Work/Life Balance

It’s an unfortunate reality that most of our business shifted to the fourth quarter after the roll out of the Affordable Care Act. In the season of holidays and sniffles, Life & Health Agents are pounding the streets to help small businesses across the country with open enrollment.

Early mornings, late nights, weekends at the computer… living the dream, right? Maybe not so much. For those of us with spouses and little people, long hours at work are hard on the whole family.

So how do we make sure we are working to live, not living to work? How do we create a balance between our ambitions and our appreciation for the ones around us?

It matters.

If you’re young and independent you might not feel it yet, but when you get to the end of the game you aren’t going to lay in your deathbed reminiscing about the hours you spent massaging your keyboard, it’ll be the people you shared your life with and the adventures you took along the way.

That’s why I kicked off fourth quarter in the deep woods of a Midwestern town in northern Kansas, it’s why I championed an employee appreciation day for my team, and it’s why I made sure my wife and kids got a little extra R&R as well. Now we’re all full throttle to February.

Mound City, Kansas, has a population of 694. In early September it was 696. Traveling with a good friend that isn’t in the industry, I was able to avoid the shop talk and keep my focus on a few days of living off the land. I’m an outdoor enthusiast and growing up as a boy I always wanted to get a trophy white tail so I saved up my money and I did it.

Fresh air, challenging game and two avid outdoors man is my version of a day at the spa. I came home energized, rejuvenated, and ready for homemade venison jerky all at once.

That’s about the time I refocused on work. The team’s mental resilience in the coming months is a top priority because we could do more business this quarter than all the others combined. So masks and capes and a few riddles later we had our own amazing race.

There was some bowling and there was some grub. I could explain the Vaseline and cotton balls, but that might take a while. What matters, is that my wife delivered them to me so I’d be ready at my station when the teams arrived.

I had a little time so I got to sit down and interview her about life with an insurance man. It was interesting to hear her perspective on the teamwork it takes to juggle work and family.

My wife, Alyssa, is an accomplished woman. She’s traveled the world representing a clothing line, she’s been a successful event coordinator in Northern California and now she is the muscle behind our family’s happiness and success. When our first child, Madison, came along, we made the choice to have Alyssa leave the workforce. With kids, time is love and we wanted ours to have lots of it.

That meant living in very different worlds and making a conscious effort to create a place for our relationship somewhere in the middle. In my wife’s words, “It means I wear flip flops and you wear a suit, but we’re both working to support our family. It’s about appreciating each other’s role. I’d work nights or take a job working from home in a minute if we needed it, but you’re time at work has made it possible for me to dedicate my time to our family. We know our roles and we know not to take each other for granted.”

Like any accomplished person, I want to be as successful at home as I am on the sales floor. My job is to get it done in all areas of life.

Alyssa and I have our disagreements like anybody else. Just like a disagreement at work, it’s the resolution and the moving on that matters. It’s letting our kids see our unity, our teamwork and our partnership that matters.

But it isn’t just about not getting it wrong. It’s about getting it right. It’s about Alyssa having her spa days and me having my golf days and then coming together for good food and good wine. It’s about having the same values and goals so that we can go full throttle when it counts and amplify our life together.

I respect a guy like Gary Vaynerchuk for working his ass off when he’s not busy with his family instead of the other way around. If a guy can build his wealth to more than $160 million and still keep his family first, he’s doing something right. We can all learn from that.

If you've got a unique take on the industry, message me. I'm looking for other insurance professionals that want to share their knowledge and insight for the benefit of our community.

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For prior articles on Who's Buying Who, Ancillary Exchanges, Masterminds, Mentorship, or the Abundance Mindset, see my prior posts.