day. If she had to work forty hours outside the home, plus commuting time, her house wouldn’t have been nearly as clean.
We make sacrifices with the quality of our homes and the choices we make with our food to fit into the ever-expanding greed of the corporate world. If you aren’t working 40 hours a week and doing everything perfectly, then you are failing, right?
You aren’t failing. If anyone tries to make you out like a failure, take a good hard look at their lives with a critical eye and you will likely find areas of their life they are ‘failing’ at as well. Maybe show a little tact, and try to avoid pointing that out to them – but realize they are imperfect for your own sanity.
I’m trying to get a bachelor’s degree done and the current housing crises in my home state means that I had to find a place to live quickly that I could actually afford on my own. It’s not been easy.
I was hoping to live at my apartment for another year or two, but they continually raise the rent 10% year over year. My 800sqft one bedroom is now listed for 2385$ a month – and it’s not sustainable on my income.
I bought a place that needs a lot of work. I love the location and I love my home. That means I’m having to work on the house while also working on school, and now with a longer commute.
My dishes aren’t cleaned every day. My floors aren’t spotless. The entire house needed to be professionally cleaned when I moved in, and I didn’t have the money to have that done. I’ve been slowly cleaning around my belongings, but it’s very slow. Painting has been even slower.
I am venting, but I’m also speaking to millions of other people who are experiencing the same thing.
We live in a time when most of us are single, we are not getting married young anymore, if at all. Thankfully the younger millennials who have gotten married are actually staying married, effectively lowering the divorce rate – which is a great sign but it doesn’t help the huge amount of us living on our own these days.
It’s staggering how many college educated people are living with their parents or roommates into their mid thirties and older now. We just can’t afford to live on our own, even if we aren’t living with a partner. I’ve been lucky enough to live on my own since I was in my early 20s. It’s got it’s high points and it’s low points, but the affordability is insane.
To live in VT comfortably as a single person in 2024, you need to make 97 thousand dollars a year. There are very few positions actually offering that in this state that don’t involve constant labor.
So basically, you need to make a huge amount of money to live here. You need a job, you need a home, you need a car.
What is balance then? Whatever is good enough for you.
My dishes aren’t always clean, neither is the rest of the house. However, my assignments are always in on time and my job is always done. Those are the most important things to me. My cats are well fed, well loved, healthy and happy. They are my family.
Finding balance isn’t meeting some metric on a check list, and it’s not making the judgmental people in your life respect you – since they likely never will regardless of what you do or do not do.
Balance is finding what works for you and then having the grace for yourself to stop complaining that you aren’t good enough. You are good enough and you will get the most important things to you done!