Deliberately writing this one on a bright, cheerful Monday afternoon.

Quite possibly when you’re living for the weekends, you do not have a great fascination for the workplace or the job you’re currently involved in. Number of external factors put us in a place and there’s no shame in admitting that. All of us have been through that tight spot and most of us are still struggling to find the balance. I personally, know dozen dozens who first hated their jobs but have forced themselves into adapting to it. They are the ones who are fiercely looking out for the Friday nights. Oh boi.

As per a 2017 worldwide study conducted in the US, about 85% of people do not enjoy their work and are always wishing for the weekends to kick in, with the advent of Friday nights. When this is the case, life enjoyment is based entirely on the weekend.

So what happens when you dislike/hate your current job and are only living for the weekends? Let’s approach it mathematically.

Average highest life expectancy is 82 years old in the US, which is the most affluent nation in the world. So let us assume you are going to survive 82 years on this planet.

Remaining time left on this planet = 82 years-(Current Age)

Let’s assume you’ve turned 25 years old today, and you’re expected to put away childish things in favour of more grown-up and mature activity. I like the sound of it.

So, Remaining time left = 82–25 = 57 years

This means you have 57 potential years of life now. That would equal 20,805 days or 499,320 hours.

We roughly spend an average of 8 hours of sleep per day. Yeah I know it’s more with many people.

So this equates as: (8 hours x 365 days) x 57 years = 166,440 hours of sleep

166,440 hours is equivalent to 19 years of sleep.

Now let’s figure out Waking years of our life.

Potential Waking years of life = 57 potential years of life — 19 years of sleep = 38 years of Wakefulness, which accounts to 38 years x 365 days = 13,870 days

Now, for the people who are clearly living for the weekends, let’s introduce a little adjustment in the Potential Waking years of life.

Here comes the scary part!

I am going to subtract all the weekdays from your 38 years of potential waking life.

Enjoyable Life (only Weekends) = 38 years of Wakefulness — Working days of life

= (38 years x 365 days) — (38 years x 260 days)

= 3990 days or 11 years (approx)

Further considering the idea of working in alternate weekends or annoying personal work stuff on weekends, it reduces an extra year or so. So if you’re 25 now, your waking life expectancy for life you want to live is now equivalent to around the age of 35; i.e. if you live for the weekends.

So for people who live for the weekends, only enjoy a sum total of 10 years in their life.

And that’s it. Brutal Truth.

Quit Escaping.

The idea that anyone would accept to live a life where such a large amount of it is wished away, where such a huge quantity of time spent not wanting that time to happen, where such a small percentage is spent enjoying it and living in the moment; is frightening and laughable.

Sure there are responsibilities that we must attend to in life, sure there are things that we’re going to have to do that we don’t always want to do, sure every day of our job and career can’t always be fun or how we want it to be but to work a job or be in a career or be at a company that you don’t enjoy or find fulfilment in at least the majority of the time, you’re essentially signing away most of your life.

Life is extremely short if you do out all of the math and consider every little trivial or self maintenance oriented thing we spend time doing even if you love what you do for work and don’t subtract all the weekdays from your remaining life, the time we have is still frighteningly short. So it truly is so important that we do not give it away, that we are careful and conscious of what we exchange it for, that we do not let outside pressures from family, friends or society convince us to just give it away blindly and choose jobs, careers, companies or lifestyles that we don’t personally enjoy or resonate with, that we don’t become easily distracted or persuaded by short term glitz and glamour that we know we don’t really need and that we try our best to avoid accepting anything less or making big mistakes that forced us to have to.

If you feel like you’re constantly wishing for the weekend, only for it to come and then in a blink of the eye it ends and you’re back at the same starting point on Monday waiting for the weekend all over again. If you feel like you’re anywhere close to living a life where you dislike almost every day of what you do, throwing each day into the trash of waste of time, then perhaps you should spend some of your time trying to figure out how to make sure you don’t waste anymore of it.

Unfortunately, the clock is ticking, the hours are going by. The past is increasing, the future receding. Possibilities decreasing, regrets mounting. Do you understand?

Wisdom will eventually come to all of us but I fear it will come at a heavy price of “Time” or not, I don’t know.

“Lucky for you, if you stay inside the ground, after you turn into oil” — BicameralAB7

In this ultra-consumerist world, that day is also fast approaching.

Thank you so much for your time.