a professional and personal blog in one? - laura lundahl baga

It's happening whether we like it or not - the lines between work and play have blended. Where does one part and and the other begin? Where does work stop, and the rest of the world start?

Margins between personal and work time are blended today more than ever, as our personal devices are also our work devices, and technology to connect with anyone at anytime is simply part of our every move.

Work and personal identities are blending too, as demonstrated by this article by gethpp.com. Don't fight to divide your life, is the basic thinking behind all this "blended" talk. The blended approach to a single self - your work and personal worlds, isn't new at all. It's a way many people from the Gen X generation (that's just slightly older than me :) ) and down to Millennials tend to operate already, and according to recent research, it might be making us happier.

Work Life Balance Got you Down? Try Blending by Tamara Runnels Briley is part of a growing trend to push back against the 1990-2000's decade era push to have an ideal "work-life-balance" with good personal time "margins", and lots of talk about how having it all was possible. But it didn't feel possible. As technology blurred the margins between our work life and the dinner table, how do we respond to this?

Embrace it! And work to intentionally connect with where you need to be in that moment - be it work, running with your dog, holding your baby, or typing an email with a toddler on your lap. 

In my work with SVP and MEDRIX, discussed briefly here, there's a blend of my personal volunteer interests, my work in public policy, and the personal passion I have for disadvantaged populations in the Asia-Pacific rim area. Having lived in Hong Kong and Central China, the care that I developed for the people and their spirit, compassion for one another, and work to meet each other's needs was very real. But these interests don't relate to my US-based work life. However, this was not a barrier, in my mind, to integrating these personal interests into my working world.

Separating work identity and personal identity is something of a past generation. There's no need to. I've discussed giant funding proposals with officials on the ski slopes, and brought my toddler son to founding kickstarter dinners to be a sweet and slobbery distraction from our work. 

Another person who is doing this well? Check out Cherie Edilson, founder of the new and broadly successful Cedar Rapids Marketplace, as well as the Pink Barrette, and co-founder of Edilson Web Design. Her four adorable kiddos are part of her every move, and she would say, her successes too. 

Cherie and I met in graduate school in Iowa a couple decades ago (almost), and have bonded over a shared belief that life can be exactly as you want it, but that most people don't achieve that because they're focused in too many directions at once. We've had a number of personal and professional successes by pushing each other forward in our careers and relationships, to be our best selves.

If she wasn't able to have the family she wanted, because she was working on her career dreams and had to separate her life from her career, she wouldn't be happy and would never be as successful in her entrepreneurial goals. Blending your life lets you own all of your goals, divide your time moment by moment or day by day as you see fit, and as works for your unique situation.

We chat a lot about focusing in on your own passions, talents and gifts, and blending that with family life. We challenge each other every week or so, to blur the boundaries, and have prided ourselves on breastfeeding while writing a brief, web design while watching the kids play, and policy research while baking a pound cake. 

Does this mean you take work calls during your daughter's dance recital? No. But it means while you wait for your son to get out of his appointment, you can design an data protection solution quote from your personal wireless hot spot, and schedule your happy hour next week with your mom's magazine club (don't laugh, it's a thing).  You're able to do this when you're not fighting against separating the margins of your life to find "work-life balance" -  instead you are letting technology be your friend, work for you, and let you choose where to be in each separate moment. 

If you're struggling (like so many women are, and have been since the beginning of time) to balance work, family, and professional life, stop for a moment. Consider blending them all, blurring the lines, and operating in one happy existence. 

-- Laura Lundahl Baga