On several occasions, I’ve read information on the web about ‘work-life balance’. – You know, how companies are realizing the importance of balance between work and life. It’s important for their employees to have a balanced life, because a happy employee, is a much more productive and creative employee.

I’m not sure exactly which companies are concerned with their employee’s stress levels, because I don’t think the one I work for is. I’m not knocking them, I’m just saying that customer service, efficiency, and profit is the focus and the bottom line. Working out stress and creating balance in the other aspects of life, is primarily a responsibility left to the employee.

So, is keeping balance between work and the rest of your life important? I sure think so, but I don’t think a company can or will provide that for you.

According to David B. Bohlof Reflections on Balance,

…companies attempt to frame the work-life discussion in a way that is most favorable to them………The discussions that companies have with their employees about work-life balance are adversarial by nature. At the heart of it, the company wants more work from the employee and the employee wants more time off. Thus, company-employee discussions are win-lose propositions because they invariably end up being about the corporation versus the employee.

The fact is that to achieve a balance between work and the rest of your life, that’s something that you will have to do for yourself. Waiting on your employer to provide that, is like waiting for the government to provide it……..as they fix all your other problems as well. That’s how I see it….

I’ve been playing around with my Ubuntu installation since reading Ben from Openswitch’s tour of his PC. Ubuntu has released Feisty Fawn now, which I have not upgraded so far. Right now I’m running Edgy Eft on my second hard drive, and have only been logging in to it every so often for the past couple of months.

I had planned on ditching Windows completely at the time, but I was having a few problems getting some of my settings right, and got tired of tweaking. For instance, I upgraded to a 19-inch flat screen monitor, and had a lot of trouble getting the screen resolution set right…….so I set Ubuntu aside at the time. It turns out, that wasn’t such a big deal to fix……….but sometimes you do have to do some research to come up with the answers.

Some Good Points

The way I see it, Ubuntu has a lot of good points. One of the main things being the price…….$0.00. Aside from that, the possibilities are just endless. If you know what your doing, you can make it do anything that computers are capable of doing. There are programs to fit just about any need you may have – that are also free. There’s a huge friendly community at the Ubuntu Forum and tons of customizations at sites such as Gnome-Look.org.

Not-As-Good Points

Something that’s not so great, is that upon installation, there’s a lot of things to do to get up and running. For instance, if you have a graphics card, installing the drivers can be a headache. If you want to watch those YouTube videos, you’ll probably have to install some codecs to get them to work. It’s mostly easy-to-fix stuff, but when you already have Windows installed, it’s a lot easier to just log in to it. I know, that doesn’t sound so bad. I guess the biggest downside is, you can’t use some programs that you really like. For most programs, there are alternatives available, but it’s not always the same.

I plan to keep learning more about Ubuntu/Linux. I think there are a lot of positive things about Open Source Software.

Jonathan at SmartWealthyRich is running this contest, where he’s giving away a copy of the book, Secrets of the Millionaire Mind. I’m not sure when the deadline is, but there’s still time if you would like to participate. I like to read, and I like money, so it sounds like a good deal to me.

So the question is, “Why would I like to be a Millionaire”? Well, I think it’s natural to associate money with less stress. In other words, “if I had plenty of money, I wouldn’t have to work, and I wouldn’t have to worry about how I’m gonna pay all my bills, etc.” However, I think having money would not necessarily be less stressful. It may be a different type of stress. Not stress to survive, but stress to manage and keep. I think having to manage and hold on to your money might be easier to deal with.

When I consider myself with a million dollars, I don’t really see myself in a fancy car or living an extravagant lifestyle. I think I would certainly pay off my debts immediately, but aside from that, I think I would want to figure out how to leverage that money to create an income. If you only made 10% per year off of it, thats $100k. $100,000 of debt-free income sounds pretty good! That would let me provide my son with the best opportunities and it would free me up to try new things, regardless of the profitability.

So maybe if I win this book, I’ll learn all the secrets…..

Must I Play Golf To Get Ahead? is an article from Anne Fisher on Yahoo Finance from a few days ago. I think that’s a really good question.

I’ve read in business books before, that some of the best business relationships are made on the golf course. I’ve also witnessed it first hand to an extent. I see people move up the ladder, who are generally considered good golfers. Obviously, playing the game of golf is not a prerequisite for being successful in business, however it is a great tool, and that’s a fact.

I used to play golf, or played at golf may be a better way to put it. It is an enjoyable activity, leisurely playing the game surrounded by beautiful scenery. However, I felt that to really improve, I needed to devote more time to it than I had to give. I also felt that if I wasn’t going to actively try and improve, that the time and expense wasn’t worth it. That may or may not have been the best decision.

There’s no doubt that golf can bring new opportunities your way. Especially if you’re fairly skilled. The better you are at the game, the more people are interested in setting up a tee time with you. Golf is the game of the successful, and the successful like to congregate on the golf course.

I see one way that golf could actually hurt your career. If you wore those silly plaid pants to your job, you’d quickly become a laughing stock! Can you imagine this dude to the left showing up at the office looking like that? Can you imagine this guy trying to sell you an insurance policy or managing your portfolio? Personally, I’ve never understood why so many golfers dress so goofy…..

I continue to read on the net that the best and most successful blogs are the ones that focus on a particular niche or a particular topic. This site has never really defined it’s focus, and I’m not sure I want to try and classify it. It’s not that I have a problem with the ones that focus on a particular topic, but I can’t help but feel limited with what I decide to write about if I try to make it fit a particular niche. That may be the only possibility that I could ever reach the heights of blog stardom, but that’s not why I started it in the first place.

I’ve noticed quite a few blogs that define themselves in a certain niche, yet they still post about many different topics. I guess that’s fine, but why put a name on it? I think it’s probably to bring in a group of people that are interested in a particular topic. On the other hand, I have seen some very popular blogs that really don’t fit in anywhere…….they just do what they do, and they have tons of readers.

I can see the value of being focused on one main topic, mainly if your trying to build a business with it……….I would say it’s crucial for building business. But when I think about settling on one topic for this site, it just takes the fun out of it. I realize that I tend to write about a couple of categories on a regular basis, but I just don’t want to limit myself. I do want my readership to continue to grow, but my broad array of topics possibilities may keep that from happening.

So I suppose that would mean that I’m focused on not focusing?