Never-ending to-do lists? The feeling in the evening that you haven't achieved enough? A tight, self-disciplined organization, even in your private life? Does this sound familiar? Do you disdain the "work ethic" of younger generations and the topic of "work-life balance"? Do you define the meaning of your life and the appreciation of it through your work? Do you stylize overwork and overtime as a lifestyle? Then you belong to the "Burn On" target group - known from the book of the same name by Bert de Wildt and Timo Schiele - and you may exhibit the occupational disease symptoms of chronic burnout, if this does not erupt acutely in a final event. Following Richard David Precht's philosophical consideration of the topic of work, this medical perspective complements the picture of our performance-oriented society, its effects and the logical consequences that generations Y and Z must inevitably draw from it. The good news is: with simple solutions we can reduce our stressors and increase our well-being.
Work-life balance effectively discredits working hours as not worth living. If that applies to you, you should indeed change jobs quickly. Even those who find fulfillment in their careers are faced with various challenges. Simple to-do lists have long since been exhausted. Tim Allen is trying to give the flood of new tasks a practical structure with his Getting Things Done method. Embedded in a clearly structured daily routine with clear rules for work and leisure time, such ideas make an effective contribution.
Like we did at school, we need to go back to clear time allocations. Within this stable structure, procedural methods help us to help ourselves. Because not all tasks can be completed and therefore need to be prioritized. This creates clear time windows for answering emails, for example from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m. and from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m., callbacks or regular meetings. In the time in between, clustered topics can be worked on in a concentrated manner, for example, preparing appointments for the current week every Monday, the forecast on Tuesday and the development of a specific topic on Wednesday - and of course in the afternoon with a similar schedule.
The "timetable" provides structure and security. Time slots for spontaneous topics or follow-up work must also be planned. However, changes can only be made within "working hours". Free time can also be structured if certain topics fall by the wayside. It is important to clearly separate the organization of private and professional life - especially if you are in a relationship in which your partner also plays a business role. Strict business hours and off times should apply here. However, anyone who plans their private life in a similarly tight and efficient manner also has a burn-on risk profile.
Anyone who wakes up in the night and remembers tasks that still need to be done that they didn't manage to do during the day should "wake up". There must be times when duties are not on the agenda and should not be on the agenda. In concrete terms, this means: turn off your cell phone, and ideally have two devices for private and professional matters, so that you have fewer excuses. Like drug addicts, we are addicted to digital devices that promise to connect us with a false relevance of professional developments.
What defines us and what should we really use our time for? Let's imagine for a second that we are lying on our deathbed and looking back. In project business in particular, the professional part naturally takes up a significant proportion of the work and leaves little room for pseudo-modern working models. Prioritizing is not a bad thing, but it only leads to greater well-being if at the same time our expectations of ourselves are adjusted to reality. In private life, supposedly dutiful people find it easier to postpone appointments and miss deadlines. In addition to "fulfilling obligations", therefore, consciously unplanned time slots with real "free" time should create space for mental relaxation, especially in leisure time.
Only a lack of demands and tasks leads to real creativity and reflection. An easy exercise is to simply sit in a quiet room without music or TV for 15 minutes and do nothing. Many people will find that we find it incredibly difficult not to look at our mobile phones after a minute - of course only to check the time left.
Your Ensider:Team
(Author: Markus Vogelbacher)
(Image: IFP Entertainment GmbH)