‘Stay home, flatten the curve,’ it was the way we walked into lockdown, and through our quarantine life. It was as well the way to make us conscious about our ‘homes’ and our work-life balance. Something we should not forget when we walk our homes out again.

Work-Family Clash

For many families, however, the same disbalance of this rat race just continued at home. Teleworking is beautiful, less emissions and traffic jams, less time, energy, and fuel spend in commuting, less hassle going out and about, and for some even increased productivity.

This all changes if you have a few toddlers at your care. As they are supposed to ‘work from home’ as well, various parents started combining the role of teacher with the one of full-time employee. Both commitments clashed. Moreover, in most families this battle was largely fight by the mother figures, whereas the father figure could pursue his career commitment. Turning back the times.

Work-Family Balance

So, how could we solve this dysfunctional disbalance inherent to our rat race society? Let’s have a look at the Scandinavian countries, where the scarce daylight during winter forces people to be more at home anyways. Still, Denmark scores among the happiest countries in the world.

Year after year, the Danish people score among the highest if not the highest itself on global happiness indexes. Besides having high trust in government and being a fair wealthy nation, the main reason for their even self-perceived happiness is the culture of ‘Hygge’.

Hygge is the cultivating and valuing of high-quality intimate relationships. They create it by organising cosy family nights around the firepit, or having a good coffee with a friend for instance; non-spectacular activities with a spectacular result: happiness. Therefore, to the Danish, hygge is a fundamental part of well-being.

But there is more. Danish claim to prioritise life above work. As a result, they score higher than average on any work-life balance index. Imagine, only 2% of the Danish reports to work regularly long hours, compared to 13% of other OECD countries, Two-thirds of their day goes to non-work activities. They have time to enjoy life and social relationships, while they enjoy greater flexibility at work as well, such as working from home and flexible starting hours, while guarding the lunch break as a designated break in which they can catch up with colleagues rather than overworking. On top of that, they have 5 weeks of paid leave guaranteed, and longer maternal and paternal leave than many other countries.

Hence, if an overall better balance between work and family, in combination with higher valorisation of intimate connections is the key to happiness, why wouldn’t we all prioritise family and real connections, or ‘life’ above work?

If in times of corona the cracks of our system became visible, work-life balance was an obvious one, so let’s use the Danish glue to fix it.

This article is part of the series of Hope in Times of Corona. Read

1. How this too shall pass
2. how this times of self-isolation should not mean loneliness,
3. how you can contribute to this battle, 
4. how gratitude lights up the dark,  
5. how united we will stand strong
6. on the most util strategy in awake of a crisis 
7. how I got blown of my feet as well, but caught by many caring hands, 
8. how being calm can get us through the storm.
9. about Love in Times of Corona
10. how to discover your own talents 
11. why we need stories to hold on to 
12. how you can be creative and innovative.
13. how to spend your mot valuable assets in times of Corona.
14. how to listen to the sound of silence. 
15. How breath taking Corona really is.
16. discover the other freedoms Corona has shown us, 
17. about the new-born freedom Corona gave us.
18. about another way to exceed your personal bubble.
19. about the position of nature in this entire story
20. about nature bouncing back
21. about the crucial choice between resilience and resistance
22. about the game to play
23. about star gazing in dark times
24. About looking for Meaning
25. About how Music Connects
26. about what Easter and Corona have in Common
27. About the Shark and the Turtle
28. About the Irony of Distance
29. Why to Hold on
30. Fake News
31. about The Big Unknown we live at
32. about Feeling Alive
33. About turning obstacles into opportunities
34. about what the Birthday of my nephew learned me about life 
35. About where we should go from here?
36. About coping with incertitude
37. About the Great War and the Great Pandemic, and we should not forget
38. about history’s most important message, echoed by corona
39. How one country could rule them all
40. About how to prevent the next Green Pandemic 
41. about how we are experiencing a new episode of our history books
42. about when the poppy flowers
43. about what’s in a number
44. masks off, how a friend in need is a friend indeed
45. What’s Next. after we flattened the curve?
46. how will our personal story look like in a post-corona world?
47. why we should never let a good crisis go too waste.
48. How Spring can happen in Autumn
49. How to unlock the lockdown
50. Why education matters
51. How we can give meaning to the meaningless deaths. (rethink health care)
52. The remarkable marketability of health, or not?
53. the remarkable rewards of health
54. The queeste for global health care 
55. Health Heroes
56. Pains and Gains 

Or wait until tomorrow, when I’ll shine another light on yet another positive corner of this dark times.