{"id":842,"date":"2013-06-07T14:31:04","date_gmt":"2013-06-07T18:31:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/?p=842"},"modified":"2013-08-28T11:38:32","modified_gmt":"2013-08-28T15:38:32","slug":"twitter-tutorial-do-we-work-ourselves-to-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/?p=842","title":{"rendered":"Leadership Tutorial VI (for women): Do We Work Ourselves to Death?"},"content":{"rendered":"

You don’t have to be a woman in the U.S. to work yourself to the detriment of your health. But many of us risk our well-being. You may have seen Arianna Huffington<\/a> discuss this recently. It’s more a problem of fast-paced culture — all the racing here and there in jobs and at home. \u00a0There’s so much opportunity for failure and economic pressures don’t help. \u00a0Children don’t go out to play and come home at meal times and when the street lights go on. \u00a0And so, “having it all” is having it under your feet a lot more now days.<\/p>\n

Having paid some hefty health costs while working to be the best I could be, I write now with the benefit of hindsight. \u00a0As my female oncologist said to me when I was 32 and diagnosed with breast cancer, our bodies are not made for the abuse we put them through. Do you think she was dropping a hint? \u00a0Yes. \u00a0She was trying to convince me that taking time off was a good idea. She was impressed that I’d tried to keep up my schedule. \u00a0I, on the other hand, fought to keep things as they were for as long as I could — to teach the same schedule, write, and publish. Such immersion in work had its benefits, but there is something called pacing that both men and women could learn more about. \u00a0And for those women in careers where getting ahead requires being significantly and conspicuously more competent than male colleagues at the same level, the risk to health is significant. \u00a0You just can’t beat yourself up without breaks and expect to be around in a healthy condition to reap the benefits of your hard work. \u00a0Besides, you probably look stressed and tired and that doesn’t help promotions.<\/p>\n

So, what’s the answer? \u00a0How do we give it our all without doing so to the detriment of our health and thus to the detriment of our personal lives and families? \u00a0My first suggestion is to begin separating out what truly matters from what matters, matters somewhat, could matter and really doesn’t matter at all. \u00a0This isn’t easy. \u00a0But one clue is to see what men and women getting ahead are doing? \u00a0Are they wasting their time on projects for which there is little reward? \u00a0Are they team players all the time? Do they torture themselves over slights? \u00a0Or do they help as they can, realize no one is perfect, recognize that some criticism is useful and some is just gossip, and protect themselves from being pushed and pulled in all directions?<\/p>\n

I used to marvel at a colleague who protected herself by carving out blocks of time when only certain types of requests would be allowed to distract her. \u00a0We would plan lunch a month in advance, unless she was in a relatively relaxed period. \u00a0Then she’ be quite spontaneous. \u00a0I began being more protective of my time. \u00a0Truth be told, I was never a pro at it because my work involved students and they need your time when they need it. \u00a0But even with them, I asked that they arrive at my office having thought through what they’d like to discuss so we could use our time wisely. \u00a0It was good practice. And it often left time for casual, fun discussion. \u00a0None of us should waste people’s time. \u00a0When pressed for time, I learned to let people know how much was available. \u00a0If that wasn’t enough, we’d reschedule. \u00a0The side benefit is that, in time, others learn to value your time.<\/p>\n

These are just a couple of simple ways to protect your time. \u00a0I also learned to meditate while recovering from breast cancer. \u00a0It has served me well. \u00a0Bernie Siegel’s Morning and Evening Meditation is my constant companion. \u00a0When our children were little, it was difficult to find time to meditate, but when I did the benefits were great. \u00a0It only takes about 10 minutes and once you get used to doing it, the introductory music alone will relax you.<\/p>\n

My dad used to say, “You can do anything if you have your health.” \u00a0He was right. \u00a0If you’re working yourself into illness, step back. \u00a0Don’t do less, just do what matters most. \u00a0Take some down time. \u00a0And don’t be hesitant to protect your time. There are ways to politely tell people that you won’t be able to respond right away or that they’ll get more from you if they can wait an hour, a day, or maybe a week.<\/p>\n

By all means exercise. \u00a0Think about work as little as possible during that time. \u00a0Enjoy the people you love, get enough sleep, work hard at what you do well and where you’re appreciated. Donate your time to something that has nothing to do with work. \u00a0Reap some benefits and when you do well at something, before getting back on that ladder to climb the next rung, celebrate. \u00a0Life is better with celebrations!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You don’t have to be a woman in the U.S. to work yourself to the detriment of your health. But many of us risk our well-being. You may have seen Arianna Huffington discuss this recently. It’s more a problem of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[35,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tutorials-for-women","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1cEol-dA","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=842"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":956,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/842\/revisions\/956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comebacksatwork.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}