Work cult you were not going to join

Are our most valuable qualities exploited at work? Let's take a look at how our strengths are embroiled in the formation of bad habits, which - if we do not change our lives - may well kill us.

You did not think that you would encounter such a thing. You did not even notice how you came here yourself.

It all started with a chance to make a living doing what you love. Your dream job. Create, not sit out all my life in a stuffy office. You were not just going to earn, you were going to leave your mark on the world.
')
At first you loved work: it was difficult and interesting, it set the pace fast. Everything was terribly smart.

You thought about solving work tasks in your free time. Took projects home. Worked extra hours on the weekend. You never thought you were overworked because it was not work for you.

You worked more than 40 hours a week, but who counted them? That was great.

But the weeks took shape in months, and somehow you came to the conclusion that you already work at least 60 hours a week. You greet colleagues, looking at them with dull eyes and mentioning (as it were) as a joke that you cannot survive without coffee.

You still like the work, but the passion that was at the beginning is no longer there. Entire days fly past you, and you do not know what happened, but you have definitely not succeeded lately.

Everything that does not concern work is in a hung state. You’d love to check if Belgian waffles are as good as the Belgians themselves are praising. But now you have no time to travel. You know that you need to exercise, but somehow you always avoid the gym.

“Next time,” you promise yourself, “I’ll soon find the time for this.”

And not that you feel unhappy, but something is wrong. You can not understand what it is. It just seemed to you that it would be ... something more.


You have been force-fed an “ideal” work ethic that is toxic to anyone who faces it.

You swallowed a dangerous bog

You are no longer a free member of society. You lured to the Cult of Suicides.

The Cult of Suicides is an artificially created misconception that working 60 or more hours every week, donating everything else in your life, is not only a necessary component of success, but is also considered honorable.

The cult of Suicides is cunning because it disguises itself as all that we like about ourselves: dedication, ambition, sense of duty, responsibility.

He tells us to work harder, stay up late, and, as they say, we can rest in the next world. He says that we will never move forward if we do not come to work before everyone else, and go home later than everyone else.

Slyly and mercilessly the Cult of Suicides leads us to hang on our own best qualities.

And if we do not break free, we are all doomed to ruin.

The Cult of Suicides will kill you (as he tried to kill me)

Balance is the main salvation if the Cult of Suicides has already captured us in its steel arms.

For me, it all started with health problems. I did not go to the gym - I thought I was too busy. I did not have time to cook - too busy - I ordered meals at home.

Then followed my hobbies. Everything that didn’t touch the work went away - too busy - until I sat out all my time working at the computer. In 2012, I worked 70-90 hours a week.

After that, I lost even the remnants of my social life. My friends knew that I wouldn’t show myself — I couldn’t, I was too busy — so they stopped calling. Some days my only contact with people was just buying coffee.

Then — and at this stage I finally realized that I had problems — I lost my beard.

Canaries in a coal mine, or How I killed my beard

At the end of 2012, I received my most ambitious project in my entire career at the time: a site for sales on Black Friday for a company in the list of the 100 most profitable enterprises.

I was excited and scared. Such a project could move my company to the next level, and I decided to make this project my best work at any cost.

Designers have proposed great ideas, and we discussed them to make sure that we put on deadline. We have created a brilliant modern idea based on the most advanced technologies. The client really liked her.

Then the bureaucracy entered the game. The legal department made changes. Brand attachment was against the law. Work on the design did not meet the schedule. Very much missed.

By the time the design was approved, I had only a third of the time we had planned for the project. And - since this was the site for Black Friday - we could not push the deadline. The site should have appeared on time, or it will suffer a complete fiasco. And the point.

In order not to be defeated, four days before Black Friday I worked like crazy, I managed to sleep a total of six hours. Thanksgiving I didn’t spend far from my family to complete the final touches.

I was exhausted. I was in a frenzy. But damn, I completed the project.

The customer was excited. The site has won several awards ADDY Awards. I guess they did dofig holiday sales.

Over the next few months, the areas of my beard began to turn gray. Antennae became ultra-rare. Then they all fell out.

Soon I lost all ability to grow a beard - I was left with only the dubious choice between a smoothly shaved "giant toddler" and a creepy mustache.


May 2013 - about half a year after my Black Friday fiasco

I was so exhausted that my body forgot how to grow a beard. And for what? In order for me to work 19 hours a day and skip family holidays to fit into deadlines?

I was exhausted. My body could not stand. I was overwhelmed, unhappy and isolated. At the moment I had a mustache.

I greedily swallowed the poison of the Suicide Cult.

It was necessary to change something.

How to determine that you are in a cult

The clear signs that we have fallen victim to the Suicide Cult:

• We often work more than 40 hours a week.
• Often we sleep less than 6 hours a day
• Feel guilty when distracted from work - even spending time with family or friends

We do not join the Cult instantly. One way or another, dragged into it, we may deny this fact.

But we are joining - thousands of us.

Suicide Cult Lies

The sweet song of the Suicide Cult sounds like a healthy ambition. "We must work hard to move forward." This is what we have been told all our lives.

We are doing what we believe will be the best for the future.

But the Suicide Cult does not involve survivors.

And although the symptoms of Cult originate from good intentions, they are short-sighted habits that do much more harm than good.

Let's look at the obvious signs of belonging to the Suicide Cult, and how each of them in the long run does harm by disguising itself as a healthy work ethic.

Often work more than 40 hours a week

Often an extended working day seems obligatory - it’s just part of the culture. You think: “My boss / colleagues / cat will judge me if I don’t work overtime like everyone else. I will never move forward unless I work harder than necessary. ”

And that's all you need to succeed, isn't it?

Not. You're wrong. Incredible, terrible, amazingly mistaken.

Research has proven time and time again that it’s impossible to be productive more than 40 hours a week . At least for a long period of time. Henry Ford offered a 40-hour work week in 1914 because he saw — thanks to research — that workers whose shifts lasted 5-8 hours kept up the highest level of productivity.

Despite 100 years of research that supports a shorter working week, many companies are still promoting a distant working day, hiding behind the fact that they are now "broke" or need to do the "last spurt."


This chart is based on the graph used to illustrate Sydney J. Chapman's Theory of Labor Clock (Sidney J. Chapman, Hours of Labor).

The paradox appears when we look at productivity for an extended period of time. After only two months of 60-hour work weeks, productivity becomes negative compared to the values ​​that a 40-hour work week could provide.

Are you laughing at? In the long run, you will do less by working 150% of the time.

Often sleep less than 6 hours a day

Somehow, not sleeping at night has become an honor. We share “martial stories” about how we slept for two hours a day with strange pride, dimly glowing in our bloodshot eyes.

“I sleep little, sleep is a relative of death,” we say sleepily. So many projects, so little time. Believing that, without getting enough sleep at night, we will succeed, it will not lead to anything good.

Your perception of reality is comparable to the state of a drunk driver, if you have not slept for 18 hours. But the problem goes on increasing: if you don’t get enough sleep, then the next day your ability to concentrate will decrease even earlier. After a few days of lack of sleep, you become someone (something?) Like a drunken zombie.

We would not have gone drunk to work, so, damn it, why are we lugging there after four hours of sleep, when we are in even more “half pipe” than after being hit by a hammer?

Worse, sleeping less than six hours a day can cause early death. The Cult of Suicides literally kills you.

Feeling guilty when distracted from work - even spending time with family or friends

Finding ourselves in the claws of the Cult of Suicides, we feel remorse when not working.

"I would love to go to this party, but I should not go - the project will not make itself." We are afraid that the time spent not at work is wasted.

And again the irony is that research tells us: the opposite is true.

Working with overload leads to increased levels of stress and exhaustion, which can be associated with the possible appearance of health problems.

At the same time, it has been proven that spending time away from work reduces stress levels and increases creative abilities, not to mention many other advantages.

In addition, if you accept the fact that it would be ideal to sleep 8 hours a day and work as much, then you still have 8 hours for non-working activities. Time spent not on work, gives us the opportunity to "recharge". It separates us from our projects, allowing us to remember why we love what we do.

Planning our escape

We were drawn into the Cult of Suicides, but it was not too late to break out of it.

We were tricked into developing addictions using our best qualities. They seemed to make us better, but they made us less productive and less satisfied with our work, less happy in our daily life.

We can break the clutches of the Cult of Suicides towards happiness, using our strengths that it exploits.

After the death of my beard, I fully felt my physical and moral exhaustion. Hell, I burned to the ground. I realized that I need to completely abandon my career or fundamentally change my lifestyle.

Just in case, below are the promises that I made to myself, and which helped to break out of the Cult of Suicide.

I work as much as I can - but not more.

First of all, I had to accept the fact that it is possible to work productively only 6-8 hours a day. Attempts to work longer will not make my work more productive. In fact, the longer I work, the less I do.

I chose the second option, deciding to change my lifestyle. I used radical (for me) strategies to control my own time, reducing the work time per week from 70-90 hours in 2013 to 38 hours during the last year.

I expected to see a decline in professional success in favor of the overall balance in my life — I willingly made that sacrifice. Instead, I saw higher productivity at work: the lead time for my orders decreased, and I was more systematically on time. I was amazed, but, looking back, I understand that there is nothing surprising here.

Sleep has become my top priority.

Good sleep is helpful in many ways. And yet, this is the first thing that I sacrificed when I was busy. Lack of sleep caused chaos in my ability to think clearly, which was very bad for my work.

After I reduced my work hours, I began to get up without an alarm clock. Since I stopped working a crazy number of hours, I close my computer at six or seven in the evening, by eleven, I usually already in bed, I read before bedtime. I easily wake up between 7:00 and 8:30.

It changed my life. Without exaggeration.

Previously, getting up the alarm clock before I could rest properly, meant a difficult start to the day in a state of clouding of consciousness. Waking up on my own after I got as much sleep as my body requires, I became much happier during my waking hours and much more ready to start the day.

I dedicate a reasonable amount of time to "UNABILITY"

This was and is my greatest difficulty, which I faced, trying to escape from the clutches of the Cult of Suicides. I love what I do, and I want to finish my projects. It's pretty simple - to build a working day, even with more working hours, if you remove any distracting things that prevent me from working.

But now I know that rest makes me more productive: the time I spent away from work gives my passion and excitement an opportunity to “recharge”. Taking my thoughts away from the project, I allow my subconscious to return again and again to various abstract ideas, which as a result become the best solutions. Taking a break from work reduces stress and increases my creative potential.

So I definitely take a break from work, even when my intuition tells me (and is mistaken) that this is a bad idea. I go for a walk. I leave my phone in my pocket when we go out with friends or during a meal. I devote a lot of time to my hobbies, such as reading or hunting for the best cheeseburger in the world.
I am happier today than ever in my life. I work with pleasure and joy on my projects, doing my hobbies and spending time with people I love.

I am happy only because I live.

Parting with the Suicide Club saved my life

When my beard died in 2013, I was afraid that this was only the beginning of the deterioration of my health, and this would ultimately kill me. It was only a passing vision of my future, and I was horrified that, if I did not change, then I had the prospect of isolation, alopecia, moral decay, and a possible heart attack or brain tumor provoked by constant stress.

By changing my lifestyle, I was able to change everything for the better. My beard grew back after a year of maintaining a balance between work and the rest of my life. I lost 13.5 kg because I stopped sitting all the time at work and finally got to the gym. I felt more cheerful and more positive.

When I left the Suicide Cult, everything in my life improved. Nothing got worse.


In a superhero pose near a volcano in Costa Rica (Pay attention to my beard)

Ready to make your escape?

If you are sucked into the Cult of Suicides, know that you are not alone.

You can meet with the public pressure that keeps this crazy pace. You can fight with your workaholic image and feel that without overtime working hours, you become lazy or useless.

But I promise you - in spite of all the doubts that are creeping into your mind about the Suicidal Cult - there is a better solution. The best for career. Best for health. Best for your relationships with people. Best for your happiness.

You ended up in the Suicide Cult, because you are smart, ambitious and dedicated. But you were led astray by your good qualities, and they turned into bad habits.

There is a better solution, and you are smart enough to take it.

Pour poison into the toilet. Give back your freedom. Find the happiness and success you have been seeking, starting your career.

Shut down your computer. Get outside. And call your friends, they miss you.

What next?

If you are like me, then you will like the idea of ​​escaping from the working madhouse and the soul-stifling routine of the Suicide Cult, but you do not feel that this is possible.
But I was wrong. I just had to trust myself and take the first step.

Do not waste time as I did. You can leave the Suicide Cult today.