Actually it was the lack of Internetaccess that caused me great stress and threatened to impede my life/workbalance.
I’m in London with my 15-year-oldson. We arrived last night from Berkeley, CA. Since life/work balance is soimportant to me I knew that I needed a vacation. At the same time I have abusiness to run and I’m in the midst of several projects.
The plan was to hold virtualmeetings on-line, use Skype, and send email attachments. Since I’m neverworking in one time zone, I didn’t think it would be a problem. Someone oncesaid, “Some things never work out the way you want.”
As we were waiting for ourplane, while talking to my assistant, my cell phone just died. That was thefirst problem. When we arrived in London, I was not able to get online and thenew person at reception was not able to help me.
I went out with my son forthe day, and had a great time, walking for hours around London. I just knew that when I got back, therewould be someone who could give me some assistance and I didn’t give it anotherthought. Unfortunately, that was not the case. I started thinking about peopleI needed to reach here in the UK and back in the states, and worrying aboutlost productivity. I had to remind myself several times that the world wouldstill go on and so would I if I had to wait a few extra hours, (not that Iwanted to of course.)
This was a lesson in being inthe present. I’m here with my son on vacation with a little bit of work thrownin. I’m not working with a little bit of vacation thrown in. The time may comevery soon when he would rather go to Europe or anywhere else with friends. Itwas time to let go of the Internet and all of my “important work,” for the restof the evening and enjoy my son.
We got back to our hotel ashort time ago. Its 2:00 AM, I got online, and my son is in the lobby with agroup of college students doing Karaoke and having a great time.
I’m just grateful that Ididn’t ruin our day by obsessing about what I needed to do and how important Iam. It almost reminded me of the South Park episode when the Internet was downand it was a national crisis equal to massive floods, fire and global warming.
Related Stories: | Topics:Innovation, Leadership, Management, Work/Life, quality of life, work-life balance, workplace environment, London (England), Berkeley (California), United Kingdom, Skype Ltd., Europe |
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Recent Comments | 5 Total
September 7, 2009 at 6:35am by Chris Fernandes
Hi
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Chris Fernandes
September 7, 2009 at 6:36am by Chris Fernandes
Hi
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They also dont hike their prices anytime they have standard prices throughout the year. They also provide good discounts on bookings.
Chris Fernandes
September 7, 2009 at 6:37am by Chris Fernandes
Hi
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They also dont hike their prices anytime they have standard prices throughout the year. They also provide good discounts on bookings.
Chris Fernandes
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Mario
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