When you are working as a freelancer, the chances of you overworking yourself can be quite high.
Recently, I have worked myself up to a point where I am already feeling sick with fatigue from working long hours.
I used to have this thing about working overtime at home but I seem to have lost grasp of that. My husband and I set our minds to achieve a financial goal in a couple of years and I am obsessively driven to reach that target.
Admittedly, this is probably not a healthy arrangement for me. This compulsion to achieve our goal has the right intentions. But I have to control it to keep me from abusing myself. I have to keep my strength to take care of my son – which was and still is the reason why I started writing from home.
This is proving to be quite a difficult dilemma for me. But, like everything else, I need to know my limits. So here are a couple of things that I remind myself so I can keep myself from being too overworked.
Avoid overworking yourself by focusing on priorities
Again, I need to touch base with my reason for staying at home – which as I mentioned, is my son. Oftentimes I find myself rushing my son so that I can go back to work – which is me being a bad mom. I usually have to reprimand myself when I am putting my work ahead of my son. NAEYC shares that children need quality time with their parents. I need to remind myself of this.
I remind myself that I have an emergency fund
This is the benefit of having an emergency fund – you have the secure feeling that you are financially capable of providing for your family even if you are not earning. This is something that I have to keep on reminding myself of from time to time. If you want to steer clear of overworking yourself, consider setting aside money for emergency use.
I lose more when I get sick
When I get sick, I can’t work and I need medication. If I take it slow, I get to lose a couple of hours of work. All in all, I lose more when I let myself get too sick to be able to work.
So far, these are the reminders that I use to make myself stop working. People who own their businesses can probably relate to this – you never really stop thinking about earning more because you are in control of your source of income. But then again, it defeats the purpose of me quitting the corporate rat race so I can slow down.
This is still an ongoing process. I can’t say that I have mastered the art of not overworking myself. I’m sure I need to be thankful that I have a happy problem of having too much work coming my way. But then again, I have to think about what it is taking away from me – which is my personal well-being and time away from my son.
These are some tips to avoid overworking yourself and as for me, I need to re-assess my priorities. Wish me luck!