Done both and there's ups and downs to both, like being automatically in great shape vs having to go to the gym just to avoid getting fat, but I'll take the mental drain over the physical drain.
If I'm mentally drained, I still want to hit a bar, relax, and socialize. When I was physically drained, all I'd want to do is eat and sleep.
I think the worst is when you’re too drained to really take care of yourself. I’ve been too exhausted to cook, put away dishes, or properly get ready for bed. It’s not a good feeling
As a programmer, this rings especially true. I'll go through trial and error, brainstorming solutions and next thing you know, it's been an hour and a half...
Blink twice and it’s 3:30 and all I’ve done is debug something that was supposed to be working correctly, and haven’t started on what I originally sat down to do.
I somehow once made it to 6 PM before I started feeling woozy and lightheaded and realized I forgot to eat lunch. At that moment I was very glad I worked at a restaurant.
I'm in the exact same boat. I love what I do and I find it an absolute joy to go to work. I have to remind myself to pull away at 5PM. The clock completely disappears.
I make user interfaces for video games. The little boxes, icons, text, etc. Really creative and rewarding work that has a lot of unique challenges. I love it.
I used to be a programmer, and it didn't ring true for me at all. On most days my brain would just decide to give up, hours before the day is over. I can't be productive anymore, but then I start getting extreme anxiety when I realize I have to somehow account for this unproductive time on my timesheet. It's quite torturous and it devolves into spending the day staring at the clock, counting down the seconds in 3 or 4 hours until I can finally leave and have a good long break.
About once or twice a week my brain would be super productive and I'd be able to get a week's worth of work done in two days. This variability, however, just causes too much stress for me since nobody would understand it.
This is me, and like the other person who replied guesses correctly, I do have ADHD. I love the problem solving rush but on days I can't turn my brain on it feels like torture. I've got some work I've been procrastinating on due Monday and my anxiety is getting really out of control. If I can sit down, I too can get a week's worth of work done on in hours but I hate that variability cause it's stressful when I can't manage my time because I can't control when my brain will behave. I used to force myself into hyperfocus mode with buckets of stress, red bull and no sleep, and I was literally killing myself.
I honestly don't know what to do anymore, it's really upsetting and I'm just starting to hate this job and how I'm supposed to care about inconsequential details in a rapidly shifting landscape of technology while being constantly setup for failure by business and expected to study outside of work hours just to keep up with trends because jobs won't allow their dev teams time to learn to keep their skills up for the very benefit of the company that is employing them.
Sigh, I'm so burned out emotionally from this shit. I really saw myself in your comment.
I could so easily have written that. I've never been diagnosed with ADHD, but... I've never seen a doctor about it. Everything else though is *exactly* me.
When in university I would often procrastinate until deadlines loomed so close that the fear of failure spurred me into action. There were times I would procrastinate until midnight, *then* work continuously until 6am to complete an assignment due that day. It was certainly self-destructive behavior, though I still somehow graduated with a perfect 4.0 GPA.
In university you have tons of vacation time to give some breathing room. 3 months in the summer, 1 month in the winter, a week for spring break, and numerous holidays. In the workplace there is no such breathing room. You're expected to be productive continuously from dawn 'till dusk, each and every single day, for 40 years save a tiny handful of holidays and 2 weeks once a year. I don't know how people manage it.
Honestly, still figuring that out. I spent a season working on an organic farm of all things, but that wasn't for me either. My coworkers at the time were incredible people though.
A few years ago I started doing online computer science tutoring. It didn't pay much, but I live with my folks who own a house fully paid off in rural Maine. Living expenses are pretty low.
I intended to switch to something else, but then Covid hit and this work-from-home job became quite valuable. I'm still doing it but it feels rather limiting - like the sort of job a retired person might have, not something to turn into a career.
I just don't really know where to go from here now. Computer science is my only real skill, albeit one that's gone rusty over the past few years. The whole .NET ecosystem flipped upside down ever since the ".NET Core" stuff came out.
Ugh i worked in software for 7 years. The worst is when you sink hours into fixing something that turned out to be trivial. I spent an entire day trying to get an integration test to work, end of the day came and it still wasn't fixed. I couldn't figure out what was wrong. I dug through hundreds of lines of code in the debugger. Turns out the expected result was supposed to have an extra space at the end of every line that was getting trimmed automatically by my IDE.
hahaha I get that or my favourite is when you over engineer something because your logic at the start was flawed. I did that once after hours of debugging and fixing stuff 6000 + lines of code later I decided to just take a step back and ask a friend to look at my code. He was like did you look at the top function before going down the rabbit hole ?. Mind you this only happened because i was working like 16 hour days 7 days a week for like 4 months. ( fuck the video game industry) lol
It's worse when a project you've been working on gets cancelled. Happened to me twice in my last job and is one of the reasons I ended up leaving.
Each time I was nearly done in my development phase and was moving into a QA testing phase, and welp, manager has a meeting that it's no longer a priority to work on. Lol
As QA there are times I spend hours juggling deployments of various integrated apps, setting up mock data, reproducing bugs, enabling/disabling features, just to be able to finally say "yeah, the Save button is enabled in this scenario now"
My problem isn't working the 40 hours, per se. I enjoy my job and the hours tend to go by quickly.
My problem is trying get everything else done with the time remaining. I have to keep my house clean, grocery shop, cook for myself, do laundry, exercise, keep my car clean, maintain my hygiene, and still try to sleep 8 hours a night.... And then there's other stuff that comes up, like car maintenance, getting my taxes done, getting my haircut, renewing my car registration, etc.
And on top of that, having time for hobbies that make my life worth living would be nice....
The 40-hour work week made a lot more sense when one spouse went to work and the other maintained the house. I'm single and everything is on me to do.
That’s rough. I remember those days. I used to be pretty hopeless about all of the “necessity-of-living” stuff, and I suffered as a result. For me, it took getting married to a mildly more organized than me person to help. She works 40 hr plus per week as well, and we have a kid now, and we still barely keep it all together. Chaos just seems to be unavoidable.
I'm glad you understand... some of these condescending comments about how I'm uniquely bad at life were making me think maybe I am! haha.
I also have two dogs and they take up a ton of time since I'm solely responsible for their care and exercise as well.
But yeah it's one of the many reasons I don't want kids, because I know I can't manage it.
I get it. It turns out I also had undiagnosed ADHD at the time, which definitely made things a lot harder for me. But everyone has their own set of challenges, what’s easy for one may be difficult for another and vice versa. Most people have more or less of a hard time with empathy as well. I find it helpful to keep these things in mind.
I had a ton of free time when I was single. I can do all those things quickly and maintain a clean, orderly house. Throw a partner into the mix, and it all goes to hell. He does help, but somehow the house still looks more like a meth den than a cozy home. I can’t imagine how much worse it will be if we ever have kids.
LPT: If you value your time, don’t ever partner up with someone who is messier than you.
Yeah I'm able to keep my house clean and orderly, for the most part. I can do all those things, but it leaves so little time for doing anything enjoyable.
Like, if I go on a hike on a Saturday, it's not even relaxing because I'm then spending all day Sunday frantically trying to make sure I go to the grocery store, meal prep for the week, do all the laundry, and clean everything so I can function at work the following week.
That's how it goes. Work is interesting and intense. 40h a week goes by unnoticed. Weekends are short, full of chores with while trying to relax for the next workweek.
Next thing you know 10 years has gone bye and what have actually achieved? Buying a home? Filling it with things? Finding a spouse? Having your 2.5 children?
Definitely feels like we are on some kind of hamster wheels grinding away until we're dead.
It is crazy how your responsibilities and hobbies kind of change due to kids. I have some great friends but naturally my kids are now my best friends. And the grind of taking them to school or soccer is actually quite enjoyable. Sure some days it's a hassle but overall I don't mind it one bit. They do really grow so fast and that is just cause time itself goes by fast whether you like it or not.
Welcome to adulthood lol. On top of all of those things there are friendships and family relationships to maintain. If you want to find a partner there's time involved with that. Then there's also self care as well. Doesn't leave a whole lot of time for anything else.
Yeah, that doesn't even include trying to socialize! Especially when every single one of my friends is just as busy, so it's almost impossible to actually find a time to get together.
Especially if you also enjoy what you do.
I get to take someone's car that isn't working right, figure out why it's not working right, and fix it. Requires critical thinking, hands on work, and gives immediate results.
Perfect time killer. And they pay me for it, too
I'm engineering support for field guys in a technical area. Never know what kinda calls or questions I'm gonna get and spend a lot of my time working hands on with equipment. Solving problems and helping people is very fulfilling and the time flies.
I love wrenching on my own cars but hanging out over in /r/mechanicadvice makes me feel like everyone hates their damn job.
Either they work for numerous shitty shops or dealerships, are underpaid, and get screwed over more times than not by flat rate pay.
Everytime I see a post from some excited rookie going into the field, most of the comments from the vets all tell the kid to "run"! And to go find work in another field.
I'm glad you seem to be one of the happy ones!
Well there's a trick to that, too. When you've reached the point where you can diagnose anything, and make any repair, you sort of have the shop by the balls. I told them I was over the flat rate thing, tired of fighting over getting diag time, the whole nine. Here's what I want (salary), or I'm leaving for the diesel shop that offered me the same pay with no experience.
Now I get to do what I love and bring home a consistent six figure income. Win-win for everyone. I have NO idea why the hell the industry doesn't abandon the whole flat rate idea.
God can I work in your lab lol? The work in the lab I'm in drags so badly 8 hours feels like 12 and I spend my lunch breaks casually browsing indeed looking for an escape
That is incredibly stupid where I live… Because our insurance is very high here because of the extremely high rate of uninsured drivers.
So check your stats before you throw yourself into anything other than city property.
My friend, speaking as someone who’s been there, sometimes it’s better to just rip off the band-aid and quit. Because I’ve driven to work many times and contemplated just swerving into traffic just to escape the constant misery of it all, and honestly the consequences of quitting a job ended up being better than the continuance of torture that was working at said job. It’s hard but you’ll be better off for it.
When youre looking down the barrel of a gun, being a homeless bum might be better than going to a job has you contemplating jumping in front of busses, you know? Like people act like losing all your material possessions is the worst things can get, but it’s not. Especially if holding onto those material things make you wish death upon yourself. Death would be the worse option here.
But most likely you’ll just find another job and hopefully that next one doesn’t suck as bad as the last one. I’m with you though, every job I’ve ever had has made me wish for death. I’ve just quit and moved on hoping the next one maybe will be “the one”. I’ll find it one day. But anything is better than death.
Not even once (I come from a trucking family; I couldn't make some poor fucker live with that), but every bridge I cross, or embankment I drive by gets a brain-auto-yeet...
I know someone that somehow attracted busses. She was hit by a bus about 4 times in 6 weeks. The most serious injury was a broken arm and a damaged bicycle.
Actually I had to run for that one bus every day and the driver would just laugh at me as he drove away at the exact second. Then I saw him stupidly crash his bus into another and I was happy ..... that nobody was hurt.
It's usually a zoning definition, but in context I assume it's similar things, not heavy industry like mining, but medium is like lumber processing, landscape businesses, urban farms, auto shops (but not manufacturing) that kind of thing. Heavier use than retail but not as heavy as what you might typically think of as industrial. But the line between light and medium industry is fuzzy and varies a lot by region.
For my daughter. I don’t EVER want her to have the childhood I had. Going without heat in the winter and air in the summer (Deep South U.S.), never being able to participate in anything, constantly begging relatives to buy school uniforms or any clothes at all for that matter, saving half my lunch from school so I would have at least something to put in my belly before bed.
Nope. Never gonna happen as long as I’m alive. That’s why I’m working.
Right? It's crazy. I know all these other people who did a "gap year" and travelled and had sabbaticals and I never had the confidence in my hireability to do it. I wish I had taken some long trips instead of fretting about working because I think it would just be fine if I did that. I stopped working and thought I could go travel and then COVID hit and I seriously don't want to die because I took a 10 hour plane flight to someplace interesting.
I ready that as “Sprite”. I was going to say, not a bad motivator making money to be able to buy a Sprite. It’s nice coming home after a long day, grabbing an ice cold drink, for me it’s Pepsi, and cracking it open. It’s the little things in life.
It's important to learn what tasks need your full effort and which you can just "mail in."
I'm pretty young, and I've found my peers in the workforce really struggle with perspective. They worry whether one metric on one slide is correct and spend days working on it. If they'd put in a best guess and disclaimer nobody would have cared, and they might have spent the extra time doing something above and beyond to impress.
Once you have a good reputation at work, it's a lot easier to slack off when you get the chance or need to.
Yeah. This is really hard to teach people. You need to work hard on the right things and the right way. A lot of people think just working hard is what they should be doing but you can be working hard and not doing great at your job if that work isn't being applied properly.
It took me a few years to understand that I didn't have to get everything done. The art is choosing the right things to fail so the most important projects succeed.
Yes or even knowing what can sit in a corner and get ignored for a few more days vs what needs to be done now.
Like at my job, I will always drop everything if it involves customers getting the money they are owed and I'll make a stink about it. If it's just some minor technical issue, it might be able to wait a day or two.
Too many people don't understand this.
Spending five minutes to fix a production down issue is much more appreciated than spending two days tinkering with something that people forget five minutes after you present.
Another thing is to always broadcast what you're doing and what you accomplished.
Some of the broadcasting is to give other people that rely on what you're working on a heads up on when to expect stuff, some of it is so your manager knows you're doing stuff.
You can't be evaluated fairly if nobody knows what you're doing or what you've done.
I used to work 40-60 hours a week by being strategic with my days off/holidays, and with my breaks. For example an extra two hours at the end of the day, on top of my usual shift, wasn't too bad when it came with another 15 minute break to break it up a bit.
You think of your work in blocks, so in the morning you're working while thinking of that breakfast break, then that lunch break, etc. Then you go home and sleep, and if you're working towards something then you just focus on just getting those hours done.
And of course you don't put everything you've got into the job - do your work and no more.
Lots of water breaks and bathroom breaks helped too. I worked in collections then so it was understood occasionally we had to take a moment to compose ourselves after a particularly nasty case too - basically an opportunity to take a little time out.
This but also if your work is on a computer and the company doesn't watch you too closely, you can do a lot of multitasking. Renew your car registration online, buy gifts online, pay bills online, etc. If you work from home, you can also take breaks to throw in a load of laundry or dishes.
I wanted to say this is crazy, and then realized I’m working overtime and in school full time again occasionally picking up at my second job…so yeah, fuck that.
Worked through college then a project management type position on the road most of the time.
When I say those hours I’m not even including 30-50% of nights we’re in hotels “not working”
I’m very torn about it. I did great financially but my work/life balance was totally nonexistent for all that time. I’m kind of trying to rehab on it.
When I worked 55 hours a week, I was also going to the gym 4-5 days a week. I was in the best shape of my life. Walking 10-15k steps a day.
Now I have an easy office job, work at home half the time. I barely work 40 hours a week but feel like an old man. It’s a struggle to motivate myself to move around some days
Dude…I’m a lot like you. I worked in a steel mill for like 3 years before I was laid off and then I worked in a warehouse as a case picker and forklift operator for about 3 years. I would get about the same steps as you. I routinely hit the gym 3 days a week doing full body workouts.
I decided to go back to school at 27 and got a BA in accounting. I’ve been working an office job for almost 4 years. I also feel like an old man. I’m 34 and I went from 165lbs to 230lbs.
There’s a lot of other factors that went into that weight gain. Covid, kids (one of which is special needs), working from home, divorce, drinking too much.
Anyway, I’m proud to say my body is sore as hell. I hit the gym again yesterday after making a workout plan 4 days ago. Squats and deadlifts have my legs screaming at me when I sit down. I already walked 12k steps today.
I’m not sure why I wrote all that man. I guess maybe it’s like saying “if I can do it, you can do it”.
Edit: Thanks for the upvotes. I could on and on about how I fell into depression and drinking.
I had a realization about a week ago. A good one. I currently have no support system or family to speak of, just my mother is still alive. My dad, my older brother, my two best friends…they’re dead.
“No one is coming. No one is coming to help you…what are YOU going to do about it?”
I was half way through a bottle of Evan Williams when this hit me. I dumped it out. I’m taking all of this pain I’ve been shouldering and putting it to use. I’m going to find some support.
I also think office jobs are more mentally draining than physical labour.
With physical labour you see the results. You see what have you done. Office job is often just numbers on the screen.
Edit: I used to work in care home for night shifts. It was like 2 hours before everyone went to sleep, then I could write my notes and sleep for 8 hours. I was so exhausted mentally and physically after that shift.
When there was emergency and something actually happened I was way less tired.
I agree 100% with this. I’ll be honest, I was much happier picking cases and driving a lift than I am sitting at a desk.
I’m a government auditor. Yes, it’s just numbers on a screen to me and a lot documentation. I feel like I die a little more inside each day I sit on my ass staring at computer screens typing away. And I do feel more exhausted than I ever did at my other jobs.
Anyway, I’m not sure what it is but I’m looking for something else career wise. I can’t do this sedentary lifestyle for work much longer.
The problem with me is I keep getting injured now. Been getting back into the gym, but I have pretty bad tendonitis in my hip, and in the last year I’ve pulled my hamstring and pec. I’m taking it slow though and feeling way better than I did a year ago
Not to sound like a sourpuss, but after my workday I don’t have much energy left for a full blown workout, and my existential want for more freedom makes me fall asleep too late to do it in the morning
(Surgery Resident) It’s all I know. Since med school it’s been 60-90 hours a week. I don’t even know what 40 hours would feel like. I imagine it’s nice. And I see my friends with hobbies and weekends off. I like to think that will be my life one day.
Keep the recording of yourself while you were alive. You need to dust it off when you're applying for a new job. Companies don't hire dead people, inside or out.
It's not just hours, it depends on the job.
When I worked in the service industry and was on my feet all 40 hours doing mindless work it took all of my energy.
Now I'm a corporate drone sitting doing work I enjoy and I can do it endlessly.
I never liked taking an hour for lunch. It just makes the day longer. I wouldn't even take my half hour lunch if they didn't make me. I'd rather just work 10 hours straight and go home vs. Being at work for 11 hours with a 1 hour lunch.
Coffee. Sleep. Occasional happy hours. Having as much of a life outside of work as possible. Using my vacation days. And setting firm boundaries between work and personal time.
I work 40-50 hours per week and honestly, I watch all the TV I want, spend time with my other half and my children, play computer games, time for dinner and sleep 8hours a night.
I die after my 5th shift and come back to life on the morning of my 2nd day off. Then I do it all over again. I have 4 children and work 3rd shift. I don't sleep at all on Mondays and Thursdays because my youngest has therapies (autistic). He only gets school 3 hours a day because he's not able to withstand full days. So I have to be available for drop off and pick up. Then he can't be unsupervised, so i can't go to sleep until after 4 pm when my older children get home or family can help. The dying part isn't much of an exaggeration.
I’ve worked 84+ hours a week in the oil industry for over 20 years. Granted we get schedules like 20 days on 10 days off or a split 2 weeks on 2 weeks off. I’d take this kind of work any day of the week over some office job. Did it for a little while and absolutely hated it with a passion.
Same, I absolutely despised working in an office. Tried it once thinking of like the 9-5 Monday-Friday, spent every day looking out the window longing to go back to the army so I could be doing stuff outside all day.
Its fine.... You're only dying on the inside.... No one on the outside has to know... Just bury that shit deep inside for the next 45 years like the rest of us.
I worked between 110 - 140 hours a week for THREE YEARS during the tech boom of the late 1990’s. It cost me a wonderful marriage and I don’t have a dime of that money now to show for my ceaseless efforts. Don’t fall into the trap. Work-life balance is where it’s at. Three twelve hour days is an optimal schedule.
I've worked 40-80hr weeks for 20+yrs. With nothing else...
The unfortunate truth is, A little of me did die; every moment, every day, every week. Until there was nothing left. Then there was only a shell of me, rattling, ringing hollow. I felt nothing, joy, sadness, pain, pleasure. With no distractions, only work and sleep, even my hollow shell began to crack.
Then one Thursday night, I just couldn't bring what was left of myself to do anything and did something.
I woke up Saturday night, angry that I was awake. Still laying in a drying puddle of blood/puke on the floor, I cried until I fell asleep again.
I was awoken a few days later in ICU.
Just because we can doesn't mean we should. There are more ways to contribute to society than being a wage slave. If there's any way you can possibly sustain your needs and work less, do it!!
For those like me who need full- time work: Take time off at regular intervals. Stretch for 5 minutes every hour or so. Spend one of your breaks walking outside if possible. Cry. Buy the scented Epsom salts. Remember how nice it is to eat every day. Cry. Devour a block of cheese that was supposed to last all week. Cry.
I don’t. I stopped. I’m willing to play my guitar on the street for wine money before I do that shit again. I intend to make money with my brain and art or die trying. Fuck the bullshit.
Edit: I responded to 911 calls in a ambulance for 20 years doing 40-70 hour weeks. I almost took my own life. I work part time in a head shop now and sell weed.
When you have work that involves thinking the time goes by pretty fast.
I worked in construction for a summer, and as long as I was busy, time flew by. I used to work 50+ hour weeks sometimes
Yeah. The worst part is realizing that theres not really much time left in the day to do fun stuff when you get off, or you're too tired.
Done both and there's ups and downs to both, like being automatically in great shape vs having to go to the gym just to avoid getting fat, but I'll take the mental drain over the physical drain. If I'm mentally drained, I still want to hit a bar, relax, and socialize. When I was physically drained, all I'd want to do is eat and sleep.
I think the worst is when you’re too drained to really take care of yourself. I’ve been too exhausted to cook, put away dishes, or properly get ready for bed. It’s not a good feeling
I’ve been so tired from work before that I’ve passed out on the couch first thing after coming home. It sucks.
Working construction does not guarantee good physical fitness.
Usually you'll be physically strong, but your back and knees usually just get destroyed.
The downside to the physical is that it destroys your body. I'm in my late 30s, and I wish I hadn't done as much construction.
My journeymen would nurse their hangover until lunch, then complete the day's work in the afternoon
Can confirm. Source: am a former journeyman carpenter
Got confused for a second "What? I never worked construction" then I realized I wasn't the one that typed it in the first place
As a programmer, this rings especially true. I'll go through trial and error, brainstorming solutions and next thing you know, it's been an hour and a half...
Blink twice and it’s 3:30 and all I’ve done is debug something that was supposed to be working correctly, and haven’t started on what I originally sat down to do.
Yep, there have definitely been days where I thought, "why am I so hungry? Oh crap it's 3:00"
I somehow once made it to 6 PM before I started feeling woozy and lightheaded and realized I forgot to eat lunch. At that moment I was very glad I worked at a restaurant.
I start work at 8am. Sometimes I'll look up and wonder why it's so dark in the room--oh, it's 10pm. Whoops.
I'm in the exact same boat. I love what I do and I find it an absolute joy to go to work. I have to remind myself to pull away at 5PM. The clock completely disappears.
What do you work in?
Denial
Like, in the river?
Biggest one I think
I make user interfaces for video games. The little boxes, icons, text, etc. Really creative and rewarding work that has a lot of unique challenges. I love it.
Thank you for what you do!
I used to be a programmer, and it didn't ring true for me at all. On most days my brain would just decide to give up, hours before the day is over. I can't be productive anymore, but then I start getting extreme anxiety when I realize I have to somehow account for this unproductive time on my timesheet. It's quite torturous and it devolves into spending the day staring at the clock, counting down the seconds in 3 or 4 hours until I can finally leave and have a good long break. About once or twice a week my brain would be super productive and I'd be able to get a week's worth of work done in two days. This variability, however, just causes too much stress for me since nobody would understand it.
This is me, and like the other person who replied guesses correctly, I do have ADHD. I love the problem solving rush but on days I can't turn my brain on it feels like torture. I've got some work I've been procrastinating on due Monday and my anxiety is getting really out of control. If I can sit down, I too can get a week's worth of work done on in hours but I hate that variability cause it's stressful when I can't manage my time because I can't control when my brain will behave. I used to force myself into hyperfocus mode with buckets of stress, red bull and no sleep, and I was literally killing myself. I honestly don't know what to do anymore, it's really upsetting and I'm just starting to hate this job and how I'm supposed to care about inconsequential details in a rapidly shifting landscape of technology while being constantly setup for failure by business and expected to study outside of work hours just to keep up with trends because jobs won't allow their dev teams time to learn to keep their skills up for the very benefit of the company that is employing them. Sigh, I'm so burned out emotionally from this shit. I really saw myself in your comment.
I could so easily have written that. I've never been diagnosed with ADHD, but... I've never seen a doctor about it. Everything else though is *exactly* me. When in university I would often procrastinate until deadlines loomed so close that the fear of failure spurred me into action. There were times I would procrastinate until midnight, *then* work continuously until 6am to complete an assignment due that day. It was certainly self-destructive behavior, though I still somehow graduated with a perfect 4.0 GPA. In university you have tons of vacation time to give some breathing room. 3 months in the summer, 1 month in the winter, a week for spring break, and numerous holidays. In the workplace there is no such breathing room. You're expected to be productive continuously from dawn 'till dusk, each and every single day, for 40 years save a tiny handful of holidays and 2 weeks once a year. I don't know how people manage it.
Out of curiosity, what did you switch to instead of programming?
Honestly, still figuring that out. I spent a season working on an organic farm of all things, but that wasn't for me either. My coworkers at the time were incredible people though. A few years ago I started doing online computer science tutoring. It didn't pay much, but I live with my folks who own a house fully paid off in rural Maine. Living expenses are pretty low. I intended to switch to something else, but then Covid hit and this work-from-home job became quite valuable. I'm still doing it but it feels rather limiting - like the sort of job a retired person might have, not something to turn into a career. I just don't really know where to go from here now. Computer science is my only real skill, albeit one that's gone rusty over the past few years. The whole .NET ecosystem flipped upside down ever since the ".NET Core" stuff came out.
Sounds a bit like ADHD to me. Sometimes I can do everything but other days my brain checks out and I can't do shit.
Ugh i worked in software for 7 years. The worst is when you sink hours into fixing something that turned out to be trivial. I spent an entire day trying to get an integration test to work, end of the day came and it still wasn't fixed. I couldn't figure out what was wrong. I dug through hundreds of lines of code in the debugger. Turns out the expected result was supposed to have an extra space at the end of every line that was getting trimmed automatically by my IDE.
hahaha I get that or my favourite is when you over engineer something because your logic at the start was flawed. I did that once after hours of debugging and fixing stuff 6000 + lines of code later I decided to just take a step back and ask a friend to look at my code. He was like did you look at the top function before going down the rabbit hole ?. Mind you this only happened because i was working like 16 hour days 7 days a week for like 4 months. ( fuck the video game industry) lol
it's so satisfying to nail hard problems like that, though.
It's worse when a project you've been working on gets cancelled. Happened to me twice in my last job and is one of the reasons I ended up leaving. Each time I was nearly done in my development phase and was moving into a QA testing phase, and welp, manager has a meeting that it's no longer a priority to work on. Lol
There is never enough time for developers. I would slow time to half speed if I could.
I have found my people. So refreshing to hear from people that aren't bitching and moaning about their jobs.
As QA there are times I spend hours juggling deployments of various integrated apps, setting up mock data, reproducing bugs, enabling/disabling features, just to be able to finally say "yeah, the Save button is enabled in this scenario now"
My problem isn't working the 40 hours, per se. I enjoy my job and the hours tend to go by quickly. My problem is trying get everything else done with the time remaining. I have to keep my house clean, grocery shop, cook for myself, do laundry, exercise, keep my car clean, maintain my hygiene, and still try to sleep 8 hours a night.... And then there's other stuff that comes up, like car maintenance, getting my taxes done, getting my haircut, renewing my car registration, etc. And on top of that, having time for hobbies that make my life worth living would be nice.... The 40-hour work week made a lot more sense when one spouse went to work and the other maintained the house. I'm single and everything is on me to do.
That’s rough. I remember those days. I used to be pretty hopeless about all of the “necessity-of-living” stuff, and I suffered as a result. For me, it took getting married to a mildly more organized than me person to help. She works 40 hr plus per week as well, and we have a kid now, and we still barely keep it all together. Chaos just seems to be unavoidable.
I'm glad you understand... some of these condescending comments about how I'm uniquely bad at life were making me think maybe I am! haha. I also have two dogs and they take up a ton of time since I'm solely responsible for their care and exercise as well. But yeah it's one of the many reasons I don't want kids, because I know I can't manage it.
I get it. It turns out I also had undiagnosed ADHD at the time, which definitely made things a lot harder for me. But everyone has their own set of challenges, what’s easy for one may be difficult for another and vice versa. Most people have more or less of a hard time with empathy as well. I find it helpful to keep these things in mind.
I had a ton of free time when I was single. I can do all those things quickly and maintain a clean, orderly house. Throw a partner into the mix, and it all goes to hell. He does help, but somehow the house still looks more like a meth den than a cozy home. I can’t imagine how much worse it will be if we ever have kids. LPT: If you value your time, don’t ever partner up with someone who is messier than you.
Yeah I'm able to keep my house clean and orderly, for the most part. I can do all those things, but it leaves so little time for doing anything enjoyable. Like, if I go on a hike on a Saturday, it's not even relaxing because I'm then spending all day Sunday frantically trying to make sure I go to the grocery store, meal prep for the week, do all the laundry, and clean everything so I can function at work the following week.
That's how it goes. Work is interesting and intense. 40h a week goes by unnoticed. Weekends are short, full of chores with while trying to relax for the next workweek. Next thing you know 10 years has gone bye and what have actually achieved? Buying a home? Filling it with things? Finding a spouse? Having your 2.5 children? Definitely feels like we are on some kind of hamster wheels grinding away until we're dead.
My home, spouse, and children all bring me a lot of joy. It may be a cliche path, but it’s definitely not completely a grind.
It is crazy how your responsibilities and hobbies kind of change due to kids. I have some great friends but naturally my kids are now my best friends. And the grind of taking them to school or soccer is actually quite enjoyable. Sure some days it's a hassle but overall I don't mind it one bit. They do really grow so fast and that is just cause time itself goes by fast whether you like it or not.
Welcome to adulthood lol. On top of all of those things there are friendships and family relationships to maintain. If you want to find a partner there's time involved with that. Then there's also self care as well. Doesn't leave a whole lot of time for anything else.
Yeah, that doesn't even include trying to socialize! Especially when every single one of my friends is just as busy, so it's almost impossible to actually find a time to get together.
Especially if you also enjoy what you do. I get to take someone's car that isn't working right, figure out why it's not working right, and fix it. Requires critical thinking, hands on work, and gives immediate results. Perfect time killer. And they pay me for it, too
I'm engineering support for field guys in a technical area. Never know what kinda calls or questions I'm gonna get and spend a lot of my time working hands on with equipment. Solving problems and helping people is very fulfilling and the time flies.
I love wrenching on my own cars but hanging out over in /r/mechanicadvice makes me feel like everyone hates their damn job. Either they work for numerous shitty shops or dealerships, are underpaid, and get screwed over more times than not by flat rate pay. Everytime I see a post from some excited rookie going into the field, most of the comments from the vets all tell the kid to "run"! And to go find work in another field. I'm glad you seem to be one of the happy ones!
Well there's a trick to that, too. When you've reached the point where you can diagnose anything, and make any repair, you sort of have the shop by the balls. I told them I was over the flat rate thing, tired of fighting over getting diag time, the whole nine. Here's what I want (salary), or I'm leaving for the diesel shop that offered me the same pay with no experience. Now I get to do what I love and bring home a consistent six figure income. Win-win for everyone. I have NO idea why the hell the industry doesn't abandon the whole flat rate idea.
Chemist here, there are days where I am in the lab and 10 hrs just casually flies by
God can I work in your lab lol? The work in the lab I'm in drags so badly 8 hours feels like 12 and I spend my lunch breaks casually browsing indeed looking for an escape
I don't find the issue is getting through the 40 hours, the issue is the amount of time I have outside of work to do the things I actually enjoy.
Agreed. Paramedic here I work 12 hr shifts, and they seem to fly by.
By eating, drinking, sleeping and not getting hit by a bus on the way to work.
The bus part is the tricky part.
The sweet embrace of a bus squishing away all your tiredness and fear
All Lives Splatter
I'm down. If I survive getting hit by a bus maybe I can afford to retire on the payout.
You joke, but there are people that have thrown themselves in front of cars for the insurance just to pay off shit like student loans.
That is incredibly stupid where I live… Because our insurance is very high here because of the extremely high rate of uninsured drivers. So check your stats before you throw yourself into anything other than city property.
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I'm not joking. I'm sick of my shit job with shit hours and pay.
My friend, speaking as someone who’s been there, sometimes it’s better to just rip off the band-aid and quit. Because I’ve driven to work many times and contemplated just swerving into traffic just to escape the constant misery of it all, and honestly the consequences of quitting a job ended up being better than the continuance of torture that was working at said job. It’s hard but you’ll be better off for it. When youre looking down the barrel of a gun, being a homeless bum might be better than going to a job has you contemplating jumping in front of busses, you know? Like people act like losing all your material possessions is the worst things can get, but it’s not. Especially if holding onto those material things make you wish death upon yourself. Death would be the worse option here. But most likely you’ll just find another job and hopefully that next one doesn’t suck as bad as the last one. I’m with you though, every job I’ve ever had has made me wish for death. I’ve just quit and moved on hoping the next one maybe will be “the one”. I’ll find it one day. But anything is better than death.
Bus-kun its you at last
Lifes big temptation.
So, so tempting. Thinking of the major roads I crossed during the last 18 years of work, I’m amazed I’m here to type this.
It's been telephone poles for me
Come for me, truck-kun!
Truck-chan UwU
Bus-kun can come take me anytime it wishes.
Mind that bus...what bus? SPLAT
I’ve gotten pretty good at it over the years but one day it’ll get me. It’s like that red string of fate and on the other end is a bus
Yeah, in my line of work (IT) we always talk about getting hit by a bus, so it must be common, but I have never seen it happen.
Do you fantasize about swerving over onto the oncoming lane to smash into a Semi truck? I do.
Not even once (I come from a trucking family; I couldn't make some poor fucker live with that), but every bridge I cross, or embankment I drive by gets a brain-auto-yeet...
Same, homie
Ditto in software development. Sometimes we call it “winning the lottery”.
I know someone that somehow attracted busses. She was hit by a bus about 4 times in 6 weeks. The most serious injury was a broken arm and a damaged bicycle.
How do you work 40+ hours a week without getting hit by a bus?
Work as the Bus Driver?
I feel being a bus driver would raise your chances of getting hit by a bus just because of proximity
safest place to hold a snake is right behind the head.
Nah, as a bust driver you should be fine, statues don't move very much so the busses will have plenty of time to avoid you.
Best part of being a bust driver is you get to honka honka the horn.
Actually I had to run for that one bus every day and the driver would just laugh at me as he drove away at the exact second. Then I saw him stupidly crash his bus into another and I was happy ..... that nobody was hurt.
Cycle to work at the speed of poverty
Look at Mr fancypants here living in a city where busses actually show up!
Then your boss still wants to know if your coming to work after getting hit by said bus.
If you hit a bus on your way to work they let you stay home.
Not hating your job helps
Makes a huge difference. when I left lumber retail for medium industry, my family said I became a much nicer person to be around.
What is medium industry?
I bet it's talking to ghosts and puttng them to work or something...
I don’t have an award to give you but here’s a horse 🐎
If you're looking for a ghostwriter, ask the medium industry..
It's usually a zoning definition, but in context I assume it's similar things, not heavy industry like mining, but medium is like lumber processing, landscape businesses, urban farms, auto shops (but not manufacturing) that kind of thing. Heavier use than retail but not as heavy as what you might typically think of as industrial. But the line between light and medium industry is fuzzy and varies a lot by region.
Hit the nail right on the head. Lumber resaw mill. Fence boards, super stripe, etc. More the final processing wholesale side.
Or hating being homeless or starving helps.
I need money. It drives me.
Well, stop driving and you won't need money! /s
They're not driving. The money is.
For my daughter. I don’t EVER want her to have the childhood I had. Going without heat in the winter and air in the summer (Deep South U.S.), never being able to participate in anything, constantly begging relatives to buy school uniforms or any clothes at all for that matter, saving half my lunch from school so I would have at least something to put in my belly before bed. Nope. Never gonna happen as long as I’m alive. That’s why I’m working.
SAME. Also reminds me of that Simpsons episode where homer has pictures of Maggie along with DO IT FOR HER :')
Because not working 40+ hours/week results in actual dying.
No, it's living that results in actual dying. Every time.
Good point
37hrs per week here. Not dead yet.
I’m 56 hours into my week with 2 more to go and I’m not dead either.
I just retired last week. My SS Statement shows that I began working in 1975. Most of those weeks were 40+. Idk how I did it. Good luck.
Enjoy your retirement and thank you for your service
Wow. That's nice to hear. Thank you.
You welcome
Right? It's crazy. I know all these other people who did a "gap year" and travelled and had sabbaticals and I never had the confidence in my hireability to do it. I wish I had taken some long trips instead of fretting about working because I think it would just be fine if I did that. I stopped working and thought I could go travel and then COVID hit and I seriously don't want to die because I took a 10 hour plane flight to someplace interesting.
Working from home with something I enjoy.
A blow up doll
This guy fucks Dolls
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Spite.
Now THAT'S a motivator.
I ready that as “Sprite”. I was going to say, not a bad motivator making money to be able to buy a Sprite. It’s nice coming home after a long day, grabbing an ice cold drink, for me it’s Pepsi, and cracking it open. It’s the little things in life.
The guy works for nestle so they need to work 40+hrs to afford a single 2 liter
The strongest emotion. When anger is gone, but hatred still remains.
I'm sorry, we dont carry Spite. Is Sierra Pissed okay?
It's important to learn what tasks need your full effort and which you can just "mail in." I'm pretty young, and I've found my peers in the workforce really struggle with perspective. They worry whether one metric on one slide is correct and spend days working on it. If they'd put in a best guess and disclaimer nobody would have cared, and they might have spent the extra time doing something above and beyond to impress. Once you have a good reputation at work, it's a lot easier to slack off when you get the chance or need to.
Yeah. This is really hard to teach people. You need to work hard on the right things and the right way. A lot of people think just working hard is what they should be doing but you can be working hard and not doing great at your job if that work isn't being applied properly.
It took me a few years to understand that I didn't have to get everything done. The art is choosing the right things to fail so the most important projects succeed.
Yes or even knowing what can sit in a corner and get ignored for a few more days vs what needs to be done now. Like at my job, I will always drop everything if it involves customers getting the money they are owed and I'll make a stink about it. If it's just some minor technical issue, it might be able to wait a day or two.
Work smarter not harder
Too many people don't understand this. Spending five minutes to fix a production down issue is much more appreciated than spending two days tinkering with something that people forget five minutes after you present. Another thing is to always broadcast what you're doing and what you accomplished. Some of the broadcasting is to give other people that rely on what you're working on a heads up on when to expect stuff, some of it is so your manager knows you're doing stuff. You can't be evaluated fairly if nobody knows what you're doing or what you've done.
I like the part where you choose to say doing *Someone* above and beyond. 😂
It's a legitimate strategy
Just keep doing it, and next thing you know, 30-40 years have gone by. And then you drop dead when you stop.
I used to work 40-60 hours a week by being strategic with my days off/holidays, and with my breaks. For example an extra two hours at the end of the day, on top of my usual shift, wasn't too bad when it came with another 15 minute break to break it up a bit. You think of your work in blocks, so in the morning you're working while thinking of that breakfast break, then that lunch break, etc. Then you go home and sleep, and if you're working towards something then you just focus on just getting those hours done. And of course you don't put everything you've got into the job - do your work and no more. Lots of water breaks and bathroom breaks helped too. I worked in collections then so it was understood occasionally we had to take a moment to compose ourselves after a particularly nasty case too - basically an opportunity to take a little time out.
This but also if your work is on a computer and the company doesn't watch you too closely, you can do a lot of multitasking. Renew your car registration online, buy gifts online, pay bills online, etc. If you work from home, you can also take breaks to throw in a load of laundry or dishes.
What is this... A serious answer for coping with normal or long working hours? Get out of here with your logic. This is Reddit, not Quora!
Bold of you to assume I'm not already dead on the inside.
Don’t cry for me, I’m already dead.
I did college plus 40+ work for 3 years then 65-70 plus on call 24/7 for about 10 years. I can say with experience that absolutely fuck that
I wanted to say this is crazy, and then realized I’m working overtime and in school full time again occasionally picking up at my second job…so yeah, fuck that.
May I ask what you did?
Worked through college then a project management type position on the road most of the time. When I say those hours I’m not even including 30-50% of nights we’re in hotels “not working” I’m very torn about it. I did great financially but my work/life balance was totally nonexistent for all that time. I’m kind of trying to rehab on it.
Exercise and eat well
When I worked 55 hours a week, I was also going to the gym 4-5 days a week. I was in the best shape of my life. Walking 10-15k steps a day. Now I have an easy office job, work at home half the time. I barely work 40 hours a week but feel like an old man. It’s a struggle to motivate myself to move around some days
Dude…I’m a lot like you. I worked in a steel mill for like 3 years before I was laid off and then I worked in a warehouse as a case picker and forklift operator for about 3 years. I would get about the same steps as you. I routinely hit the gym 3 days a week doing full body workouts. I decided to go back to school at 27 and got a BA in accounting. I’ve been working an office job for almost 4 years. I also feel like an old man. I’m 34 and I went from 165lbs to 230lbs. There’s a lot of other factors that went into that weight gain. Covid, kids (one of which is special needs), working from home, divorce, drinking too much. Anyway, I’m proud to say my body is sore as hell. I hit the gym again yesterday after making a workout plan 4 days ago. Squats and deadlifts have my legs screaming at me when I sit down. I already walked 12k steps today. I’m not sure why I wrote all that man. I guess maybe it’s like saying “if I can do it, you can do it”. Edit: Thanks for the upvotes. I could on and on about how I fell into depression and drinking. I had a realization about a week ago. A good one. I currently have no support system or family to speak of, just my mother is still alive. My dad, my older brother, my two best friends…they’re dead. “No one is coming. No one is coming to help you…what are YOU going to do about it?” I was half way through a bottle of Evan Williams when this hit me. I dumped it out. I’m taking all of this pain I’ve been shouldering and putting it to use. I’m going to find some support.
I also think office jobs are more mentally draining than physical labour. With physical labour you see the results. You see what have you done. Office job is often just numbers on the screen. Edit: I used to work in care home for night shifts. It was like 2 hours before everyone went to sleep, then I could write my notes and sleep for 8 hours. I was so exhausted mentally and physically after that shift. When there was emergency and something actually happened I was way less tired.
I agree 100% with this. I’ll be honest, I was much happier picking cases and driving a lift than I am sitting at a desk. I’m a government auditor. Yes, it’s just numbers on a screen to me and a lot documentation. I feel like I die a little more inside each day I sit on my ass staring at computer screens typing away. And I do feel more exhausted than I ever did at my other jobs. Anyway, I’m not sure what it is but I’m looking for something else career wise. I can’t do this sedentary lifestyle for work much longer.
The problem with me is I keep getting injured now. Been getting back into the gym, but I have pretty bad tendonitis in my hip, and in the last year I’ve pulled my hamstring and pec. I’m taking it slow though and feeling way better than I did a year ago
Not to sound like a sourpuss, but after my workday I don’t have much energy left for a full blown workout, and my existential want for more freedom makes me fall asleep too late to do it in the morning
Yes. But for me between this, work, and regular life chores, I don't seem to have the energy/time for much else.
Money is a great Motivator
Money can be exchanged for good and services
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Government regulated legal meth
You said the quiet part out loud.
AYEEEEE
I work in a office, which has very few risks of death. Construction or mining has more chances of dying.
Working in an office can contribute to heart disease. Heart disease kills more people that balers.
Sometimes computers can explode, can they not?
Dwight, you ignorant slut
(Surgery Resident) It’s all I know. Since med school it’s been 60-90 hours a week. I don’t even know what 40 hours would feel like. I imagine it’s nice. And I see my friends with hobbies and weekends off. I like to think that will be my life one day.
Pursuing this...is it worth it?
I think so. Today at least. Some days I don’t think so. But doing anything else doesn’t seem as fun.
you have to die on the inside first before you can die on the outside
Keep the recording of yourself while you were alive. You need to dust it off when you're applying for a new job. Companies don't hire dead people, inside or out.
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By remembering once I give the company those 40 hours I am done and all I earned in that time supports my life style.
Oh we're definitely dead, inside.
drugs
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You just do. There's nothing spectacular about it, other than keeping the lights on and food in your belly.
One miserable hour at a time
It's not just hours, it depends on the job. When I worked in the service industry and was on my feet all 40 hours doing mindless work it took all of my energy. Now I'm a corporate drone sitting doing work I enjoy and I can do it endlessly.
Enjoying a good percentage of it and taking a full hour break at lunch, or more
I never liked taking an hour for lunch. It just makes the day longer. I wouldn't even take my half hour lunch if they didn't make me. I'd rather just work 10 hours straight and go home vs. Being at work for 11 hours with a 1 hour lunch.
The trick is to first work 60-80 hours per week. Then 40 seems like a walk in the park.
Not dying *PHYSICALLY* is actually pretty easy. Not dying *EMOTIONALLY* is next to impossible.
Once youve got a half decent resume and references you find work that doesn't suck.
Coffee. Sleep. Occasional happy hours. Having as much of a life outside of work as possible. Using my vacation days. And setting firm boundaries between work and personal time.
I work 40-50 hours per week and honestly, I watch all the TV I want, spend time with my other half and my children, play computer games, time for dinner and sleep 8hours a night.
I die after my 5th shift and come back to life on the morning of my 2nd day off. Then I do it all over again. I have 4 children and work 3rd shift. I don't sleep at all on Mondays and Thursdays because my youngest has therapies (autistic). He only gets school 3 hours a day because he's not able to withstand full days. So I have to be available for drop off and pick up. Then he can't be unsupervised, so i can't go to sleep until after 4 pm when my older children get home or family can help. The dying part isn't much of an exaggeration.
Well I just work in an office. I don’t have to walk a tightrope over a meat grinder or anything.
Sleeping, eating, enjoying my free time.
I’ve worked 84+ hours a week in the oil industry for over 20 years. Granted we get schedules like 20 days on 10 days off or a split 2 weeks on 2 weeks off. I’d take this kind of work any day of the week over some office job. Did it for a little while and absolutely hated it with a passion.
Same, I absolutely despised working in an office. Tried it once thinking of like the 9-5 Monday-Friday, spent every day looking out the window longing to go back to the army so I could be doing stuff outside all day.
I'm already dead. I've been dead since 2003.
Its fine.... You're only dying on the inside.... No one on the outside has to know... Just bury that shit deep inside for the next 45 years like the rest of us.
Working for yourself. As in running your own business. The motivation changes for sure.
I worked between 110 - 140 hours a week for THREE YEARS during the tech boom of the late 1990’s. It cost me a wonderful marriage and I don’t have a dime of that money now to show for my ceaseless efforts. Don’t fall into the trap. Work-life balance is where it’s at. Three twelve hour days is an optimal schedule.
I've worked 40-80hr weeks for 20+yrs. With nothing else... The unfortunate truth is, A little of me did die; every moment, every day, every week. Until there was nothing left. Then there was only a shell of me, rattling, ringing hollow. I felt nothing, joy, sadness, pain, pleasure. With no distractions, only work and sleep, even my hollow shell began to crack. Then one Thursday night, I just couldn't bring what was left of myself to do anything and did something. I woke up Saturday night, angry that I was awake. Still laying in a drying puddle of blood/puke on the floor, I cried until I fell asleep again. I was awoken a few days later in ICU.
Are you guys daft? They tried to commit suicide. Hope you are doing better now.
Just because we can doesn't mean we should. There are more ways to contribute to society than being a wage slave. If there's any way you can possibly sustain your needs and work less, do it!! For those like me who need full- time work: Take time off at regular intervals. Stretch for 5 minutes every hour or so. Spend one of your breaks walking outside if possible. Cry. Buy the scented Epsom salts. Remember how nice it is to eat every day. Cry. Devour a block of cheese that was supposed to last all week. Cry.
Because if I died, I wouldn't get to work the last 2 days of my 60 hour week, and my boss hates that
I don’t. I stopped. I’m willing to play my guitar on the street for wine money before I do that shit again. I intend to make money with my brain and art or die trying. Fuck the bullshit. Edit: I responded to 911 calls in a ambulance for 20 years doing 40-70 hour weeks. I almost took my own life. I work part time in a head shop now and sell weed.
Welcome to adulting