Tightrope Lessons from the Big Top

At moments like this, it feels like I have it all.  I am building a successful business from home doing what I love, using my experience and creativity to offer help to others, and I get to do that with my dog napping under my chair and my husband sitting beside me.  Of course, he nudges his way into my train of thought every few minutes to show off the new feature he just unlocked on his video game, and the dog will be dropping a wet tennis ball on my keyboard any moment now.  Having it all has its ups and downs.

Keeping it all in balance is like walking a tightrope.  Just like tightrope walkers get to jump and do flips and spins in midair, working from a home office gives me freedom and flexibility.  I can do hard-hitting, in-depth journalism over the phone, while wearing my favorite doggy slippers with the floppy ears (although I am always secretly afraid that my interview subjects somehow know about the shoes).  If my husband gets a four-day weekend, I can rearrange my schedule and spend at least some of that extra time with him.  If a deadline is looming, I can burn the midnight oil with my husband snoring beside me and a fridge full of caffeine at my disposal.

Of course, I also don’t have a net below me or rails to hold onto, up here on my tightrope.  As much as I felt trapped by the fixed schedule at my last day job, it at least kept a firm barrier between work time and personal time.  Until I ventured out here onto the tightrope of running my own business from home, I failed to realize how much that arrangement protected my family life, as well as my productivity.

It really is like walking a tightrope.  I am hard at work and struggling to give shape to a brilliant idea – an  idea that will change the world, cure cancer, stop global warming, and make chocolate fat-free – when my husband pokes me in the shoulder for the third time.  Poof.  My idea vanishes, and I grudgingly turn to see what he needs.  “Will you play World of Warcraft with me?” he asks hopefully.  “You’ve been working all evening, and it’s nearly bedtime.”  Instant guilt kicks in, both at my grumpy reaction and at how long I have been ignoring him.  In my head I see myself swaying on the thin wire high above the circus, tilting to one side and flailing at the air, trying to center myself again.

“It’s a long way down,” I think, considering the prospect of a neglected marriage and a very lonely retirement.  Three hours later, my husband and I are laughing and slaying virtual monsters together (a great team-building exercise), and we both find ourselves yawning.  It is well past bedtime, my husband is happy, my character is two levels higher, and my brilliant article is still half-finished, with my train of thought long gone.  Back on the tightrope again, I flail too hard and start to teeter the other way.  It’s a long way down on this side, too; failure looks like a long fall, and at the bottom await financial troubles and the grim prospect of another 9-5 office job.  Splat.

How do I stay balanced and keep moving forward?  Just like the real “big top” performers, I try to make small, careful corrections, not big ones that throw me even more off balance.  I take small steps, and I keep my eye on the goal.

 

Share