HN Reader

When Covid restrictions hit and I got to telework consistently I had to relearn this. For the first month or so, every time I passed by the home office I'd think, "Let's see if I got a response to..." or "I wonder how the build and tests are doing" and check. It was pointless and stupid, they weren't paying me for that time and it was distracting from time for my wife and I to do whatever we wanted to do.

Fortunately I realized just a few weeks in that I'd started doing that and changed my habits (went for a run as soon as the work day was done; shutdown, not just closed, the work laptop). That was enough for me to break the bad behavior and get my life back, but I have lots of colleagues who just can't do that. They'll check their email on the weekends or even at 2 in the morning on a weekday, when I'm living my life or sleeping. If the boss needs to tell me something critical on Saturday, they can call, I won't touch the computer again until Monday.

I like that this article puts the onus on the individual to do the thing.

I think there are jobs that set unrealistic expectations, but I also think A LOT of Americans who never disconnected from work ... simply choose that lifestyle.

I recently had some free time and fired up my personal computer and realized that my personal profile was out of date on a lot of software and so on. But I'm on a computer a lot ... I'm on my work computer. I don't regret the work I put in on the work computer on and off hours sometimes, but it was pretty jarring to notice how "neglected" my personal computer was.