Why Work Might Be Killing You + 3 Legit Things You Can Do About It

Guys, I feel like we need to talk about work for a minute.

Our jobs were not created to kill us.
Work was not created to consume our lives, mess up our marriages and deteriorate our health.
I know I literally JUST talked about success, but felt the need to delve in a little further.

There’s this thing happening in America that is not awesome: We are determining the quality and importance of our lives and the lives of other people based off of what they get paid to do for a living.

You’re an NBA Player? That is important!
You work on Wall Street? You must be rich!
Dang you got in at Google? You are so smart!
You work in music? Your life must be so cool!

BUT WE ARE NOT OUR JOBS – WE ARE OURSELVES.

I look around at a lot of my friends and acquaintances, coworkers and family members. Most of us are too stressed out. We are consumed with perception. We are answering work emails through dinner with our families. We are missing weekends with our kids for business trips. We are taking the stresses of the day out on our spouses, and each time we do it is taking its toll.

But we continue to play the game because we don’t want to fall behind. We live in fear that we’ll mess up, or even lose our jobs. We’ll miss a chance for more money or more recognition if we take a step back. We are living to work instead of working to live.

And for what?

So at the end of our lives we can say, “Yeah I didn’t really enjoy myself, but I made a lot of money and was great at my job.” ????

I get that we need to make a living, provide for our families, have healthcare… all very important, very legitimate things. But if you lay in bed at night stressing out about upcoming deadlines, meeting goals to get your bonus, or plotting against the coworkers you have it out for… It’s a clear sign that work might be killing you.

Here’s a novel idea: What would it look like for us to relax?
Imagine if we spent a day (or 365) not freaking out over what comes next in our careers?
In all of this I am yelling at myself, of course.

If you didn’t get that promotion, relax.
If you are driving Uber while you figure out your next step, relax.
If you haven’t “made it” yet relax.
If you feel like your last opportunity was really was your last opportunity, I feel you.
But relax.

Work is good. It’s God-given. And there will be so many beautiful opportunities within our work to grow, add to our skills, and be challenged as people. But there has to be a balance between our work and our health, our well-being, our relationships, our lives.

Regardless of where we are or what is happening in our work we always have a CHOICE.

If you know it’s time to re-evaluate for yourself, here are three basic choices:

1. STOP by recognizing the habits, mindsets and fears that keep your work life stressful. Be conscious about calling those things out and deliberately choose not to lean into them. Get someone to hold you accountable and be aware when they pop up in your daily life. Often much of this simply starts with our attitude. An attitude adjustment can do wonders.

2. DROP commitments and responsibilities that have taken you over the edge.
Seriously, don’t be afraid to let some things go when it gets to be too much. Extra assignments and add-on commitments aren’t always the best thing for you. Scale back to only what you can manage and still be healthy/happy.

3. ROLL on to the next thing.
This is self-explanatory. Sometimes the best thing you can do is something different entirely.

Yes, some jobs cannot be changed. Some problems cannot be rectified. Sometimes the best thing you can do is move on to the next opportunity and remember that it is just that… an opportunity. But there are certainly some situations where the problem is not what we do for a living, it is ourselves. It’s our priorities, our thoughts and our attitudes.
And we need wisdom, and grace, and honest people in our lives to help us know the difference.

The biggest thing to remember is that You always have a choice.

With everything in my being I am rooting for us all to choose a life marked not just be what we do, but by how we lived

If work is killing you, recognize that you have the power to take back your life… and then do it.

Have thoughts or a story to share? Totally agree with me? Hate me for writing this?
Let’s talk in the comments below. It’ll be FUN!