Work to Live, Yes, I said it Out Loud!

I have just returned from a 9 day vacation that reminded me that I work to live. Unfortunately I had forgotten this old adage and was taking my job much too seriously and had begun living to work. No matter what you do for a job, it is a job, and should only be one facet of your multifaceted life. I am sure controlling Department Heads are all grimacing as they hear someone actually say this out loud. If your current job is all-encompassing in your life and you gain credibility there by “not having a life” and always responding to the wacko CEO’s 2:00 a.m. email messages, I urge you to get professional help. Okay, maybe professional help is overly dramatic but you really need to take a long hard look at how you are spending your precious energy.

The lesson about this that I have had to learn over and over again is the more you work the more your peers and superiors expect you to do. Your internal message is “I am showing them what a team player I am” or “I am showing them how invaluable I am”, but neither of these messages are how your Boss views you. In the worst environments your Boss laughs behind your back about how much you take on and is placing bets on when you’ll crack. In the best environments your Boss is concerned about your lack of a life beyond work and questions your judgement. Either way this all absorbed approach to your job only results in burnout and a tremendous drain of your precious energy. Make a change before you suffer health problems, family problems, or lose it from having a boring existence.

As a person, who forgot to keep a balance, I state with the inner peace of a wonderful vacation, I am more valuable as an employee because I have a calm, clear perspective on the issues that I faced this week at work instead of the “OMG it’s a crisis, what will we do about this” approach I had before my vacation. Keep your perspective and remember they are lucky to have you and your skill set at your job. Remember that your outside of work life contributes to your work performance by keeping your outlook clear. If your response to that statement is you would lose your job if you acted in that way, Houston we have a problem. You are already in a toxic work environment and I suspect you are not valued as a whole person. So take a break from your 2:00 a.m. response to the CEO’s latest “critical issue” and do something novel like get a good night’s rest. If you do this three days in a row I predict your perspective will change and I suspect you will change your life and love it.

Is Your Job Who You Are?

We are all multifaceted but can fall into the trap of believing that our career is who we are. We feel having a job is important and what the job is identifies how we fit into the world. I certainly have done this despite the many experiences that I have had that reminded me that my job is only something I do in the myriad of things that I am. Being successful in my job used to mean to me that I was a good person and my life was complete. This was a very myopic view. I am joyful, fun, supportive, loving, giving, generous, bright, fair, non-judgemental, loyal, faithful, melodic, and a singer. While I call on some of these characteristic in my job, many are not used. Believng that my job is who I am is very limiting and not at all accurate. It also puts a lot of undue pressure on me about the daily occurences in my job which in the scheme of life are not so important. Work life balance means to me that I keep my perspecitve about how my job fits into my life. I was having dinner with a dear friend when she said she couldn’t imagine not working because her job is who she is. I was surprised by her comment and felt a little heartache when she discussed how she had been laid off and the effect it had on her. She is so vibrant, creative, loving,caring, bright,( and many more things) and I never have just seen her as her profession, in fact I don’t think much about her job when I thnik of her. Her comments hit me hard and reminded me that when we see our job as who we are we give our power to our employer. It is healthier to look at the job as a necessity and to do your best work but at the end of the day remember your job is just a small piece of who you are. If we don’t have this perspective, we forget that the employment relationship is two way and should be beneficial to both sides. I have a trusted advisor who has been trying to help me understand this concept for two years and it took a conversation with a dear friend to help me finally get it.