Considering the fact that I get my job done despite all of the time during the working day I spend messing around on my phone, waiting for my computer to load, banging my head against the desk etc. – there is just no way my company reducing my full time working week to 25-35 hours from the 45-55 I do now would negatively affect them whatsoever.
I worked a 12 hour shift last week, that’s 4 hours overtime for free because I’m salaried. When I asked if I could leave an hour a few days later I was told I could if I made up the hour the following week. I was in shock.
I’m relatively young and have been an entrepreneurial person since I can remember, I think 10 year old me would be in disbelief that instead of running my own business like I planned, I am exploited every day for a living. I promise myself every day that I will work on my business ideas when I get home from work, but I am so burnt out everyday that even cooking myself a meal and showering is exhausting. Some days I push through and sacrifice the short time I have to relax after work before I’m back there again the next morning, to work on personal projects, but unfortunately, all my creativeness, energy and overall will to live has been sucked into the oblivion by the previous 10 hours. It’s awful.
Realistically, I know I won’t be at this place for much longer and I hope that I can start over at a place that allows me more work life balance but my current situation angers me.
It’s so clear to me now that the average working week is designed to diminish your light and what you could really bring to the world, even if you enjoy your career. I feel like if I said this out loud I’d be called dramatic, ungrateful and lazy – especially by the members older generation who seem to be the first to brand younger workers like myself in this way. I just wonder how this can be the narrative when we’ve never actually tried an alternative way of working.
Theres talk of a 4-day week being trialed in the UK and although I don’t see it happening I think it would be an eye opening experience for employers who are hellbent on working people to death because they think it’s the only system that succeeds.