The false narrative of “hustle”
How to have a side hustle is the veritable “Kim Kardashian” of today’s web searches. We still want to learn how to contour the right way and find the new products she and her sisters are marketing, but we also want to discover how to make a million through aggressive commitment.
I hustled for years. How did I define my hustle? At one point, I worked 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. at an email marketing company, after-hours freelance writing, and weekends at Anthropologie. It was all in an effort to make enough money and generate enough repeat clients to quit my full-time job and work for myself. I had this perception that I was making it all happen, really living life to its fullest, wringing it of every drop of possibility.
Photo by Fernando Hernandez on Unsplash
The reality is that I was in the red with Anthropologie, having essentially established a bartering relationship (NOTICE: WILL WORK FOR MAXI SKIRTS AND PAINTED DISHES), and the majority of my clients were one-time-only, as my business was focused on resumes and cover letters.
There’s an assumption that Millennials don’t want to work hard, but in truth, we have to work extremely hard. According to a 2019 survey by Apartment List, 69% of renters plan to always rent because they can’t afford to buy a house, and 70% of those who do plan to buy a house can’t afford one. This preoccupation with figuring out what in the hell you’ll make and sell on Etsy while working through your lunch break is precisely because of student loan debt, housing costs, turning around bad credit, etc.
But you guys, listen: I don’t want to be a millionaire. (Good, you’re thinking, because it’s super unlikely you’ll become one.)
A reframing
I had a great conversation last week with the marketing director at a SaaS company for which I freelance. He said he just wants to work, make his money, and enjoy life. He doesn’t want to hound his team and instead treats them like adults who can be trusted to do their work. If they aren’t on Slack when he has a question for them, he doesn’t assume they’re slacking (LOL at myself); he assumes they’re living life. Picking up a kid from school. Eating lunch. Going for a bike ride. Doing whatever they want to be doing before they return to work.
First, can we all be so lucky as to find clients like this?
Second, he’s right in line with what I’ve learned about myself. Instead of pushing myself to do more, do the most, do everything, I’m constantly scaling myself back. You can say no to back-to-back meetings. You can turn down a project that doesn’t excite you. You don’t have to work seven days a week to prove what to whom?
Because the truth is I don’t enjoy doing it all. I want time to read, to play outside with my kids, to make this Bon Appetit icebox cake. I don’t want to turn myself inside out just to make a few more bucks. I want to be able to afford housing and food, and beyond that, you’ll find me somewhere outside.
Why the experts are wrong
Hustling doesn’t make you feel better; it makes you feel tired because you’re so busy. Busy isn’t better.
Again: BUSY ISN’T BETTER.
Now, this isn’t about about the effort to make ends meet. When I say “hustle,” I’m referring specifically to the sans serif HUSTLE on gray tank tops worn by the gals on the bachelorette Pedal Taverns in downtown Nashville. It’s is the glorification of overworking oneself. It’s the home visit IV drip to counteract the exhaustion of overextension.
The struggle of working off one’s ass (as well as not ending in a preposition) with the sole purpose of more, more, more is, frankly, ugly to me. It didn’t used to be, but now, I’m not impressed by my past self. She seems easily influenced by what she thinks she should be doing instead of what she wants to be doing.
What you can do about it
You get to decide for yourself what it looks like to be a human, to be a creative, a partner, a neighbor — all the many roles that make you beautiful. Someone else might be defining those roles (those kids watching Luca in the living room while you reply to emails do mean you’re a parent), but it’s up to you how you embody those roles.
How present will you be? Will you prioritize being present over being productive? That question has been top-of-mind for me during this season of face masks and feeling like I’m just scraping by. No one can make you scale back except you. Figure out what’s most important to you, what you need to survive literally (food, shelter, air) and figuratively (library card, dog, struggling to come up with a third thing).
I don’t actually think it’s a privileged stance to cut yourself a mental break after you’ve covered your bases. Free time should remain free. Play time should include some play. It’s a struggle to keep unstructured time unstructured. I find I have to hustle at it.
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