I work too much. Between 55 hours / week at my day job, and 15-20 hours building my own business, it’s just too much. Putting in 70-75 hours every week on a regular basis does not jive with living a simple life.
This morning my wife was telling me about how we’re going out to dinner with some friends.
No honey, you’re going out to dinner with some friends. I have to work.
This got me the sad face. The one I hate saying no to.
Do you really, really have to work tonight? (emphasizes sad face)
You know I do babe.
I know. I just don’t want you to wake up one day regretting all those times you worked instead of spending time with us.
Damn it.
She’s right of course. She usually is. My wife has a knack for that sort of thing. Even though I do limit myself with self-imposed rules ( no working on Tuesday or Thursday evenings, and no working on Sunday ever), the fact is that I spend too much time working. I don’t want to be bitter when I’m older because I missed so much time with my family.
OK, so I admit that I have a problem. Now what?
My choices seem to be these:
Shut down my side business entirely, or quit my day job.
Option one sucks, because my goal of working only for myself would be destroyed. The loss or income would be troublesome, but probably manageable. Losing the future ability to ever work for myself?
Unimaginable.
Option two is just plan impossible. Even with the pay cut last year, I make a good living at my day job. I do not make nearly enough on the side to keep my current life. The biggest issue here is that I would surely have to sell my home and move.
The main reason we bought a house was so my son could really enjoy it. A backyard to play in, a neighborhood full of friends. These things are immensely important to me. Moving back to an apartment would lower my expenses, but my son would really miss out.
I do try to squeeze some work into the downtime during the day. For example, I’m writing this post on my iPhone during lunchtime. There simply isn’t enough downtime duringth day to get much work done though.
So, dear readers, I come to you for help. If you were hoping for some brilliant insight or elegant solution… I have none. Instead i’ll ask for your thoughts. What say you?
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s one or the other.
But if it helps any, you’re doing it the right way — keeping your current income and building the side business, so you don’t take on all the risk, nor do you stay where you’re at.
You need to do it and you need to put in the hours if you want to keep both.
Perhaps your wife could help with something in the side business — administrative, scheduling, filing, taxes, invoicing… it might help lessen the workload.
I say stick an evaluation period on it for a year, and if you don’t see the side business taking off or making any progress, then think about shutting it down.
> Shut down my side business entirely, or quit my day job.
I don’t think it has to be one or the other. Life is usually not black and white. Instead there are many shades of gray. There are other solutions out there and hopefully this post will generate some ideas.
One idea – reduce your expenditures as much as you can and then ask if you can reduce your real job to 30 hours a week.
Everyday Minimalist,
I’m too responsible to quit my day job now, just hoping for the side biz to blow up. I have a son to care for, and a wife in school. Quitting would be just place irresponsible of me, so it’s definitely out
I’ve thought about having my wife work part time, whether at a job or with me… but to be honest, I like her schedule these days. She has a full school workload, with full-time classes and plenty of homework. After that she gets to cook for me every day. Besides being much healthier than eating out, it’s cheaper, and more delicious
So I think having her work would actually be a negative more than a positive, as it would take away from her time to handle house stuff.
What I do like is your time limit idea. It’s something I’ve never considered, but it makes perfect sense. If I can’t figure things out in a year, and make real progress, perhaps it is time to shut things down. I like that quite a bit.
Kate,
While I’m still (relatively) frugal, there are certainly areas I could cut back in these days. I’ve gotten a bit lax with my finances over the last few months.
With many jobs, working less hours is a great solution. Unfortunately with mine, I’m already at the low end of the hours slider. Most of my colleagues are putting in 70-90 hours, while I squeak by at just 55 or so. That’s through a combination of being efficient and just plain stubborn – I won’t put in more time than that at my day job. Offering to put in less would get me a swift kick in the butt and an escort to the door, based on my company’s history.
Thank you for the idea though, I certainly appreciate your input
I don’t know if I can really offer much advice, but I can say I feel your pain as I’m going through exactly the same questions (for the past couple of years, in fact…)
At the moment, I think we just need to give it time. Keep working on both, slowly moving towards the goal, making sure to leave some room for time off but still working as hard as we can the rest of the time.
My goal is to work from home to be there for my kids, and I realized that even if it takes four more years for me to make it happen, it still means I can be there when my oldest son goes to school. And even after four to five more years, it’ll be useful — if I only remember to make sure to live in the years in between