Work Life Balance
My Work-Life Balance Sucks
And it isn’t going to get any better unless I do something about it.
Another useless, uninspiring post that no one will read. Me. Just writing words, because I paid for a years subscription to Medium and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let them take my money and not take up some of their server space and bandwidth!
It’s funny to get my daily read alert from Medium.
I declared a few interests, so every day I get some recommendations, that are inspirational, life changing, and “4 Hour Work Week” type stuff.
I have no idea what I’m doing, or why I’m here.
I am a software developer, we used to be called computer programmers, but I think that sounded too much like a trade, so someone upped the game a little and rebranded us.
I’m not really into the lifestyle bullshit that is associated with the tech industry.
I’m old (54 as of 2019), don’t get enough exercise because I’m always responding to something at the office, which means I’m overweight, my blood pressure is controlled via medicine, and I should spend more time at home. To put it mildly: my work life balance sucks!
Work life balance is a weird concept.
I think people mistakenly assume that work life balance means that everything is good, everyone is happy, and my life is just awesome. Nope.
Work life balance is when you try to strike a balance between work and life such that you can keep your job and your relationships.
My “work-life” balance tips toward work (not sure I can really call it a “career”), and I’m sure that’s probably true for a lot of you.
I only assume that’s the case based on the number of people that I know that wish they did something else for money that would allow them to have more free time to do the things they really love.
Seems like a lot of us are trying to tip the scale to the “life” side.
I’ve created a few web apps that were subscription based, and did OK with them, but I really just made a job for myself, and made less money that I do at my real job, and it was exhausting.
Then I created a couple blogs that turned out to get some attention in a highly competitive niche, and made a few bucks via affiliate links, then I got bored because it was just another job.
None of these activities seemed like they were leading to any more freedom that I get by just working 45–50 hours a week at my regular old job.
So I’ve turned to writing. Not for blogging, or affiliate links, or to try to convince anyone of anything. I’m not selling anything at all. Just getting words down on “paper”.
Back in the old days, I wanted to be a writer.
And I’m not even sure what that meant, but I’m sure it was based on some romantic notion developed in an American Literature class.
I would become an expat, move to France or Spain, hang out in dive bars and crank out words while publishers waited, called, and left nasty voice mails.
But I would ignore them because I am creating art that would outlive me and be ready by generations to come. Yeah, not so much.
I intuitively knew that no one makes money as a writer unless they work at a job that pays them to write. So I started writing code, and made a good living at a job that allowed me to be creative.
But I still feel like something is missing. No one reads code.
I like sitting at a keyboard writing words, imagining that someone will read them, and we can pretend that we’re friends, just talking.
So here I sit on a Saturday morning, being a writer.
This is how I’m tipping my scale toward “life”.
Sorry for taking up your time.
