Ask HN: Work-life balance?

When I got my current job, I chose a desk where my screen is visible to the room deliberately. I'd been stuck on a slashdot refresh loop since 1998, and the visibility of my screen broke the habit cold

I can appreciate your opinion, but there’s nothing that can’t wait until tomorrow unless it’s life critical. Is it going to only take 15? Or will will it take 30-45 minutes and now I’ve missed dinner with my family for your question that is not critical.

If I don’t defend my time, who else will? I don’t buy the argument about rigidness being a bad thing. That’s how boundaries work best: clearly defined and enforced.

Pregnant wife and a toddler so my home time is skewed. Up before 6 to play with the kid, make breakfast, load of laundry, load of dishes, etc. Bus around 8:30, at work around 9. Work til 4:30, skipping lunch every other day. Then 30 mins back, errands, cooking dinner and finally relaxing around 6. Play with the kid til I put her down around 7:30 to 8:30. Hang out with the wife until she goes to bed around 10.

This is when my second shift starts. I pick up the kid's area, clean the kitchen, dishes, laundry, and whatever other stuff is left over. After that I do another 2 to 4 hours of work depending on when things are due, late to the bus, early to leave because of family stuff. In bed somewhere between 1am and 4am.

I keep track of my life in todo lists. Got a notebook and a pen within arm's reach at any given time. Zero Inbox/Bullet Journal/GTD my entire life, work and personal. I also naturally do sort of a pomodoro technique with everything. Breaking it down into smaller parts so I can cover as much space as possible. Cleaning the kitchen turns into two separate tasks (dishes, and cleanup) which I then inject 10 minutes with the wife or kid in between. It probably adds more time to my overall day, but I can't push their schedules later and I need to get work done so I can't push my duties to later either.

The other "trick" is I've never needed a lot of sleep so I can do stuff later at night once everyone is in bed. Sleep on the bus, or whenever I have a free moment.

My previous job was within biking distance so that was my health management. Now I have to ride the commuter bus so I'll have to figure something out once the 2nd kid comes.

Reading all the comments seems like most HN users have pretty good work life balance. I am surprised I thought most tech people are overworked.

Anyway since most people here seem to be from industry. Here is my situation working as an academic in Europe.

I normally work from 9 to 6. Sometimes if I am chasing a conference deadline (2-3 times a year) work after hours and weekends. I also choose conferences which also double as my vacation spots (one of the reasons why I decided to stay in academia).

Bike to work (15-20 minutes each way). No kids most likely will never have any. Spend most of my free time with my SO after work cooking, watching TV, reading, or just relax. Go swimming sometimes. Bike trips in summer. Cook and Eat healthy balanced vegetarian food.

I am a mid-twenties single male Product Manager, working at a major tech company in SF.

I average 55 hours/week at work. Usually this means 9-7 5 days per week but sometimes its 9-8 or I'll work for 3-4 hours on a weekend.

I don't spend any time with family because I am single and my whole family lives on the east coast.

I spend 4-5 hours a week working out, usually weight training in the morning right before work.

Nothing fancy for productivity - create lists for everything, prioritize the items on your lists, and put the items you commit to on a calendar. Know yourself and try to schedule at a pace you can realistically accomplish, but don't freak out if you only tackle 70% of your list for any given day. The trick is to be disciplined about actually using these lists (I'm still bad at this).

When you're feeling like you're totally burned out and don't want to do any work - just do ONE thing that day. Making ANY progress at all is so much better for your psyche than getting nothing done, and once you complete that one thing you can stop beating yourself up for being unproductive and enjoy just doing nothing.