The recent realization about me after I started working full time is, I do not prefer to go out with colleagues on weekends. But I see people all the time hang out with colleagues even on holidays. What I don't understand is, what to talk with them while hanging out? bitch about another colleague? or what happened to the other project and what we overlooked? well, I certainly do not want to do that on a blissful weekend or after work.
Since it does not match my mental model, I find it very strange and needs justification to accept or deny it.
I am sure it is not very shocking to hear stories like a girl getting divorced because of her husband's office affair, or office couples roaming around in the cafeteria, Office brothers and sisters etc.
When we look into this in-depth, a person who spends most of his/her time in office, working on various projects, trying to be successful in every attempt and portray their best quality in the workplace is giving huge amount of thought and effort, and same amount of effort may seem useless if it has to be outside office. If I have to come to a conclusion at this time, i would say “just go out and make some friends”. But as usual, my brain does not stop there, I need more logical reasons to understand human behavior, let’s explore together.
There could be multiple reasons for finding emotional needs at work, some of them could be,
(a). When the person has just started his/her career and staying long hours in the office.
(b). No other place to go
(c). New to the city and working is the only aim of life.
(d). Has never made an effort to make friends.
(e). Happy with old friends who are not in touch anymore.
(f). Who are too busy with family troubles and do not go anywhere else other than office and home on a daily basis.
(g). No Hobbies, only work
Well, i can go on and on and on with the reasons… please feel free to add your reasons in the comment section. But read further this article :)
Time is everything
A human being’s one of the basic needs and expressions are Emotions, it needs to be acknowledged and addressed. When he/she spends most of the time in the workplace and interacting with people around, All sorts of emotions will be experienced at this time and it is obvious to find emotional support from people around either consciously or unconsciously, all because they are the only people we know and no matter how they are to you and you are stuck to them until you take the risk of leaving job.
The emotions we feel need to be expressed in one or the other way and we do express it as it comes, the contradiction comes when the other person makes us realize its just a workplace, and our mind denies the reality since many days of emotional effort has already been invested. After a few unsuccessful attempts to deal with people, it starts to feel like a burden, sometimes it is difficult to move on, some people change jobs and drama continues in another workplace.
So what can be done to avoid such trauma?
We need to ask ourselves first, do I really need to spend this much time at work? is it all I want in life? Once you have an answer and if it is “NO”
- People with family,
a. If your single, try to get in touch with that cousin or friend with whom More often you used to hang out during college because they have accepted you for who you are.
b. If your married, try to invest some time with your spouse and children because they are actually your support system and you are theirs. - Find people who are not from your work and especially not from your team for coffee breaks.
- Try to spend less time with colleagues after work.
- Avoid dinner with colleagues, instead go for lunch.
- Find out what you like and try to do it more often during breaks (i sketch).
- If your single, there are so many dating apps, find your match date as many as you want ;)
- Dedicate yourself to a social cause, One cause is more than enough to keep you occupied.
- Join hobby classes, finding like-minded people in hobby class is easy, if you share a hobby, chances of sharing other interests are high.
By doing any of these,
- we get to know about the world in a much more broader way, understand our drama is much smaller in comparison to others,
- you get to talk about different things, you get to forget about work for some time,
- may find new friends or like-minded people,
- Productivity increases the self-confidence which most likely reduces the need of emotional support system and workplace,
- and Most importantly the less your emotionally available at work the more productive you become (means No Drama).
In my own experience, as a social experiment, I started calling all my old friends and relatives for a full one hour on Tuesdays during my cab ride. I used to start the conversation with them casually, initially many of them thought I need something and that's why I am calling them. They slowly understood it was a casual call to talk.
In the ratio of 10, 3 responded very well in most of the times we spoke and I understood these are the people I can rely on whenever I need emotional support and they did turn out to be “My The Best Support Systems”. Probably this is why I do not feel the need for any emotional intervention at the office and find strange when others do.
What is your story of emotional need at the office?
