in defense of working less

17 Feb, 2025

Before I worked fulltime, I had a rather low bar for work and low expectations for myself. I wanted to find easy work that would be enough to get by, and otherwise be focused on my free time. This view came to be because of low self esteem and insecurity around even being able to bring up the energy for anything more than that. Mind you, back then I already had the symptoms of my now-diagnosed autoimmune diseases, but didn't know it yet and didn't have treatment, and I also used to have severe depression. I had trouble showing up at school regularly (not with the grades, though) because of pain, exhaustion, sadness, and issues with peers. So internally, I didn't realistically see more for myself than the bare minimum because I didn't know if I could regularly show up at work. It all seemed so overwhelming, surely I wouldn't be able to handle more than that.

Since starting fulltime work a few years ago, my view has shifted a lot. I can actually handle it (with home office, at least) and I can do a lot on the side, too; even a degree and now also another certificate class, and I want more challenging work. I recognized that easy, mundane, repetitive and monotonous tasks are actually more straining for me than doing something I have to focus and actively work on. And as fulltime work tends to eat up so much of our week, I don't want to waste it on uninteresting things anymore that don't challenge me and just drain me; I have simply outgrown the work itself and its difficulty, because it used to be more difficult for me than it is now. But something that never changed is my support for working less hours and focusing on who I am outside of work.

Sometimes, I offend people by my wish to work less hours or only 4 days a week, or expressing that tech was marketed as having the capabilities to take over menial tasks no one really wants to do and get us to work faster and possibly, less (whether powers that be let that happen and problems around income are a different matter).

I didn’t pull this out of my ass; more than one book has been written about it, even now right-wing darling Elon Musk has shared this idea publicly since 2018, and the discussion has increased since AI has made vast improvements in a short time.

I also work with people who get my wish, people that could be my parents. They have children my age, see what they have to deal with and also regret this big chunk of life that work took up in their life, now that they’re close to retirement and all the ailments start or get worse. They feel like giving up so much for work wasn’t worth it. They’ve seen friends, coworkers and family be ripped out of life suddenly or prematurely and know time is limited and each day is a privilege. They want to spend more time with their kids now, but it's hard as they have fulltime jobs now.

If I had to sort the people that act unnecessarily offended by my opinion into groups, it would be:

• The Lucky Ones: Their job aligns perfectly with their values, their passions or hobbies and their income expectations. Work is not really work to them. They can’t understand that for many people, these circles never overlap, or these jobs are hard to find, or people struggle to gain the necessary qualifications for location or financial reasons. In their view, everyone should just find their Ikigai and shut up.
• The Lone Wolf: He doesn’t need anyone and neither should you. Human connection is a farce. He has resigned himself to doing his job and that’s it. He can’t understand why you would want less time at work to spend more time with the elderly family members, your children or your friends, because that sounds exhausting and like drama. He just wants to be alone.
• The Depressed Workaholic: Work is their life because it’s all they have left. The silence is too loud at home. They just want to come home late and pass out to wake up and get ready for work again. They never take time off - for what? They need this work and all their friends are their coworkers. They pride themselves on their sacrifices and work ethic to hide the deep shame and emptiness in their life. If they can’t be proud of that, then what is there to be proud of? They want you to work equally as hard so they aren’t reminded of what they’re missing and don’t feel like they’re weird. If people worked less, they’d see less of the only people they have. They don’t understand why you have hobbies or want to volunteer on the side - why do that if you can work?
• The soon-to-be Millionaire/FIRE guy: The people who are so concerned for companies they will never own and worried for your financial freedom. What about our economy if everyone thought like you?! Why would you wanna work less if you can work 80 hours for 20 years, only eat pasta and invest 50% of your monthly income and then retire? Aren’t you putting money in ETFs and crypto, worried about retirement? Please worry about retirement!! He sacrifices his young years and body for a future he might not have and doesn’t get why you prefer investing into your current time instead. He will throw a fit if his partner doesn’t wanna just eat Spaghetti Carbonara anymore ¹.
• The Bitter Fossils: Life was hard and it should be for anyone coming after them. It’s only fair! If their life was robbed by work and work injuries, yours should be, too. Fucking youngsters having no work ethic! What’s interesting is that they’ll also shoot against other groups, envious over money and fulfillment the others get - life is just pain without purpose and work has to be exploitative to them, so the Lucky Ones and FIRE types get shit on too. How dare you find fulfillment! They’d be a Lone Wolf too, if it wasn’t for “the old ball and chain” they got themselves into somehow.

In general, I believe people should have enough time and resources to

• raise families if they desire
• be there for their children
• take care of their elderly family members themselves, if desired
• volunteer
• have hobbies
• meet their friends
• travel
• protest
• educate themselves further
• heal from illnesses and injuries
• take care of their chronic illness and disability, not exacerbating it

And I think being able to work less and take more time off is a logical desire and one possible solution for all this.

We can’t want for people to procreate and stop dumping the elderly at overworked facilities and blame mothers for hiring nannies or putting them in kindergarten, and then make everyone work so much.

We can’t expect people to be contributing to the world in cultural and altruistic ways if they’re always too busy with work or recovering from it.

We can’t expect people to work longer and longer in their life if their bodies are worked to the ground early on. If you want people to last, you have to use their skills sustainably.

Innovation doesn’t only happen in companies, it also happens in private, and enough minds are stifled by mismanagement, draining boring work and bureaucracy at work. Workers can’t give their best if they aren’t well rested with a good work-life-balance. We also can’t expect people to come up with new startups or good ideas if most of the time is taken up by their day job - it otherwise either takes fuck-you-money to quit, or an immensely stressful workload juggling both for anyone to pursue that.

I'll always want to work less, and focus remaining work time on important things. I’m good at my job and it’s not customer-facing, so many days, I’m done in less than four hours - what’s the use of the other four? Pretense? I still do the same work and carry the same responsibilities. Hell, I even opt into more responsibilities at work through our environmental team and an attempt to build a queer group. It’s not like I’m lazy or disinterested in my employment, I just like to call out bullshit time wasting when I see it.

I’m ok with anyone else wanting to work less or not at all, too. What do I care that I'll be financing their work-free lifestyle? Good for them! That's how this system I'm paying into is supposed to work. When I can't work, others return the favor. I can't even understand why I have to explain this to grown adults sometimes that have been paying taxes and insurance for years.

The following is petty and a little bit in jest, but with some people that get seriously pissed off about this I just think: Wow, sorry that I’d rather work smart and fast than hard and dragged out for fake performance. Sorry that my private life, my freetime, is more interesting and enriching than yours apparently. I’m sorry that I have people I actually want to spend time with in my life, I’m sorry that I have so many hobbies and different exercise I do. I’m sorry that I chose to pursue a degree next to work and get extra certifications. I want to make the most out of my life because it has been tough until recently and because I’m committed to die a self-determined death between 60 and 70.

Wanting to work less is a love of life for me. The only way I’d work more is if I had to for survival, or if I really hated myself and had nothing left in my life. Until that is so, I’ll much rather cultivate who I am outside of work. What my work gets in return? My new knowledge, my recharged energy, my focus, not having to call in sick, and my 120% when it is needed.

Since writing this post in the drafts, Jarvis Johnson actually released a video fitting to this. It’s mainly an entertainment video poking fun at a TikTok channel, but Jarvis is dropping some bombs about work in the middle that I felt were too good not to include, so here is a link; if you don't want the entire thing, the stuff I mean is mainly around 10:30 - 18:00 and 25:25 - 30:00.
“When people have to work 7 days a week 12 hours a day to put food on the table, that’s not them hustling, that’s a failure of the system.”

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Published 17 Feb, 2025

#2025 #misc