5 Tips to Surviving Work (well, for me anyway...)

Pretty much everyone hates their fucking job (In case you're going to look at me funny for breaking the "fuck" barrier in the first sentence, we all have said so verbatim at least once) and in case you've ever been curious about my job, I'm no different. The end of any weekend can bring a feeling of real lethargy and indifference towards one's employment...but especially the end of a long weekend like the one most of us just had. We all know the feeling of forcing oneself out of bed earlier than you want to to go to a place you don't want to go with people you don't want to see to do things you don't want to do for longer than you want to do them. It feels like being dragged. It sucks, that's not news...

Well, actually it was news this morning. As I often do, I was half-watching the news while making myself fit for public presentation (hey, can't just walk out the house looking any old kind of way...it's twentyleven, you never know when your next move will be on YouTube) and they had a "Surviving Work" piece on how many people dislike their jobs and gave 5 tips on making the experience a little easier...you know, minor stuff like using one's time effectively, being to work on time and staying out of office drama. I thought it was a good concept, but lacked real-world effectiveness for folk like me...I had tried all those things at one point or another in my job history and they did nothing for me, but it did give me an idea to share things that make my workday less sucktastic...so here it is, umf presents "5 Tips to Surviving Work".

1) Look busy- It's the most important thing on this list because you can do almost nothing else without it. A common misconception about jobs is that one's approval rating is based on how much work he actually gets done. While that is true to some extent, you must realize that LOOKING like you are doing something is far more important. If you blow through all your job duties before lunch and spend the entire back half of the day on YouTube, people will see that you have done no actual work for hours at a time and think you are slacking, despite everything that you do actually being done. However, if you subtly sprinkle in distractions throughout the day (playing with Facebook, texting incessantly, and running a semi-popular website with a color scheme based on the uniforms of your favorite football team, just for a few examples that have nothing to do with me...) and have your work done by quitting time, you will be praised as a model employee. It doesn't make sense...but like so many other things in life, that's just the way it is.

2) Realize, it's not that serious- Sometimes, our worst problems arise not from anything job-related, but the folk we have to do our jobs around. Trust me, I work around plenty of assholes (and write posts about them) but a lot of times the best thing to do is laugh (which is why I write posts about them). It's tempting to let folk like that get under your skin and want to punish them by sabotaging their work, snitching to a higher-up on something minor they've done or stalking from office to office with a gas powered AR-15 assault rifle, pumping round after round into colleagues and coworkers. However, these are quick fixes that will have undesirable long term effects. Yes, they're insufferable cretins and make your life a little harder, but remember, at the end of the day...you'll be at home and away from them and they still have to be around themselves...isn't that punishment enough? Your work is not your life...and if it is, you're dead already.

3) Stay out of office drama- This is one they had mostly right, but I'm going to put it here too...with an asterisk. It's true, you should stay out of office drama...but stay up on it. Word around the water cooler is a fun and interesting time-waster...who doesn't like finding out that the boss is fucking his secretary(ies), guessing who leaves the bathroom smelling like bum shit at 8 in the morning, or trying to figure out who has been stealing lunches from the refrigerator? Just don't be the topic of discussion. Instead, stay on the sidelines and spectate...it's the best seat in the house.

4) Consider self-medication- Okay, this one isn't for everybody.Maybe this one just works for me, but I gotta say...some morning medicine makes the rest of my day way smoother. It's like insulation against life's bullshit. If somebody comes to my desk screaming about some file like I personally lost it just to make sure they had something to be upset about, I can just smile, nod, and gently point them in the direction of somebody who gives a fuck. If one of my bosses is telling yet another dry joke, I'm high enough to find it (and everything else) funny so I can laugh and he can go away. If I'm in a boring, pointless meeting, I can sit there, think it would be hilarious if a cricket sound played, download an app on my smartphone to simulate the sound, play it, and watch the amusement of my co-workers (again, not that I've ever done that). I realize everybody can't...some folk are surgeons and jet pilots and shit...and I'm not telling you to start if you don't, just saying it works for me.

5) Be happy you even have a damn job- I get it, work sucks. You won't hear an argument from me...however, it does do one thing that does not suck in any way...it pays the bills (and maybe allows you room for one hobby or something). Especially in times like this, we should all be grateful for that. I hate going to work as much as the next man, but I do like that special moment twice a month where my employer goes "here...this is a fair amount for the time you have sold us". Once, they gave me a bonus...I was so pleased I wrote my job a letter. For the 2 weeks after that, I was a 18% better worker. Unfortunately, it was only a 1-time thing on the bonus...which made it a 1-time thing on both counts. There are many people who don't even have that. (Well, some still have the hate of work...but whatever. That's what welfare is for.) When you find yourself thinking "I really hate my job", try thinking how much you would hate not having one and not knowing when one is coming. About once a month, that and number 4 have to get me out of bed...but here I am today.

Aight, hopefully you enjoyed my look at surviving work. Hopefully, you can apply one or more of these to your daily life and each day at work will go a bit smoother. The fact is, few people actually like what they do to make a dollar...but just because work in general sucks doesn't mean your job has to blow...lol...