Technology can only go so far in helping us with work/life balance. If you feel stressed out but don't know why, you may need to clean up and organize your living space.
According to Dr. Manny Alvarez, Senior Managing Health Editor of FoxNews.com and Chairman of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Reproductive Science at Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey, in a video from FoxNews.com, you can lower your stress by cleaning up clutter.
Personally, I cannot stand a messy room. Whenever I go to my friend's house, I automatically start to clean because the moment I set foot in her apartment, I feel anxiety and stress over the sheer clutter and dirtiness I see. Dishes are piled up, used water glasses cover the end tables and clothes are everywhere. But not everyone has the same level of organizational ability, which is why professional organizers are popular.
The article "Housekeeping Tips for Less Stress" from March 2009, mentions that cluttered homes are the norm. I think this may be a contributing factor as to why so many people of all ages feel stressed. Our lives are busy and technology allows us to multitask so we constantly feel rushed or off-focus, making it hard to quench feelings of stress. If we are welcomed after work by a messy, unorganized house, our stress level increases.
Messy homes hurt more than your mental energy, they also waste money. According to "Home Relaxation" from about.com, people who don't have a specific place for their belongings often forget where they are or buy more of the product. For example, my friend has about seven jars of peanut butter because she forgot she had them.
In fact, many experts will tell you that lack of organization is not only a major cause of stress but it is also a major cause of failing to achieve your goals in life. That's right. By becoming more organized, you can decrease your stress levels as well as increase your chances of achieving success in your life.
Psychologically, this makes sense. How can we keep our mind clutter and stress free if we are constantly bombarded with a messy home environment. Throughout my study of psychology, studies have shown that children who grow up in a clutter-free, organized and clean home are better able to adapt to their surroundings.
Below is a viral video about a woman who lives in a 90-square-foot apartment in Manhattan. Notice how stress-free she seems, all because she's able to maintain an organized home, despite its small size.
The working world has changed drastically in the past few decades. A male-dominated world is slowly turning to a female-dominated world with work/life balance shifting in importance, greatly assisted by technology.
In the last generation, women surged into the workforce on the waves of feminism, getting increasingly higher positions and dominating roles that men used to hold in both the home and the workplace. Because of this shift between roles, men have slowly started losing motivation and have begun to act more like boys according to the book Manning Up by Kay S. Hymowitz, which was reviewed on RealClearPolitics.com. We also see men using technology in a more narcissistic way than women, which could be due to natural instincts or men's rivalries with other men according to scienceandreligiontoday.com.
Another impact of women's move into the working world is the changes in work/life balance. According to an academic paper from worklifebalance.com, an international work-life balance training and consulting company, childcare, paternity/maternity leave, and work hours are among some of the changes the working world has seen in regards to work/life balance.
Now that women have become such a dominant force, I think men have shied away from responsibility and decision making, which used to be their expertise and their duty as husband and bread winner. In a 2011 article by Heather Wilhelm called "Men May Be Jerks... But Women Are Insane", she talks about our hyper-feminized world that disallows for men to feel the same motivation for success they once did in a male-dominated world. Conversely, many women have become "alpha-girls" in which they strive for success in their career. But this is not necessarily a good thing.
What all of this adds up to for women is a gap between the cultural ideals behind preadulthood-equality, freedom, personal achievement, sexual self-expression-and biology's pitiless clock.
With some men acting more like boys, a trend we see in countless sitcoms, their use of technology shifts. Many men play video games, buy expensive TVs and electronic gadgets to stay in competition with other men, proliferating the view that men use technology in a narcissistic way, as a 2011 article from scienceandreligiontoday.com points out.
Before women's surge into the workforce, companies didn't put as much stock into work/life balance because men were the breadwinners and women stayed at home. But now companies have to take maternity leave and childcare into account. According to the authors of a 2002 academic paper "Work-Life Balance... A Case of Social Responsibility or Competitive Advantage," 62.8 percent of traditional families are dual-income households. To attract these workers, companies offer childcare incentives, something that wasn't necessary in previous decades.
Check out this training video from 1944. Notice how the men talk about women and the progress we've made since.
I think that the changing dynamic between women and men and their relationship in the workforce will continue to change work/life balance and how we use technology to assist in those changes or to set ourselves apart from others.
