Flourishing@work + home - using your strengths to find your balance

Returning to paid work after taking a period of maternity leave (which might have lasted for years) can be a big deal and there is often a lot to balance between work and home.  My personal experience has sometimes been that the coordination of child care and work hours can be enough to make me feel exhausted even before I step into the workplace. That then can make it hard to perform as well as you want to at work.

But what if……..

• Work was a place where you felt extremely engaged, confident and happy?
• Your work gave you regular opportunities to use and showcase your strengths?
• You left work most days feeling uplifted and energised?

At the beginning of this year we wrote about Strengths for the New Year  and the well-researched evidence that identifying and using your personal strengths can increase your life satisfaction and sense of well-being.  This notion of “playing to your strengths” seems to us to be a key way of managing the balance of family and paid work.

If you want to return to paid work we encourage you to look for work which allows you to use your strengths and to look for ways to spend more time on the aspects of work that you love and/or are great at.  The lovely flow-on can be that you bring home so much more energy to your family and are able to better accomplish and enjoy the myriad of child related activities.

Before you start job hunting you could make a list of the things you enjoyed most about your last position, the aspects you felt most confident in, and the areas in which you regularly received good feedback.  You may not be able to build all these elements into a job but identifying these things is a great place to start! 

Positive Psychology research into personal strengths consistently shows that people who use their strengths experience less stress, have higher levels of self-esteem and are more likely to achieve their goals.  This is at the same time as enjoying more energy and a feel-good buzz.!

We hope that these ideas will help to give you energy and enthusiasm for your own balancing act!

Best wishes from Flourishing Mothers

Adapted by Flourishing Mothers from the work of Carmel Proctor, John Maltby and Alex Linley.

Well-being is contagious!

I think you’ll probably agree with me that it’s very hard not to smile when your child giggles uncontrollably and sharing a funny story with a good friend usually leaves both of you feeling happy. 

We know in our hearts that sharing positive emotions is good for all concerned. Scientific research takes this idea a step further and suggests that the sense of well-being created by positive emotion can be contagious in communities.

Researchers in the UK tracked happiness levels in a community over a period of 20 years and found evidence of distinct clusters of individuals reporting high levels of positive emotions and overall well-being.  The researchers saw evidence that positive emotions are contagious, that they can be transmitted over social networks a bit like a virus (but with better outcomes). Further, that if a member of an individual’s family or a close friend reports being happy, that individual is statistically more likely to report higher levels of happiness.

In another study, research carried out by the Gallup organisation suggests that the well-being of employees is strongly influenced by their immediate supervisor’s level of well-being and that this relationship increased over time and appeared to be reciprocal.  It seems that an individual could be a positive influencer of the well-being of their entire team.

What is really encouraging in this for mothers is the idea that striving to improve our own well-being can actively assist our family and friends.  It can be hard to set aside time for yourself but I hope that the idea that your well-being can infect those around you might be an added motivation. 

In previous blogs we’ve suggested some strategies for increasing your well-being that you could take another look at, or please feel free to email or call us for some other ideas.

Best wishes

Flourishing Mothers

Adapted by Flourishing Mothers from the work of J.H. Fowler & N.A. Christakis and the Gallup Organisation.

Strengths for the New Year

• What did you enjoy doing most in 2014?
• What consistently gives you a sense of energy and satisfaction?
• How would you like to be in 2015?

I’m hoping that these questions will lead you to consider your personal strengths. The study of individual character strengths is a key element of Positive Psychology and without wanting to over simplify – it’s about making the most of what you’re good at which appeals strongly to me!

Using your strengths, particularly in a new way, has been demonstrated in many scientific studies to provide a lasting boost in well-being and life satisfaction.  For example?  You may be a naturally curious person who loves discovering new things – you could deliberately put this strength into use and take your family to explore a new destination or try a new activity during the holidays. 

Research in the workplace suggests that people who consciously use their strengths more perform better at work and are more likely to achieve their goals.  When trying to improve performance the greatest return has been shown to come from focusing on using and developing strengths rather than fighting to improve areas of weakness

Sometimes we instinctively recognise our strengths and the strengths of those around us but if you have time over the summer you might find it fascinating to take the free strengths survey developed by the VIA Institute. You can find it at www.viacharacter.org/www/The-Survey If after you take the survey you would like to discuss your results please give Flourishing Mothers a call.

As we jump into 2015, may we suggest an overarching resolution –whatever you’re doing – “Play to your Strengths” and encourage those closest to you to do the same.  Whatever you’re planning to do this year, extra energy and an increased sense of life satisfaction will give you a flying start!

Best wishes from Flourishing Mothers

Adapted by Flourishing Mothers from the work of Alex Linley, Reena Govindji, Robert Biswas-Diener and Martin Seligman.