Ben Greenfield describes practical strategies for balancing travel and family life: he stipulates in speaking/travel contracts that his family may accompany him, and he always schedules a buffer day (either clearing the day after returning or booking a later flight home) to catch up on work so he can be present with family upon arrival.
I will stipulate that as a part of that speaking contract or that travel, my family, my wife, and sometimes my sons need to be able to come with me to whatever event it is. And that's just built into the contract. So I'll do that sometime. So the family just comes with. Another thing is I always have a buffer day, meaning either when I get home, I make sure there's no work scheduled, or I arrange for my flight home from the event to occur later in the day. So I've got like the whole morning in my hotel room to catch up on all the emails, the phone calls, the stuff that inevitably piles up so that when I do get home, I'm not rushing down to the office and, you know, having a brief and curt hello to the family before I jump back into work. So I make sure slate's cleared when I get home for the next day. Or I've got that buffer time worked in for a later flight home. So it's not like I got to rush home to see the family, because I know how I operate. If I rush home to see the family and I've got a plate full of work, all the family is going to see his dad's home and he's busy.
The Solution to Aging Might Be Closer Than Anyone Realizes - With Ben Goertzel
