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Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

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Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#1

Post by noamelf »

I always feel a little strange among all the other 9-5 workers. It's really difficult for me to do that every day of the week. It's not that I'm not enjoying work or anything like that, while I'm at the office I totally enjoy it, but I once I get home I feel drained out, as if I can't do anything but watch TV. It's like all my mental powers are gone and I can only do the simplest thing possible.

Thing is, when people are talking about burn out, they usually mean 60 hours work week, so complaining about a 40-45 work week feels spoiled. Maybe my psych is not built for continues effort but short sprints and relaxation. When I stay to work from home, and split my work day into 2 halves, morning till noon, and evening until night, I feel much better, though I still work the same time more or less. Problem is, this is not something I can do regularly since It's not common to work from home where I work, and I'm leading a dev team so I need to be around.

Does anyone else feels the same way? How do you handle daily burn out?

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#2

Post by Freak_NL »

Can you cut down on the number of days you work? Even as a team-lead your team should be able to handle missing you one day a week (your team wouldn't be very self-sufficient if even that is impossible).

I am fortunate to live in a country where working three or four days a week instead of five is perfectly acceptable. I have explicitly chosen to work four days a week (four times 9-to-17), and use the remaining workday for my own relaxation/chores/shopping/projects. My partner does the same thing with a different day off, so we each get our own home alone downtime day. It works really well for us.

By working less days you effectively sacrifice only four evenings for recuperation from work, but keep three days for yourself. Of course that means less income, so this depends on your personal financial situation as well. It does make it easier to simply accept that you simply need the downtime in the evenings.

Some people are fine working five days a week, some aren't.

> Thing is, when people are talking about burn out, they usually mean 60 hours work week.

Only in some countries (US I guess?). Burnout is a global phenomenon. In the Netherlands people tend to work 40 hours a week, but burnout is still common enough here.

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#3

Post by alansmitheebk »

I'm guessing that you're an introvert and being around everyone in the office is what wears you out. If this is case, try and move your desk to a quieter less crowded part of the office and invest in some good headphones. You can also try going out for a walk in the middle of the day to get away from everyone.

Another thing you can do is focus on having more energy by doing things like working out, eating better, etc. If you are always tired you might want to go see your doctor and check for hypothyroid and / or low testosterone (assuming you are a middle-aged man)

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#4

Post by itamarst »

I definitely feel that way - I'm much happier when I'm working less than 40 hours a week, these days. It is possible to start with what you want and eventually negotiate or find a work situation that meets your needs.

Some options:

1. If you have good relationship at current job, see what you can negotiate. E.g. maybe you can become individual contributor. Maybe you can figure out way to make it work just by rearranging things - in office first half of day, available from 4-5 pm in afternoon, or something.

2. Find a different job where you can the job schedule you want. E.g. remote job, or just a job with more flexible work schedule.

2. Negotiate a less-than-40-hours job - definitely possible, I interviewed someone who has been doing that for 15 years: https://codewithoutrules.com/2018/01/08/part-time-programmer...

(I talk about options, negotiation skills and more in my related book, The Programmer's Guide to a Sane Workweek: https://codewithoutrules.com/saneworkweek/).

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#5

Post by p0ints »

I'm feeling the same. I think it's very common. That's what motivates people to go above and beyond and try to be financially independent - as the alternative is having very little from life until you're old and retired.

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#6

Post by shoo »

If you want to have time in your week outside of work where you aren't drained, one thing to try is waking up earlier every day and focusing on your own stuff before heading in to the office

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#7

Post by tboyd47 »

Think of human activity as lying on a spectrum of mental effort. You probably need activities that lie somewhere in the middle range of energy and complexity. Work is probably on the higher end: an continuously exhausting challenge. Vegging out in front of the TV is the lower end: relaxing, but unfulfilling and boring.

If the only mentally engaging activity you ever do is work, then every time you get bored, you will jump straight into overdrive just by THINKING about it. This will actually wear you out even if it's only 30 hours a week or 20 hours. You need activities that are only a little bit challenging to distract you from the big one.

I experienced the same problem myself (replace TV with jogging). I had other things going on (RSI, frustrating work environment), but adding hobbies like competitive video gaming and painting landscapes helped my mental health tremendously.

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#8

Post by biasforaction »

I burned myself out building and launching a cloud service last year. After that service launched publicly, I quickly took three weeks off. The first week I felt depressed and was barely able to get up in the morning. The second week I started to feel better and was able to achieve daily goals. The third week I started to feel like my normal self but was nowhere close to being ready to go back to work.

Currently, I'm still struggling to have my normal drive during the 9-5. My short-term memory is not at its best. I'm averaging only a couple hours of coding a day but I'm also a lead on my team, so I have a lot of interruptions throughout the day. I feel energized on Monday, but by Friday I feel like a failure (like right now). I feel stuck.

After work I invest my time into improving skill-sets, knowledge, and other projects until 10 or 11 pm. My goal is to have an exit strategy in place by the end of this year.

I know I'm still recovering from the burnout and it seems like it's going to take another year to recover fully. Every week I want to break down, cry, and leave but I'm afraid to jeopardize everything that I've worked hard to achieve.

I would like to share more about my story and background, but I'm afraid to share too many personal details that will identify myself.

"Help Me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You're My Only Hope"

Re: Ask HN: 9-5 burnout?

#9

Post by noamelf »

tboyd47 wrote: post #7

Think of human activity as lying on a spectrum of mental effort. You probably need activities that lie somewhere in the middle range of energy and complexity. Work is probably on the higher end: an continuously exhausting challenge. Vegging out in front of the TV is the lower end: relaxing, but unfulfilling and boring. If the only mentally engaging activity you ever do is work, then every time you get bored, you will…

> Think of human activity as lying on a spectrum of mental effort. You probably need activities that lie somewhere in the middle range of energy and complexity. Work is probably on the higher end: an continuously exhausting challenge. Vegging out in front of the TV is the lower end: relaxing, but unfulfilling and boring.

> If the only mentally engaging activity you ever do is work, then every time you get bored, you will jump straight into overdrive just by THINKING about it. This will actually wear you out even if it's only 30 hours a week or 20 hours. You need activities that are only a little bit challenging to distract you from the big one.

That's a very interesting way to look at it. Problem is I'm too tired during to pick anything up after work. I really feel that if I can reduce the amount of mental energy I consume at work, I'll actually have the desire to pick up the guitar or something like that.

Maybe using something like the pomodoro technique can help with that, and then taking more breaks. I think one of my problems is though, that my ambition takeover and I want to get just one more thing done. I feel like I need to produce better results, etc.

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