Things I Don’t Miss About Working Full Time

If you’re a new reader and not familiar with my backstory, in a nutshell I became financially independent in my mid-40’s and went down to 20 hours a week at my W2 job.  I now spend the newly freed half of my week living a more fulfilled life doing the things I want, whether they pay money or not. 

So that begs the question, what are the things I miss the least about working full time?  Well, here are the four biggest…

 

The Commute

“Wait”, you’re thinking “I thought you commuted by bike and loved it? Were you lying to us?“

No, I wasn’t lying and yes I commute by bike the two days a week that I go to work.  But here’s the thing, even though it’s way better, cheaper, safer, and healthier than driving, it’s still a bit boring and repetitive for me.

I’m a cyclist, not just a bike commuter.  I sometimes race both mountain bikes and road bikes.  I ride lots of miles to train, and lots just for fun.  So to keep it interesting and to keep the training beneficial it’s essential to mix things up.

Riding the same route four times a week is a bit boring.  If I had to go back to work 5 days a week I’m not sure I’d bike commute everyday.  I need a few rides during the week on my racing bike to get a harder workout in.  My commuter bike and the route I take to work don’t really allow for that.  Plus I have a heavy bag on my back. 

In the end my commute is still light years better than driving – better on my body, my net worth, and the planet. 

 

Being Forced To Do Things On Weekends

I hate crowds and I’m not the best at waiting in lines.  I rarely deal with those things anymore however.  With my new free time I’ve designed my life to take advantage of off-peak times.  That means for virtually everything – driving, hiking and cycling trails, grocery shopping, the library – life in general.

So I’ve really come to dislike the weekends.  Everyone’s out riding on the trails, paddling on the river, or at the stores.  It’s a royal shit-show.  I don’t know about you but I’m not a fan of shit-shows.

The obvious problem with this purposely timed lifestyle is that despite what it seems I’m still a social animal, and therefore to do cool activities with my friends who still work full time I often have to suck it up and do them on weekends.  

Trust me, there’s worse problems to have.

But in general one of the big things I don’t miss about being full time is being forced to put off things until the weekend.  I use my blessed weekdays off as much as possible and revel in it.

 

Waking Up To An Alarm 5 Days A Week

I don’t mind waking up to an alarm if it’s to do something I’m really jazzed about.  Like my big Sunday morning group bike ride, a day climbing at the crag, or a running race.  I do mind waking up to an alarm to go to work. 

I’ve cut that down from 5 days a week to 2, and it’s awesome!  In his best selling book “Why We Sleep”, (see my review here) Matthew Walker explains why alarms are an unfortunately necessary devil and why we humanoids evolved to fall asleep and wake up naturally with the sun and our circadian rhythms.

Ever since I read his book I’ve been working on various tips and tricks to improve my sleep.  Much of it has worked well, but some improvements are very difficult to implement with the way we live our modern lives.  The unfortunate reality is that so much of our modern culture revolves around sitting down and looking at screens, and those things don’t make getting in a good night sleep easy. 

But overall, the miserable mornings when the alarm goes off and I realize it’s a crappy work day have gone down from 5 a week to 2 for me, and I don’t miss the other three at all.

 

Managing Within A Large Bureaucracy

I posted before about how middle management sucks.  To be more accurate, I was really in “upper” middle management in my last job.  I was in charge of a lot of people and a lot of money.  In a typical 40 hour week, I’d estimate that 36 of those hours would be just dealing with unnecessary and over-burdensome bureaucracy. 

It’s the Federal Government, they can get away with it and not have to worry about going out of business.  They’re not in business. 

It’s not that I don’t want the responsibility, or that I shy away from hard things.  But if I’m going to take on big challenges like that I’m not going to do it while treading water in a sea of needless B.S. crap. 

I would gladly run a large organization and be in charge of a lot of money in a well operating company that lets me do my job and avoid unnecessary time wasters.  But that’s not how the chips fell for me.

I don’t miss it, at all. 

So there you have it readers, the things I miss least about working full time. 

Your turn – If you’re still working, do these resonate with you?  If you were able to retire or semi-retire what do you think you’d be most happy to stop doing? Chime in below!