Is life to short when you work?

Steven123

Steven123

Angel's Buddy
Joined
Oct 1, 2011
Messages
606
Age
34
Location
United Kingdom
I know that for me personally and most people I work with, we are constantly wishing our lives away, waiting for Friday to come around, for the weekend to fly by, before dreading the Monday-Friday grind at work again, before complaining that it is x amount of years away until we retire, by which time we will be to old to do many of the things we enjoy or want to do now, but due to work etc we can't. (This applies to work/study/schooling/training etc)

Is life REALLY to short? Or is life only short when you have to work in order to try and enjoy what home life you get, or when you have to go through years of schooling/training etc?

I promise if I ever have a good win on the Euro Millions, I will make sure you can all retire early 🙂 lol.
 
I've kind of Retired after doing shift-work for 37 years. That's all I ever did, wish the days away till the next set of days off.

Weird thing is......now I seem to have even less spare time than I did when I was working? 😱
 
Steven123
Steven123
Funny how it works out lol
Yeah the work/life balance was really off for me when I lived in the city. For hours I didnt know were long, for pay I didnt think was poor. I did enjoy the work but it was little pay off for HARD labor. Now I have too much time to spend worrying about the lack of food!

I was in a relationship with man who lived for friday, and was too tired every weekend to do anything at all. That drained my lifeforce. I have never chosen 9-5 work. Sounds like hell. He didnt need that much money to live, but did waste it by living that way. I feel like not many people understand this.

I really believe we live in a rich enough world to provide everyone with a basic income for basic human needs. Australia is headed in a bad direction if society continues to choose to be oblivious to the needs of humans and nature for profit. I wont sit on that train to doom and have chosen a different life.

Most on BB have put up with me when I genuinely thought I was going to die. I still have major health issues, I know now that they are NOT in my head, like the city doctors said. I had to re-access and take steps to get my life back in balance. I feel I live more authentically now which helps me during the hard times. This life is enjoyable but not without struggle. Perth was permanent struggle town.

I am currently glad i have not been forced into an unsuitable job. I had a hard time trying to afford food and water unemployed, but I didnt get into debt. I now have a marvelous job that is so much fun, I cannot believe I get paid for it! For me, this is part of the balance. A job I enjoy and benefit from is more important than the pay check. I still have a lot of spare time and would like another 8 hours work a week. I have a plan for that but am pretty slow in the head these days haha. Actually I am moving at a good pace and need to forgive myself for illness. I find a lot of pressure from mainstream to push myself through it because everyone else does. Thats never going to work for me.

I am watching my elderly neighbours in extreme pain and dying around me and wonder why everyone thinks they can wait until retirement to live! Some younger oldies in town are living well, but in poverty, others are confined to home and miserable because of the chances of change they missed.

I've lost many friends to stress related death, I no longer understand life like others do. I will make my time on this earth as helpful and comfortable as I can, for myself, and those surrounding me. I do have to be aware not to over-do it, and learn to limit myself so not to become a drain on others (still working on that). I guess thats part of learning the life balance! I have discovered that I can survive on a very low income. Its not my driving force in life.
 
Yes it's much too short. I've worked 8-5 for years now but the first few months were awful picturing how much time I was wasting.

I'm quite stubborn though so right from the start I was resolved not to let it ruin my life. So I'll still go out during the week. Sport, cinema, meals, drinking or whatever I'll do it and just show up tired the next day.
 
I've been on both sides... now I'm currently looking for work I find it boring.. i have too much time on my hands that I spend remincing and wanting to go back to a better time. When i was working it was tough hours especially when there was a convention and your boss wouldn't give you the time off. But it did keep my mind busy at least
 
I am definitely starting to think that life is too short and that I'm wasting it on work.

From the summer of 2015 to like November last year I did basically nothing but working.
It was couple of months in the beginning of 2016 that was a bit slower but besides that I had to put everything else aside.
I don't mind my work. Overall I enjoy it. But it isn't that fun.

It was a lot of work from home though. So I could sneak in some TV shows on the side while working and take breaks checking out this boards and others so most people didn't even noticed how much I worked.
But I did absolutely nothing else. I didn't even touch my own hobby projects for over a year.

I've had similar situations before. But this the first time I seriously felt that I basically lost over a year and started ask myself if its actually worth it?

So at the moment I would absolutely take more free time over more money.

/SK
 
Life is always short. Doesn't matter if your busy working crazy hours, having fun, bored, or not working...weekends keep coming, months roll by, and in December it seems like everyone is saying something about how fast the year has gone.
 
I thought i might expand on my post a little with more observations 😉


I chat to people who work the usual 50 hour weeks and have lived with people who do. When I say that life is more expensive, I am talking about the shortcuts taken to continue functioning on that level. For example - my ex needed 3 coffees a day ($15) then was too tired to cook or even make his own lunch or breakfast, he would get so much takeaway and soft drink ($30+ even if i packed him lunch) then he would come home to a 6 pack of beer a night to cope with the work load/stress ($20) not to mention the weekends with binges all all kinds (tv, sleep,eating, drugs $300+). This was not unusual in my circle of friends and no one saw it as a problem, except me. They were all scared of early death yet on a road to it. I didnt want to live like that. No one has to live like that. And while some see it as real life and no fuss, I see it as a trap.

The amount he spent on convienences in a week was enough for me to live off rurally for a month. That work balance breeds consumers so I understand why the governments need it. If we did give people more time to care for themselves, there would be less money going into housekeeping services, less going into food services and FAR less going into medical services.

It keeps coming back to UBI for me. Give people a decent quality of life (as ALL humans deserve) and I'd imagine in time, we'd find a better world balance.

For me, with so much time, I have been able to participate in community more. Of course social exclusions come into play, but seeing it so obviouslty here made it easy for me to find those on the fringe. I know for a fact that I have had a very positive impact on half a dozen lives in a year here. That is important to me, to know I improved someones life first hand. And to witness it is one of those warm fuzzy feelings.

I know I whinge a lot on here but it is because I turn on my phone on the loo and am bombarded with extremely well off people wasting money on trivial things, all while saying the unemployed could just get a job or work more to improve their lives. Life isnt about money to me, but it does make living harder without it. I just dont know why the world cannot see this is exactly why we have increasing rates of suicide, general unhappiness and people losing the plot. It is NOT normal to feel like crap day in, day out to make enough to pay for living like crap day in, day out. We've lost the fun of the simple things.
 
I work a 40 hour week and somehow find the time to have fun most days, but I'm single and still live with my parents so there's that.
 
@HappyHippy . What you said is right. I had this one job that was horrible . I would wake up feeling sick & call in & after hanging up feel like I wasn't sick any more . I working part time right now & thanks to that have enough time to do things I like without felling stressed out .
 
I think it depends on your job and if you find it for-filling or not. It all depends on your healthy physically and mentally. If you are happy and coping with life ok and doing what you want to do then that's got to be all good. The problem is that not many people are lucky enough to have this situation.
 
Give Us A Kiss said:
I work a 40 hour week and somehow find the time to have fun most days, but I'm single and still live with my parents so there's that.
Click to expand...

Thats so good you have fun near on daily 🙂 its important.

I think home life has some to do with it. Those who are trying to pay off houses on a low wage dont have the luxury of conveinence, and in turn have more strain and get too tired for fun. A family base, a saving point to get a head start is a good idea. The reliability of nightly meals is likely a comfort too. I could not imagine living with (healthy) parents in my 30's and i guess those who do could not imagine my life either. There is definitely a saftey of remaining in the nest, but a freedom of leaving. Would this change with universal income?

I love being single. Although Its harder to make new friends than ever, I cant find many my age and ability to relate to. Some days i am happy with that (2 is enough close mates right? 😉 ).The oldie neighbours teach me heaps, and are forgiving of my ditzyness. I am grateful to have the chance to spend time with elders outside of my own family. I can tell you all, some regret their excessive work and starting families. 2 have told me directly - if they were to do it all again, they'd do it my way.
 
Luckily I am disabled enough not to be employable, I can't even do what I was self employed as. So I can laugh at everyone wining about their predicament. The stupid politicians said people would only have to work 30 hours a week because of machines and computers doing their work. Then the dumb as you can get politicians allowed millions more people in the country thereby stopping any hope of people not working a 30 hour week. They decided to pay people to have bigger families which exasperated the problem so much they are now threatening the end of the world. And the politicians are still smiling.
So find a way to enjoy yourself, as and when you can.
 
There rarely seems to be a happy medium. You either work a lot and don't get the home life etc, or get the home life but then don't have the money that you more often than not need these days to be able to do things that you want.

Annoying really that you know for the most part that every day you are making someone else money, and even if you go self employed you end up having to work a lot more hours to get the money in, a lot of the time anyway.
 
When I worked 9-5, life was like this blur...get up, get to work, go home, have dinner, go to sleep. I really hated it and I was so stressed. Even with a good salary, I felt like a trapped rat. Now that I'm not part of the 9-5 hell, life is far more enjoyable. True, I have less money but it's worth it! And I long ago learned how to survive on very little. It's an art. Besides, I don't need much...toiletries, food, cigarettes, drugs, pepsi...and I gave up my car awhile back, so that totally saves A LOT OF money.
 
I've never really had a regular hour job. I had a good one a few years ago where I worked 10 days (11am - 7pm) then I had 4 days off. So it wasn't to bad. Money wasn't great though. I then moved on to a few 8-4 jobs, again money became an issue. My previous job and now this one I'm on a salary, so one week like this week so far I've worked 60 hours and worked away from home 2 nights, but then some weeks I might only work 20 hours.., but I get paid the same money (so obviously on long weeks it's a bit of a downer lol).

More money you end up making though, more you spend as well, I've found anyway.
 
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