There is a simple philosophy that I live by to help maintain peace and harmony in life, and that is what happens at work stays at work and what happens at home stays at home. Letting the two worlds impact one another can have devastating effects on both areas of your world. This can be especially challenging for people that work from home.

Many people work long hours in their jobs or home business and find they don’t feel like they have much left over for their families after a long day. Yet, the families are the priority, how to give your best to both can be a struggle.

Tip One: Use your commute time to shift gears mentally from letting go of the day at work, and begin thinking about your family.

Granted this is sometimes easier said than done, but you can use your commute time profitably, and is more geared toward those working outside the home. Begin to actively let go of the work day’s problems knowing they’ll be there tomorrow, and look forward to time with your family and what may be next.

Strategy Two: Create a Schedule

You might need to think outside of the box when you work from home. There’s a tendency to put in more work hours when you work from home, simply because there’s not clear boundaries of work hours. Maybe you can work after the kids have gone to bed, or early in the morning. But look at the schedule of your family and see if you can find times in their day when their needs are less and use that for work hours.

Strategy Three: Get Separate Phone lines

This will help create a division between work and home. Define work hours as much as you can. You can either have a cell or land line be one or the other. You can also have different phone rings for personal use to separate the roles. When it’s not work hours, let those business calls go to an answering device.

Four: Make a designated place for business transactions.

I know this isn’t always possible. What you can do is create a work space. There are really beautiful little room partitions that you can get to help create a separate workspace. It’s important for you to be able to get up and walk away from work.