As with many of the behavioural addictions I have been talking about in my recent posts, work addiction can be difficult to identify. Obviously, people that work hard and succeed in business are not necessarily addicted to their work, many of them are extremely competent and successful with no indications they are suffering from a behavioural addiction. A personal observance I have made is that I would go into periods of showing addictive behaviours around my work and jobs I’ve had largely due to a desire to focus on something that could distract me from some serious mental or emotional issues occurring in my personal life. For more information on behavioural addictions, including work, please check out The Recovery Lodge link here.

Early warning signs

I never considered myself as having a work addiction and I never identified any consequences as a result of me being addicted to certain aspects of my working. As a student, my top priority was to socialise with friends, have a laugh and go out to get drunk on nights out – studying and assignments were quite low down on my list of priorities! After my 2nd year exams, I performed far worse than I had hoped, although this shouldn’t have come as a surprise. On entering my final year, I knew I needed to improve greatly if I was to achieve the 2:1 qualification I needed to get the graduate job I was aiming for – with a wine company, ironically! I soon began to heavily focus on my studies, neglecting friends and opportunities to socialise and found that I was getting a real buzz out of working hard and achieving good marks. My hard work paid off and I achieved the grade I wanted – a lesson I took into my future working life.

The pursuit of success, prestige and kudos

My first “real” job after graduating saw me working with a police force in London working in the heart of the city in a large, symbolic location. I felt huge waves of pride and achievement and really thought that I had made it in the world. I became very arrogant and prideful and would tell anyone who listened about where I worked, who I worked for and what I did. My social life and relationships dropped down into second place in my list of priorities as I sought to become one of the top performers in my department. Thankfully, the job itself was one I took to very quickly and I soon achieved a high level of performance that was acknowledged by senior management and deputising and secondment roles followed. This felt great, of course, but I was becoming neglectful with my old friends and in my relationships as the chase for more success became quite an obsession and I was focusing on making new friends and contacts to help me achieve more.

Pushing myself into dangerous territory

Overtime shifts increased, promotions and new opportunities came my way and the hunger to achieve more never ceased. Then one day, the news came that huge cuts were being made in my department and that I would be offered a generous voluntary redundancy package. I felt scared, empty and at a loss to what I would do next as this organisation had been such a huge part of my life for 6 years. However, I felt that this presented an opportunity to take a big risk and, in hindsight, made a dangerous and thrill-seeking decision to move to Brazil to work in a very challenging environment with significant responsibilities that I hadn’t been faced with before. Taking myself away from my loved ones, my support network and everything I knew and felt comfortable with felt easy as I became so obsessed with this new and exciting opportunity. It didn’t take long to realise I had bitten off more than I could chew and discovered that my desire to try something amazing led to me overlooking what was most important in my life.

Getting my priorities right

Following the experiences of losing relationships, friendships and the sight of what was important in my life, I knew I needed help but was still at this point completely unaware that my relationship with work was causing me so many problems. When I went to The Recovery Lodge as an inpatient, I required detoxification from alcohol and predominantly focused on this as being the main problem. However, with help from therapists and other experienced people in recovery, it became very clear that my work addiction had been a transference from my previous alcohol addiction and I was merely seeking comfort, escape and satisfaction from somewhere else. Rather than throwing myself into the next job that came my way, I took my time to decide what I wanted to do and what I wanted to achieve – not just in work but in my life as a whole. As such, I now live a life that is freer from the demands of work and I make more time to focus on my relationships and my recovery as I now see these two aspects as being the most important part of my life now. There is no doubt I am happier as a result and my relationships with others are far more healthy, loving and genuine.

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