After giving in out of a sense of obligation/politeness for many years, I finally got sick of working free overtime, and began to put my foot down. I’ve noticed, if you do this politely but firmly at the start of a new job, it’s very unlikely you’ll be asked to work overtime often, and it doesn’t damage your reputation, it actually makes your team leader (if they’re the decent sort) treat you with more respect because they know they can’t rely on you to pick up the pieces if they do sloppy work. So, in turn, they improve their own work standards. You benefit by being able to keep to a regular 8 hr day and be a better worker because of it.

I’m sure this isn’t a universal thing, but I’ve definately seen enough evidence to think it’s fairly common. The key thing of course is to be a good worker – you can’t shirk overtime if you’ve been bludging half the day, but if you’ve worked hard for 8 hours why on earth should you stay at work unless something very urgent needs to be done (and those ‘somethings’ shouldn’t happen more than once every few months, if they are then someone along the chain of command is slacking, or procedures need to be examined).

It’s also a fact that working too hard for too long can and will create the basis for chronic depression. Without getting too technical, high-concentration activities (reading, writing, coding, designing, etc) deplete seratonin levels fairly rapidly, and low seratonin levels leave you much less able to deal with stress. So if you work hard for 8 hours, then give your brain a break by doing stuff like watching movies or playing computer games, your seratonin levels will jump back to normal, especially if you add a good night’s sleep to the picture. But if you’re spending lots of time in ‘work mode’, doing high-concentration activities, eventually your stress system will kick in, and that in turn creates patterns of negative thinking which lower sleep quality, make you more susceptible to pain, and start a loop of depression that is really hard to get out of. And I’m talking from experience here ;). Sorry for the science lesson, but I thought this was relevant to the post. There’s a great site online actually that deals with this stuff – http://www.clinical-depression.co.uk/index.htm

Thanks again for the article and the linked one too, both are very interesting :)

I have been planning on taking one day to do nothing, which is much more difficult than it seems. In the meantime, I have been making myself take breaks to walk outside at lunch, and at home I have a outdoor project to keep me away from staring at screens in the evening. It’s a start.

As I go to work, feeling stressed and overworked, having to cut my vacation time short, this series of articles really struck a cord.
Bloggeropoly talks about why Taking a vacation is important.
According to the study, Canadians have about 21 days o…

Listen. It doesn’t work. Period. What I have found over the past 6 years or so, is that if you decide “right, I am going to work really hard from say 9 til 12, take a 30/60 min break, work really hard again until 3 or 4, take another short break and finish up at 6pm”, then switch off the PC until next morning, you’ll be far more productive than doing 12 hours of constant slog. It’s the nature of the beast. The brain and the body will see to it eventually. Thing is, I never really believed it until recently. I was afraid to finish at a “reasonable time” each day. I stopped taking public holidays, only took 3 out of 4 weeks annual leave, never ever worked the required 8 hours…oh no…had to at least do 11+. And as you say, colleagues start to expect if from you, family/friends learn to live with it and before you know it, that’s what you do, that’s who you’ve become.

It’s not too late to change things. Ask yourself honestly, have you been really productive today? Are you sure you are not simply filling 12 hours up with tasks that, if you are focussed and alert, you’d not manage to do in 8 hours anyway. Most times you will find that you may well have achieved your marathon days work within the confines of a 9 til 5 scenario.

I work from home and therefore separating work from family life and personal interests (whatever they are!) is not always easy. But I am working on it, and reading this post has sparked my desire to tackle this whole work/life balance again head on.

Recently I’ve been going for a lunchtime jog and taking the dog out for a proper walk for once. It’s doing us both the world of good. (ok, today has been a day example of my new approach to things, but one step at a time people). And, I’ve got to say I’m enjoying work again, refreshed each morning knowing that I’ll put in an honest days work until early evening then it’s time for some reading, movies, diy, visiting friends, going for a drink and a natter, walking the dog again etc. I think, and correct me if I am wrong, but I think it’s what they call living…

Sarah, I wish I had 32 days off. In the US, it’s a ridiculous 15 or less depending on your job. We definitely work too much here to our detriment.

Yannick, I am the same way. I just can’t seem to get off the damn computer, especially now that I’ve started blogging for the past 3 months.