Hustle Culture: Definition, Impact and How to Overcome It

Have you ever worked too hard, often, without rest and lost track of time? That’s what they called the hustle culture. Hustle culture is a culture of hard work, pushing yourself and beyond your limits to achieve capitalist goals, such as wealth, prosperity and success as quickly as possible. This phenomenon is currently happening among young people.

Not infrequently children of the younger generation share moments of working too long without knowing the time through uploads on social media. This culture seems to be glorified and considered a positive work achievement. So, what exactly is a work culture like this and what impact does it have, is it good or bad?

Understanding Hustle Culture

Literally referring to the Oxford Learner’s Dictionary, hustle culture means pushing someone to move faster aggressively. In simple terms, hustle culture means a culture that makes people move more quickly or aggressively, in this case a matter of work culture.

Defined as a culture that encourages employees or workers or laborers to work more than normal hours. They even think about work when they have free time, such as weekends. This culture requires them to complete a job on target and precisely to a faster rhythm than usual.

For people who have been trapped in this culture, they almost never rest and when they do have time to rest usually all they think about is work. This culture was born since around 1970, until the internet era made this culture even more crazy. The company is facilitated by the existence of email and digital administration systems.

Hustle Culture Impact

• Increase Disease Risk

Research conducted by Current Cardiology Reports in 2018 found that people who work more than 50 hours per week have an increased risk of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease. Can be like myocardial infarction or heart attack and coronary heart disease is deadly.

Long working hours cause blood pressure and heart rate to increase, due to excessive psychological activation and stress. In addition, working overtime also contributes to insulin resistance, arrhythmias, hypercoagulability and ischemia among those who already have a high atherosclerotic burden, diabetes and stroke.

• Mental Welfare Disorder

The risk of mental health disorders, some of the problems experienced are symptoms of depression, anxiety, to suicidal thoughts. Hustle culture makes workers experience burnout and has a negative effect on health, the World Health Organization (WHO) defines burnout as a syndrome caused by prolonged stress.

Burnout syndrome causes workers to finally feel pessimistic about the results they are doing, thus making workers lack the motivation and energy to return to work and unable to meet the competition. Mental health with work is more closely related.

• Loss of Work Life Balance

Is a condition that is balanced between career and personal life, stress that arises because of work can be instantly lost if a person does activities that he enjoys. Like meeting family, couples to gathering with friends. Socialization is very influential on happiness and balance with work.

Indonesia is not immune from this crazy work culture boom, not a few workers experience mental health problems due to excessive working hours. Including during the pandemic, productive campaigns at home run the risk of increasing the hustle culture trend because working from home actually makes the boundaries of working hours disappear compared to in the office.

How to Avoid or Overcome

• Avoid Comparing Yourself

Social media is one source of pressure that creates a work culture without rest, everyone wants to look successful and established in their work. Then take pride in showing off work in the middle of the night or on the weekends. Try not to compare yourself to those who flaunt it on social media.

• Find a Hobby Outside of Work

Find free time to do hobbies and everything you love to make life more balanced. Usually known as work life balance, at least don’t let the time you spend be consumed by work.

• Know Your Limits

The next way to avoid the hustle culture is to know your limits and make clear boundaries. Understand and know when to say no and dare to say it, know when the body has asked to rest and know when the body can be invited to work hard. Don’t push because you want to meet inhuman standards.

Creating a balance at work and a healthy situation in the office is something that must be embraced by workers rather than a hustle culture. A supportive work environment and respect for every effort can make the mental condition of the worker better and less stressed.

This is a brief explanation of hustle culture, its impact and how to overcome it. This culture is very closely related to the millennial generation, which is also known as the ‘sandwich generation’. To face the tough challenges in the future, the young generation needs to be equipped with competent education.

Sampoerna University is a fully accredited university in Indonesia that offers the best choice for those seeking an excellent international education. Sampoerna University is the only university with the United States’ standard of curriculum, faculties, facilities, and operations in Indonesia.

In collaboration with the University of Arizona, we offer a Dual Degree Program that allows you to study for 4 years in Jakarta with a US curriculum and graduate with 2 degrees: an accredited US Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Arizona and an accredited Bachelor’s Degree (S1) from Sampoerna University. Find out more information about how to apply at Sampoerna University by clicking the link here.

Reference

Forbes