Hello,
I'm Mervi Eskelinen!
An artist, nerd and sorcerer, dedicated to make world softer and better for everyone, and to get you to make more art. Make art, change the world!
How to make working from home work for you
Most of those articles and tips you read about working from home don't ask the most important question: What works the best for you when you are working from home?
Reading all the articles online, working from home can appear like the most difficult task in the world. There are tons of opinions and half-assed studies about how to work more efficiently from home. The more complex the advice is, the better. For example, there's that helpful and often repeated advice about having a separate working space. It tells how working from home you should, must, have to have a separate working space. Preferably it should be another room with a door and very little distractions. Let's not forget the fact that it must be always in order, organised and perfect. And you should change into working clothes, not wear your pyjamas or sweatpants. Why won't you put on make-up too and do your hair, while you're at it.
All that helpful advice is making you to chase the habits of successful people. As pointed out in the article I linked, that is not going to make you successful. Nobel-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman has given a formula of success. According to him, success = talent + luck and great success = a little more talent + a lot of luck. While that is a bit out of the scope of the main idea of this article, you see that success has nothing to do with the "20 habits of very successful people". In regards of how you work from home, the advice is similarly skewed. The habits and methods may or may not fit you and your situation, your work and your way of getting things done. Your brain sees causality where there's none. So if a successful person working from home says they need a separate room for it, you start to think your lack of success is due to you not having a separate working room.
I have been freelancing and mainly working from home for 9 years. I'm the most productive, get the most done, get most relaxed and creative when working from home. I can talk to myself and nobody has anything to say about the way I look (or smell). My spouse works from home too and our home is small. So small there's no separate room for working for either of us. Unless one of us goes into the bathroom to work. There are only two people in our open office and both have a very casual Friday every day. I have done some work in nude before popping in that other room we have to take a shower. The television is often on, sometimes there's music or something else in the background. No silence, silence is distracting. There's beauty in chaos. My mind thrives when it's unleashed, when there's no set place, time and clothing confining it.
An office is full of distractions. The other employees, the boss breathing down your neck (hopefully only figuratively speaking), phones ringing, people talking and walking. Yet some people work the best in the offices like that. At home, there are different distractions. Family members, the unwashed dishes, that strange crack on the ceiling, that other thing you've gotta do, Facebook... You might think distractions don't come in your separate working space at home. They do. Often those distractions are in your mind. You can get distracted by something inside your workspace as well as something that happens out of it. Perhaps you realise, in the middle of everything all, that your pens should be arranged by colour. What was that sound behind the door? Are the kids being too quiet? There you go, you are distracted. Distractions happen. As a matter of a fact your brain cannot keep focused to one thing for a very long time. You get tired. Too much focus makes you dull and uncreative. Your mind is thirsty for distractions.
The organised people have a tendency to scoff over us unorganised ones. And us unorganised ones are ashamed of not being organised. Thus why there are so many blog posts about better organising your life and working from home. That is why the unorganised people try so desperately follow those tips and get so sad about failing to get organised. I have embraced my less than organised life and work. Mostly, at least. Thus why I'm not trying to create a working space, organised and separate. I don't need it. And I'm not going to be bullied into needing one. There are those people for whom the separate, organised and "distraction free" working space is how to do it. They need the organisation and silence and working clothes to keep working. If you are one of them, that's fine by me. But it's also okay not to need that separate room and quiet space and strict organisation and pantsuit to get your work done.
Your working habits, your need or not need for separate working space, your outfits, your organisation, they are yours only. Nobody else can dictate them. Not me, not that cool, successful biz person you admire. Not anyone else. The other people can only tell you what works for them. They cannot tell you what works for you. The best way to work from home? That's something you need to figure out for yourself.
Familiarise yourself with your own personal working habits and stop struggling to fit the generally admired ideals. Find out when and where you have been able to work the best. Take a note on what distracts you from work and when that happens. Be honest with yourself. Was the distraction in your mind, did it happen because you are tired? There are times when you are using distractions as an excuse not to work. Do you need that separate working space or do you just need to adjust the way you think? Your living and family situation also dictates parts of your working from home habits. If you have a small home you cannot be picky about the work space. Family members and their needs have to be taken into account. A spouse working from home as well of course adjusts your working habits. If journaling is your thing, try writing down how it felt to work today, why it felt that way, what went wrong, what went well. Get acquainted with what makes working from home easiest for you.
Quit chasing the habits of other people and get known with yours. This way you will find out what is the best way to work from home. For you.
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