Anyone else just hate working, no matter what the job is?

[DrSheppard]

I'm in a pretty good job right now - the people are nice enough, the pay is very good, the subject matter is relatively interesting and it's flexible (can mostly work from home). But each and every day I struggle. I've felt like this in every job I have, and I've had a fair few! I dislike the routine of work. I dislike meetings and emails and workshops. I hate going into the office especially - I hate the glaring lights, sitting at a desk all day and the feeling of being boxed in. Even in the best of jobs I've had, this feeling never goes away.

I just don't care about work, frankly. I do what I need to do and always get great performance reviews, but I have zero investment in the outcome of what I do. Every day when I log off I breathe a sigh of relief, but the thought of doing this for the next 30+ years is awful. Sometimes I think about retraining but I really don't know if that'd 'fix' it, since I'm already in a well-paid and comfortable role and I've already dabbled in a fair few types of roles. Does anyone else feel this way?

I do. I’m on maternity leave and had the best year off doing what I want, whenever I want (within reason due to baby) that I’m dreading the restraints of going back to work.

Sometimes, I wish I was an influencer or something similar, but don’t have the face or body for it 😂

I’m not saying this applies to everyone here, but OP reading your description made me wonder if you have ever considered looking into ADHD? Lack of motivation could be linked to seratonin levels, you might not be getting the ‘high’ others do from a task well done. If you are female, you are more likely to mask and therefore conform, perform well, but mask the fact you hate it. People with ADHD are also more likely want change frequently as they struggle to sustain interest in things that aren’t their passion (jobs, relationships etc). Also the feeling of ‘everyone else seems to be able to do this, why can’t I?’
Obviously I’ve got no qualifications to tell you this whatsoever so feel free to ignore me 😂 I’ve just been doing a lot of reading to try and support my son.

What is this FIRE retire early thing I keep hearing about? Just live frugally and overpay a smallish mortgage is it? I don't want to live frugally either as life is too short.

Having to work just for a living is pretty degrading. Being able to do the work of your choice for the satisfaction and enjoyment it brings is preferable, especially if you can choose your own hours.

If all things were going smoothly in the world that's what we'd be progressing towards, a world where everyone is happily engaged in what they really want to do, most of the time. It's certainly not impossible.

Management is so weird. You become a manager by showing a completely different skill set, eg you're great at book binding, so the way to advance is to stop doing it and manage a team of bookbinders. So now the organisation has lost its best bookbinder, to go into a completely different job, and this is seen as desirable.

It really does explain why there are so, so many shit managers. Far more, proportionally, than there are shit bookbinders who are paid to bind books.

Management is so weird. You become a manager by showing a completely different skill set, eg you're great at book binding, so the way to advance is to stop doing it and manage a team of bookbinders. So now the organisation has lost its best bookbinder, to go into a completely different job, and this is seen as desirable.

You are spot on with this @DrSbaitso

I would like to think that I am good at my job. I love doing it and want to do the job rather than tell other people how to do it. I am a doer rather than a delegator.

I agree that managing people is a skill that a lot of managers don't have and requires soft skills rather than technical skills.

No.

I love my job.

May I ask what work you do? I hate my office life but would like to wfh so I could be alone

So many interesting points for discussion. One point is yes, I suppose I could try my hand at a non-office job but typically those are either lowly remunerated compared to the job I do now, or require a lot of retraining. I have enough student debt as it is from a couple of degrees that the thought of taking on more is really not appealing, especially when there's no guarantee I'd love the job at the end of it. Besides, I've already tried a range of different working environments and roles and nothing really changes how I feel!

And yes, I've considered the possibility that I have ADHD - I definitely do get bored easily and lose focus. But that doesn't really help me anyway because I have to work in some job and there's only so much you can change within the parameters of a workplace, no matter how 'accommodating' they try to be. But aside from that, I just really resent spending most of my time Monday to Friday doing things I'm told to do when I'm told to do it. Although I have a fair degree of flexibility and autonomy within my job, ultimately this is what working life comes down to. Even if I was self-employed (not really an option in my line of work anyway) I'd still have to hustle to get business and do things clients want.

I wish I was paid better, but even if I won the Lottery I would still keep working.

What area do you work in?

I’m a secondary school teacher. Even when I have awful lessons with horrible kids that make me think ‘why the hell am I doing this?’, I then also remind myself of the difference I’m making in some of these kids lives. I know how horrid it is at home for some of my pupils and I just wish I could do more. I’m a stable constant in their life, and that is actually a really important role. Even if I won the lottery, I would still do something working with kids. Some adults are awful and I see it as my job to try and make sure as many of these kids grow up to not be awful adults!

Maybe OP needs to find something that has more meaning in life? That gives a sense of fulfilment? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t feel that every day (I said I was going to quit on Friday after a particularly bad year 7 lesson 😂), but I still have the drive to make a difference, or at least try to!

Despite what my user names says, which was picked in a hurry, I think I have found a happy medium by working P/T. I think I get bored easily. I have had great jobs in the past earning a lot and travelling round the world and now I have a low paid, low stress, P/T job after being a SAHM for a long time.

I work P/T, I enjoy it when I am there because my work colleagues and the customers are a good crack, but when I am not there it is out of sight, out of mind. I have a lot of chores to do at home, but the rest of the time I am doing my hobbies. My DH works long hours and earns quite a bit but he is a serious workaholic and has admitted he will struggle when he retires. This has caused a few marital problems over the years but in the end I just let him get on with it and made my own friends and hobbies.

Truth is I am only happy when I am working out, playing tennis, at my running club, doing yoga, weight training and walking my dog. Work is something I do to sort out my state and private pension and savings and for the self esteem of going to work. If I won a million tomorrow I'd pack it in straight away.

I’m a teacher and I love it. I love the students, my department, the school, my subject, the rhythms of the school year. I even don’t mind getting up at 6.05 every day. I broke up yesterday for 64 days of summer! I’m very lucky as it was a pragmatic choice at the age of 27 when I wasn’t sure what else to do.

I do think management is a shit job though, and that’s why the pay is better. If I love making tea cups, doing a job which requires me to not make tea cups, but instead make the rotas and sign off the annual leave requests and break up the bickering of the people who do get to make the tea cups then I’d be pretty fed up too. Then on top of that you have to go to boring meetings where you get to listen to other people talking about how to get people to make more teacups for less money, and how to market the teacups, and how to automate teacup making.

I do think management is a different skill set and managers should be drawn from people who are good at organising systems and processes so that the ‘talent’ can get on with their job. If your best salesperson brings in £4m a year, you wouldn’t put them behind a desk to manage a sales team. You get a manager in to do all the boring stuff and you’d have your salesperson out selling and training everyone else how to sell.

No, I love my job. I’d do it even if I wasn’t paid if I could afford it! That’s sounds hard. Definitely try to find something you’re passionate about.

If you run your own business, then yes to might have to do what clients want or do some marketing, but the difference is that you get to make all the decisions! Work with the clients you like, offer them things only you like to produce or do. Sub out some of the marketing.

It is so freeing working for yourself - waking up seeing what sort of mood you’re in and tailoring your work to suit.

I’m the same as OP. I go to work and get everything done, and I don’t actually hate it when I’m there, but I’m always counting down the hours until I finish or counting down days to the weekend etc. I hate having to get up and go out. I always joke that I’d be happily unemployed if I didn’t need the money, whereas other people in my life feel they need jobs to stop their brain rotting or to feel useful. I’m inherently lazy, though, and can easily waste my days away.

@AllstarFacilier I don't think it's lazy not to want to work! I question why spending so much of our time working AND being expected to like it is considered normal. I feel like we've been brainwashed, really. Who wouldn't prefer to spend their time in a way that they choose? I could still contribute meaningfully to society without being a salaried employee or running a business, by being part of a community, building good relationships, volunteering etc. The idea that our worth is tied to our contribution to the economy is what our capitalist system wants us to buy into. I don't buy into it.

We all need to contribute in some way.
We can't live in a house and expect our heating to work, water to flow out of our taps while we do nothing.
But work can take many forms, we may be looking after children to allow our OH to work long hours.
Many people have limitations, and I do think we are far too hung up as a society in measuring our worth by wealth.

I also know what it is like to do a job you hate- even ones that can impact on MH.

Even if I was self-employed I'd still have to hustle to get business and do things clients want.

That's the deal with life though- we trade off doing things for each other, that is manifested as tokens, money.
I couldn't make a mobile phone, but I do things for others in order to join the system and the guy who makes the phone is paid to buy the things he needs.

Teaching. Retrain as a teacher. Lots of long school holidays and breaks from the grind. No two days will be the same.

But none of those things are going to solve your problem of being 'told what to do'.
You'll have the same issues, and more, with the added sting of no money. You need commitment to volunteer and to have good relationships. You don't just swan in whenever you want doing whatever you like

If you're capable enough to get a well paid job you could have bought a flat, worked to pay off a significant chunk and then gone part time / done whatever you wanted.

I'm guessing you didn't, cuz you either chose to have a family or despite what you said, love money and expensive things more than you hate working

Have you looked up pathological demand avoidance?

I don't hate my job, I actually enjoy it (I know I'm lucky) but boy how much I love not working!!! In the ideal world I would work maybe 2-3 days a week, or maybe 1/2 time, and only doing projects I picked myself. I actually think I would have been more creative and productive if I weren't so bloody tired all the time.

You can’t change the system though. It is what it is. You will only serve to damage yourself and prospects.
Many people take a financial hit and go part time is that an option for you?

I hate working, I have never understood why people love to work. I just do it for the money and the social interaction.