Freelancing guilt.

It’s a real thing, unfortunately. This is the idea that you should have no personal time. And your time should only be used on client work.

In the event that you’re not trying to fill that time, a feeling of guilt washes over you.

“I should be finding clients right now or finishing up this project”

Why are we this hard on ourselves?

This is an unhealthy path that I’ve ventured down many times.

Work-life balance is the phrase often tossed at this situation. For the type of person feeling this guilt, work is their life. Which is fine, it’s a personal lifestyle choice.

A better phrase for this generation would be “work-health balance”.

For that reason, I have a new type of balance: work-health balance

What you do what your life is subjective, this is why work-life balance is such a loaded topic.

Health isn’t subjective. It’s a hard requirement to produce your best work.

This goes for physical health and most importantly, mental health.

The first step towards addressing this guilt is realizing you’re not a robot or machine.

Quick exercise: Go look in the mirror and see if you see a robot.

If you do see a robot, then go get repaired because robots don’t feel guilty about working.

If you don’t see a robot, then stop feeling guilty about being a broken robot.

Health is the objective, the more you understand your health, the easier it would be to find a balance.