Getting Work Done is Hard When Your Cat Turns You into a Bond Villain

But it is a reminder that breaks from getting work done are good.

Getting work done is not the end all be all of life. — *This is Thalia, turning me into a Bond villain.*

Sometime during the height of the pandemic, amid working from home full-time and regular Zoom calls, one of our cats decided she needed more regular attention.

It started with her jumping on my desk and walking around/nuzzling my monitors. And the purr – oh the purr!

But then, she nuzzled me. And insisted on jumping onto my chest.

Many a Zoom included me in classic Bond villain pose, absently petting the purring cat on my chest.

Getting work done when the cat has one, if not both of my hands occupied attending to her is nigh on impossible. But look at that face. How could you not pet this cat when she’s purring loudly and contentedly?

But this is a reminder that sometimes, you need to take a break from getting work done. I think this is the equivalent of “stop and smell the roses” – except it’s “stop and pet the cat”. Whatever the case may be, the message is what’s important.

That message? Sometimes getting work done isn’t life’s most important activity.

Work/life balance and modern society

It’s become increasingly apparent – especially during the pandemic – that work/life balance is askew.

All those people who discovered that they could have always worked remotely – and saved long commutes and other wasted time – came out of it changed. Suddenly, as much as they still valued getting work done (contrary to the arguments of numerous middle-management types), they ALSO valued the biggest yet most invisible thing of all: TIME.

When all is said and done, we want more time. But that’s vague and non-specific. What we truly desire is more time to choose what we truly desire. More time for fun, family, relaxation, and overall enjoyment of life and all that it has to offer.

Why do most people desire wealth? For more time. They want to be able to choose where and how to spend their time as they most desire.

We all know – but seldom acknowledge – that our time in these meat-popsicles we call our bodies is finite. But the demands of life, the Universe, and seemingly everything often shunt time away, even hiding it.

And then we scramble. We’re rushing about, putting out fires literally and figuratively, and chasing our tails.

When someone like me chooses a path away from the norm, it can be the cause of a lot of issues. I think most of them come from uncertainty on the part of others regarding how to react to someone consciously choosing their work/life balance in an unusual way.

Given our general desire for more time, you’d think we’d seek more balance. However – working against the “norms” and “status quo” can be overwhelming.

Getting work done is almost a religion

A good friend of mine has always worked hard. Like, calling her a workaholic doesn’t entirely cover it.

She typically works 60+ hours a week at her job. Additionally, she volunteers 20+ hours of her time to work in our shared hobby.

Yet she’s constantly seeking to find/create more time for things she would much rather be doing.

When she took the entrepreneur route, I hoped it would gain her more time. That was why she chose it. Instead? I think a 60+ hour work week is a short week for her now.

When I have been looking for work, it never ceases to amaze me how many companies demand on-call, weekends, and unconventional work time. In addition, mind you, to standard times. And, just to add insult to injury, at infuriatingly low salaries.

Whole narratives in politics exist about lazy, pampered, largely young people frivolously spending their money on coffee and avocado toast and not working nearly enough. Oh, please look at them – because then you won’t look at the undertaxed billionaires and shareholders hoarding money and being the true cause of most of our economic woes. Just work harder. It’s all about getting work done.

Is it really? Why do we accept that spending one-third to one-half of every weekday at jobs that are unpleasant, uncaring, and all about ludicrous metrics over people and their needs to be right and proper? And don’t tell me because that’s how it’s always been – because that’s utterly not true.

In this enlightened, technologically astounding time, we still accept a whole lot of BS about getting work done. But it is BS. And when more of us recognize this – we can make choices and decisions to help change the narrative.

But that starts small and starts with you and me.

Getting work done that’s necessary

I strive to write 1500 words of fiction, minimum, a day.

Additionally, I put time into working the part-time gigs I have. Yet, when I get Bond villained by my cat, I feel a sense of guilt that I am not getting work done as I should be.

It’s simply amazing to me that we emphasize getting work done above all else – to the point where we have guilt if it’s too fast, seems too easy, or otherwise doesn’t align with “the norm”.

I read somewhere – don’t recall where – that during an average 8-hour workday, most people put in 2-4 hours of actual, factual work. The rest of the time? There is surfing the web, socializing with coworkers, staring off into space, and/or sitting at their desk looking productive and busy.

Are they getting work done? Yes. And this is part of where remote work gets complicated. You can be available to work 9-5 and paid for your time 9-5. Yet you get all your work done between 10-12. Now what?

You’re available if and when things pop up. The question becomes – should you only be paid for 2 hours?

I guess that depends, really. If you work as a freelancer/contractor like me, you are getting work done and only being paid for that work and any time it takes. If you are a full-time employee – hell yes, you should get paid for all of the time.

Especially if your company earns billions in profit. Remember – profit is pure cash above and beyond operating costs.

Thus, if your company costs $100,000 to run annually, but it earns $1,000,000 – you’ve made 9 times more money than the company costs to run. That being the case, your employees should be well-compensated, right?

No, unfortunately, it’s often not the reality. But I digress.

Self-care starts with you

Whatever work you do – art, writing, science, teaching, office work, lawyering, stay-at-home-parenting, or whatever – getting work done is good. But it is not the end-all-be-all of our life experiences.

It’s up to each of us, individually, to work with this. To recognize that getting work done is good – but not everything.

When the cat demands attention, overall, it’s time to pause and give some (not ALL the time, however, as someone is circling to my right mrrping at me just now. Relax, Thalia, I see you there).

Be a Bond villain and love your pets. Then go back to getting work done. Unless what you do is, in fact, life or death (doctors, nurses, EMTs, firefighters, etcetera) getting work done isn’t life or death. But you and I need to each, individually, recognize and take care of this.

When we change, we create building blocks for greater change.

Self-care is not selfish, and it starts with you and me. Getting work done is part of our self-care but by no means all of it. And that can help us all find our way in this crazy world.