How to Build a Passion Business While Raising a Family

I am constantly getting questions from readers about how they can pursue their passion business given whatever life situation they’ve found themselves in. But one situation tends to come up more often than most:

“I have a wife (or husband) and kids to support so how can I possibly make the transition to doing work I love?”

The way I always answer this is to point them to the people who are in very similar situations, who have families to raise and big financial obligations, who have defied the odds and built an incredible passion business and life for themselves.

The first person I always point to is Leo Babauta, the creator of Zen Habits.

In a matter of a few years Leo went from working hard as a newspaper reporter, to creating one of the biggest blogs in the world, and having a 100% passion based business – all from a standing start, from scratch, while literally living in the middle of nowhere out on Guam. Time Magazine consistently rates Zen Habits one of the top 25 blogs.

How is this possible?

The answer is simply simplicity. Family is the important thing, so make time, by simplifying your commitments, one by one. If you can simply your family life, your other commitments, and the steps it takes to pursue your passion business, you’ll have enough time. If you don’t simplify, you’ll just be trying to cram more things into an already crowded container.

How To Simplify Your Commitments

When I realized I had too much on my plate for my family and doing the work I was excited about, I realized something had to give. So I started to simplify commitments:

I started saying “no” to work committees. Yes, this meant I wasn’t as popular at work, but I decided my standing at work was less important than finding time for my family and passions.
I stopped accepting so many invitations. I had to say “no”.
I reserved one day a week (Sundays) for nothing but hanging out with my family and playing. That meant no parties, no other social obligations, no work, nothing.
I started getting out of other projects and commitments, one at a time. Getting out of these things is often just an email or a phone call.

Here’s what I learned:

You think it will be horrible resigning or saying no to a project, but while people might say “please!”, they will usually accept it after a couple firm “no thank you’s” and find another way to make it work. Life goes on.
Telling people your policy helps to keep your boundaries firm: “Sorry, I don’t make commitments for Sundays because it’s family day”, or “Sorry, I’m not taking on any other commitments for the next few months because my plate is full.”
Its’ very easy to say yes to something, because it never sounds very difficult. But it will usually take about 5-10 times as much of your time as you think. Seriously. If your plate is full now, don’t say yes to something without clearing away something else.
You’re not missing out on all the fun. It might sound like other people are having fun by going to all these cool parties, but you can have as much fun staying home and playing board games or kick ball with your family.

How To Simplify Your Family Life

Here are some of the things you can do to simplify your family life:

Work early while the family is sleeping. The most important work can be done in the early morning, so that by the time everyone else is moving for the day, you have time
Reserve later in the day for the family. There’s always a point in the afternoon when you need to call it quits, and focus on spending time with the kids. If you don’t, you can easily work into the night and never have time for the family.
I let the kids know when you need to work. While working from home means you can always make time for the family, you also need to have work time. So teach them to take care of themselves, learn on their own, help each other out, and entertain themselves, when you have to focus on work.
Don’t overschedule your kids. Many kids have every minute of their day scheduled, from school to school organizations to sports to music or dance lessons to play dates and more. Cut down on those things, and never do more than one at a time. So sure, your kids do less than most kids, but they then have to learn how to keep themselves entertained, and have more free time for most kids. That’s good for them, and it means we’re less busy.
Don’t worried about keeping up with the Joneses. The kids don’t have to have the latest gadgets or clothes.

How to Keep Your Passion Business Simple

While I think having work that I’m passionate about is very important (second only to my family), if I want to fit it into my life and still have family time, I need to be good about keeping work simple. Here’s what I do:

Limit your time. Set limits to how time you can give each task, so you can get them done. Limit how much time you have for email and other social online stuff, forcing yourself to make the most of that limited time.
Do 1-3 important things first. Early morning times is critical — if you don’t get the most important things done then, you might never get them done. So pick one important thing to do today, and do that first, before your day gets chaotic. If you can, do a second important thing, and then a third.
Cut out the things that don’t matter (almost everything). I’ve learned in the online world that there are lots of things you can fill your day doing: social networking, email, leaving comments on other blogs, improving your design, adding new plugins and widgets, checking your stats, and on and on. None of those matter. The only thing that matters is helping your readers with great content. That’s all that makes any difference, and if you cut out the rest, you have time for the important stuff.

When I finally found the passion ignited inside me, I stopped making excuses and started making priorities. And I’ve never made a better decision.

Related article: 7 Ways to Make Time For Your Passion