Most of the time, I have a pretty low-key situation with my job (or jobs). With my two main jobs, I can pretty much work them at the same time. I do my data entry between my customers at the box office job. It’s not always easy to juggle it, but I make it work.
Then of course there are the days that my box office job is insanely busy and I have no time for the data entry job. I then either have to not work the data entry job that day (not a big deal since I can only work that job 12 hours a week) or I have to work after my box office job is done for the day. It’s not a horrible situation and I still consider myself so lucky that I’ve found these two jobs (and the combined money between the two of them is almost enough to pay my bills!).
I’m trying not to get overwhelmed on the days that it’s super busy, but lately I’ve struggled with that. The combination of a lot of customers, lots of either repetitive questions or questions I can’t help with, and the heat have made me cranky and I don’t want my customers to know about that. I keep videos of puppies playing up on YouTube in the background to watch when I need to calm down.
The other day, I was asked by my old boss to help him at his job. I’ve done phone calls for him as well as some day-of box office work. But this time he needed me to help him stuff envelopes.
I wasn’t really looking forward to it. I knew I’d be working my 2 jobs earlier in the day and it was hot (and that office has no a/c), but I needed the extra money. So after working a double day, I drove over to Venice to work my 3rd job of the day.
At first, it was a bit annoying doing the work. It’s busy work and very repetitive. But then I decided to get my phone and headphones out and listen to some podcasts while I worked. Between the podcast entertainment and the repetitive action of stuffing envelopes I started to relax and calm down. I had to pay attention to what I was doing because each envelope had a different paper that needed to go inside, but it was still a job that I was able to just focus on what I had to do and let the rest of my mind drift.
After working those 3 hours, I felt so much calmer than I did before. It’s not something that I’d want to do every day, but stuffing those envelopes that day was really the perfect thing for me to do. It’s nice that while I wasn’t looking forward to the job before I got there, it was exactly what I needed in my day (plus, the extra money doesn’t hurt!).
I’ve been trying to find ways to separate my mind from work when the work day is done. I thought that I had it worked out well, but I’ve now realized that it’s not totally what I need. When I go to work out, that’s a perfect separation of when it’s work time and when it’s fun time. And on the other days I try to do some sort of errand (even if it’s just going to the store or post office) as soon as my box office shift is done to help my mind realize that work is over (if I stay at my computer I wouldn’t feel like it’s done). I’ve realized now that just going to the store after work might not be enough to create separation for me. I need to work on figuring out what would work best for me. Workouts work well, but I’m not sure if I can work out every day.
If any of you work from home, I’d really appreciate your suggestions on how to separate work life from regular life!
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