Health and Work
My Perspectives on Healthy Self-Employed Life as New Passion
Insights from 40 years of employment in demanding workplaces explaining the health and well-being benefits of self-employment after tasting it as a sense of freedom
Why do I Still Work as Semi-Retired Entrepreneur and Keep Writing, Researching, and Producing
Unless we inherit millions of dollars, luxury houses, and expensive properties from our wealthy parents or other family members or hit the jackpot, we all need income to survive in this modern world.
Some of us earn our living by working hard. Some people work smart. I share my four decades of work experience and perspectives with crucial lessons learned in this short story.
Many people prefer working for others for perceived safety purposes and other reasons. Some people desire to be their own boss and sacrifice the benefits of working for others.
Some of us are leaders, some followers, and some both. An employment type working for someone might not work for others. There are myriad factors affecting our employment preferences.
Unfortunately, unrealistic assertions about earning money easily and swiftly with no effort turn me off. The reality is that 95% of small businesses established by individuals fail in the first year. Or they survive a maximum of five years with great difficulties.
Being in the 5% is not an easy job. It is possible, but it requires effort, vision, strategy, flexibility, agility, discipline, focus, attention, commitment, excellence, loyalty, collaboration, a growth mindset, clarity, impact, patience, empathy, and dedication to work.
In addition, we need to deal with myriads of setbacks effectively, as they are inevitable.
From my observations, the real benefits of entrepreneurship come after a decade of successful delivery to clients. Sadly, many entrepreneurs give up before hitting the tipping point due to not seeing instant gratification.
After 40 years of work and gaining financial freedom, I still prefer working for various reasons.
Mental health is the critical one. I completed my full-time employment with IBM in December 2020, supporting hundreds of corporate clients by producing cutting-edge technology solutions.
However, I did not stop working because my loyal clients needed executive advice in my expertise and research field. In addition, I continue my postdoctoral academic work by supervising postgraduate theses and providing research support to several educational institutes.
I don’t see writing as work. However, as I am known as a prolific writer on this platform, I want to briefly touch on this point before discussing my main topic about employment’s physical and mental health aspects. Writing is a hobby and a therapeutic practice; therefore, I don’t experience writer’s block and never get stressed from writing.
Scientific research and academic investigation are my other hobbies. Even though I earn my living from scientific and technical research, I see research as a hobby.
Learning new things daily increases dopamine, serotonin, and other critical neurochemicals creating new neural pathways, improving cognitive reserves, and keeping my brain healthy and mind sharp.
Work may look like a tedious obligation to some of us. However, working with freedom can give us meaning in our lives. It disciplines our minds to create solutions for ourselves and others. I expressly point out freedom as this privilege contributes to our self-esteem.
There is nothing wrong with working for others if it meets our goals and lifestyle requirements. However, some people do not enjoy working under the supervision of others.
Therefore, many entrepreneurs initially worked for others but later transformed their careers for freedom of choice.
I’d like to point out that there is a difference between freelance work and entrepreneurship. While freelancers use their time to trade for money, entrepreneurs generate income by scaling businesses and leveraging other people’s skills and contributions.
Many entrepreneurs initially start as freelancers, then scale their business by collaborating with others.
Another vital point is that being our own boss does not mean we solely work for ourselves. We still have the responsibility to other people requiring numerous obligations. As a freelancer, we have clients to delight in. As entrepreneurs, we have employees, customers, shareholders, and vendors to support.
After this background, let me briefly share the health benefits of working with freedom from my experience and observations of people in my circles. I specifically highlight health because even if we are the wealthiest person in the world, if we lose our health, nothing means much in life, including enormous wealth.
Working with freedom is understood as being our own boss. If we are self-employed, we can decline a task if we don’t like it and don’t feel like doing it at a specific time.
However, it comes with some ramifications. This is not possible when we are full-time employees working for an organization. Declining a task or not meeting obligations means that we lose our job.
If we are our boss, we don’t lose our job unless we fire ourselves for other reasons. The worst-case scenario in self-employment is to lose customers. If appropriately managed, this risk is reasonable to take.
For example, I had to fire a few clients politely to maintain my sanity. I still stay in contact with them and provide advice in emergencies. However, I stopped dedicating my full attention and scarce time to unreasonable requests such as phone calls at 3 AM or on a pleasant Saturday when I spend time with family.
Working with freedom has both physical and mental health benefits. If done correctly, people working for themselves have the freedom to schedule their time based on their lifestyle requirements.
For example, they create more time for exercise, healthy eating, sleeping, resting, and having fun. Work and life balance are critical for our health.
These fundamentally critical physical health requirements can also significantly impact our mental health and well-being.
A sense of freedom creates a peaceful state of mind. When we feel free, we have less stress and anxiety hence we create better and more.
Toxic emotions are prevalent in the workplace. These emotions also manifest as harmful behavior such as bullying, jealousy, and back-stabbing, which are common, especially in corporate workplaces.
Another critical issue for employees in the workplace is dealing with a bad boss and even being overqualified. Interactions with difficult supervisors and managers can be challenging, cause emotional stress, and increase employees’ anxiety.
Thus, self-employment might potentially have valuable mental health benefits by reducing unnecessary stress and anxiety.
However, self-employed people still need to deal with demanding clients and partners. So, my point is that stress and anxiety risks still exist if not managed well.
Therefore, from my experience, the healthiest and most productive way of working is entering a flow state, whether working for others or self-employed. We produce better results with less stress and more joy in a flow state.
Unhappily, when I was working for organizations, it was difficult for me to get into a flow state even though I knew its value and the mechanics. The failure was due to my supervisors and multiple managers’ constant interruptions and priority changes.
Ironically, the demands of some managers conflicted with the organization’s goals at the time. These conflicts prevented me from staying in a flow state, adversely affected my mental state, and consequently caused health issues.
I don’t believe in the time management concept in business and personal life. We cannot manage time as it is not a tangible entity or phenomenon.
Instead, I focus on priorities to use time wisely. When we become our boss, we can set our priorities and preferences by cutting off distractions affecting our creativity and productivity.
Therefore, going into a flow state can be much easier for self-employed people if they understand the importance of this valuable mental state. When we consistently work in the flow state, we become more creative and productive, improving our business gradually and sustainably.
Toxic emotions do not happen in the flow state. Thus, it is a healthy position for work.
For many years, for the sake of perceptive security, I chose to work for others. Those people I worked for were not necessarily more educated or skillful than me.
But they had better personal and interpersonal skills such as risk tolerance and building better relationships with others. Since I lacked those crucial skills, I needed to take fewer risks to feed my young family.
However, when I stopped working full-time, I noticed most of my insecurities were perceptive. I don’t regret my full-time employment as it gave me many benefits, including the client privileges and great relationships I have now.
However, I feel the importance of freedom, allowing me to produce better and more for myself and others.
Ironically, even though I work fewer hours, I earn more than full-time employment. Nevertheless, working fewer hours does not mean putting in less effort.
I still put the same amount of effort into a flow state in less time. As I reduce many distractions and focus on my priorities, I get better results.
From time to time, I still need to work long hours when a priority item must be addressed promptly. However, I do not sacrifice my sleep, rest, exercise, nutrition, family time, and fun activities due to low-priority items.
When I was a full-time employee, sometimes trivial things which some managers thought were critical caused me sleepless nights and anxious days.
I used to care about what they thought about me. But unfortunately, those unhelpful thoughts, emotions, and behavior adversely affected my physical and mental health.
In addition, when I was physically and mentally exhausted, I still had to join meetings and be at my desk to make my managers happy. However, now I take a mini-break and triple my outcome afterward.
Now, I know what is urgent, important, trivial, and unnecessary. More precisely, I don’t sweat for small stuff anymore. I don’t care what other people think about me anymore as it is not within my control.
This awareness and privilege might significantly impact our creativity, productivity, and mental health. I love the freedom of scheduling my time and choosing my priorities based on my lifestyle and goals.
This freedom gives me both physical and psychological health benefits.
Employment opportunities come and go. Observing and noticing them on a timely basis is essential.
However, more importantly, creating opportunities is beneficial for a sustainable career and freedom of work for our physical and mental health.
To create opportunities, in addition to business, technical, creativity, and leadership capabilities, we need considerable personal and interpersonal skills allowing us to become sensible risk-takers for freedom.
Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a happy and healthy life.
If you enjoyed this story, you might also check my collection, including personal stories profiling interesting people in my social circles and giving perspectives on solving various life challenges.
I envisioned humanity winning the battle against diseases in the 33rd century in a lucid dream. I hope my vision is realized one dayIf you are a new reader and find this article valuable, you might check my holistic health and well-being stories reflecting on my reviews, observations, and decades of sensible experiments.
Sample Health Improvement Articles for New Readers
I write about various hormones and neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, GABA, acetylcholine, norepinephrine, adrenaline, glutamate, and histamine.
One of my goals as a writer is to raise awareness about the causes and risk factors of prevalent diseases that can lead to suffering and death for a large portion of the population.
To raise awareness about health issues, I have written several articles that present my holistic health findings from research, personal observations, and unique experiences. Below are links to these articles for easy access.
Metabolic Syndrome, Type II Diabetes, Fatty Liver Disease, Heart Disease, Strokes, Obesity, Liver Cancer, Autoimmune Disorders, Homocysteine, Lungs Health, Pancreas Health, Kidneys Health, NCDs, Infectious Diseases, Brain Health, Dementia, Depression, Brain Atrophy, Neonatal Disorders, Skin Health, Dental Health, Bone Health, Leaky Gut, Leaky Brain, Brain Fog, Chronic Inflammation, Insulin Resistance, Elevated Cortisol, Leptin Resistance, Anabolic Resistance, Cholesterol, High Triglycerides, Metabolic Disorders, Gastrointestinal Disorders, Thyroid Disorder, and Major Diseases.
I also wrote about valuable nutrients. Here are the links for easy access:
Lutein/Zeaxanthin, Phosphatidylserine, Boron, Urolithin, taurine, citrulline malate, biotin, lithium orotate, alpha-lipoic acid, n-acetyl-cysteine, acetyl-l-carnitine, CoQ10, PQQ, NADH, TMG, creatine, choline, digestive enzymes, magnesium, zinc, hydrolyzed collagen, nootropics, pure nicotine, activated charcoal, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B1, Vitamin D, Vitamin K2, Omega-3 Fatty Acids, N-Acetyl L-Tyrosine, Cod Liver Oil, and other nutrients to improve metabolism and mental health.
Disclaimer: Please note that my posts do not include professional or health advice. I document my reviews, observations, experience, and perspectives only to provide information and create awareness.
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