Quality of Life vs Gainful Employment

I had hoped that I would have resolved this matter satisfactorily by this time in my life, but it appears that I still have many lessons to learn.

The crux of the problem is that success in business seems to carry a burden of responsibilities that eat up your time and turn your days and nights into a whirl of scheduled activities.

This is true whether you work for yourself or for others. There should be a way to balance enjoyment of life and production of income. Somehow, that balance is hard to find.

When you are between careers, there is a period when you spend more time meeting new people and exchanging creative ideas on living and commercial ideas for supporting yourself and your family.

Eventually, some of your plans take root and start to show signs of becoming viable businesses. This is an exciting time as you are still having fun and your bank balance is beginning to look healthier.

If all goes well and you continue to provide products and services that customers need and are willing to pay for, your income and your workload continue to grow.

Sooner or later you find yourself spending as much time organizing and managing your business as you spend creating and producing products that you enjoy.

If your business volume is high enough, you can afford to hire others to help, but that actually moves you away from producing things and into a management role where your time is spent managing others instead of creating.

You now have more time than money and have other people doing tasks that you used to do yourself.

I have been through this cycle several times over the years and although it is nice to be able to share the wealth and provide employment for others, I have never learned how to maintain a tranquil and satisfying quality of life. Things seem to escalate until stress becomes an overriding concern and work is no longer satisfying.

I am resolved to figure out a way to handle this before the cycle begins anew. The pressure is mostly self-imposed and I think it comes from a desire to produce quality results on a tight schedule and maximize income.

If I can set more relaxed delivery schedules and still provide outstanding customer satisfaction, I should see an improvement in my quality of life. I expect to be doing creative design work for many more years and I want to enjoy every minute of it.

With the advent of the Internet and the growing popularity of home-based micro businesses, there should be more opportunities to run a business at a comfortable level where sufficient income is generated, but there is still time to enjoy life.