How Do I Shutdown While Watching the Kids?

00:00:00.000 | [Music]

00:00:04.720 | Alright, let's do one more deep work question.

00:00:08.360 | We have one here from Heather.

00:00:09.560 | Heather asks, how do I make a better transition from working from

00:00:16.840 | home to afterschool with the kids?

00:00:18.960 | So Heather says, pre COVID, my transition from a working mindset to mom

00:00:24.400 | mindset was easy since there was a 30 minute commute from the office to aftercare.

00:00:29.720 | Now I permanently work from home and there is no transition.

00:00:33.080 | They get off the bus when school is out.

00:00:34.760 | She says in parentheses, we nixed aftercare since I am here, but

00:00:39.440 | is that a bad idea in parentheses?

00:00:41.560 | But I'm still getting a few things done during that hour.

00:00:44.320 | Thoughts?

00:00:44.840 | All right.

00:00:46.160 | Well, Heather, my specific thought for your situation is you

00:00:50.120 | should not have nixed the aftercare.

00:00:51.800 | Work is work.

00:00:54.160 | Don't let the fact that the work is happening at your home make you change

00:00:59.200 | the status of that work to be half work.

00:01:01.160 | Work slash I'm also doing another job, which is taking care of my

00:01:05.520 | kids after they get home from school.

00:01:07.440 | I mean, that's sort of equivalent of being like, I work at this office job,

00:01:11.920 | but for like two hours in the afternoon, I'm also serving food in the cafeteria.

00:01:16.360 | Your bosses will be like, well, you can't have both those jobs at the same time.

00:01:20.400 | Right?

00:01:20.600 | Like, you know, when you're in the, when you're here in the office, you can't

00:01:22.880 | also be serving food in the cafeteria.

00:01:24.800 | Like this is your job here.

00:01:26.280 | Uh, but when we work from home, we blur those lines a lot more and we say, yeah,

00:01:29.640 | but I could do like childcare too.

00:01:33.360 | And can I just mix it all together?

00:01:34.760 | And it's very hard to do.

00:01:35.760 | This is why during the heat of the pandemic, when, when schools were

00:01:40.080 | closed and offices were closed, I kept describing the situation as a dumpster

00:01:43.320 | fire, because it was impossible.

00:01:45.520 | When you ask people, do all your work and do all the childcare

00:01:47.720 | and do that at the same time.

00:01:48.960 | It's like being the cafeteria worker at the same time that

00:01:51.680 | you're trying to be an accountant.

00:01:52.640 | It's impossible.

00:01:53.520 | And we pretended like it's not.

00:01:54.800 | So my specific answer for you, Heather is if at all possible, financially

00:01:58.920 | go back to exactly the same care setup you had pre pandemic.

00:02:02.360 | And it sounds like the setup you had was after school, your kids went to

00:02:05.720 | aftercare, which brought them to the normal end of a standard nine to five

00:02:09.920 | workday, and then you would pick them up.

00:02:11.160 | Go back to that aftercare.

00:02:13.240 | Yes, you're working at home, but who cares you're working till work is over.

00:02:16.720 | Uh, and then you're shifting over to the mom mindset, not trying to mix the two.

00:02:20.280 | So if that's possible, that's what I would suggest.

00:02:23.320 | Let me give a more general answer here about, I think a very good point.

00:02:28.360 | More generally shutting down when you have a hazy boundary between work and

00:02:35.560 | non-work, which, which again, is pretty common, especially in these work from home

00:02:38.600 | days.

00:02:39.000 | Uh, so you might have a, this hazy period.

00:02:41.320 | So let's say the aftercare thing doesn't work out.

00:02:43.120 | You have this hazy period where you're kind of working and you're kind of doing

00:02:47.240 | something else and you recognize this and you, you know, you don't schedule

00:02:49.720 | meetings and you know, you're just going to get a little bit done because

00:02:51.800 | you're also doing childcare.

00:02:53.160 | You have to find how to have a definitive shutdown that still works.

00:02:57.160 | So even if you're in this hazy period, have a definitive into the hazy period.

00:03:01.480 | All right.

00:03:02.040 | Now I'm doing my shutdown complete.

00:03:03.480 | Even though the last 90 minutes I've been half shut down.

00:03:06.200 | Uh, I have to get my kids going with their homework, but I have to return and

00:03:09.960 | answer emails and I have to get snacks.

00:03:11.400 | Then I'm going back and sending out these reports, even though that's back and

00:03:15.320 | forth and hazy, have a clear shutdown at the end of that, where you're like now

00:03:17.880 | work is completely done.

00:03:20.280 | Uh, now if possible, if you can have one that gets you out of your house and

00:03:23.320 | completely changes your state, I think that would be good.

00:03:25.480 | I don't know your marital situation, but if you have, let's say a partner that's

00:03:28.920 | working, it sounds like here, maybe they're working at an office when they

00:03:32.440 | come back, that spells you to do a 30 minute transition to really fully

00:03:37.480 | change your mindset.

00:03:38.600 | I think exercise is a good one here.

00:03:40.360 | I've been doing this some more, especially on my teaching days when I

00:03:43.480 | can't get exercise in earlier in the day.

00:03:46.280 | Uh, I'll do this when I'm with the kids in the afternoon.

00:03:50.040 | I'll bring, I'll set it up.

00:03:51.320 | So, you know, maybe once working on their homework and once playing

00:03:54.840 | Minecraft and I'll let my youngest, I'll bring them down to the basement to

00:03:57.320 | where my exercise equipment is like, okay, you can watch this video here.

00:04:00.760 | Um, and then I'm going to go in the garage and, you know, do evil things to

00:04:05.240 | a rowing machine.

00:04:06.360 | And it's a transition, even though I'm kind of watching the kids, the exercise

00:04:10.040 | is very different.

00:04:11.160 | It's very different than looking at a screen.

00:04:13.240 | And it really is a way of, okay, now I come out of that and I physically

00:04:16.600 | changed my state and I come out of that, not doing other types of work.

00:04:19.800 | So have a clear shutdown.

00:04:21.480 | Even if that shutdown happens after a period of sort of hazy boundaries.

How Do I Shutdown While Watching the Kids?

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