On living a balanced life

At a party on friday night I was chatting to someone I had just met. He was a tall good looking guy describing his apparently perfect life; his successful career making feature films, a wife he loved and a healthy small daughter. Yet his wife had moved to Bristol and they met at weekends. They decided there was no point in her staying in London when he worked such long hours that he didnt see her or the daughter, passing each as they came and went in their busy life. This was a solution to him keeping his job and losing the guilt, and her having a less urban life that she craved. Yet she was now struggling with having to work and look after the child. They were having to keep working hard at high salaries to pay for their two houses and travel backwards and forwards from the two cities. Perhaps they will find this will work out. But it struck me that they were in this familiar trap of success.

To me the ultimate sign of success, as I define it, is being able to spend most of the time doing the things you love, and that includes being paid to do the things you love, being paid enough to be able to take time to do things you love that dont pay! Having time to play the piano, write your blog, spend a day helping a friend, making curtains, spending time with your child or partner.

Making curtains!

Gustavo bee-keeping

Flexible working is an essential ingredient to redressing the appalling in-balance of women in senior positions in the workplace when they have returned to work a mother. This is not just about ensuring women can balance a senior job and being a mother by providing good part-time jobs. Its also about ensuring men also want to take part time jobs to be a father too. It hadnt occured to the film-maker father that now he was in a senior position at work that he could negotiate reduced hours. Yet I bet he would be used to negotiating better pay at work or promotions.

We have never been more wealthy now in 2011. We have far higher expectations of comfort levels and technology to make chores quicker. Yet I cant understand why more people aren't aiming to work less hours a week as part of their vision of 'success' that they work towards. Its not just a parenting issue, but a question of having time in your life to do your hobbies, to be a friend, to volunteer, to grow veg, or just to enjoy the seasons. This inevitably also means living on slightly less. But that's not necessarily a sacrifice, just a question of being more careful and clever about the money you do have - by making and growing more of our gifts, home decorations or food. All things that apparently everyone wants to be doing more, but doesnt have the time. Hence Jamie Oliver's 30 minute cook book being a roaring success.

Gustavo and I are both now working part time, not because we are sharing child care, but partly a response to pragmatic circumstances working at charities with limited budgets, and mainly due to a desire to have other time to work on side projects, to work with neighbours growing food on our estate, and to tend to his bees. I supposed Cameron would like to think we are a model Big Society couple as we are both setting up social enterprises part of the time we are not in our paid jobs. But really this seems to us the only way we can really live a balanced happy life. It means we can take a risk with a social enterprise without sacrificing our careers. And I can start writing again without worrying if its a viable career option, but just because its what I like to do. We've only just begun this part time life, and are definitely having to be more frugal or creative (depending on the energy levels!) and cant go out as much as we did. So lets see how it works out. But so far I am finding it hard to imagine wanting to go back to full time, if I am lucky enough to be able to keep finding good part time jobs.

I'm going to keep a track on inspiring stories of people who are living on part time jobs. I have read about a few men in law firms setting this trend. Here is one for starters.

The New Economics Foundation recently published a report about the 21 hour week, arguing that it would help tackle unemployment - more jobs to share - as well as help reduce environmental impacts (less travel to work?), and better health - less stress, more time to exercise and cook and grow food.

I have a friend making a documentary about the 21 hour week. Will this be a future trend? Lets make it happen.