Get More Out Of Your Day By Working Less Hours

Does this sound contradictory or impossible to do? Actually, people who consistently put in long hours are less productive than those who organize their time more effectively. With practice, you can learn how to do what you need to get accomplished during a normal workday – without putting in more time on the job than you need to.

We’ll cover some specific time-management tips, but for now, make a pledge to only work the required hours each day. Whatever you don’t get done, use the opportunity to reassess your priorities and reorganize your daily work schedule to accommodate the most pressing items first.

Eight hours is the norm. Strive to leave at quitting time – and don’t be tempted to bring any work-related items home with you. This includes thinking about work and assignments while you are away from the job. Yes, it may be tough to do, but you have to start somewhere if you’re going to make time count and get past the trap of workaholism.

Set Goals

Time management experts say the number one way to increase productivity and maximize the use of your time at work is to set goals. Without a goal to work towards, you’re more likely to waste your time on a lot of tasks that have confusing or contradictory priorities.

While it does take a little time to set goals – and this is the main reason so many people avoid goal-setting – the process is well worth the small amount of effort it takes.

Prioritize Everything You Do

When you have a job to do – any job – it’s important that you prioritize what needs to be done. Without priorities for your job-related tasks and assignments you may be spending a lot of time – and wind up with less-than-desired results. That’s because you’re wasting your time on projects that are not strategically important to your job.

You’ve probably heard of “To Do” lists, and maybe even use this tool yourself. What many people fail to take into consideration, however, is that To Do lists are worthless unless they’re structured according to the highest-value tasks. Without some structure, a To Do list is simply a list of things to get done. There’s no order or sense to it. Many of us just take the quickest or simplest thing on our To Do list and let the really important tasks sit there – and add to our stress level because they’re not done or even started in time.

How do you start prioritizing tasks? We’ll cover some tips a bit later. For now, just reconcile yourself to the idea that you need to learn how to prioritize everything you do during the workday.

By the way, forget about multitasking. Several studies have found that multitasking – rather than saving time – actually causes people to waste about 20 to 40 percent of their time, depending on what they’re trying to do.

Learn How To Manage Interruptions

None of us is free of the unexpected drop-in visitors, phone calls, emails and texts when we are trying to work. It doesn’t matter how well you’ve prioritized your tasks if you are constantly interrupted – and don’t do something to minimize those interruptions.

Workaholics who allow themselves to be swayed by and pay attention to everyone who walks in or calls, emails, or texts feel they have to stay later just to get their own work done. They are unable to say no to the time-robbers and have to work harder and longer just to keep pace.

Every working person will have interruptions on the job. It goes with the territory. But you can learn ways to deal with what needs to be handled immediately, and manage the rest. The key is to do what you can to minimize interruptions but don’t scare away co-workers or others who may legitimately need/want your help or counsel.

Watch Out For Procrastination

How many times do you tell yourself that you’ll get to this or that task later? A great number of us do this, and it’s an understandable reaction – especially if the task that remains untouched or incomplete is difficult or time-consuming (or both). The problem with putting things off is that they add up. After several tasks left undone, you’re going to wind up being buried by incomplete assignments and tasks.

The way out of this trap of workaholism is first to recognize that you do have a tendency to procrastinate. The next step is to determine why you’re avoiding this or that task. Is it because you’re afraid you can’t do it right, that you need help but are afraid to ask, lack the necessary resources, or are actually afraid of being a success at it?

After you’ve figured out why you’re procrastinating, you can take steps to avoid using this to keep from doing your tasks. Time management experts say you should reward yourself for accomplishing those tough tasks you used to put aside. It’s also a good idea to remind yourself of the consequences that come when you fail to do what’s required of you at work.

One other point about procrastination that’s worth mentioning is that people often put off tasks that are simply boring or tedious. Word to the wise: the quicker you get these done, the more time you’ll have for more exciting and rewarding assignments.

Pay Attention To Scheduling Your Time

What good is prioritizing tasks if you don’t get to them during the course of the day? It isn’t that you lack prioritization ability, just that you’re not paying attention to how you schedule your time. The simple truth is that you need to set goals, prioritize tasks, and then you need to schedule your time so that you can stay on track and avoid the stress that comes when you fall behind.

When creating your daily schedule, besides setting aside time for your goals and priorities, you also have to allocate what time management experts call contingency time. This is time that you factor in to allow for interruptions and unexpected events – like being handed a rush assignment at the last minute – that could otherwise sabotage your working day.

Keep in mind that creating a schedule that recognizes and reflects your work and personal goals and priorities will help you not only control your work time but also help keep your life (work and personal) in balance.

Tips to Setting Goals

To set effective, achievable goals, try these tips.

• State goals as a positive statement.
• Be precise in stating goals, listing dates, amounts, and times – so that you can better evaluate effectiveness.
• Set priorities for each goal.
• Write goals down. This helps you keep track of them and reorganize them as necessary.
• Keep low-level goals small – so that you can accomplish them more readily.
• Be sure to set performance goals, not outcome goals. If you work the best you can, that’s your performance. Some goals you have no control over the outcome, so setting outcome goals could be detrimental.
• Make sure goals are realistic. You may not know some of the problems or obstacles that you could encounter, or that you’ll require additional assistance or resources – which may or may not be available to you.

Tips on Prioritizing Tasks

Start with your To Do list. Write down everything you have to do first – ideally, keeping tasks in the 1-2 hour time blocks. Next, assign a letter grade to each, depending on importance, where A = very important or urgent and on to F = unimportant or not at all urgent.

If you find that you have too many tasks at the A level, go through your list again and demote some to lesser importance. Then reorder the list according to the A through F priority grades.

Now start working on your tasks — according to the priority you’ve assigned them. By using your To Do or Action List you will ensure that you remember to do all the tasks that are necessary, you’ll work on the most important ones first and not get bogged down wasting time on trivial ones, and you’ll avoid becoming stressed over a lot of trivial or unimportant tasks.

How to Manage Interruptions

Figuring out how to manage interruptions will help you get past the trap of workaholism. But first, you have to know what those interruptions are. The best way is to keep a log of what or who interrupts you during the day. Then you can work on dealing with or managing those interruptions.

Do the interruptions log for a week, recording the date, time and person doing the interrupting. Also note whether the interruption was valid or not – or could it have waited for another time.

Valid interruptions can be scheduled into your day via contingency time you’ve set aside for such things. Interruptions that are not valid are ones that you learn to manage by dealing with them politely and assertively.

Here are some other tips on how to manage interruptions:

• Make your phone work for you and not against you. When you’re on deadline or working to complete a project, use voicemail to screen your calls – or have your assistant do it for you. When you have the time – allocated on your schedule – use it to return phone calls in order of priority.
• Assess the importance of the interruption. Most interruptions aren’t that important. Take a moment to weigh and balance the situation. Then you can act appropriately.
• Say no. If you are busy and someone asks you do take on a task – that another person could handle – learn how to say no or say that you’ll be able to get to it at a later date or another time.
• Let others know when you are available and not available. Time management experts say this can really help you avoid the trap of workaholism. When you let your co-workers and others know when you are available or not, it cuts down on the interruptions and helps you be more efficient with your time.
• Set “Invitation” time for those people you talk with most. If you need to check in with a co-worker or others regularly, schedule this time during your day. Maybe it’s first thing in the morning or right after lunch. Just be sure it doesn’t spill over into other time you’ve set aside.
• Deal with unimportant interruptions quickly. Don’t invite the person to sit down or engage in small talk. Be polite and say something like, “I only have five minutes right now” and then stick to it.

Using Time Management Skills When in Recovery From Workaholism

The prevention techniques mentioned in this article work equally well – perhaps even more so – for those in recovery from workaholism. While there may be psychological factors underlying the need or compulsion to work, everyone who puts in too many hours working, brings work home, skips vacations or works during them can benefit from learning how to better manage their time at work.

In fact, even though continued counseling is often required to overcome some of the underlying psychological difficulties, having a sound toolkit in place for handling stressors on the job makes a great deal of sense. When you have something concrete that you can do – taking proactive steps – getting past the trap of workaholism is easier to do.

Workaholics Anonymous Tools of Recovery

Whether or not you’re working too hard and trying to learn how to get past the trap of workaholism or are in recovery from workaholism, you may benefit from looking at Workaholics Anonymous (http://www.workaholics-anonymous.org/page.php?page=home) – specifically the WA tools of recovery.

In brief, there are 15 tools of recovery that Workaholics Anonymous details on its website.

• Listening
• Prioritizing
• Substituting
• Underscheduling
• Playing
• Concentrating
• Pacing
• Relaxing
• Accepting
• Asking
• Meetings
• Telephoning
• Balancing
• Serving
• Living in the now

What do these 15 tools mean and how do you use them? Check out the WA website and take some time to look through the various resources and literature available. Take the WA 20 Questions to find out if you are a workaholic. Use the site to find a meeting (http://www.workaholics-anonymous.org/page.php?page=_meetings#USA), either by phone, online, or in-person. There are also more than 50 international meeting sites.

Maybe the workaholic is another member of your family, a close friend, or a co-worker. Check out Work-Anon (http://work-anon.blogspot.com/), an outside fellowship that’s recently been started.

Bottom line: Getting past the trap of workaholism – whether you’re in danger of becoming a workaholic or are in recovery from workaholism – requires learning how to make time count for you, not against you. Yes, it takes a bit of effort and practice, but the results will be well worth every minute you spend putting your life in balance and perspective. 

Work is the Most Important Thing in Your Life

Obsession in any area of life is not a good thing. This applies equally well to work as anything else. In fact, cataloging endless hours on the job is one of the quickest ways to developing a work addiction. When you keep on working, despite fatigue, other responsibilities, even to the neglect of your own physical well-being, you are not doing yourself any favor at all. The more hours you devote to work, the more hours you will devote to work. It’s a self-perpetuating endless cycle.

How working too much becomes addiction is not hard to figure out. Addiction, in the simplest definition, is the obsessive pursuit of anything despite growing negative consequences. When you only think about work, only concern yourself with all things work-related, your life has already begun to spiral out of control. You’re not well-rounded any longer, but focused solely on work, work, and more work. This is not healthy and is a sure sign that there’s trouble either already apparent or well on its way.

Of course, you could cut down on your hours, but when you’re away from the job, if you’re constantly checking emails and voice messages and planning or strategizing or taking meetings, guess what? You’re still working. Where’s the balance in that?

When your relationships with family and friends begin to suffer and you still cling to your obsessive need to work incredibly long hours, you are showing classic signs of being a workaholic.

Social Life Disintegrates in Favor of Work

Most people go to work and also leave room in their lives for interaction with others in the form of social activities. But a workaholic gradually withdraws from most, if not all, social interaction that doesn’t have to do with work. This doesn’t occur overnight, but the excuses for not meeting up with your friends for a weekly get-together add up over time and result in a depleting of your social life to the point where everything is all about work for you.

Why do people socialize, anyway? There’s a feeling of community and good-will, sharing of conversation and experiences that helps balance our lives and make us feel complete and whole. It’s a form of relaxation to be able to converse with our family and friends in casual and non-work terms that’s healthy and contributes to our satisfaction with and overall quality of life.

If you find yourself blowing off all invitations to go out with friends, or only interact with others when it has something to do with your job, you should circle this in red pen and do something about it sooner rather than later. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy is more than just a proverb. It’s a recipe for workaholism.

Vacations are a Thing of the Past

Everyone needs time off from work. This includes extended periods of more than a day or so to rest and revitalize. Usually people take vacations in order to get back their zest for life, to feel more in balance, or just to get well-needed sleep. But the workaholic can’t seem to find the time to devote to being away. If it’s not related to work, as in a trip connected with the job, the workaholic just can’t afford the time. At least, that’s what he tells himself and others, mainly the family but also well-meaning friends.

How long has it been since you took a vacation? And don’t include trips where you piggy-backed a so-called vacation by taking the family along. If you were going on the company dime and devoted 50 to 75 percent of your time (or more) to work responsibilities, you’re just deluding yourself that it was a vacation at all. So, getting down to the nitty-gritty, when was your last real vacation? If it’s been years, you’ve definitely sold yourself – and your family – short. And you may have a problem of work addiction.

Remember that a vacation doesn’t need to involve expensive trips or really lengthy periods of time. But it does need to have your full concentration on the vacation and the people you’re with. No work during vacation – that should be your mantra. It’s tough to cut the strings that bind you to work, but it’s absolutely something you’ll need to do in order to overcome workaholism.

Suggestions You Cut Back Greatly Annoy You

Chances are that your long hours away at work have created tension at home with your spouse or partner. It is also likely that your close friends, and perhaps even your boss or co-workers, have noticed how many hours you work and have commented about it to you. Most of these conversations center around a suggestion that you cut back on the amount of time you spend on the job, thinking about the job, obsessing about the job.

And most likely these suggestions that you’re working too hard are a source of great annoyance and irritation to you. That is, they are if you’re a workaholic. If you aren’t, and have just been logging some really long hours to finish a project, then you’ll be able to laugh it off and reply that they’re right, you do need a break. For the workaholic, though, any suggestion that they’re obsessed with the job is taken as a personal affront. Instead of spurring them to cut back, such talk only increases the workaholic’s dedication to the job. Maybe he or she views it as a threat, something that they have to tackle with even more resolve in order to forestall another person gaining advantage.

In any event, if you’ve become annoyed or irritated when others mention they think you’re working too much and should take it easy, you could have a problem of work addiction.

Only Work Brings you Happiness

When self-worth is tied up in work, there’s a problem. Sure, it’s good to identify with our successes and be justifiably proud of our accomplishments, when we only find happiness – seemingly – in things related to our job or career, there’s something that’s out of balance. Life is more than just going to work and doing things related to work. If that’s all our everyday existence consists of, we’re being way too one-sided.

Do you only light up when you hear yourself – or your work – praised by others? Do you feel that who you are as a person is directly tied to how much of a work output you generate? Do you need to be the top of the sales list or the first one into work and the last one to leave to feel worthwhile and happy? Is work the only thing that brings you happiness? If so, you’re a prime candidate for being a workaholic.

Remedies for this include developing interests outside of work that generate a feeling of self-accomplishment and happiness. Whether that’s a hobby, recreational activity, going to school or taking up a class to learn something new doesn’t matter. What does matter is striving to find joy in things other than only those related to working.

Stress is a Constant Presence

Non-stop pressure, endless deadlines to meet, real or arbitrary hurdles to overcome – all are the hallmarks of stress. Workaholics are always creating their own stress, and can’t seem to exist without it. When stress continues unabated, however, the human body begins to break down. Stress takes an incredible toll on our physical condition, mental abilities, and emotional health. In short, non-stop stress can reach a point where it can kill us. Is work really worth all that built-up stress?

A workaholic doesn’t recognize stress for what it is. Stress may creep up on him or her and be attributed to a bug going around, or an inability to sleep due to a crashing deadline, or something else altogether. The workaholic will never admit to having too much stress. He or she will defend the work obsession as necessary and completely within bounds. There’s not a problem and whatever the work schedule is, it is perfectly under control.

The truth is, however, that it is anything but that. The more you work the more stress you build up. And the more stress you build up, the worse it is for your overall health and well-being.

How does someone who finds work is becoming too much find relief from stress? There are many ways to overcome the effects of stress, and to prevent it from building up. These include meditation, yoga, Pilates, deep breathing exercises, vigorous physical exercise and counseling.

Do you even know what it feels like to play? Do you ever allow yourself the luxury of doing something just for you – that is wholly independent of anything work-related? If you’re a workaholic, you rarely, if ever, have any free time, and you can’t even conceive of doing anything other than work.

Furthermore, when you do have an idle hour or so away from work, you find that you don’t even know what to do. In short, you suffer from an inability to play. Out of practice for who knows how long, you simply find yourself lost. Your mind drifts right back to work. That’s your refuge. That’s where you feel at home. You know what to do, and there’s always more to do.

When you can’t play, can’t relax, can’t be yourself without it having anything to do with work, you’re on the road to being a workaholic – if you’re not already there.

What’s the solution? You’ll have to force yourself to do things that don’t have anything even remotely to do with work. Go to a play, see a comedy act, and enjoy a family outing at the circus or amusement park or a nearby lake. Be with others, and really be with them. Don’t bring your Smartphone or Blackberry. Leave the laptop at home. If you really want to rediscover the ability to play, it has to be all about play. Work can’t have any part in it.

Family Life Suffers

As with any addiction, family life suffers when one member of the family is a workaholic. No one in the family is spared from the effects of workaholism. When a family member – usually a parent – is a workaholic, the spouse or partner and children gradually see less and less of that person. Relationships become strained at best, and disintegrate at worst as the addiction becomes progressively worse.

Sure, working as hard and as long as you do may bring more financial stability to the family, but at what cost? And if you’re working because you feel more at ease and whole while working rather than being with your family, you’re using work as an excuse to feed your addiction. This is only harming you and your family.

When you’re not there – even if you’re there physically at the table or sitting in the living room – to take care of your responsibilities with the family, other negative consequences are likely to ensue. Children may start to do poorly in school, get in trouble with drugs and/or alcohol, get in fights. Your spouse may feel emotionally adrift and seek solace elsewhere. This could be anything from going to work, having an affair, getting involved outside the home in other activities, or engaging in substance abuse — and this is only a partial list.

The point is that when you abdicate your family responsibilities in favor of your obsessive compulsion to work, work, and more work, there are bound to be some serious negative consequences at home with the family.

As an old saying goes, “Home is where the heart is.” That’s where your heart should be as well, not back at work with your endless hours spent chasing an elusive and self-induced goal.

Workaholics are Driven

Many gurus talking about success mention drive as an admirable trait. In the case of a workaholic, however, drive takes on a whole new meaning. Instead of drive, the workaholic is driven. This is another symptom of being a workaholic, the compulsion to work, the drive to work. It goes far beyond being motivated to succeed. Motivation is a positive thing. Being driven is totally the opposite.

When you are driven to work, you are obsessed with work. It consumes you to the point where your entire sense of self-worth and self-esteem are wrapped up in your job, how many hours you put in, how well others perceive you, how far and how fast you can get ahead of all the others.

It’s not easy overcoming workaholism. It’s certainly not easy to step back from being driven. How do you go about it? There is help available.

Counseling Can Help Treat Workaholics

Counseling is one of the best approaches to help treat workaholics or those who have experienced a problem with workaholism. This counseling can be on an outpatient or inpatient basis. Some residential addiction treatment facilities specialize in treating workaholics and offer a well-rounded program of therapeutic modalities tailored to the individual’s needs.

Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, or other forms of counseling or psychotherapy may prove the most beneficial in helping the workaholic to heal. Such counseling seeks to get to the underlying reasons why the person feels compelled to overwork, as well as to identify ways the individual can change his behavior to adopt a healthier lifestyle.

Many times, individuals who are workaholics need help in terms of communication issues, learning how to overcome a drive for perfectionism or need to control, reconnect with their feelings, and rebuild their self-esteem.

There are also 12-step self-help groups such as Workaholics Anonymous (http://www.workaholics-anonymous.org/page.php?page=home) that serve as a long-term support network as the individual gets on solid footing in recovery from workaholism.

Bottom line: If you’re a workaholic, you’ve identified with several of the signs of workaholism listed above. You can get help to overcome workaholism and learn to live a happy and more well-balanced life. There’s no need to continue on the current path of endless work. If you want to live a better life, you can have it. Recognizing the problem and seeking help to overcome it is the first step.

According to a recent University of California Santa Barbara study, more than 31 percent of college-age male workers worked more than 50 hours per week on a regular basis. That’s just one study. Corporations know that compulsive work addiction and burnout are a serious problem and many have engaged consultants or initiated programs to try to deal with the issue. This isn’t compassion on their part. Lost productivity due to burnout, workplace stress and compulsive work addiction can seriously impact the bottom line.

But here we’re concerned with the effects of compulsive work addiction on the individual and his or her family and friends.
Burnout versus Compulsive Work Addiction

Classic burnout is a very serious condition that involves physical, mental and emotional symptoms that intensify over time. Without treatment, burnout leads to clinical depression. Work addiction is a very different condition whose roots often lie in the individual’s childhood. But, similar to burnout, without treatment, the worst-case scenarios end in the same type of clinical depression. Both burnouts and work addicts seem to be driven, committed, dedicated and completely identified with their jobs. It’s the internal mechanism that is different. Work addiction is internally like an addiction to alcohol, drugs or gambling in that the addict has to have the fix – in this case, the fix that work provides. He or she simply can’t do without it.

It is important here to further differentiate between a hard worker (or Type A personality) and a workaholic. The hard worker appears, in many respects, to have the same traits as the workaholic. Yet they are always able to set healthy boundaries, clearly delineating work from play or non-work. Driven by underlying emotional issues, the compulsive work addict is characterized by compulsive behaviors. Workaholics never take vacations, or they bring their work with them on the vacation. Research, however, shows that too much work without balance and rest will eventually result in breakdown. Compulsive work addiction is extremely dangerous to your health.

Negative Health Effects of Compulsive Work Addiction

Each individual has a unique tipping point as to how much stress and tension they can endure. As such, the physical and psychological symptoms of work-related stress, work addiction and exhaustion will vary. Some of these symptoms include:

• Anger and irritability – often unpredictable and explosive

• Emotional outbursts, sometimes to the brink of tears

• Inability to concentrate

• Depression and anxiety

• Extreme fatigue or low energy levels

• Chest pains, shortness of breath

• Unexplained aches and pains

• Insomnia or disrupted sleep patterns

• Overeating or eating too little

• Jaw clenching and grinding of teeth

• Muscle cramps

• Stomach problems

• Profuse sweating

• Nail biting or other nervous twitches

• Faintness or dizziness

• Lack of sexual desire

How To Recognize Compulsive Work Addiction

Workaholics, like other addicts, may often be in deep denial about their addiction. The following signposts of a workaholic are adapted from Workaholics Anonymous (WA), a 12-step organization dedicated to helping individuals overcome their work addiction.

• Inability to relax – The workaholic finds it increasingly difficult, if not impossible, to put aside work and relax. This spills over into every facet of the workaholic’s life, often seriously jeopardizing relationships.

• Concerned with image – Image is all-important to the workaholic. Without the constant approval of others, the workaholic feels less important, unlikeable. He or she feels that working harder will make others like them more.

• Unreasonable self demands – No demand is too unreasonable for the workaholic who pushes more and more tasks on his or her plate. The workaholic no longer is able to distinguish between job-related demands and those that are self-imposed. The lack of ability to pace results in overscheduled commitments, racing to beat the deadline, afraid to fall behind, and then working in a furious last-minute burst of frenzied energy to complete the mountain of work. With no end in sight, no conclusion of work, no rest, inevitably, breakdown and burnout result.

• Perfectionist – The workaholic has to do things the right way. Mistakes are not acceptable to the workaholic. Since no one else can do the job quite as well, the compulsive work addict can’t delegate tasks to others. Instead, he has to do the job himself. As WA says, “Thinking ourselves indispensable often prevents our progress. Unrealistic expectations often cheat us of contentment.”

• Can’t wait – Waiting is anathema to the compulsive work addict. “Gotta get it done today.” As a result, the workaholic is more concerned with the quantity of the output rather than the quality or the work. Impatient to the extreme, the workaholic’s work is often not the best because of his or her skewed sense of crisis timing.

• Too serious and responsible – Everything has to have a purpose to the workaholic. There’s no time to just stand by idle. Finding it difficult to relax, workaholics often work even at play, and are less and less able to laugh or feel a sense of renewal. How can they, when there’s so much work to do?

• Work is an addiction – Just like alcohol is to alcoholic, drugs to a drug addict, gambling to a compulsive gambler, work is an addiction to the workaholic. The compulsive work addict stashes work away so there’s always something meaningful to do. He or she takes no pleasure in vacations and would rather be working, and lies to himself and others about how much work he has to do.

• Home is part of the workplace – To the workaholic, home is just part of the office. There’s no boundary separating them. The work still has to be done – at the expense of a good night’s rest, spending time with the family, relaxing. Everyone around the workaholic arranges their time to suit his or her schedule, in the fruitless hope that they’ll eventually get face-time.

• Work helps deal with life’s uncertainties – The workaholic worries constantly, plans and overcompensates for every contingency, hoping to thus be able to rationalize and deal with every uncertainty in life. Always having to be in control, the workaholic loses all sense of creativity, spontaneity and flexibility.

• Overworking impacts other areas – In all this, the compulsive work addict’s health gets neglected, his or her relationships become strained or broken, spirituality is forgotten and recreation also suffers. The workaholic’s life is so out-of-balance that he or she is always thinking of the next assignment or task, everything is work-related, and there’s never a moment to enjoy life.

• Can’t love or accept self – Work has become so integral to the workaholic’s life that he or she can’t feel any love or self-acceptance. The workaholic uses work to gain others’ approval. In essence, the compulsive work addict justifies his existence and finds his identity in work.

• Escape feelings through work – Since feelings are too painful, the workaholic uses work to hide from them. As a result, the compulsive work addict has no idea who he really is or what he wants and needs.

• Grew up in chaotic home – Many work addicts grew up in highly stressful, chaotic homes. As they matured, they sought to replicate the level of intensity and stress in the workplace. If there isn’t a crisis, the workaholic creates one. In fact, the workaholic needs to simulate a crisis in order to truly become motivated to do his or her “best work.” This, however, is often just the opposite. After the adrenalin kicks in and overworking to get the job done, the workaholic often suffers withdrawal symptoms such as anxiety and depression. See-sawing back and forth, these mood swings wreak havoc on the individual’s mental and physical health.

Treatment for Compulsive Work Addiction

Often the workaholic needs the prodding from family and friends to seek help when their lives are out of kilter – skewed as they are all toward work. Compulsive work addiction is treatable, but it takes time. The standard treatments include seeking help through therapists, psychiatrists or psychologists or trained and certified mental health professionals. Specialists in compulsive work addiction may be tough to find, as this is a new and growing field.

One form of therapy that may be helpful is cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT. This is a form of psychotherapy that focuses on identifying negative thoughts and patterns of behavior and modifying them. CBT concentrates on five aspects of the client’s life:

• Work
• Relationships
• Play
• Self
• Spiritual life

Self-help groups such as Workaholics Anonymous offer meetings by phone, online or in person. Their website lists meeting locations by state and international. The organization also provides literature, links and other resources. There are no dues, and anyone can join. The only requirement for membership is the desire to stop working compulsively.

In the end, if a compulsive work addict truly wants to regain balance in his or her life, reconnect with family and friends, and honestly put the obsession to work behind, there is help available. To be successful in recovery requires time and a real commitment.