Full Time, All the Time
with Britt and Robyn
I'm Britt. I work full time as a mom, wife, blogger and salesperson with a fancy management title. And I'm Robyn. I work as a project manager and between corporate meetings manage to cook a home-made meal every day. This blog is about our experiences of juggling full-time work with family.
Check out our personal blogs:
Miss Britt and Who's the Boss?
Not all of us are working at our dream jobs.
That’s life.
But, there’s a difference between having to balance your passions with your day job and absolutely hating your job. Hating your job is bad. Spending 40 or more hours a week in a place that you hate sucks. And it’s bad for the soul.
It also has the potential to seep into your home life, your personal life, and every aspect of who you are - if you let it go too far.
What are your options if you hate your job?
1) Stay miserable.
2) Change jobs.
3) Learn to not hate your job. And maybe even like it.
Staying miserable is not an option. At least, it shouldn’t be. Yes, I’m going to use should. No one should resign themselves to unhappiness.
Changing jobs might be an option for some people. Of course, the economy isn’t all that great right now, right? Right. And… there’s something to be said for recognizing that YOU actually have some control over how happy or unhappy you are in a situation.
Which brings us to option 3: Learn to not hate your job. How?
1. Decide to like your job. The first step to changing your attitude is making a concious decision to flip the switch.
2. Make a list of 20 things you like about your job. I learned this trick from Zig Ziglar. And, OK, you’re thinking there isn’t anything you like about your job - or you wouldn’t hate it. Start small. Do you get a paycheck? Do you have office space? Do you work an adequate number of hours? Focus on the positives and you’ll find the list gets longer.
3. Stop complaining about your job. Negativity breeds negativity. Stop it.
4. Befriend your coworkers. You don’t have to love everyone you work with. But if you make the effort, chances are there is someone who works with you that you have something in common with. Enjoying your coworkers makes it more likely that you’ll enjoy going in to work.
5. Do a good job. Focus on doing your best when you’re at work. A sense of pride and accomplishment feels good. The more you good feelings you have when you’re at work, the less you’ll hate being there.
As cliche as it sounds, attitude is everything. You, ultimately, have the final say in how you feel about your work and your job. Learning to appreciate the good in any situation is a valuable life skill to develop - no matter where you work or what you do.
What tips do you have for learning to like your job?
Photo by Morning theft.
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I found a great book, “I Don’t Know What I Want, But I Know It’s Not This” by Julie Jansen that helped me identify exactly what I liked and disliked about my previous job (I took two years off when my son was born) and identify the best situation for me when I decided to look for work again. It really helped me look at the alternatives (career change, starting a business, finding a different position while staying in the same field, etc.) I think it could be very useful for anyone who hates their job.
SoftwareMom | August 12th, 2009 at 8:23 am
Figure out what it is that you don’t like about your job and see if any changes can be made. Is it the money? The responsibility? Are you bored? You can always talk with your supervisor about taking on new responsibilities, shifting old ones and branching out. You can make a particular job uniquely yours. I’ve done it many times with interships and summer jobs as well as regular gigs.
Finn | August 12th, 2009 at 9:25 am
This arrived at the perfect time. Like a gift from Heaven
samantha jo campen | August 12th, 2009 at 10:36 am
I used to be somewhat miserable in my job (back about 13 years ago). I was thoroughly stressed out about both job demands and money, and I felt trapped. As part of my continuing education requirement, I attended a “fluff course” in time management, where I was given a copy of the book “Don’t Go to Work Unless it’s Fun.” Sounded stupid, but I threw it in my suitcase before my next trip and checked it out while vegetating in my hotel room.
This book honestly changed my life. The message is very simple: be cognizant of the fact that YOU CHOOSE what you are going to do each day. You can always choose to stay home. You can choose to take some other job, move in with your mother, or run away to the mountains and live in a cave. You weigh the pros and cons but nobody is forcing you to do anything. Nobody is forcing you to travel, to sit through meetings with male chauvenist a-holes, or to work until 2am. Just because they assume you will work all night to give them that report in the morning, doesn’t mean you “have” to do it.
Now, I told myself, go to bed and when you wake up, know that you have weighed the pros and cons and made the POSITIVE choice to heave your butt out of bed and go sit in that 8am meeting. Because it was the best choice you had, and it is going to pave the way for you to do other things that you really want to do.
Honestly, it was like a light bulb turned on in my brain that night. The truth was that there were many positive things about my job and good reasons why I chose not to quit. In contrast, after that there were a couple of times when I weighed the pros and cons and made the POSITIVE decision to tell my boss I was leaving. But I have never felt quite as rotten about my job as the night before I read that book.
Another thing that helps is when things get really bad, literally “live in the moment.” If I can just get this email out, I will have moved forward. If I can just complete this one analysis, it will dig me a little way out of the hole. If I can just keep my big mouth shut until 5pm . . . .
SKL | August 12th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
How about: look for opportunities outside your job description for having some fun or gaining new skills? Most companies have employee committees. I’m part of a committee that plans our weekly 20-minute fun breaks (woo hoos @ 2). It’s not part of my job description, it gets me interacting with other silly people, and I get first dibs on deciding what we’ll be doing: jacks tournaments, karaoke, yoga, salsa lessons (taught by me), etc. When I’m hating the bureaucracy in my workplace, inevitably this meeting will come up and blow all the clouds of bullshit away.
Also: stop hanging around people who complain about your workplace and stop gossiping. You are who you hang around with.
Great list.
lynn @ human, being | August 12th, 2009 at 10:54 pm
This is so good!
And what the other commenters have said are valuable and insightful too! I’m so glad I read this!
Nanna | August 13th, 2009 at 7:12 am
Wow, this is a great post, and so true for me at this moment in time. I’ve been working full time as the temp for over 2 years (going on 3 in Jan) but in the meantime, promoting, writing and blogging for Winslowshire, which to me was a grand success.
I think that you are right on the money about deciding the pros vs. the cons especially in this economy, and if I can still work full time, while performing, while writing and while making money for the extra stuff I do, eventually I will get out of my situation and I can say, see I did it!
Gia Saulnier | August 14th, 2009 at 7:02 am
Great post - I love my job and the passion I have for my business - I’ve even picked up another biz -
I am a grateful woman who is very blessed to be able to balance each -
THANK YOU FOR THIS POST! There are so many working moms who HATE their jobs - but they have to do what they have to do to keep a roof over their family’s heads!
LARRAH | August 29th, 2009 at 3:50 am