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[INTJ] Work-life balance

Joined
Sep 18, 2008
Messages
1,941
MBTI Type
INTJ
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512
Instinctual Variant
sp/so
I'm posting this at 6:40am from work, having been here since 9am yesterday. I worked a 14 hour day before yesterday. I'm completely exhausted and have spent most of yesterday on my feet.

I know that I work too hard; I've been accused of being a workaholic. My problems are that I'm an INTJ (so if I can do things NOW to prepare for the future, I will) and that I have ADD (capable of hyperfocus and an over-compensatory anxiety that I am not living up to standards).

I often find myself burnt out and exhausted, yet am unable to reign in my requirements of myself and efficiency to acknowledge that I'm trying to do too much. Another INTJ in my lab has the same problem, but he doesn't seem to have found a solution either.

Just the other day, someone asked me if I had a "life outside of the lab", and I said "depends on your definition of 'life', I guess". Which pretty much sums up the situation.

I was wondering how people define a work-life balance, and how, if any of you, have solved this problem of pushing yourself too hard (to the detriment of your own health).
 

Geoff

Lallygag Moderator
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
5,584
MBTI Type
INXP
Hmm.

When you are working, work

When you are not working, don't work. Don't be "at home... and not at work" or out in a restaurant and not working. In short, stop thinking/worrying about it when you are not there.

Really, you just have to educate your brain to listen to this advice. And, yes, I know it's hard.
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2008
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Thanks for your advice, Geoff. In retrospect, I have been doing that work/not work thing, so my life revolves around work, whether I'm here physically or not.

It's definitely a challenge trying to get the anxiety/thinking part of the brain to shut off. Do you have any tips with regards to that?
 

Darjur

New member
Joined
Oct 26, 2008
Messages
493
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INTJ
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For me, working is living and living is working. Be it work a hobby or something, but I am basically always working on something.

There really is no real distinction between work, self or hobby time to me simply because I enjoy my work a lot.
 
G

garbage

Guest
I concentrated on my career for a very long time, which put me in a position where I had financial security and where I could sit back and enjoy the flexibility.. so then I just felt the need to concentrate on other areas of my life. I consider work to basically in the background for me right now, but I feel that same productive streak in these other areas.. I hit them with full force, just as I did my career.

Eventually, I simply reached a point where the investment in time toward a career just ended up paying dividends, as if I didn't even have to work for future promotions and enhancements to my career.

Once I finish my Ph.D., I know that I'll be concentrating on my career again for a short while in establishing a business.. but hopefully I'll be able to go back to the position that I'm in again now.

I do also very much like what I do, but I'm preferring to not allow it to tie me down.. that is, to work on my own terms as much as possible.
 
Joined
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For me, working is living and living is working. Be it work a hobby or something, but I am basically always working on something.

There really is no real distinction between work, self or hobby time to me simply because I enjoy my work a lot.

Yep, I agree with you. But sometimes it can be taken too far (with me), and that's where the problem lies.

I enjoy my work, but it should not be an obsession.
 

Geoff

Lallygag Moderator
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
5,584
MBTI Type
INXP
Thanks for your advice, Geoff. In retrospect, I have been doing that work/not work thing, so my life revolves around work, whether I'm here physically or not.

It's definitely a challenge trying to get the anxiety/thinking part of the brain to shut off. Do you have any tips with regards to that?

Keep telling yourself. Tell yourself off when you "keep" thinking about it. Mentally change the subject on yourself. It's not easy, but it will sink in.
 
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