Barrett's Blog for Working Moms

What Happy Working Mothers Know hits the best seller lists

2009-09-22T12:59:00Z

If you are a regular reader of this blog, like Gigi (thanks, Gigi), you know that I co-authored a book entitled "What Happy Working Mothers Know" (Wiley). It came out on September 8th and my co-author, Cathy Greenberg, and I launched the book at the Pennyslvania Governor's Conference for Women on September 17th. Last week, the book hit 4 best seller lists - the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today and Amazon. We could not be more thrilled.

When we spoke to a group of 2000 women in Philadelphia last Thursday, we explained to them why we wrote the book. Both Cathy and I struggled to find happiness as working mothers. Our stories are very different but we both had a lot of career success and beautiful children but, for many years, we did not feel at peace. We want to help other women to find their path to happiness faster and more directly than we did. The book is science based and also contains many stories of women we interviewed who inspired us.

We don't advocate that mothers should go to work, nor do we advocate that they should stay home with their children. That is an intensely personal decision. We advocate for happiness. Through the book, we give women the insights and the tools to get over whatever the obstacles are that are getting in the way of their happiness.

On our website - www.whathappyworkingmothersknow.com - we will post tools and articles for free. Our goal is not to make money with this book. I have a job and Cathy doesn't need the money. Our goal is to make a positive difference in women's lives.

I hope you will read the book and share it with a friend. Let me know what you think.

Mistakes, Anger and Rose Petals

2009-08-29T15:13:00Z

It's been a rough couple of weeks for me. I'm not sure why, but I've made more mistakes and had more arguments with friends in the last two weeks than I have in the last 2 years. It may be that the planets are in retrograde, whatever that means. All I know is I've been feeling like there was a weight on my head and my chest. The weight was anger - at myself and at others. It made me feel very unhappy.

So, is it ok to be angry? Little girls are often taught that anger is not ok, it's not feminine. We all know that is just silly. Anger is human. Everyone feels it and it serves a purpose. Anger tells you that something is wrong, it is out of alignment. The problem is, we often misdiagnose our anger. We may be too quick to blame others. Or, we may be too quick to blame ourselves. The key to making good use of anger, is to take the time to really figure out where the misalignment is. Notice, I said misalignment not blame.

Ask yourself, why you are angry? What happened and how did it make you feel? Where you disrespected? Betrayed? Misled? Try to understand why the other person or people involved acted the way that they did. Was there bad intention or was it an honest mistake? Really try to analyze it objectively. If it helps to talk it through, choose someone who you know to be calm and fair. You're not looking for the friend who sides with you no matter what. You want someone who can help you think this through. For some people, journally can be a good way to understand what is going on in your head.

Are there actions you need to take? Perhaps you need to have a difficult conversation with a friend or a co-worker? Or maybe you need to resign from that committee you had volunteered for. If you need to take action, plan it out with a cool head.

Once you've figured out exactly why you feel angry, hang onto it for a moment. Concentrate on how right you are and how wrong they are. Then, let it go. Visualize a rose in your hand. It is lush, red and perfect. As you think about what is making you angry, the rose petals will turn brown. Then visualize them falling from your hand and blowing away.

Anger is a healthy, natural emotion if we use it the right way. Listen to it, learn from it but don't hang on to it. Holding onto to anger creates stress in your body and in your life. It keeps things spiralling downward. The next time you feel angry, embrace it, understand it and release it. You'll feel stronger than ever when you do.

Doing the dance

2009-08-22T15:17:00Z

If you look at life as a dance, you will no doubt agree that working mothers have to dance to two different rhythms. We have the work rhythm with a strong, insistent drum beat of profit, customer satisfaction and boss' demands. And there is the dance at home which is more subtle and varied. Your family looks to you to harmonize the various melodies of children and partner. Just when you have it all working - the beat changes and you need to adjust - quickly.

Change can be exhausting and nerve racking. It can also be exhilarating. How do you navigate change and still do the happy dance?

Again, I draw from the wisdom of my yoga teacher, Amanda. If you need to change position or take a challenging pose, it helps a lot to have a strong foundation. To me, that means being very clear in your own mind about what is important to you and why. You need to prioritize to make this work. For most of us, our family is the most important thing in our lives. But does that mean that you let even a small family need get in the way of work obligations? If you did, you probably wouldn't continue working for long. If you want to do both dances, you need to decide when you listen to one tune and when you listen to the other. Guilt, by the way, will throw off your balance so try to let go of guilt completely.

You may need to let go of things you'd like to do but that just don't make the cut after you prioritize. For example, home cooked meals with the whole family are important. But, they are not more important than letting my kids get involved in sports and other activities that take them away from home at night. Or, you would love to go to every one of your kid's soccer games but sometimes, you just need to stay at work to get something important finished. When I travel, I miss a lot at home. I miss all of the after school chats about the social world my boys live in. On the other hand, I do interesting work and go to interesting places and traveling is important for me to be effective. Although I feel sad when I miss things at home, I don't feel guilty because I made the decision to take a job that requires travel and I love what I do.

Dancing to multiple tunes every day is not easy. It requires trial and error. But, as Amanda told us today, learning the steps may be difficult but, once you learn the steps to the dance, you will find bliss.

Happiness starts with self-awareness or What I learned in yoga class

2009-08-08T15:38:00Z

I need to share something I learned in yoga class this morning. First, let me give you the visual of me in yoga class. I am the one who can never get my knee to 90 degrees, who needs blocks to do triangle pose and who sits and watches while the rest of the class does handstands. I'm terrible at yoga but I go to class because I really like the teacher, Amanda. She picks a theme for each class and talks about it as she pushes us to take painful poses.

Today she talked about the bliss of self knowledge. In a yoga context, that involves muscle energy and organic energy which I don't fully understand but which seem to make the poses more painful and also more powerful.

While I was not doing handstands, I began to think about the bliss of self-knowledge in relation to being a working mother. I think that bliss, or happiness, is the product of living a life in harmony with who you truly are. Of course, to do that, you need to know who you are which is where the self-knowledge comes in.

It's hard to shut out the expectations and demands that your family, your work and society have for you. There are a lot of them and we bump into them every time we turn around. It is not easy, I know, but you need to find a way to shut out all the noise long enough to hear you own voice. Maybe it's taking a walk alone or journaling or soaking in a bubble bath or meditating. Figure out how and what time of day you do your best thinking and reserve a few minutes of that time to try this.

Imagine your perfect life. What is your day like in that life? Do you go to work? If so, what do you do at work? What is your interaction like with your children? What about your partner? How do you talk to each other?

If you are like me, this is an iterative process. I couldn't figure it out all in one go. In fact, it took me months of thinking and amending. It's like an oil painting that you work on for a long time. You create the sketch, then change the sketch. You begin to paint, then adjust the colors. Maybe you even scrap it and start over.

It's not easy but it is worth it. Because, unless you know who you are, what you enjoy and what is truly important to you, you can never find happiness.

I go back to yoga even though it hurts and I'm bad at it because I love the way I feel when I'm done.

Busting the Happiness Myths

2009-07-26T18:41:00Z

Most of us want to be happy. What may be getting in our way are some commonly held myths about happiness.

Myth: Happiness is dependent on acquiring certain things or relationships.
Truth: Happiness is a choice you make every day.

If you have every thought, I'll be happy when....I make more money, my kids are older, I meet my soul mate, etc, you are laboring under this commonly held myth. It is interesting to note that research involving people who won the lottery observed that, within 6 months after winning, their happiness level returned to what it had been prior to winning the lottery.    Happiness is a state of mind, it is how you choose to view the world and your place in it. Regardless of what is going on around you, happiness is a choice you make every day.

Myth: Happiness is a frivolous luxury
Truth: Happiness is an important part of good health.

Many people minimize the importance of happiness. They think happiness is for kids or self-indulgent wealthy people. Certainly a hard working mother does not have time to worry about happiness. In fact, happiness is an important component of good health - like diet and exercise.  Happiness reduces stress which means it also reduces the risk of stress related ailments like high blood, stroke and heart attack. When a person feels happy, their entire nervous system synchronizes and works with less strain on the body. Happy people are also far less likely to suffer from eating disorders, alcoholism and drug abuse.

Myth: Happiness is a function of good luck
Truth: Happiness is a discipline

This myth is partially true, to the extent that genetics are good luck. In 1996, University of Minnesota Professors David Lykken and Auke Tellegen found that everyone has a genetically determined happiness set point. It is like a default setting for happiness. It does not determine whether someone will be happy or not but it is a significant component. Building on that research, Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky of US Riverside, Dr. Ken Sheldon of the University of Missouri and Dr. David Schkade of UC San Diego developed a model for happiness:

50% of happiness is genetic
10% of happiness is the circumstances of the individual (health, financial security, etc)
40% of happiness is a function of our choices and how we choose to view the world

If you assume that we can also influence our circumstances to some extent, we have control of 50% of our happiness.  It takes self-awareness, knowledge and discipline to make ourselves happy.

In our book, "What Happy Working Mothers Know", we provide the information and the tools to help you find your happiness. Check out our website at www.whathappyworkingmothersknow.com

Make a string of pearls - one pearl at a time

2009-07-19T14:03:42Z

My friend and co-author, Cathy Greenberg, has taught me many valuable things. Some of those lessons are in our book "What Happy Working Mothers Know" which will be out in September. It is already available for pre-order on amazon.com.

This lesson is not in the book but has been very helpful to me.

For years, people would tell me to "appreciate the moment". I would nod in agreement and then roll my eyes when they weren't looking. Which moment, I would ask myself, should I appreciate? Always multi-tasking, all of my moments contained at least 3 activities. The whole thing sounded a bit trite, like when people advise me to "have a good day".

Cathy's pearl analogy really helped me to put this into practice.

First, we need some definitions. A "moment" is a span of time. It can be 10 seconds or an hour. Most of my moments last between 1 and 10 minutes. "Happy" means when you feel good. It may be relief, pride, appreciation, laughter or just a moment in which you really connected with another person.

Think of happy moments like pearls. They are rare and beautiful. When you find one, you need to appreciate it, look at it, hold it up to the light and admire it. If you found a pearl, you wouldn't complain that the floor was not filled with them. You would hold that pearl in wonder and consider yourself lucky to have found it. Happy moments can be like that too.

Your happy moments can come anywhere at any time. Maybe, when you open your eyes in the morning, you take a moment to appreciate the beauty of the color of the sky. Or your happy moment may come as you tie up your running shoes to go on your morning run. It could come when you hear your baby giggle or when you get a quick moment of praise at work. Whenever or however it comes, take a moment to polish it before you store it in your pouch.

I put words around my happy moments. I will actually say (often outloud) "this is a pearl". In fact, my sons are so used to it that they sometimes identify the pearls for me. As we sit in the kitchen after school laughing about the days events, one of them will say "is this a pearl, mom?" When they do that, I get two pearls for the price of one.

You will find that when you are looking for moments of happiness, they appear more often than you might expect. So open your eyes and your heart and look for the pearls in your life. Try it and let me know how it goes.

Womenomics - the new feminism

2009-06-28T15:51:00Z

    I'm currently reading a book called "Womenomics" by Claire Shipman and Katty Kay. Both women are working mothers in the highly competitive field of tv journalism. They write about an important workplace trend - led by working mothers but followed by men and younger women as well. The trend is to reject the climbing of the corporate ladder to design your own career path. A strong desire to find a comfortable work life balance is what drives this trend. Increasing numbers of people, from working moms to millenials, reject the idea of letting work crowd out the other important things in their lives.

    As I read this book, I am struck by how much of it describes my own career over the past 9 years. In August 2000, my family and I left Chicago to move to Tucson. I was looking for a way to have both a career that was interesting and to be with my sons as they grew up. I negotiated with my employer to allow me to make the move and to telecommute to work every day. Although I was and am grateful that my employer was flexible enough to allow me to do what I so desperately wanted to do, I paid a high price for my decision.   I had to give up the team I was managing and take a job with no direct reports and I was taken off the path to promotion.  I felt I had taken several steps backwards on my career track.

    Shipman and Kay describe this trend as the new feminism. The original feminists, of the 60s and 70s, gave women the opportunity to compete with men on men's terms in many fields. It was a huge breakthrough which has made so many things possible for the women who followed.  The trend today is to challenge the status quo.  When we demand flexible work arrangements or alternative career paths, we are saying that we want to re-define the rules of career success rather than simply compete under the old rules.    This is not just a women's issue. Increasingly men are also looking for a better work life balance and are walking through the doors that women are opening.

    As with all change, this one is not easy. There is an ego bruising side to it. No matter how sure you are in your decision to step off the fast track, it still hurts when you watch others - those who used to be far junior to you - zoom past as they climb the career ladder that you have eschewed.  To soothe your bruised ego, I suggest you remind yourself of all that you have gained as a result of your decision.  It doesn't make the pain go away but it helps.

    Women, particularly working mothers, are leading one of the biggest transformations in work place dynamics in decades. We are redefining career paths and focusing on the value we bring our employers. The millienials - the generation in their 20s today - will expect this kind of flexibility. The companies that adapt most quickly will be the winners of the war for talent.

    If you are one of the people who have made this decision, I'd love to hear about your experience. If you are thinking about making this move, I'd love to hear from you too.

Happy Father's Day!

2009-06-20T15:39:00Z

We couldn't be moms without men. That's pretty obvious but it's also easy to forget when you feel like you are the one doing all of the child care. On the occasion of Father's Day, it seems appropriate to take a moment to celebrate the fathers in our lives - particular the father of our children.

First, a reality check. In our research for "What Happy Working Mothers Know", Cathy Greenberg and I surveyed and interviewed over 1000 women in multiple countries. The majority reported that they contributed 50% or more to the family income and they handled 80% or more of the child care. Does that ring true to you? It certainly did not surprise me.

The interesting question is why? I think we can all agree that fathers love their children just as much as mothers do - they just express that love in a different way. Men enjoy rough play - wrestling or tossing in the air. Men are generally better than women at teaching kids to take a risk, to push themselves out of their comfort zone. Perhaps most importantly, men simply see the world differently than women. Even if Dad agrees with Mom on what time a teenager's curfew should be or whether junior should be on the travel soccer team, his reasons may be different. Children benefit from both perspectives - mom's and dad's.

Happy moms are those who have worked out a split of responsibility for child care that suits them. Some women want to take on the majority of the child care. They enjoy it and they like being clearly in charge of the kids. Others prefer a more partnerial 50/50 split. Decide what you want and talk with your husband about it. Too often, we expect the men in our lives to read our minds. Or, we are inconsistent. We ask them to do something and then we criticize the way they do it. If dad is in charge of getting the kids off to school in the morning, don't worry if their clothes don't match or their hair isn't combed. If it has to be your way, you are the best one to do it.

So, today, I celebrate all dads who love their kids. I celebrate the fun dads who devote their weekends to giving piggyback rides and playing games. I celebrate the serious dads who talk about the news and teach their kids to play chess. And I celebrate the well intentioned dads who forget the names of their daugthers best friend or embarass their son by shouting at the ref during a basketball game.

Dads (like moms) are not perfect. As long as their kids know that dad loves them, there is a lot to celebrate.

Happy Fathers Day!

The "H" is Happy is for Health

2009-06-17T13:14:00Z

In a previous blog, I mentioned that the formula for happiness that Cathy Greenberg and I have devised and described in our book "What Happy Working Mothers Know" is:

H - Healthy physically and emotionally

A - Adaptable to change

P - Proud of your work

P - Proud of your family

Y - Young at Heart

Let's start with health. You know your health is important.   But, how much time and energy do you actually spend taking care of your health? Many working mothers smile ironically at the question and respond with a sarcastic "I take care of my health in my spare time." We know that it's hard to find time to go to the gym or whip up tasty, high protein, low carb meals.

My suggestion is we start from wherever you are right now. First, you need to acknowledge that your health is important not just to you but also to your family and to your work. To be your best, at home or at work, you need to be healthy. I am not suggesting you have to train for marathons (although my friend Jill is doing that right now and I am in awe). Start small and build. Here are 3 suggestions to get you started.

Drink water. To run optimally, your body needs 84 onces of water a day. That is 9 and a half glasses of water. Diet soda, ice tea and coffee don't really count. The caffeine, sweeteners and carbonation all bring some negatives with them. You can drink those tasty beverages in moderation but water is really the best.

Move around. At least half an hour of moderate exercise every day can do great things. Of course, if you have time, do more.  If you don't have time, taking your dog for a half hour walk or getting off the bus or train one stop before yours and walking the rest of the way can make a big difference in how you feel. If you have time try to take an exercise class.   Committing to a class can help you work out on days when you might otherwise be tempted to skip. Some classes can be social as well.

Get some sleep. Research shows that adults need 8 hours of sleep a night.  Ha! That was my first response too. I thought, I was in high school the last time I got 8 hours of sleep in one night. Then I tried it. I really made an effort to go to bed early (I am a morning person anyway). The nights when I am able to get close to 8 hours of sleep, I feel much more relaxed and I eat less the next day.  Try adding one hour of sleep to your routine and see how it feels.

If you have trouble sleeping, there are some good over the counter sleep aids to get you started. Also, Paul McKenna, a hypnotist, has a book "I Can Make You Sleep". The book includes a guided hypnosis CD that you are supposed to listen to every day for two weeks. I tried his book "I Can Make You Thin" and it helped me lose about 10 pounds. I haven't tried the sleep book yet.

I'd love to hear what you do to stay healthy.

Barrett

What Happy Working Mothers Know

2009-06-17T12:50:00Z

I'm back and I have a good excuse for not blogging for a whole year. I wrote a book! Well, my friend and co-author, Cathy Greenberg and I wrote a book. The title is "What Happy Working Mothers Know' and it comes out in September. You can pre-order it now on Amazon.com

The book is based on principles of positive psychology and how they are applied in real life. We surveyed and interviewed over 1000 women around the world to get their stories and their tips for finding happiness amidst that chaos that is the life of a working mom. The book is not just for working moms. It is for moms who are staying at home and thinking about going back to work. It's for managers who have working moms on their teams. It's for husbands who want to help their wives find happiness as they juggle work and family demands.

Moms are very good at taking care of others but we often neglect ourselves. Happiness is a health issue. To be our best, at work and at home, we need to do what it takes to find our own happiness. If you think happiness is a luxury that you will get to when the kids are older, think again. Your children need you to be happy today, tomorrow and everyday. You are their role model and if you want them to be happy, you need to show them what a happy adult looks like. Have I convince you yet that your happiness is important and you need to invest some time and energy in it?

If so, here is our model for happiness:

H - Healthy - both physically and emotionally

A - Adaptive - life happens and you need to be able to adjust quickly

P - Proud of your family

P - Proud of your work

Y - Young at heart

More on each of those in future blogs.

Thanks for reading and I'd love to read your comments.

Barrett

Back to school - how can you make this school year better for YOU?

2008-08-17T15:51:00Z

School is starting again. You may be heaving a sigh of relief or you may be dreading the car pools, homework nagging, soccer games, swim meets and all of the busy-ness that the school year brings. The question is - what can you do to make this school year better for you?

First, we have to focus on you. I'm not talking about your kids or your spouse or partner. I'm talking about you. How happy are you right now? On a scale from 1-10, how happy are you? If you say a 8 or higher, the challenge is knowing how to keep that happiness when schedules get tighter and time seems to shrink during the school year. If you are a 7 or below, we have a little more work to do.

Together with Dr. Cathy Greenberg, my co-author for "What Happy Working Mothers Know", I've developed a model to remind women of the elements of a happy life. You'll notice that it spells HAPPY when you read it vertically. It's a little cute but, when your short term memory is as bad as mine, every little trick helps. So here it is:

                                Healthy
                                Adaptive
                                Proud of her work
                                Proud of her family
                                Young at heart

So let's start with healthy.  In order to be the best mom you can be, and to do your job well, you need to be healthy. You probably already know that but sometimes a reminder is helpful.

You have probably read enough articles and seen enough reports on tv. to know that taking care of your health requires a healthy diet, regular exercise and enough sleep.   From experience - doing all those things right, and then not doing them, and then doing them again, and then not....I can tell you that eating well, exercising and getting 8 hours of sleep a night makes you feel much better. Of course, if it were easy, you would probably be doing it. Here is my suggestion - for the next 2 weeks, pick one thing you can change and change it. You may decide to walk at least a half an hour a day, or cut sugar and caffeine out of your diet (that's not one I would pick), or you may put yourself to bed by 9:30 every night. Pick just one healthy change and try it out. If that works, build on it. Big change can come in small steps.

What I really want to talk about is GUILT. We all have it. You miss your child's piano recital because of a business trip. Or, you don't feel you're pulling your weight on a project because you were home with a sick child.

Guilt comes in two forms - guilt laid on you by others (some well meaning, some not so well meaning) and guilt that comes from inside of you.

The guilt laid on you by others serves no valuable purpose. So don't let it stick to you. If you need to, remind yourself why you've made the choices you have and why those choices are the right ones for you and your family. You live by your own values, not those of your mother in law or your co-worker or the stay at home mom on the playground.

If the guilt comes from inside of you, it's a sign that you need to check the alignment of your values with the way you are spending your time. Guilt becomes pervasive when the way you spend you time is out of alignment to your values.

You can start by listing your values in order of priority and be specific. For example, instead of saying "family" is my #1 value, I would say that raising my sons to be confident, capable, independent and happy adults is my #1 priority.   Specificity is important because it helps guide you. By being specific about what I want to do for my sons, I realize that sometimes that requires I be with them and sometimes, it's better that I'm not with them. They can't learn to be independent if I'm always there. They can't learn to be happy if I don't model what a happy, working adult looks like.

After you make your values list, make a list of how you spend you time and assign percentages. How much time do you spend at work? How much time commuting? How much time grocery shopping/running errands? How much time car pooling? How much time doing homework with your kids? You get the picture.

When you compare the two, if you find you spend a lot of time on things you don't value (eg. running errands or cleaning the house) ask yourself whether you can get someone else (a spouse or someone you pay) to do it for you. If you find you hardly spend any time on things that are really important, look for where you can take time away from things that others could do for you.

Let's say you checked and your life is aligned to your values. It still tears you apart when your daughter calls you at work to ask if she will see you before she goes to bed and you have to say no. What do you do about that guilt? First, remind yourself and tell your children why you work. Focus on the positives of work. Tell them (and remind yourself) what you love about your work. Tell them about the importance and joy of making your own money. Tell them how they benefit from your work and that we all have to make sacrifices. Most of all, tell them you love them but it's important and good that you work.

Then, focus - really focus- on your children. Sometimes, we are so busy multi-tasking and getting things done, that we forget to live in the moment. One idea is to make sure that, when you do come home, you make it a big, joyous event. Call the kids over to you and give them a massive hug. Gush about how happy you are to see them. Even a jaded teenager can be swayed by flattery. Create a small routine that you do as part of your homecoming. Maybe you all sit down and take turns sharing one thing about your day.

I know that there are many nights when you will pick up your kids at practice on your way home from work at 8. Or, they'll be asleep when you get home. You don't have to do this every day - but find a way to connect with your kids to make your time with them more satisfying. It doesn't have to take long. It doesn't even need to be every day. Start with what you can do.

To make this a good school year for YOU, make one healthy change in your life and let go of your guilt. Let me know how that goes.

What I did on my summer vacation

2008-08-08T21:10:00Z

My family and I went to Costa Rica. The highlight of the trip for me was rappelling down waterfalls. For the uninitiated (like I was until a few weeks ago), rappelling is the way that rock climbers go down rocks. With a harness attached to a rope at the top, you "hop" down the side of the rock by pushing yourself off with your feet, making an arc in the air and coming back into contact with the rock a little further down. The rope, and the people controlling it on the top and the bottom, keep you from killing yourself. The team that managed our group of tourists were all 20 something Ticos (natives of Costa Rica). They spoke perfect English and looked very fit. They also did not share the extreme aversion to risk that I have - as a lawyer and a mother. We tromped through the rain forest for about 20 minutes and then one of the guides gave us a 3 minute lesson on rappelling. Then we were all expected to rappel down a 180 foot waterfall. Right!

We did this in pairs and I went down with Harrison, my 13 year old. He was totally unconcerned - merely eager for his chance. I was hyperventilating. As I approached the precipice, I made the mistake of looking down. Yikes! It was far and there were rocks and water and no net. This was a real rain forest - not Disneyland. Here is what I mean...it was the real deal.

Not only did I do it, I did a total of 5 waterfalls (well, ok, everyone in the group did 5 but I was probably the most scared of anyone). With each waterfall, my exhilaration and self esteem grew. I was stronger, braver and more agile than I thought I was. By the end of that morning, I felt happy, light, wet and totally at peace. So here is my question...

Why do so many of us put ourselves and our own happiness after our children our partners and our jobs? It's a common female trait to put yourself last but it's not the right thing to do for your family, your work, or you.

Research has shown that when people are happy, they are more productive, more creative and make better ethical decisions. Happiness also lowers cortisol levels in the blood which, in turn, lowers the risk of heart attack, stroke and other stress related illnesses. The Hearthmath Institute in California has shown that, by thinking thoughts of love and appreciation, we can actually alter our heart beat into a regular rhythm that is much healthy than the ragged heart beat that occurs when you are stressed or feeling fear.

My question to you is - do you think your happiness is important? If so, what do you do to ensure that you are happy?

Vacation time - Take a deep breath

2008-06-29T17:06:00Z

Summer is vacation time for many of us. This is the time of year when we are expected to take time off and create golden memories with our families. We entrust our business to others and spend 24x7 with our families. Yikes!

Planning and taking a vacation can be more stressful than just working. First, the planning. You need to find a place and activities that appeal to everyone in the family. Depending on your family - that can be pretty tough. My husband and I have travelled a lot with our two sons and what I've learned is that it works best when everyone compromises a little. We make sure that the trip includes some things the boys will like but we also make sure that we get to do the things we really want to do. If you go to Paris and spend all your time at Euro Disney, you will feel frustrated and your kids won't learn anything. Travel is a way to stretch your kids to try things they would not otherwise do. Travel can be very educational and really open up the world for your children or it can just be fun. If you decide to do a Disney trip, make sure that some of it is fun for you too. Maybe that means you plan a day just hanging by the pool so that you can relax.

You also need to pace your trip according to the ages of your kids. Small children need food every few hours and they simply cannot handle a museum every day. Teenagers like a little space so cruises can work well for them. If anyone is interested in hearing about some of our more successful trips with our kids, just write to me.

Then there is the problem of disengaging from work. You need to arrange for coverage for everything you do. You need to be clear and thorough with your instructions. Then, you need to step back and trust your team to do what you've asked them to do. They won't do things exactly as you do but that is ok. It has to be ok.

As for laptops, I say leave them at home! Taking your laptop with you to the beach is like napping on the couch. You get a little rest but not really. Leaving your laptop at home when you are on vacation is like taking a long nap on a delicious feather bed. You'll awake rested and re-energized.

Vacations are also a great time to re-connect with your family. It may be a little tense at first as everyone decompresses and gets used to being together. Give it a few days. Be patient. Stay calm. Your mood will set the tone for the vacation so take a lot of deep breaths and focus on relaxing.

You owe it to yourself, your family, your colleagues and your customers to take time off and really disconnect. When you come back, you'll be re-energized and more creative than ever.

I'm going to Costa Rica for two weeks. I'll let you know how it goes.

Good luck to you and Bon Voyage!

Sex and the Working Mom

2008-06-09T16:11:00Z

So, last weekend, I joined the throngs of women around the country and saw the movie "Sex and the City". My experience may have been a little different because, instead of going with a group of women friends, I went with my husband. In fact, he insisted on it. He is a big "Sex and the City" fan and takes pride in the reaction that evokes when he tells other males. The movie was fun and I recommend it. As a married, lawyer-mom, I particularly identified with the character Miranda. And that brings me to my question.

How do you keep a healthy sex life going when you are married, working and have kids?

Since I am no expert in these things, I will define a "healthy sex life" as sex that is good enough and frequent enough that both you and your partner are reasonably satisfied. Please note, it requires that both you and your partner be satisfied. That is the tricky part.

Some couples insist on a "date night" once a week. Others go away for romantic weekends every once in a while. Still others meet their partner for lunch and a quickie from time to time. I would like to know what you have found that works. If you are not comfortable talking about sex directly, let's frame it as -

How do you keep the romance in your relationship with your partner when you are working and raising kids?

This is important because our relationships with our partners often take 3rd place, after work and children (or children and work). Yet, that is the most important adult relationship we have and romance is an important part of keeping that relationship close and warm.

I look forward to your responses.

Setting summer goals

2008-05-18T16:38:00Z

I love summer because it is different than the rest of the year. For most of us, is it slower and more relaxed. In the past, I've used summer to just relax into the slower pace of my work. I spend more time with my kids and I travel less for work.

This summer, I'm going to try something a little different. I'm going to set summer goals.

Here are mine:

1. Finish the proposal for the book "What Happy Working Mothers Know" with Cathy Greenberg and Aliza Sherman Risdahl.

2. Start interviewing a lot of working mothers about how they have struggled and juggled their way to happiness - I'm still looking for volunteers so let me know if you are interested in being interviewed.

3. Document my tangible contributions to my company over the past year and set out (in writing) my vision for talent strategy in the next fiscal year (starting Sept. 1)

4. Try something new. We are going to Costa Rica this summer so I'm thinking that zip lining may fill this requirement for me.

5. Get back into yoga

If I do all these things, it will make me feel good because I will have been productive (items 1-3), young at heart (item 4) and healthy (item 5). Wish me luck.

Let me know if you have any goals for the summer.

It's almost summer - do you know where you're children will be?

2008-05-17T14:41:00Z

For those of us in Arizona, there is one more week left in the school year. Summer always leaves me with mixed feelings. I enjoy the more relaxed schedule. There is no homework, no basketball practice or music lessons. Everything slows down in my kids lives. Of course, the rhythm of work doesn't change so life is a little more lopsided -busy at work, quiet at home.

When my kids were younger, I struggled to fill their summer days with interesting and educational activities. Since they were never interested in going away to summer camp, we did a lot of day camps. When they were little and we had a nanny, life was simple. I did feel a lot of longing to be with them in the park and enjoy those lazy summer afternoons eating ice cream and just strolling around. Notice I said longing and not guilt. I knew that the kids were perfectly happy without me and that my absence wasn't marring their childhood. I just would have preferred to be outside with them instead of in my office.

As they got a little older and we moved away from our nanny, filling the summer days with activities got a lot more complicated. Every week was a different camp and then there were play dates to fill in the gaps. When the school year re-commenced, it was actually a relief.

The highlight of every summer for me is the family vacation. We take a two week trip every summer. Generally, we go somewhere far away because I have lots of American Airline miles burning a hole in my virtual pocket. I love travelling with my sons. In my view, it is terrific education for them. They see how other people live, they hear different languages and learn a little about the history and customs of others. My goal is to make them citizens of the world - young men who know that people are people everywhere and all people deserve the same respect. We'll see how that plan works.

What are your plans for the summer? Do you find it to be a time you re-connect with your kids or are your kids away all summer? Do you re-connect with your significant other? Or is summer just like the rest of the year only warmer?

Post your response or write to me at barrett@barrettavigdor.com.

HAPPY MOTHERS' DAY!

2008-05-11T14:58:00Z

Happy Mothers Day!

Happy Mothers' Day to all of you!

I have a Mothers' Day question for you and I really hope to get lots of responses.

How has being a mother made you better at your work?

For me, there are at least 5 big ways in which being a mother has made me better at being a lawyer.

1. My sons have helped me to understand men. I grew up with only one sister (Happy Mothers' Day, Loren!). She is fabulous but she is not a guy. There is something about watching babies grow into boys grow into teenage boys that make the men I work with far easier to understand and appreciate.

2. Being a mother has made me more focused and efficient.   When you have a desperate desire to get home every day and you want to continue to be known as a strong team member or leader, you get very focused very fast. I have seen this in other working mothers that I know. It's not to say that non-mothers are not focused and efficient. The point is only that, when you have a strong counter-balance to your work that competes for your time, you concentrate hard on making the most of your time at work.

3. Being a mother has made me more patient. I expect every mom would say this. I am not a patient person but, as a result of raising my sons this far, I've learned that forcing things to happen how and when I want is not always the best answer.  Letting things do what they need to do at their own pace can often give you the best result.

4. Being a mother has made me a better leader. Moms are leaders. Whether you think of yourself as a leader of not, your kids look to you for leadership every day. Through trial and error, my kids have taught me to be a better communicator, to be very clear about my expectations, to be specific about the consequences of not following my rules and to be generous in my praise. Being a mother has shown me that, if I do not have a clear vision for the future of my kids and a clear set of rules of behavior, they will adopt the vision and the rules of someone else.

5. Being a mother has taught me to forgive my own flaws. One of the things I love the most about being a mom is that, when you mess up, you always get another chance. You can't get fired. You can't be replaced. Your kids will love you no matter what. With that feeling of forgiveness, I am more willing to take chances at work. I am more creative and more open to trying new things.

I would love to hear how your kids have made you better at your work. Please post a response to this blog or write to me at barrett@barrettavigdor.com

I wish you a Mothers' Day full of joy!

Working moms helping other working moms with compassion and just a little cash

2008-05-05T01:02:00Z

Have you ever felt like you want to do good in the world but just don't have time to volunteer and you don't have enough extra money to make a big contribution to a charity? I think most of us feel that way at some time or another. I've been feeling that way for at least 10 years. Of course, I give money to charities but I get no satisfaction from it because I don't really know where the money goes or what impact it has. The giving is faceless and that feels a little hollow to me. It's not that I'm looking for a "thank you", it's just that it would be nice to know who benefits from the money and how they benefit.

Microlending has proven to be a very powerful tool for lifting people, particularly women, out of poverty. Muhammad Yunus, the winner of the Noble Peace Prize, wrote a book called "Banker to the Poor" that describes his experience with microlending in Bangladesh. When women are financially independent, they can care for their families and themselves. Domestic violence goes down, children go to school and women create jobs for other women.

I just found an organization that I am excited about and want to share it with as many people as possible. It is a microlending organization called Kiva. Check out their website at www.kiva.org.   I love the fact that you get to see photos of the people asking for loans and you read about their business and what they will do with their loans. The part I like the best is that this is not charity at all. These are loans. You will be repaid (without interest) for your investment. Each profile gives you the credit history of the borrower and there is no 100% guarantee of repayment but the vast majority of loans are repaid.

I am currently lending to two working mothers. One is a woman in Cambodia who has a business buying and re-selling recyclable goods. The other is a loan to two women in Peru who buy non-perishable items and re-sell them in difficult to reach locations. One of the Peruvian women has 8 children, the other has 3. My plan is to build a small portfolio of loans and follow the progress of the entrepreneurs.  Assuming that the loans are repaid, I will re-invest that money in making other loans.

Let me know what you think of Kiva or whether you've had other experiences with microlending. Write to me at barrett@barrettavigdor.com or post your comment to the blog.

Moving teenagers - I need your feedback

2008-04-28T21:36:00Z

We all worry about our kids. When want them to be healthy, get good grades and find nice kids to be their friends because kids needs friends to be happy. My sons are 13 and 16 and I've worried pretty much every day for 16 years. Now that they are teenagers, my ability to control their behavior - particularly when they are out of the house, is severely limited. This means that I have to trust them and their friends not to do crazy things like drugs, drinking or drag racing.

A question came up recently that got me thinking and I'd like to hear your perspective. With the economy moving into recession, a lot of parents are losing jobs or houses or both. This can require them to change cities to find a place where they can support their families.

My question is this:

What impact does a geographic move have on a teenager? Are their ways to make the move easier or more successful?

If you have your own stories or even stories of other families who have moved with their teenagers, I'd love to hear it.

Write to me at barrett@barrettavigdor.com

You think you have it tough? Imagine being a working mom in Tokyo

2008-04-24T18:55:00Z

Last week, I was in Tokyo on a business trip. It was only my second visit to Japan and my first working trip there so I do not pretend to be an expert on Japanese culture. I was working with a group of 14, 7 of whom are women. Only one of the women was a working mom. I was eager to understand what her life is like and how she manages.

Child care in Japan is difficult to find and very expensive. Most women, she explained, stop working when their have children because it is so difficult to find good, affordable child care. Her 13 year old daughter is at boarding school and her 3 year old son goes to day care every day. Her husband goes to work early and gets out promptly at 6. Since she is a lawyer, she can never predict what time she will get home. So, she drops her son off every morning and her husband picks him up. That works really well, until he gets a cold.

She explained to me the high stress she felt when her son had a fever and had to stay home for a week. Fortunately, her supervisor was understanding and allowed her to work from home for the week. Her clients were not as understanding but she really had no choice.

As I listened to her, I felt sympathy and gratitude. Sympathy because, as a working mom for 16 years, I understood the stress you feel when you can't give your clients or your boss 100% of your energy AND you can't give your sick child 100% of your attention. Gratitude because I have always had good, affordable child care. Without good child care options, the stress created by a sick child can be very intense.

I would like to hear your stories of times when you had to stay home from work to care for a sick child or you had to leave a sick child to go to work. Write to me at barrett@barrettavigdor.com.