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On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

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Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#61

Post by jlokier »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #33
lawrjone wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> New college grads can really struggle with finding balance after transitioning out of college > Ambitious juniors often see this and decide to go all-in The most common issue I see with dedicated juniors is when work is, by a large margin, the biggest thing in their life. When work is your thing, it only takes one thing to go badly at work for it to impact your happiness. Given how much can go wrong in a career tha…

> The most common issue I see with dedicated juniors is when work is, by a large margin, the biggest thing in their life. Great point. The transition from college to work is a shocking experience for many. Modern colleges are excellent at keeping people socialized, entertained, and surrounding them with activities to do and people to meet. Then they enter the working world and suddenly it's not so easy. They need to…

I actually found the opposite with regard to college, work. and socialising.

At college I had few friends, and spent most of my time with computers, studying mostly things outside what I was supposed to, and staying up far too late by myself or with one or two friends in the computer room. We did good things, but I wouldn't say that time was particularly sociable.

At my first job after college, that's when I started to get a decent social life. The people around me were more rounded and better connected than those at college, and I was invited to things like house parties and outdoor activities much more than at college. Perhaps it helped that I could also finally afford the costs of socialising.

This was at a games company - low pay relative to other programming work, and a reputation for not exactly rounded people (I certainly wasn't one), but many of them were fun and interesting people.

Fast forward a decade, and in my 30s I found the best social avenues ever were through people who ran regular house parties, regular enough that substantial communities formed around them. That was even better than in my 20s at work.

Fast forward another decade, and even ignoring the pandemic, unfortunately it's much harder to meet people in a sociable way. I enjoyed technical Meetups prior to the pandemic but that doesn't lead to the same kinds of social relationships as house parties with hot tubs do.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#62

Post by f311a »

American culture is so obsessed with work to unbelievable levels. We have one life and we are only getting older. A lot of people will regret working on weekends. A lot of money or a good position won’t make you happy in life without the right balance. People need to learn how to enjoy different aspects of life.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#63

Post by germinalphrase »

mettamage wrote: post #56
Scarblac wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work a strict 40 hour work week, but I hardly know anybody else who works that much in my social group in the Netherlands. 32 is far more common; I think only about 4 of the 80 people in the company I work for work the full 40. I only work this much because my wife is jobless. So it's strange to see it described as the low end of the scale. I'd pick 24 hours per week.

We Dutchies have one of the best flexible part-time work systems available I think. I think that because when I read HN or read job postings from other countries, or ask US people then I'm noticing that 40 or 40+ hours is much more common. I've noticed that a 4 day work week has outsized mental health benefits compared to 5 days. Especially when your free day is at Wednesday. There's only so much "damage" a consecuti…

As an American, Inhave never had a job (whether hourly or salaried) that allowed me to control how many hours (or when) I worked beyond part/full time.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#64

Post by t-writescode »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #38
egypturnash wrote: post #37

A friend of mine who fell for the "work hard forever" idea just wrote a lengthy post venting about what this did to her: when you spend all your free time working/studying, and constantly turn down invitations to go do stuff with friends, people stop inviting you to things. And you drift out of friend groups because of this. Your social skills atrophy, you have no idea how to try and make new friends on the rare occa…

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/work-life-balance-and-jugg... “Imagine life as a game in which you are juggling some five balls in the air. You name them - work, family, health, friends and spirit - and you're keeping all of these in the air. You will soon understand that work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. But the other four balls - family, health, friends and spirit - are made of glass. If…

I hear more about the American hatred of redemption in that speech than the harmability of oneself from overwork.

A person that has truly amended his relationships seems to have stronger ones than one who always had ‘fine’ ones, in many cases.

Scrooge may not have become as beloved and loving a person without his repentance journey.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#65

Post by username90 »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #38
egypturnash wrote: post #37

A friend of mine who fell for the "work hard forever" idea just wrote a lengthy post venting about what this did to her: when you spend all your free time working/studying, and constantly turn down invitations to go do stuff with friends, people stop inviting you to things. And you drift out of friend groups because of this. Your social skills atrophy, you have no idea how to try and make new friends on the rare occa…

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/work-life-balance-and-jugg... “Imagine life as a game in which you are juggling some five balls in the air. You name them - work, family, health, friends and spirit - and you're keeping all of these in the air. You will soon understand that work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. But the other four balls - family, health, friends and spirit - are made of glass. If…

Friends and family bounce back as well. As you get more free time you go out and get new friends, or you contact your family or old friends again. The only problem is health, you don't really get that back easily.

Of course it is harder to get them back than the keep them constant, but the same applies to jobs as well, the longer you have been without a job the harder it is to get back, but it is still not that hard.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#67

Post by jbothma »

This touched on a productivity hack I used when I was younger which really bites me now:

> Paul advocates cultivating a sense of “discomfort” when you’re not working. I’m not going to question it’s efficacy- this is an extremely effective way of compelling yourself into a variety of habits- but this advice extends beyond that.

>

> Doing this might help you work more, but it may permanently impact your ability to enjoy yourself outside of work. This type of mental trick is addictive, and it alters your perception of normal, developing a need to work that is disconnected from your personal goals.

To finish even my boring or tough studies, I oriented myself in such a way that every problem or sub-problem is a puzzle, and every solution is an endorphin hit.

Now I'm so addicted to this hit that my work can reliably give me, that it's extremely hard to stop work and be in the moment in the rest of my life.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#68

Post by psalminen »

maccard wrote: post #3

I found myself nodding along to almost everything in this article; Two comments: > The problems pulled me in, and I’d get so involved I’d be unable to sleep until I solved a problem, sometimes escaping into my dreams if I hadn’t found a natural pause point. I can relate to this, so much. It's an incrediblely productive time period when my brain is like this at 7/8/9pm, but inevitably I lose out on a day or two follow…

I had boss who pretty frequently would go around tellong everyone to leave and would make sure he's the last one there. I always really respected his position of forcing work/life balance.

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#69

Post by maccard »

softwaredoug wrote: post #31
maccard wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't work in a bubble, and if you are a more senior person on a team the juniors will see what you're doing and follow by example. And when you're a junior, it's equally as important to be told by your superiors to stop, so that it's crystal clear that it's not expected or even encouraged.

Yes I get that. My annoyance isn’t the only factor in play. Though with remote work, employees with different time zones, and pandemic parenting, it’s hard to see someone working and say “oh they’re working too much”

Yeah agreed. I think the signals in that case are the same people doing things like showing they're taking a Thursday afternoon off to take their kid to football, or actually taking a lunch break. At a certain point we are all adults, and have to be trusted but setting a good example has always been a sign of a good manager in my experience

Re: On working too hard: finding balance, and lessons learned from others

#70

Post by watwut »

t-writescode wrote: post #64
toomuchtodo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.thebalancecareers.com/work-life-balance-and-jugg... “Imagine life as a game in which you are juggling some five balls in the air. You name them - work, family, health, friends and spirit - and you're keeping all of these in the air. You will soon understand that work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. But the other four balls - family, health, friends and spirit - are made of glass. If…

I hear more about the American hatred of redemption in that speech than the harmability of oneself from overwork. A person that has truly amended his relationships seems to have stronger ones than one who always had ‘fine’ ones, in many cases. Scrooge may not have become as beloved and loving a person without his repentance journey.

> A person that has truly amended his relationships seems to have stronger ones than one who always had ‘fine’ ones, in many cases.

And in many cases, there is no amending anymore, cause other people got enough of it and trully moved on.And in even more cases, those seemingly strong relationships are actually noticeably damaged forever. They seem good because they are shelfes hanging together by sheer effort and often only out of inertia.

No matter how repetant you are, you cant unhurt other people. Repetance is about you, but they in the meantime made own decisions.

And if your plan from the start was to be repetant later to get back things you decided to sacrifice, it is smart from them to not accept it.

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