Setting Boundaries

My daughter is usually difficult at nighttime, so she goes to bed first and my son follows usually about a half-hour later. I often let him watch a cartoon during that half-hour, which gives me a chance to check my e-mail. Tonight a few minutes into his cartoon, he came and asked me if I would sit with him. Before I could respond, he told me that Daddy’s computer was over near the TV and that if I need to work, I could use it while I sat with him.

While I do think it is good that he understands that I have important work I need to get done, I feel badly that I’ve likely made him think that my work might be more important than sitting with him. Of course I stopped working to go sit with him, but I think I need to be more specific about when I am working and when I am not. And when I am not working, I need to not work.

Knowing when to work and when to not work is a challenge of working from home. A suggestion that Amber from SmartMoms shared with me during a teleconference we taped last week is that it is important to set some boundaries when you work at home. She doesn’t work on Sundays, but there are any number of rules you can set for yourself. The great thing about working from home is that you set these rules, not someone else.

By the way, if you want to work from home, I shared many ideas on working from home in the SmartMoms –SmartBusiness teleconference. It is part of their ProSeries on working from home, and you can hear it on their website here.