Is It Possible To Work 80 Hours A Week?

[krazzer]

Currently I work 5 days a week. 40 hours. I have done this for 10 years now, and I combine working for a boss and doing projects for myself.

Im also trying to build some new kind of product, which may or may not earn me money in the future, but it's more like a hobby and I really like to work on that. However, it's the same type of work i'm doing for my job: programming.

I feel like when I spend an evening working on that project, I perform worse the next day at work. I have tried to put more time in the project in the past but I always wind up not getting much progress. I feel like im scared to work on the project because i'm afraid it will impact me on other areas in my life like getting more stressed or overworked or anything bad. I always seem to restrict myself to do nothing more than 40-45 hours of work (including the project) a week.

Now my question is, are those 40 hours a week a magic barrier of how much (productive) programming work a human can possibly do? Or is it my own psychological barrier that prevents me from working more on my project?

Should I embrace this barrier and just allow myself to relax when I did 40 hours of work in a week? Or should I push myself more and try to get more work done on my project?

Edited April 1, 2016 by krazzer

[Falk]

Last year i had a period where i worked almost 90h/week  was pretty much a disaster,

40h in my normal job and try-hard 50h in my "hobby" until i realized that if i keep on doing this i will end up in hospital/ grave

the best time to work are the first 6h of every day ...it is realy not how much you work but how efficent and inspired and how deep your understand is of what you do

[krazzer]

@Falk Thanks yeah that's what I thought too. But I never experienced working >80 hours a week before. Somehow I always watch myself to keep my sanity and stay mentally healthy and maybe that's just a good thing

[JevinR]

hell fck yes, my brother in law slept 8 hours a week and worked 80hr+ A week. It's all about how much willpower you have

 

 

 

[Henri]

My teacher works 140 hours a week.

He just does not consider it as work. 

[krazzer]

@JevinR 8 hours of sleep a week sounds ridiculous. Unless his job meditating all day  what kind of work does he do? And is he doing this for years?

[JevinR]

@krazzer He use to be surveyor technician and did security at night, raked in like 6,000 a month

[Leo Gura]

You're not gonna be able to sustain more than 40 hours per week for long. Programmers burn out and destroy their health all the time.

You should research why we have a 40 hour work-week.

Where did it come from historically?

Do you know that Henry Ford and other industrialists of the early 20th century actually commissioned studies to find out the optimal amount of the time their factory workers should be working to produce the highest output and thus earn them the most money?

And you know what number they came back with?

40

[krazzer]

@Leo Gura Yeah I've been doing some research on this and most of the time i find that 40 is the magic number. I think i'm gonna stick to that. At least with programming.

But what about doing two very different kinds of work? Like 40 hours of programming. And 40 hours of working in a restaurant or something. Does anyone has any experience with that?

[Argue]

On April 3, 2016 at 2:22 AM, Leo Gura said:

You're not gonna be able to sustain more than 40 hours per week for long. Programmers burn out and destroy their health all the time.

You should research why we have a 40 hour work-week.

Where did it come from historically?

Do you know that Henry Ford and other industrialists of the early 20th century actually commissioned studies to find out the optimal amount of the time their factory workers should be working to produce the highest output and thus earn them the most money?

And you know what number they came back with?

40

Leo, man your answers are always the best. How do I get to that level? It's a burning desire for me! How do I get and stand side by side with masters of greatness. Sorry for the off topic post. Couldn't hold it in. 

[JevinR]

@Argue

@Leo Gura

 

That wasn't for Ford himself, and you shouldn't rely on solely Leo Gura as your sole Guru and worship him Argue. 

This is an info-graphic of histories greatest creative minds:

 

[T1r1on]

I worked in the oilfield, and a few years ago I was in fraq. There was several times I worked 100+ hours a week. Usually when a job started you didn't sleep for about 48 hours. The rest of it was 12 on 12 off. It wears you out to the point that you have a hard time remembering your own name. But, the job is both physically and mentally demanding. You can see where this leads to injuries and sleep issues. On the flip side, I did gain a lot of muscle and lose some weight. But, I started smoking. It was more to get a break than deal with stress (lol). 

[Raoul Duke]

I work in the oilfield, We do 13 hour shifts, for 28 days. So that is 91 hours a week...Probably a little bit more.

Its demanding, I have been here 29 days now, doing 35 this time, one week extra.

I do feel a little burned out, but I have been doing 12 hour shifts for 20 years now, I had sleep issues in the past. (Ha, and a bunch of other issues.)

On the plus side I have 3 weeks leave to look forward to in 6 days.

[kibrekidusan]

On 4/1/2016 at 9:18 PM, krazzer said:

Currently I work 5 days a week. 40 hours. I have done this for 10 years now, and I combine working for a boss and doing projects for myself.

Im also trying to build some new kind of product, which may or may not earn me money in the future, but it's more like a hobby and I really like to work on that. However, it's the same type of work i'm doing for my job: programming.

I feel like when I spend an evening working on that project, I perform worse the next day at work. I have tried to put more time in the project in the past but I always wind up not getting much progress. I feel like im scared to work on the project because i'm afraid it will impact me on other areas in my life like getting more stressed or overworked or anything bad. I always seem to restrict myself to do nothing more than 40-45 hours of work (including the project) a week.

Now my question is, are those 40 hours a week a magic barrier of how much (productive) programming work a human can possibly do? Or is it my own psychological barrier that prevents me from working more on my project?

Should I embrace this barrier and just allow myself to relax when I did 40 hours of work in a week? Or should I push myself more and try to get more work done on my project?

My answer is, it depends.  Well, it is better to do some pointless work rather than not doing anything at your " hobby " at all. There is no single way to success.  And, all that matters is to work the job you love. Don't restrict yourself by this 40 hours a week or 7 hours sleep thing. It is another limiting belief. Brain Tracy once said, anyhour  greater than 40 hours is for success. Even, Leo used to work over 40 hours.

Well when I'm saying this, I'm not being delusional. I get that you will have almost zero willpower. I suggest you to be more systematic and to separate the type of tasks that require labor and mind. And, don't be all or none in your decision. it can be 60 or 70. You can be patient till you get your results. This is what I feel about it, what do you think! 

[ZenBlue]

It depends on the type of work. Not all work is equal. Some work is very physically demanding, but requires very little mental work. Some work is very mentally demanding, but not very physical. Then you need to know yourself, and know what you can sustain over long periods of time.

I think if you can find a good balance between mental and physical work, then you can easily work 80+ hours a week and sustain it over a long period of time. But the only way you would be able to sustain it is if you really love what you are doing. If you love what you are doing, then it won't feel like work and it will feel like you are just playing and having fun all day.

If you are working long hours, but you really hate it, then you are going to burn out very fast.

Change your definition of work. I used to think work was something we had to do out of necessity and never out of love. Now I realize work can be whatever you want it to be. I've been working hard my entire life without realizing it. Just because it didn't fit society's definition of work doesn't mean it isn't work. If I analyze a lot of my activities, it can be considered work that provides value to me even if other people see it as a waste of time or as "goofing off". People are ALWAYS working. Even small children are "working" by going to school, playing with friends, etc. Going to a forum like this, and posting and reading is work. It's just that if you enjoy doing it, you won't care if you make money from it or not. You'll just do it. Working isn't only about making money or having a job. Work is any activity that you perform. Of course you should be doing work that adds value to your life instead doing work that takes away value.

[League of Lions Org]

I do semi-physical work as a general contractor about 20-30 hours/week over 2-3 days, while the other 2-3 days I work at my computer marketing, building websites, doing business coaching via phone/skype, SEO, designing marketing/sales funnels, etc. I used to do that for my own business, but once it was up and going and ranking, I've now been doing it for others past few years.

I find the mixture of the two different types of work and the fact that I'm very good at and enjoy the challenge of both. I also get to help people, my customers in both and they are my businesses as I'm a serial entrepreneur. In those ways my situation is a bit different than the others on this thread, but not "alien" by any means, probably becoming more and more typical these days. Oh yeah, my wife and I are also very involved, have started and sit on boards for non-profits, help put on events, offer free coaching and consulting (pro bono) for about another 20 hours/week, but our kids are 24 & 26 and out of the house, so believe me, it's not bad after all those years of adding family life, sports, kid's events, etc. to the weekly commitment list LOL

Lastly, I just want to mention, that multiple times I've started new jobs in new areas where I was selling and had zero knowledge at day 1. In those cases, I went to my wife and made an agreement with her and my kids, that I was going to work about 12 hours a day 4 days of the week, one day I literally stayed up all night at the office (usually Tuesday it happens) and a half day on Saturday which worked out to about 80 hours/week. I would do this for 90 days so I could bust the curve on learning the new business, having enough time to sell 40 hours a week and learn the business 40 hours a week. Every time I did this, I can honestly say I was as knowledgeable as anyone at that branch other than the top guy by 90 days and in two cases (both when I was an employee not business start up), I was top 7 out of 700 in the nation for sales at the end of the first month.

I see this same principle or strategy being used successfully in project start up, business start up and even in life/business coaching. In coaching I call it "power coaching" where instead of once a week for many months or years (like typically counseling), we burst for a month or two or maybe three with very specific goals and timeline to coach our client to get his/her business started, improve their marriage, develop a new software, create a new sales funnel and test it to success, etc. Life is generally more of a marathon, but it's very powerful to know how long and how fast one can sprint in life and business if it's needed.  Like anything we get better at such things over time as we do them and improve along the way.

Hope some of these ideas/concepts and feedback from my own experience is helpful. You appear to be much younger than me, perhaps without wife, kids, mortgage, etc. so if you're gonna write a software, start a side business, etc. I can only say it may get harder not easier as life's financial and time commitments take up more and more of your currently free bandwidth ;-)

Gary

[charlie2dogs]

On 4/1/2016 at 2:18 PM, krazzer said:

Currently I work 5 days a week. 40 hours. I have done this for 10 years now, and I combine working for a boss and doing projects for myself.

Im also trying to build some new kind of product, which may or may not earn me money in the future, but it's more like a hobby and I really like to work on that. However, it's the same type of work i'm doing for my job: programming.

I feel like when I spend an evening working on that project, I perform worse the next day at work. I have tried to put more time in the project in the past but I always wind up not getting much progress. I feel like im scared to work on the project because i'm afraid it will impact me on other areas in my life like getting more stressed or overworked or anything bad. I always seem to restrict myself to do nothing more than 40-45 hours of work (including the project) a week.

Now my question is, are those 40 hours a week a magic barrier of how much (productive) programming work a human can possibly do? Or is it my own psychological barrier that prevents me from working more on my project?

Should I embrace this barrier and just allow myself to relax when I did 40 hours of work in a week? Or should I push myself more and try to get more work done on my project?

your body needs certain things to function properly, and constructively.  You need a certain amount of good food, a certain amount of exercise and a certain amount of rest or sleep, if you are going to function in a constructive way with some degree of clarity.  Is your job important, do you want to do a good job at what you are doing, then you need to meet the requirements above.  Your project can use the spare time, if there is any, and if not then take care of what is important first because if you dont take care of what is important you are going to make a mess.