I read a quote someone had posted on Facebook the other day. I guess it was supposed to be motivational, but it got me really riled. It was something along the lines of “people who work late aren’t working harder, they’re just inefficient. You should be able to do your job within the hours you’re given”.
I got annoyed because I guess it hit a nerve. I feel so busy these days. I love my job, but I have no time to do anything else. I only see my boyfriend when I leave him (asleep) in the morning and for a couple of hours in the evening, if I’m lucky. I’ve put on weight because I feel as though I don’t have time to shop or prepare decent food or go to the gym, as often as I used to, although I still go three or four times a week.
I don’t see my friends as often, I don’t have time to make my hair look good in the morning or give myself a pretty pedicure and I definitely don’t have time to read. I feel as though I’ve never “finished” work, I have just stopped for the day.
I suppose the quote hit a nerve because it started me thinking. Although I do believe most people’s jobs are very demanding now, employers are cutting back in hard financial times and have to work more than full-time, I also wonder if disorganisation is a factor in most of the things in my life that I am finding tough to hold together.
Sometimes, I think my business may just be a combination of disorganisation and an inability to keep cool under fire. Often, I will look back on a day and see that, actually, I got very little accomplished, even though it felt like I was rushing around madly all day.
I think my day is actually not that torturous but, somehow I build it up so I feel like I have a gargantuan load of work ahead of me every day. I suppose the transition from freelance to full-time is a tricky one.
I think one of the main problems is that, by nature, I am an overthinker. I like to contemplate every small decision I make, from whether I should take the boat or the train home, whether I should have a sandwich or a salad and whether I should see my friends or make time for my boyfriend.
But with a fast-paced job, you don’t have time to faff like that, which I think is a really good way to get out of my comfort zone. Sometimes, before, I would overthink things so much that I would become virtually paralysed with indecision and end up just doing my normal, safe routine so that I didn’t have to think about it so much.
It’s a slow process, but now I am getting a bit more assertive with myself (can you assert against yourself?). A friend of mine told me that, in order to fit everything in, you have to care a little less. That means that, if you don’t have time to see your friend, you don’t see them out of guilt — you just arrange to see them when you will have time. And if you have a work problem, you leave it at the office and don’t think about it when you’re at home.
I can’t tell you how many times people tell me not to be so serious or overthink things. It’s definitely why I had that skull-crushing migraine a few weeks ago.
At the moment, whenever I am doing anything, I have the “more haste, less speed” saying going in my head. I’d like my daily mantra to be “work smart, not hard”, instead. And then, who knows, if I get my organisations skills down-pat, maybe I can be the one to smugly post things on Facebook about how other people are getting their lives all wrong.
