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The Thing That Might Be Standing Between You and Work-Life Balance
Company policies and societal norms play a role in overwork — but so do you
Are you swamped at work? If your answer to that is yes, you’re not alone.
The last two years sparked a much-needed discussion about the structural, societal, and economic factors that force people to work way too hard. The pandemic has revealed how a lack of things like paid sick leave, parental leave, and accessible healthcare — coupled with an over-identification with work as a source of meaning—has left people sick, burned out, and unhappy. Cue the Great Resignation, or as I’ve called it: a collective “not this” moment.
But there’s another thing that can stand in the way of a healthy relationship with work, and that’s your own relationship to work itself. Going further, we might even call this personal responsibility.
It’s funny because, in hyper-reactive left-wing internet circles — some might use the word “woke” here—personal responsibility has become sort of a dirty phrase. Mention it and you might be accused of denying or ignoring all the ways that the government policies and societal expectations are to blame for people’s woes and instead blaming oppressed individuals themselves.
