Live Laugh Work

I have thought a lot about that post I wrote about doing work and work-like activities in my free time and how I find them very fulfilling. I reflected that this is in part a protestant remnant valuing work over leisure and my bad self-image that is temporarily improved by productivity. This is an accurate assessment, but I think it downplays a simpler truth: I find large parts of my work fun. I enjoy making code work like I want it to. I love diving into new data. I get a deep sense of pleasure from working on tight deadlines with my favorite colleagues and delivering something worthwhile just in time. And, ah, there we are again. That last one is definitely fueled by my sense of worth being derived from work achievements. The absence of innate, healthy self-love. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a real contributor to my enjoyment of work. I conceptualize it as a dopamine button, like a gambling addiction, but instead of losing me money, it makes it easier to earn it. That’s a super power, as long as it works. The problem is that it turns into a werewolf curse on occasion.

Hang in there

Sometimes things get rough outside work, making it harder for me to work as much as I planned. Sometimes work gets rough, tasks pile up, deadlines keep having to move and seem increasingly less achievable, stress makes sleeping harder. Then work being my main source of pride and worth is poison. I think this condition is not really dependent on my bad sense of self-worth, but that certainly doesn’t help. Being more reliably happy with who I am and less anxious about my place in the world would make the buffer between ‘challenging week’ and ‘catastrophe’ bigger. But in essence, I think this is a very common issue for academics and engineering types, maybe artists too. Anyone in a profession where passion for and personal commitment to your craft or subject is a large part of the tribal lore and major reason for why people pursue a career. In these professions, work hours commonly bleed into free time and if you are not working actively, you are thinking about it. This is often the result of a lot of perceived freedom and self-regulated work. ‘As an academic you work seven days a week, but you get to choose which seven yourself’, as the saying goes. Unsurprisingly, burnout is a common issue in these professions. Being a werewolf is a super power, until it’s a curse.

It’s a marathon, not a sprint

I started a new position last week and have been trying to map out the remaining four months of the year. All the major deliverables, the teaching materials I need to produce and the ongoing organizational and administrative work that happens alongside. The schedule is, as always, tight. But right now, I’m in a good place mentally. I have recently delivered well, a new position and office are always motivating, my favorite colleagues are successful. So naturally, I am very confident about meeting the high demands I schedule for myself. At the same time, I am a grumpy pessimist (or ‘realist’, as we like to call ourselves), so I am immediately suspicious of that pulsing, buzzing beat that’s driving me. I know that if I schedule too hard, there is a danger I will crash out when I don’t meet my goals. That I will turn werewolf one weekend and dread Monday. At the same time, I know that if I schedule lighter, I will be bored to death. I won’t dread any day, but I will not do anything because I robbed myself of the motivation to work. If there are no deadlines, no heroic fight against impossible odds, no hermionic over-achievement, what’s even the point. On the good days, I feel like an athlete (minus the physique). I want to compete. I don’t want to do a reasonable amount of work and go home.

Going hard in the paint

So pacing myself doesn’t really work and going too hard all the time is dangerous. Maybe the solution is to just allow myself to crash out sometimes. To compete when I’m competitive, hit the dopamine button as hard and fast as I want to, use the superpower and when I start howling at the moon, just stay home on Monday. This doesn’t seem like great advice in some ways. Building my innate self-confidence, eating well, sleeping well, being social and active, spending time on things that motivate me but don’t pay, spending time on nothing in particular and just relaxing, all of those certainly are also a part of sustainably living and working. If I were a robot, the best thing would obviously be to even out the pace and reduce the ups and downs to an even hum. But I am not a robot and I don’t want to have less fun at work. Just less pain.