Some friends and I were discussing a mutual friend who suffered a “possible” heart attack whilst working in his hotel room, discharged himself from hospital and then worked a 15 hour day the next day before checking in with his GP the day after that.  The GP booked him back into to hospital where the heart attack was confirmed & he underwent surgery. The conversation (understandably) moved on to why people work so hard. Most of the people there said they felt they put in too many hours for a good work life balance but, if they knew that, why carry on doing it? Was it just the protestant work ethic?

The main reason seemed to be job satisfaction - there is no satisfaction in doing a job badly so rather than be unsatisfied they chose to over work.  If something is worth doing it’s worth doing right, so the choice is to put in long hours or admit the hours you do spend at work are worth nothing.

Much of stress relates to decisions, we can have too many options or (more often) no satisfactory ones so we continually re-evaluate what choices we do have. In this case ”should I work late” (maybe causing health and relationship issues) or “not” (not doing a “good” job, possibly losing self and colleagues’ respect and maybe even my job)? Neither is good option so the choice is stressful.

The solution? Like I’d know! However, being more fully aware of the options and consequences and asking the right questions is a good place to start. So, if you are overworked, ask the question “Why am I doing this?” “Because I have to” isn’t a valid answer, “Because if I don’t I’ll probably lose my job and then maybe lose my house and I don’t want that” is, but it would help to put a value the “probably” and “maybe”.

For a lot of us ,”I want people (including myself) to think I’m good at what I do” is sufficient incentive for long hours but we need to weigh that against other needs.

Finally, although I already sound like an agony aunt and this will make it more so, if you are in a relationship and work is an issue then try and talk the questions through together.