OK before you think I’m just this corporate shill, hear me out. My workplace is currently WFH but will be moving to a 3 days a week model in January. It sucks and I feel for my coworkers who prefer working from home. If there were a democratic process to come back to office or stay remote, I would vote to stay remote on behalf of them. I think that the flexibility to work from home is great. Everybody has their own workflow and if at the end of the day, the work is done – that’s what it’s all about. I however, understand that my workflow is interrupted by my gaming PC, my Play Station, my bed, my fridge and pantry which I always keep stocked with goodies, my speakers, and so much more. It is super easy for me to get distracted but let me get to the point of this article before I get distracted again, which is why I’m writing this at 10pm.
I’ve mentioned many times before on this blog, the importance of discipline. Motivation ain’t going to save you when you’re behind on work. There’s no amount of support from your coworkers that can help you to do a good job consistently. I truly believe that having the habit of being able to go into office and do work is incredibly important in order to build a workflow and focus. When I’m at the office – I work, when I’m at a restaurant – I eat, when I’m home – I relax. I make sure that the places in my life have purposes so that when I’m there I take advantage of those places and why they exist.
Piggybacking onto that, when I’m working from home, there are times where I won’t start working till noon, then continue my workday until midnight. I don’t have that block to start and stop working. Having routine is imperative for myself when it comes to getting work done. Once you start giving me too much free will though, that’s when you’ve lost me. That’s why me being poor is such a good thing, as it limits me from being truly stupid which I am very good at. I am addicted to having fun and being a child, why do I have a grown up job.
Another thing is that no one is in the office anyways, it’s so quiet in there while everyone works remote. You know how expensive it is to rent in this city – there are some days where the office feels like I’m the only person there working in my giant ass apartment. But when people are there, that’s nice too because you can be social, ask coworkers questions, get food together – it’s nice being around people. As an extrovert, sometimes I just need people. But also, when people come in once a week, they get horny to talk and bro, I’m just trying to finish my work – you gotta chill out my boy. Let me exercise this Excel sheet in peace.
Lastly, I go into office on most days – Monday to Thursday. I don’t go in on Friday because that makes all my weekends feel like long weekends. I am tricking my brain (like this girl named Ally did in my last year of undergrad when she ghosted me. She’s nice but I got back at her by replacing her name in my phone to a poop emoji), that I’m having a good time working from home. At the end of the day, it’s still work and it still sucks but you gotta do what you gotta do to make your work week better. I will trick my brain into thinking that my workflow is working for me, even if I’m low key having an anxiety attack everyday. That is not an exaggeration.
