Do you see those many posts on Linkedin from startup founders preaching their morning routine - that started at 4am and led to the most productive days of their life?
Do you know someone who earns a significant salary from their role in city banking, yet hasn't been at home to see their family for three days?
There will always be opportunities to work more hours, do more and push yourself physically and mentally. Rarely will your employer encourage you to work less.
However, whilst it can appear as if you are making short term gains, this level of over-working and lack of a work life balance can harm your long term productivity and relationships.
The common saying does tend to fall true. I know quite a few people who are considerably wealthy and compared to my "normal earning social circle", the high net worth individuals always tend to be less happy. More stressed, constant arguments in their marriage, small amount of time with their children and even extreme elements like increased drug usage.
Money is great, and in most cases this is what stems from the focus on work instead of other things. But it's really important to find that balance among all the other parts that make you happy and fulfilled as a person.
This article takes look at some of the things to consider and think about when it comes to prioritising work over something else that you could even consider to be wasting time.
Burnout
You may find you have a real drive to complete productive work, and this streak of energy may even last weeks or months depending on how passionate you are, how driven you are or how much you enjoy what you do.
But this won't last forever. Eventually, without balance, everyone hits burnout.
You know you've hit it when lose focus or start working on something and no matter what you can't bring yourself to actually do that thing. Procrastination kicks in and you'll do anything except the actual thing you need to do.
Everyone has different points at which they reach their limits and you may find some people are able to push themselves for longer than others without consequence. These people also tend to be the ones who progress quickly within the workplace and find themselves in line for that promotion.
But if you don't make time to balance your personal life, have fun outside of work and limit the time and mental effort you put into your work, your brain will reach a point where it simply says "No".
If you are burnt out, it can take a lot of mental effort to get back on track and you can find that you go from being a top performing employee to being subject to a under-performance review!
Time with your family
Too much focus on work can have a detrimental effect on the quality time you have with your immediate family. This could be your partner, wife, children or even your mom and dad that you live with.
In the short term, your family will understand if you need to stay late to meet a deadline or prepare for a big event. But prioritising your work over the quality time with your family over the long term is a big risk.
Eventually, that bond you have will begin to break. You may find yourself having more arguments at home and bickering during the limited time you do actually spend with each other. You may even decide to remove yourself from that argumentative situation and return to work to get away from it. When it course all this does is create a vicious cycle and exacerbate the situation.
A job is important and the money you bring home to support yourself and your family is important, but be careful to ensure it does not come at the cost of alienating the most important social connections that you have.
That job may not last forever but your marriage could.
Meaningful connections
It's not just your immediate family who can be impacted by your workaholic tendencies.
There are many other people within your social circle who will lose contact with you a lot quicker if you don't put in the effort to maintain those relationships.
This includes your friends, your career coach and even the extended family.
By focusing all your time on work, even if you did manage to have some minimal quality family time, this may be the only social interactions you have each week, especially if you are working remotely.
It's important to make time to see your friends for a catch-up. It's great to stick to a regular time slot each month with your career coach so you can bounce off ideas and ensure you are looking more holistically at your professional growth rather than being too zoned in.
It's also important to keep in touch with those in your extended family who are important to you. Catching up at Christmas for a gift swap isn't quite enough to maintain those meaningful connections.
Pet guilt
If you own a dog, a cat or other pet you'll notice they tend to be very accommodating when you need to knuckle down and work. This can be great for balancing those moments of intense workload with dedicated cuddles and tickles time with your best buddy.
But often I see a pet being almost forgotten due to it's obedience and quietness laying on the couch, waiting patiently for you to finish work so they can play tug and fetch with you.
At the end of the long working day you find yourself prioritising family time and apart from a quick walk around the block, the pet is pushed aside again. And then just before you go off to bed you give them a tickle with a sense of guilt and a promise to spend more time with them the next day, only to break that promise when something else comes up.
This is the immediate guilt but this adds up over time and I've met many pet owners who's beloved animals are now in ill health or passed away and they tell me how they wish they'd spent more time with them.
A dog is for life. Don't have that regret.
Holidays and vacations
When you think back to some of the best memories in your life and think hard about what you are looking forward to most throughout the year, two main things tend to top the list.
The first being vacations to some awesome destinations around the world and the other being those quality family moments spent at Christmas when there is no work to think about.
Sometimes it can be difficult to switch off and focus on family time around the holiday period, and sometimes work is just too busy to book in that city break you always wanted to do with your wife.
The thing is, work will always be too busy for you to book that holiday. If you didn't book it and worked, you'd be busy after the week and if you did go on vacation and come back, you'd also be busy.
There will always be an excuse to postpone doing things away from work for yourself and your family, but if you don't make an effort to do it, you never will.
Not just that, but constantly I am barraged from Linkedin posts of being posting about their top b2b reads whilst chilling by the swimming pool in Ibiza. Put. The. Phone. Down.
Yes, there will be things to deal with when you return, but much like the company wouldn't fall to pieces if you were to leave for another role, everything will just tick along whilst you are away going down that waterslide for a week in the sun.
And when you do return, you'll probably have a day of feeling a bit of the 'holiday blues', but once this has subsided you'll tend to find you encounter a new sense of drive and productivity. This means ultimately you can get more productive work done over the span of that month, and you got a vacation and a happier family out of it too!
Downtime and thinking time
Playing Xbox, watching football or UFC on the TV. Reading a new fantasy novel or simply touching grass and going for a long walk in the woods.
These can all seem like things that "waste time". To someone who considers themself a bit of a workaholic, they may think "Why don't I spend this time better, be more productive and simply do more work instead? I'll make more money and be happier."
Please may I refer back to part one of this article: burnout. If you focus on work 100% of the time and refuse to give yourself any "you" time, it'll eventually have a negative effect on your overall productivity and ultimately your mental wellbeing.
Giving yourself a few hours doing nothing but slashing and dashing round a video game can help you go into work the next day more cheerful and with a sense of fulfilment and less feeling of being overwhelmed by the job.
Overall, finding balance across everything in your life including work, your family life, your hobbies and your downtime helps to create the best version of yourself. That in turn can have a bigger effect on how you progress at work and additionally support all the other areas of your life.
