Many high performers are fabulous at running teams, businesses, deadlines, projects and the list goes on. Interestingly enough they often find themselves getting frustrated and using more energy credits unnecessarily outside of work.
Let’s face it – often work is far easier to control than home life. Throw a couple of small children in the equation and family logistics seem to get pretty hectic. But whether or not you have small children, for high performers life admin in general can get a little annoying and can certainly drain some energy credits.
We all need clean clothes, food to eat and we probably like to live in relatively clean houses. We all have bills to pay, appliances that break and need to be fixed or replaced and the list goes on.
And of course in basic life admin, some things are going to drain your energy more than others. As an example, I don’t cook. I would much rather present to 1000 people than deal with getting dinner. If I could take a pill so that I never had to eat again (and therefore no grocery shopping or cleaning up too – woohoo!!) I would. Luckily my wonderful partner owns a stack of restaurants and loves to cook – #winning! But in all seriousness, we have agreed that he generally cooks (oh and he cleans up afterwards too because I don’t like that either.) Yes, I’m the luckiest girl in the world. But we also agree that there is no expectation for him to cook. And if he doesn’t feel like cooking then we make other arrangements.
So the first step… Get really clear on what drains your energy.
So similar to working out who does what at work based on strengths and interests, treat your home life the same. Firstly be really aware of what drains your energy and what doesn’t. I have a couple of friends who find doing laundry therapeutic. I’ll never understand that but they do and good on them. If it’s really not your thing that’s totally ok too. The first step is to just be aware and acknowledge what drains your energy. Don’t judge it, don’t blame yourself or anyone else, and definitely don’t expect your love ones to change. It is what it is, and that’s ok, just roll with it. There is always a workaround.
And secondly – Come up with a strategy to get things done with as few energy credits being spent as possible.
Once you know what drains your energy (and those you live with) you are now ready to come up with a strategy about who is going to do what. Start with the basics of things like cooking or cleaning and then maybe include various ad hoc things that will inevitably will come up.
And think outside the square. Regardless of your family situation, often outsourcing is a great solution to saving the energy of everyone involved. If you both really don’t want to cook or clean, then don’t. Save your energy for other things. And thanks to services like airtasker this concept is getting even easier to implement.
So the good news is that when you save your energy credits outside of work, you will have more energy credits to perform better and achieve anything else you want to both in and outside of work.