3/8 Second topic: Exhaustion is not a status symbol

Exhaustion is not a status symbol By Lillian Cunningham October 3, 2012  I have really seen that more in the past two years than any other time in my work. And I think it’s a combination of technology and the economic realities, where so many people are doing more than one job. It’s the whole adage of doing more with less. To be really honest with you, I don’t think it’s doable. The expectations of what we can get done, and how well we can do it, are beyond human scale. And because there’s always this readily available technology and you can get your emails all night long, there’s no stopping and celebrating or acknowledging the accomplishment of anything. Instead of feeling pride or recognition, what everyone is instead made to feel is, “Thank God, I can get to the next thing on my list.” One thing that I think really makes a difference is simply to stop, recognize and offer feedback. Imagine someone who says, “Hey, I got the proposal done, I left it on Tom’s desk.” And the response is: “Great, the next thing we need to do is…” That conversation needs to stop, and the boss needs to say, “Sit down, let’s talk about it. I’d love to see a copy and go over it together. Tell me what you think works about it.” It’s about giving five minutes of feedback, of acknowledging that someone completed something important. You know what I would argue? Less than half the people I’ve interviewed would say they work around the clock out of fear, and more than half would say they do it out of habit. We use work to numb out. We can’t turn off our machines because we’re afraid we’re going to miss something. I don’t want to dismiss the fact that people are fearful, but, you know, one of the biggest shame triggers at work for us is relevance. Our fear is that we’ll be perceived as not relevant or not necessary. So I think sometimes that’s why we jump on the weekend emails. You have to have buy-in from a lot of people to create a culture of immediacy and 24-hour working. I think as many of us are perpetuating that as are victims of it. ‘Crazy-busy’ is a great armor, it’s a great way for numbing. What a lot of us do is that we stay so busy, and so out in front of our life, that the truth of how we’re feeling and what we really need can’t catch up with us. I see it a lot when I interview people and talk about vacation. They talk about how they are wound up and checking emails and sitting on the beach with their laptops. And their fear is: If I really stopped and let myself relax, I would crater. Because the truth is I’m exhausted, I’m disconnected from my partner, I don’t feel super connected to my kids right now. It’s like those moving walkways at the airport — you’ve got to really pay attention when you get off them, because it’s disorienting. And when you’re standing still, you become very acutely aware of how you feel and what’s going on in your surroundings. A lot of our lives are getting away from us while we’re on that walkway.   Questions 1.     Can you relate to the feeling described in the article? Have you ever spent all day and night doing work/school work even if you didn’t really have to? 2.     Do you think people need to feel “busy”? 3.     How often do you check your phone/email? 4.     Do you agree with the author, that if people stopped working and relaxed, they might feel worse? Why or why not? 5.     It is becoming increasingly common for people to work from home. However, these people often find themselves doing more work than they did at the office. Why do you think this is? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Lily 가 보내준 토픽 대신 올립니다.