Hi Friends-
Two themes that I have been exploring fairly deeply of late — the rising burnout epidemic and our obsession with optimization — came together neatly in my most recent Hurry Slowly interview.
I sat down with Anne Helen Petersen, senior culture writer at BuzzFeed, who wrote a recent piece that went viral about millennials being the "burnout generation."
We talk about how our cultural obsession with optimization connects to "errand paralysis," why techniques that are peddled to us as burnout cures are really just ways to make us better workers, and how leaders can model more sustainable work behaviors.
Listen to "Anne Helen Petersen: Errand Paralysis"
| | LINK ABOUT IT
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When did performative workaholism become a lifestyle? This article introduced me to the phrase "toil glamour" so obviously I loved it: "Ryan Harwood, the chief executive of One37pm's parent company, told me that the site's content is aimed at a younger generation of people who are seeking permission to follow their dreams. 'They want to know how to own their moment, at any given moment,' he said. 'Owning one's moment' is a clever way to rebrand 'surviving the rat race.' In the new work culture, enduring or even merely liking one's job is not enough. Workers should love what they do, and then promote that love on social media, thus fusing their identities to that of their employers."
It always starts with asking the right question. A nice piece from Clayton Christensen on what he's learned after 25 years of studying innovation: "When people who have a high need for achievement have an extra half hour of time or an extra ounce of energy, they often unconsciously allocate it to activities that yield the most tangible accomplishments. And our careers provide the most concrete evidence that we're moving forward. You ship a product, finish a design, complete a presentation, close a sale, get paid or promoted. In contrast, investing time and energy in your relationship with your friends and family typically doesn't offer that same immediate sense of achievement. Kids, for instance, misbehave every day, and it's not until 20 odd years later that you can say, 'I raised a good kid.'"
Long hours backfire. Shocking news, everyone: "If your job relies on interpersonal communication, making judgment calls, reading other people's faces, or managing your own emotional reactions — pretty much all things that the modern office requires — I have more bad news. Researchers have found that overwork (and its accompanying stress and exhaustion) can make all of these things more difficult."
Your greatest hits album. I liked this piece from Paul Jarvis on not feeling the need to feed the "content" beast: "The problem is, every time we create something new, we push everything we've previously created down a little further from people's attention. Not only is it stressful. It's unreasonable to believe we're only as good as the next thing we hit 'publish' on. And sometimes we've got amazing work in our back catalog that's largely unseen by our audience—especially if we created that content before we had much of one."
+ When it's over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.
+ How to make sense of things when you're feeling overwhelmed.
+ How to be likable (funny edition).
+ What black burnout looks like.
+ The mental load.
| | | TOOLS FOR CALM COLLABORATION:
| | SHOUT-OUTS:
Much appreciation for link ideas to: Rad Reads, Farnam Street, and Alex Anderson.
The beautiful illustrations are from: Yukari Mishima, who is based in Hiroshima, Japan.
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Hi, I'm Jocelyn, the human behind this newsletter. I created the online course RESET, a cosmic tune-up for your workday, and I host Hurry Slowly, a podcast about how you can be more productive, creative, and resilient by slowing down. Occasionally, I write books and give talks too. | | | | |
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