When you have children and a career, you can find getting a perfect balance somehow always eludes you. You want to be the best parent that you can be, of course. However, on the other hand, you want to build a successful career for yourself. One that truly highlights what you can do and what you can offer the nursing industry. Unleashing your full potential is important because it can help you become the nursing professional that you want.
Focus on What You Want to Achieve in Your Career
So, to begin with, you must think carefully about what you want to achieve as a nurse and in your nursing career. For example, do you want to be a nurse leader or perhaps a nurse educator? Are you looking to mentor and train other nurses, or are you looking to change and improve the lives of more patients? Before embarking on building a sustainable career, you need to know just what you want to achieve in your career, why, and by when.
Having more clarity and focus is important, so focus on this as soon as possible. A good idea of what you want to achieve will help you shape your future, and this will give you much-needed direction and clarity.
Look at Roles That Offer Flexible Schedules
When you are looking at building your nursing career around your kids, you need to be sure that you have as much flexibility as possible. Without flexibility, you will have more stress on your shoulders because you will always be rushing around trying to reach deadlines and trying to please everyone/keep everything running smoothly.
There will be roles that will allow you to dedicate much-needed time to your family, such as family practitioner roles. There will also be roles and opportunities that allow you the chance to work part-time or flexible hours, and these are going to be opportunities that you will want to explore further. Flexible working schedules for working hours give you the chance to plan and arrange childcare and plan fun-filled days with your kids and your family.
Start Mapping Out
When you have a career map or career plan to follow, you will find that you have more chances to succeed. If you fail to plan and you fail to map out what you want to do, then you could end up going around in circles. You could also end up missing out on opportunities and even wasting precious time.
When you are mapping out your future, try not to plan too far ahead. To start with, look at the next 5-year period. Look at where you see yourself and look at what role you would like to be in at this point. Career mapping and planning is not something that sets your plans in stone. However, it is something that gives you access to clarity and renewed focus.
Always Ensure There is Clear Time For Your Children
Even though you have lots that you want to achieve in your career, you still need to ensure there is a clear time for your children. Children do not want to feel an inconvenience to you and your working schedule, and they do not want to feel that you have no time for them. Even though you are focusing on building a nursing career, you still need to set aside time for your children.
Clear and focused time will give you the much-needed separation that you need (and that they need too). If there is no separation, then everything will become blurred. Prioritizing your time and making sure that you can fit everything in will take time. Persistence and patience will be required.
Decide Where Your Passion Lies
To get the career satisfaction that you want, you need to pursue a passionate nursing career. If you are not following your passion, then you will find that you will struggle to realize your true and full potential. When it comes to seeing where your passion lies, you have to first make sure that you are in the right specialism in nursing.
If you are not working within the right specialism, then you may have to make changes sooner rather than later. To be sure that you are in the right area of nursing, look at your daily role and purpose. Are you achieving all that you wanted to? Are you helping as many people as you can, and are you leaving work at the end of the day feeling fulfilled? When you know where your passion lies, you will then see that everything else starts to fall into place.
Accept That There Will be Compromises
On your journey and within your nursing career, there will be times when you will have to accept compromise. Being prepared to compromise is crucial. If you are not open to making sacrifices and compromising, then you may find your career never goes in the direction that you wanted it to.
To be open to compromise, you always need to weigh up the situation at hand and how it will look in the future too. See what you will get from compromising, and weigh up if it is worth it or not. If you cannot see what you will get out of comp0romizing – then ask yourself, is this the right choice to make?
Make Sure You Limit Your Time
Balancing children, family, life, and a career can be challenging – even for the most organized person. To ensure that you do the best you can, you need to organize and limit your time. You will have to limit the time you spend with your children, and you will have to limit the time you spend at work if you are to achieve balance.
Being aware of the time constraints you have will allow you to see how you can best utilize the time that you do have. You may find it beneficial to plan out the time that you have a week in advance or even further ahead because this will give you more of a sense of control.
Do Not Overstretch Yourself or Your Efforts
You only have so much time and energy to give to your nursing career and your children. So, ensure that you do not push yourself or overstretch, as this can end up being detrimental to your health. When you are pushing too hard or overstretching yourself, you will also find that you are not giving 100% of your effort.
This will not go unnoticed, and it is, of course, something that will not be appreciated. To ensure that you are not overstretching yourself or doing too much, you must regularly take a step back. Evaluate what you are doing and what you have to offer. Are you getting a healthy balance, or are the scales tipped out of your favor?
Find Your Motivation and Drive
When you are working towards a harmonious balance in your life, you will find that motivation and drive will keep you going (even though those testing periods). If you do not have the motivation and drive to push onwards and upwards, then you may find that you will come to a halt or even a standstill. To avoid this completely, you must establish what is driving your career and your choices
. What is motivating you and your nursing career? For instance, are you looking to build a more comfortable life for your family? Or is it all about giving patients the best care and experience? What is making you want to give all that you can?
Accept That You Will Be on a Journey of Learning and Self Discovery
As you move forwards with your nursing career and as you juggle family life and children, you must accept that this will be a journey of self-discovery. There will be times when you can do more than you expected.
However, there will also be times when you discover it is time to stop, slow down, and take your foot off the accelerator. Learning and discovery in your career will be important as they will help you to be a well-rounded and strong professional. You will also find that self-discovery on a personal level will help you be a better parent and caregiver for your children.
Get as Much Support as Possible
When it comes to building the career and life that you want, you need to get as much support as possible. Trying to do everything by yourself can be testing and trying. Reaching out to friends, family, and other professionals are going to be the best way forward.
When you have a strong support network in place, you have people that you can reach out to and you have people that you can lean on in times of need. You do not have to do everything by yourself, and you should not try to, as this could well be counterproductive. To build a strong support network, you may also find it advantageous to make use of professional networks.
