My Work From Home Kids

While on the verge of doing work from home one day, I came across a forum post tackling about one of the major challenges faced by home-based working parents – their kids. Curious and interested, this bubbly brain of mine decided to read on and engulfed a lot of funny yet meaningful experiences and lessons brought about by people torn between their work from home and parenting.

Chances for the said situation to become part of my reality are by far low, if not very low as of now. Still, I can only imagine what they have to go through as they try to make sure their kids don’t come in the way of their work from home. But then, even if I don’t have to deal with “Mom, I’m hungry!” or “Dad, can we play ball?” stuff, there are other species of ‘kids’ I have to live through right now and probably, you know or might have known them too.

Kids on the block

Friends. Romans. Countrymen. Yes, at the height of your work, they pop in and say “Watcha doin’?” or “Hey girl! Wazzup?” And there goes Mr. Focus flying away like a bird that was freed from its cage with no intentions of coming back whatsoever. That’s just the start. Wait till you find yourself drifting away from the computer and being stuck in a long, long conversation you’re not even aware of. Hypnosis. Totally. Or you may still be in front of the monitor but doing a different thing like searching for celebrity news, playing some online games or checking out your MySpace accounts with your friends. The ending? These kids from your neighborhood (peers for short) eventually get tired or realize that they have interrupted you far too much or have something else to do that they pop out from the scene as quickly as they appeared. This leaves you just hanging there, slowly recovering from the sudden outbreak and coming to your senses and to your work from home.

Kids that really hurt

Kid, a verb synonymous to “gull” and “fool” to which my point is one hell of a challenge people of the world wide web face everyday. They range from smalltime pranks by someone who just enjoys irritating others to serious, intentional scams, hate mails, spams and all by those greedy and mischievous. Stop kidding us, will you?

Kids at heart

One person to deal with is yourself and the kid in you. That kid who wants to play instead of work. That kid who wants to do something else other than work. That kid who tends to be lazy sometimes. That kid who wants to go out and bathe in the rain. That kid who is so simple and innocent not minding the harsh world beyond. Sigh! Sometimes, it’s just hard to create a balance.

Real kids or not, we have one way or the other to deal with how they affect our entire work from home. As long as we stood firm with our goals, we’ll be fine. Oh what the heck! Who am I kidding?