Find a remote job (take a pay cut if needed), move to a cheaper country if money is a concern. Work 3-4 hours on a beach. Totally realistic as long as you’re good at what you do and manage to get things done.
I'm expected to be online during core work hours and available for calls (in a quiet location with good internet).
I feel like I've optimized working as much as humanly possible and I'm still going insane. My job pays well, has good benefits, has good coworkers, my opinion is valued, my work is appreciated, my boss is fine, I learn new things every day, I now do 12-8 instead of 9-5 by switching time zones, and I make sure to be done with work when the office is done with work. I keep telling myself all these objectively good things, but I feel like I'm wasting every day for a paycheck. I store it all away and invest it, as if there's going to be a future, but I'm fully expecting this to kill me long before I'd have enough funds to quit.
I must be doing something wrong though, because if everyone felt like I do, society shouldn't be able to function.
About being online - I worked remotely for a year with a 10 hour time difference. Talked to my boss on Skype once a week to discuss progress. The rest was up to me. Most of communication was done via ticket comments. Sometimes I skipped a day or even two, but I knew that afterwards I'd have to work extra to make progress.
I don't know if you're doing something wrong, or maybe it's just your personality, but when I did what I loved, it didn't feel like work at all. That was at a small startup where I was the first engineer, and I worked alongside CEO, CTO, and later a couple more guys, building something really interesting. If I felt how you feel, that's the only way I would work. The salary was a third of what I can make now at any big corp in California, but unless you really need the money (kids, mortgage, old age and no savings, etc), then you really don't need much to be happy.
Wait, is this common? I'm constantly answering questions and helping my team along as people get stuck all day. If I had the kind of an arrangement you're describing, I'd just get all my work done for the week in a day, and I wouldn't have a problem. Was there anything preventing you from doing that?
Maybe I'm doing remote wrong? I can choose "where" as long as it's quiet and has good internet, but I can't choose the "when" at all.
I actually didn't like to be so disconnected from the group. I like face to face brainstorming sessions, and I couldn't really have that there.
[0]https://www.forbes.com/sites/lizryan/2018/01/25/the-curse-of...
"Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need." - Matthew 6:33
Is that advice actionable for you in some way? What do you take it to mean as it relates to modern employment?
One of the lines that proceeds that is:
>27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[a]?
Humans should be smart enough to figure out how not to starve and and not to freeze to death without working themselves to death preparing for a future that may not even come. We should care about each other enough to admit that those outcomes are not necessary and be willing to give and accept support form others from time to time.
Gospel of Thomas has a similar parable > , "There was a rich person who had a great deal of money. He said, 'I shall invest my money so that I may sow, reap, plant, and fill my storehouses with produce, that I may lack nothing.' These were the things he was thinking in his heart, but that very night he died.'
Ie, don't make yourself miserable for material possessions out of fear that if you lack them for a period you will never be ok ever again. You'll lack them when you're dead too. Stress yourself out too much about those things and you'll probably just die early without even attempting the things you wanted to do. At least attempt to improve the world in some way if you think you have the means and desire to do so. And even if you risk your material possessions to do so, it probably isn't the end of the world.
Maybe the bible is right here, but another way to view that parable might be that the rich person was planning for his safety, which is wise. And by dying, he has transferred the safety that he was building for himself to his legacy, which can continue without him. I think most people in our society would describe that rich person as being prudent, not foolish. We call that "estate planning" today and it's recommended that everyone does it.
There's a lot of other guidance that I consider very wrong in the same bible though, so its authority doesn't help me much in deciding if it's correct about how to view life. It also seems like this advice might have been more applicable before the invention of medicine.
In any case, I appreciate the explanation.
No you're not doing anything wrong. You're not the problem, the society is.
Also I have to say that I feel exactly like you on everything you said on this thread.
Sounds like you could use some rotation of occupations until you find anything that's of interest to you. Intrinsic interest trumps external motivation every time, just ask a procrastinator.
Personally I stumbled upon work that interests me purely by chance, only because the web was taking off back then. I don't even need to know I'm serving the humanity or building the future, just give me some scripting to fiddle with and I'll fiddle it into perfect shape. Have no idea how I'd function otherwise—would probably rot my brains off and drink myself to death as a janitor or something.
In fact, I'm getting serious dread from the thought that I should be switching occupations for the reasons of both health and money, and because youngsters are mashing keyboards faster.
You seem to be missing that social link with your coworkers.
(And yes, if you ask me, I'd say it's everybody else that is crazy here, not you. But people are not built to have a completely clear mind.)