Tips on How to Be a Happy Super Mum

Nobody plans it this way. However for one reason or other, many women wake up one day and find themselves a career woman, a housewife and a mother all at the same time. The family needs her salary, the husband needs a wife, the children need their mother and the house needs a cleaner. Wow, what a life! Women are said to be more resilient than men. Women do not run away. Women will adapt and live on. Yet the question here is how to live on happily? Here is a little help for all the brave women in the world.

1. Think positive. Be brave, there is no conflict of interest between all the roles you are assuming. As you have chosen your life, aim to be successful and make a balance in both worlds. Do believe in yourself. You are capable of doing it, and doing it well. You must gather your determination, then reorganize, be innovative and plan your strategies and tactics, and you can be the super mum you aspire to be.

2. Look after yourself well. Your health is the vital factor. A sickly woman can hardly perform any role efficiently, let alone two or three roles. Your health is a prime factor to your happiness too. An unhappy person can neither go far in her career nor bring joy to her family. Only a happy mother can have a happy family.

3. Focus on your role of the moment. When your role is a career woman, try hard to forget all the house work, your husband and your children, (not necessarily in that order!). When the time comes to be 'a housewife', concentrate and be the mother and housewife you want to be, do not let problems at work affect your mood and emotion.

4. Remember, your career and dealing with family members (husband and children included) need to be done daily. However, cleaning up the house can wait. You do not have to split yourself into equal portions every day. On weekdays, you have to spend most of time at work; when you are on leave, (or during the semester break for teachers and lecturers) do the spring cleaning dusting, vacuuming and sort out clothes, books and papers, and the other thousand and one odd jobs around the house. Weekends should be reserved for your husband and the children.

5. You have to know when to relax and have a break. Do not be exhausted and overwhelmed with the all too many demands, and drowning from trying to be perfect. Keep in mind, super mums are efficient, not perfect.

6. Cook in large quantities, then store or deep freeze. Remember to label each container clearly. The date of cooking is important. Soon you will learn which types of food can be kept the longest. Deep freezing may destroy the structure of some foods but not others. Keep trying, you will soon be an expert.

7. Use modern technologies to simplify your work. Crock pots, pressure cookers, microwave ovens, steam irons are only a few of the many new inventions to lighten our work.

8. At times, we all have that 'just when you have finished cleaning the kitchen, another round of crumbs fall' moments. Be thankful and not fumble and fret. Many childless couples may even envy you for having crumbs to pick up.

9. Do not wait for your mom or his mom to clean up the house when they next visit. If you do that, soon you'll lose your self respect as well as your family's respect and you won't be the super mum you aim to be.

10. Train the children to help in the house chores. Do not keep a child out of the kitchen just because he is careless and is always breaking things. Be glad that he is willing to come into the kitchen. Give him a chance. He may become the second cook in the family. (Of course you as the superwoman must still be the best and chief cook.).

11. Keep improving yourself. You are the 21st century super mum. So you need to deal with gadgets in the kitchen, as well as computers, electronic toys, game boys and so on. You need to know who are Confucius, Bill Gates, the Korean Super Juniors and the Japanese comic characters. You are not to keep a caveman attitude. Learn together with your husband and children, so they can communicate with you. Don't let them feel the 'generation gap' or 'communication gap' that hurts so much.

12. Form a group with other super mums. That is the place where you can share advice, de-stress, connect and find support. Do remember you are not alone. Make use of other women's experiences and share your own with them.

We are also lucky that nowadays employers are more sensitive to working mothers, and there is much less discrimination against us. As long as we show our worth and remain productive, we will be retained. God willing let us do the best we can and get the reward we deserve.