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Emotional Labor

It crossed my mind recently (and not for the first time) that I feel exhausted by my work for none of the obvious reasons. I do have decent work-life balance, do not work particularly long hours, feel very comfortable with the actual content of my job , there are many opportunities to learn and my co-workers are decent. All in all hardly a situation from hell. Yet most days, it takes a lot of effort to get up and get going. Emotional labor is the likely root cause here. It is manifested in the intensity of effort that goes into managing people who simply cannot help tripping over their egos by the minute. Dealing with a crowd of such characters is like taking a stroll in a dense minefield. 

Someone is getting their feelings hurt all the time and then they decide to act out and create needless chaos for the group. The drivers for bad behavior are almost always visibility leading to promotions and bigger compensations. I am at a point in my life where I don't much care for any of what motivates my peers. When I see someone getting promoted, I feel sorry for the new level of administrivia couched as "leadership" that they will now need to deal with in return for a slightly larger paycheck. When J was younger and my situation was infinitely more complicated, I had the energy to pursue such things but not anymore. I would be reluctant to give up my personal time for a bigger and better job. Given those conditions, if I am intent on staying in the game with people whose intrinsic drivers are completely different than mine, it seems that I  have to bring value in the form of emotional labor. That is the cost of being where I don't naturally fit or belong. 

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