RE: Never Be a "Full-Time" Employee | Why You Should Keep Things From Your Boss
I started following your advice about six years ago. (That sounds odd! :). I really empathize with people who have much more time-demanding jobs than mine, but at the same time, I have seen that having lots of free time doesn’t mean someone automatically has a good work/life balance. I think a person will always struggle as long as they simply make work the biggest priority. It’s understandable, as we are conditioned to think that way in a myriad of ways. I live the idea of thinking of your job as your part-time gig. It has to be, because family requires more than a few hours left over at the end of each day. Again, touch for someone who is locked into a 60-80 per week job, which I would think is a safe estimate for a lot of lawyers.
To answer your question directly, my job is NOT keeping me from living my life! My tricks have been to use my commute to get my daily physical exercise, or at least a large chunk. I dress so that I can run and brisk walk up to 10 miles per day. From there, I actively learn about emerging tech so I can save time while also providing my students with a better experience. (This is something many of my colleagues are slow to understand). Every decision I make about my job gets considered partly in relation to how it will impact my time, energy, and ability to sustain my life priorities. For example, I do not teach extra classes in the summer even though that would provide a nice bump in income. It’s just not worth it. Finally, I simply do not take work home and I rarely think about work when I am not at work. All of these things, especially the last, take discipline, which takes practice. That might be why so many people just stick to the work mentality.
Awesome comment!
I love what you say here:
That is so true and I have seen that in my own life. Just because I have chunks of "free time" does not mean I am living into my priorities. I am really encouraged by your examples of drawing clear boundaries and finding ways to work with your situation to make the best of it (e.g. using the commute, implementing new tech).
The idea of turning down a bump in income is so backwards for most, but you clearly see that there is a real cost to your time. I think one of the problems in my industry is that there actually is not clearly defined link between working more and getting paid more. We work on a billable hours system, meaning we have to bill to a client X amount of hours each year (in my job, it breaks down to about 37.5/week). BUT, almost no one can actually bill 40 hours by working only 40. The motivator is somewhat of a stick, and somewhat of an ambiguous carrot (if you hit your hours, and the firm does well, and you might get a bonus). Plus, we are often dealing with very tight deadlines. For example, I am often given an assignment that needs to be turned around in 3-4 days (or less). And what if I am also working on something else in that window? I have refused to take on assignments at times, but that is usually not an option. If I am running a case, there is literally no one else who can just jump in and do the assignment.
Anyway, I am ranting, but I am thankful for your comment and inspired to find ways to improve my own balance. Cheers!