Have you ever felt like you are constantly going as a teacher?

Lesson planning. Grading. Sponsoring clubs and activities. Taking students to tournaments. Attending meetings. Answering emails. And then, somewhere in there, you’re also supposed to be a spouse, a parent, a friend, and an actual human being.

It is exhausting.

Even before I became a teacher, I heard the warnings about work-life balance and how difficult it can be to separate work from home.

Turns out, they were right.

I’m really feeling the exhaustion this September. I have a new prep, I’m coaching, I agreed to sponsor a sewing club, the school year has brought more meetings than I can count, and my son is becoming more involved in activities of his own.

I am tired.

It probably doesn’t help that one of my cats has apparently decided 3:00 a.m. is an appropriate time to start the day.

So, how do you handle the exhaustion when the work seems never-ending?

I definitely don’t have work-life balance completely figured out. But over the last few years, I’ve found a few things that help me keep teaching from consuming every minute of my life.

1. Take the Personal Day

Seriously.

Take it.

There seems to be this weird guilt surrounding teachers taking personal days. We worry about making sub plans. We worry about what our students will accomplish while we’re gone. Sometimes preparing to miss school feels like more work than simply showing up.

But sometimes you need the day.

Maybe you need to sleep. Maybe you need to sit on the couch and do absolutely nothing. Maybe you need a day to catch up on the mountain of work that has been hanging over your head so you can stop thinking about it every night.

Use the day for whatever is going to help you come back feeling like a functioning human being again.

Burning yourself out doesn’t make you a better teacher.

2. Leave at Contract Time

This is one I’ve had to make a conscious decision about.

I know that I have more work than I can realistically complete during my contract hours right now. I’m building new curriculum, and that takes time. There isn’t some magical productivity hack that’s suddenly going to create five extra hours in my school day.

So I’ve made myself a deal.

I’ll arrive early.

But I’m leaving at contract time.

For me, that’s the boundary that works right now. I know I’m going to sacrifice some personal time while I’m building this curriculum, but I don’t want to sacrifice all of it.

When contract time hits, I go home.

There will always be another lesson to tweak. Another assignment to grade. Another resource I could create.

The work will still be there tomorrow.

3. Stop Saying Yes to Everything

I struggle with this one.

Interestingly, I struggle with it the most when I’m feeling good about my job.

When I’m excited about teaching and things are going well, my brain starts saying:

Yeah! I could do that!

New club?

Sure!

New project?

Absolutely!

Extra responsibility?

Why not?!

And then Future Me looks at the calendar and wonders what Past Me was thinking.

I’ve had to learn that being excited about an opportunity doesn’t mean I have to take it.

You can care about your school and still say no.

You can love your students and still say no.

You can be a dedicated teacher without volunteering for every single thing that needs to be done.

Sometimes the best thing you can do for the commitments you’ve already made is refuse to add another one.

4. Remember That Balance Changes

I don’t think work-life balance always means creating a perfect divide between work and home.

Sometimes work takes more.

Right now, I’m building a new curriculum. Debate season is getting started. Activities are picking up. September seems determined to put something on every available square of my calendar.

This is a busy season.

There will be other seasons when things slow down.

I’ve learned that the important thing is recognizing the difference between a busy season and a permanent way of living.

I can accept that I’m going to work more right now while I’m building something new. But I don’t want working constantly to become the expectation I set for myself.

There has to be a point when I go home.

There has to be a point when the laptop closes.

There has to be room for my family, my hobbies, and occasionally doing absolutely nothing without feeling guilty about it.

The Work Is Never Actually Finished

Maybe that’s the hardest lesson I’ve had to learn about teaching.

There is always something else you could be doing.

You could improve tomorrow’s lesson. You could grade another stack of papers. You could reorganize your Canvas page. You could create something for your team. You could answer another email.

If you wait until the work is finished before you let yourself rest, you’re never going to rest.

So sometimes you have to decide that you’re done even when the work isn’t.

Go home.

Take the personal day.

Say no to the extra thing.

Close the computer.

Tomorrow, the work will still be there.

And hopefully, you’ll have a little more energy to do it.