51. Toxic Productivity Culture
We live in a society that promotes toxic productivity in its ideas and ideals, and the public health field is no exception. People talk about toxic productivity as just being a “workaholic,” but it’s much bigger, more complex, and more nuanced.
Productivity and getting things done isn’t toxic in and of itself, but when it comes to believing that constantly doing something and being productive will make you feel good and worthy, that’s when it becomes toxic. When you prioritize productivity over rest, you treat yourself as a commodity. Your health is not a commodity, it is sacred, and it is important.
In this episode, I’m showing you how your beliefs around productivity, worth, value, and rest are driving you to use productivity in a toxic way. Hear some of the messages and beliefs our society and the public health field promote, what is missing from this discussion, and the key to detaching from toxic productivity culture and increasing rest, both individually and as a workforce.
If you want to take this work deeper and learn the tools and skills to feel better, all while having my support and guidance each step of the way, I invite you to set up a time to chat with me. Click here to grab a spot on my calendar and I can’t wait to speak to you!
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What You Will Discover:
How to truly dismantle toxic productivity culture.
Why productivity has no influence on your worth.
Some examples of people perpetuating toxic productivity culture.
How you might be unintentionally believing the messages from society and promoting them.
Why we need to change our beliefs around productivity and start to prioritize rest.
How toxic productivity culture is perpetuated through religion, politics, and society.
Resources:
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Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang
Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily and Amelia Nagoski
Full Episode Transcript:
Hey you all, I’m Marissa McKool, and you’re listening to the Redefining Rest Podcast for public health professionals. Here we believe rest is your right. You don’t have to earn it, you just have to learn how to take it and I’m going to teach you. Ready? Come along.
Hi everyone. What is up? What are you doing? How are you doing? So good to be with you. I have had a great day. It’s been great weather. I’ve gotten a lot done. I’m ending my day early. I signed a new client. Coaching my clients are, oh my goodness, they amaze me. I love them so much. If you’re listening, shout out to you. Just the amazing transformations they’re having, insight changes, watching them grow and evolve, and become their own best friend, and their champion, and being empowered, and kicking ass, quite frankly. I love you all if you’re listening. I’m so proud of you. And I love my job. What can I say?
Before we jump into the episode which I am super excited about this episode, it’s something I have been thinking about, even writing about for a little bit. I’m excited to share it with you all. I want to remind you, the podcast giveaway is still open. Now, listen if you have just tuned in you have no idea what I’m talking about, don’t worry, it’s not too late. If you were listening last week and heard all about it but didn’t do it. Don’t worry, it's not too late you all.
Alright, what’s happening? We’re doing an amazing giveaway for our one year podcast anniversary for our 50th episode which happened last week, for our Redefining Rest podcast announcement, rebrand, refresh, up-level, whole shebang. It’s just fireworks and celebration. And it is time to party. So, three lucky winners are going to get either a $150 gift card to a local spa to get whatever treatment you want, a massage, a pedicure, a facial, even if they do hair treatments, whatever it is you get some time for you.
The second winner will get the books, Burnout, and the book, Rest. I mean the perfect combination in my mind because who doesn’t want to eliminate their burnout and who doesn’t want to get more rest? Those two go hand-in-hand. And the last is a Health Equity sweatshirt by my friend Omari Richins from the Public Health Millennial, amazing sweatshirt. Rep public health no matter where you go. I mean all of these prizes are fabulous. Listen, you all, I know you are tired, and exhausted, and burnt out.
This is the time to do something for you. Enter this giveaway to get free treatment at a spa, to get books that are going to change your life. And to get an amazing sweatshirt that promotes your value which is health equity freaking matters. So, I want you to enter. If you haven’t already or if you’ve been thinking about it, or even if you have entered there are more ways to get points because the top three people with the most points are going to be selected. That’s maybe the best way to say it.
All you have to do, we’re going to leave a link in the show notes to my website where it’s explained. You’re going to click on that and it’s going to take you to this platform called UpViral where you’re going to enter to win. You have to just rate and review the podcast, give an honest review. And submit your email and then from there you can reshare to Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever. And every action you take, rate and review, share on each platform, you’re going to get a certain amount of points. And those points, you all, those add up.
So, if you rated and reviewed last week you can keep sharing. Share on Facebook and LinkedIn and get more points to enter to be able to win. So, it takes less than two minutes, follow the link in the show note. You can hit pause now and go do that and follow. It takes less than two minutes, enter your name and email, rate and review and then share on your platforms. And we’re going to announce the winner in a couple of weeks. I’ll give more specific details next week. And of course, if you win I’m going to email you, so you won’t miss a thing. Alright, you all, make sure to enter.
And let’s talk now about toxic productivity standards. Okay, so today we’re talking about toxic productivity culture. Some of you have maybe never heard of this term. Some of you maybe have heard it recently. But people talk about this as if toxic productivity culture is just about being a ‘workaholic.’ And I actually think it’s both much bigger than that, more complex and more nuanced. And I don’t love using the word ‘toxic’ for things. But until I figure out a better phrase for this concept we’re just going to go with it.
But this is how I like to think of toxic productivity itself. We’ll get to the culture part in a second but just the toxic productivity. Because I think people think, that’s just being a workaholic. But what I see it as is when you’re continuing to chase your self-worth and feeling good by being in a constant state of doing something. So, this can be at work or at home. So, for example, working all day and not stopping for a lunchbreak, or bathroom breaks, or any break and telling yourself you have to keep working.
You work past your time, and you don’t follow your calendar, and you keep doing so much stuff, and sending emails, and all of that. Or maybe all weekend you’re really pushing yourself to do all the chores around the house, all of your to-do list, telling yourself you can’t feel good until everything’s done. So toxic productivity is not simply about being in a constant state of doing. It is being in a constant state of doing because you believe once you do ‘enough’ then you’ll be worthy, then you will feel good, then life will be better.
If you didn’t believe productivity or being productive enough would make you feel worthy or good then you wouldn’t be constantly trying to be productive. You wouldn’t be hustling all the time. Productivity, getting things done, that in and of itself isn’t toxic. As humans we don’t really want to be idle for 365 days a year our whole life even though sometimes our brains tell us we do, it’s a little fantasy. We don’t. We get bored, we want to do stuff. We want to use our mind.
So being productive and getting things done, that’s not toxic but it becomes ‘toxic,’ which again I don’t love that term, when the belief that being productive will make you feel good, and a worthy person. And it will solve all your problems. And that productivity and getting enough done is the key to finally resting. That’s what makes it toxic, and we could even say addictive. You tell yourself, in order to feel good, to get praise, to be worthy, I have to keep doing all these things until magically that happens.
Once I do ‘enough’ then I’ll feel good or then I’ll be worthy. And you keep going, and going, and going because you never get there. And not because that place doesn’t exist but because productivity doesn’t create your feelings, doesn’t make you worthy. And you can address toxic productivity on an individual level. This requires you to change your beliefs about productivity, worth, value and rest. And right now, your beliefs are driving you to use productivity in kind of this ‘toxic’ way because you are using productivity to try to get to a place where you feel good, or worthy, or accomplished. And everything’s going to be perfect and easy.
In order to change your beliefs about productivity, and rest, and worth, and value you need to examine it and understand toxic productivity culture. So, here’s the culture piece. We live in a society, a culture that promotes toxic productivity, and its ideas, and ideals. And the public health workforce and the field itself is no exception. So here are some of the messages and beliefs our society promotes and the public health field itself does too.
Productivity measures worth. Productivity will make you feel good, accomplishments make you feel good. Rest is earned. Rest is for the deserving. Some people have to work harder to get rest. In order to rest you have to be productive first. Productivity matters more than rest. Rest comes secondarily to productivity, or rest will help you do more, so you need to rest to be productive.
And here’s some of the ways that those beliefs are promoted structurally in a work setting. Not increasing the minimum wage in how many decades. Requiring workers in various industries to work several jobs to make ends meet. Jobs requiring you to accrue, meaning work a certain amount of hours to get paid time off. Jobs that have health benefits or other benefits that don’t kick in until three months after you start. Even just the retirement structure, the ideal that you work and hustle till you’re 65 and then you get to finally rest, then you finally get to enjoy your life because you’ve earned it.
Inequitable paid time off and sick leave accrual in companies, where some position in an org get more accrual, more hours, more days than other positions in the same company. Work performance measures based on output only and not quality or other factors. The norm of emails or meetings happening in our organization are in evenings, or weekends, or outside of whatever that organization’s kind of standard working hours are.
Not having clear policies or practices, or not promoting them, or encouraging them, or enforcing them, for staff flexing time out when they have to work a night or weekend event for example. Not paying guests or speakers at events, not paying staff to do extra tasks that the organization would otherwise have to pay an external person or company to do. Paying consultants way more than you would pay your own staff to do the same work. And so, so, so many more. And there’s many outside of work as well which we won’t get into today.
And all these beliefs I listed earlier, that drive the policies and practices I just went over come largely from this toxic productivity culture we have created. And culture as we’re talking about in this context is kind of norms, norms created by people’s thoughts, that drive their actions and set kind of standards across industries, or fields, or organizations, or society. So, let’s talk about where these beliefs that create those examples of structural factors that promote productivity is the most important, and encourage you to deny yourself rest and all that stuff. Where do they come from?
So, one of which, and these aren’t in any particular order is white supremacy. So, we had hundreds of years of slavery built, promoted on the idea that some people deserve rest, and ease, and money and others don’t. And even since the abolishment of slavery in the form it was hundreds of years ago our society has continued to promote this idea. Studies showing that people of color get denied jobs and promotions even when they have the same level of education, and experience, and skill as their white counterparts.
People of color in the justice system get sentenced for time for minor offences while their white counterparts for the same violation get off, or get volunteer hours. Religion, so I identify as Christian. But I’m going to talk about Christianity because it is the dominant religion. And as a Christian I recognize the ways people, whether they identify as Christian or not, people over hundreds of years have used the Christian religion because it’s the dominant religion and the religious text to promote harmful ideas.
So as one example, promoting the idea that idleness is laziness. So many pastors, and preachers, and congregations, and church members believe and promote the idea that if you are idle you are lazy. You always have to be doing something or you always have to be serving others. That if you aren’t serving in the church that’s a problem, you aren’t contributing and you’re lazy.
And even just the bigger idea that you have to as a human mark checks and x’s by these list of ‘chores and to-do’s’ as a human. Things you have to do or can’t do to be deemed a good enough person to get into heaven, the afterlife where it’s all relaxation and all rest is kind of a promotion of the idea that productivity comes before rest and rest is only for the deserving.
And here is the thing, even if you’re not Christian, whether you’re atheist or another religion, you absorb these ideas because Christianity is the dominant religion and because Christianity and people who practice it have tied it up with the patriarchy, and white supremacy, and all these other things. We are all exposed to the idea that’s promoted by this, whether or not you’re within that religion. Those beliefs still impact us, and we still internalize many of those.
Another one, the ‘American dream,’ America promotes this idea that we are the country, your dreams come true. And while maybe you could argue that’s true to an extent. I want us to focus on what comes with that idea that we also promote, well, you have to do it on your own. Hard work gets you that reward. Pull up your bootstraps. If you haven’t achieved what you want then it’s because you haven’t worked hard enough.
And then under kind of that umbrella is sometimes this nationalistic idea and white supremacy also comes into this, promoting that immigrants or non-citizens are a drain on society. Or even that disabled folks are a drag or drain on society. There’s resistance to increase social systems, support, and funding for everyone, but particular resistance for immigrants, non-citizens, disabled folks, and other marginalized identities. Also, these ideas that people have to prove they deserve to be here, or they don’t deserve to have health insurance or well-paying jobs.
We also get messages from the patriarchy, again, no matter your gender you get messages from the patriarchy, and you internalize them. Just a few examples and there’s many others, that if women want to have a career and women, and various cultural groups, and community groups have worked over hundreds of years.
The idea that women have just started having careers in the 20th century is false. I do think we think about it that way. But in the 20th century when women really started to take up careers that traditionally men would hold, and we were working out of the home a bit more. What we saw is this idea that okay, women can have a career, but they have to learn how to balance work and home life without additional support from society. We don’t dare as a society promote the idea of work life balance in the sense of providing more social support for family leave, for childcare.
And also, there wasn’t this shift at the time that was happening which then encouraged men to take on more of maybe the household duties or the home duties to balance it out as a family, that didn’t happen. Patriarchy also promotes messages that, well, women can only care for themselves if their family, and partner, and work, and neighbors are all taken care of first. This caretaking promotion. And there are many, many other messages that if you identify as male you’ve absorbed from the patriarchy, or non-binary, or trans. It affects people of all genders. I’m just sharing a few examples here.
And then I want to talk a little bit about how helping professions and social just movements themselves have absorbed some of these messages and ideals from religion, the patriarchy, white supremacy, kind of other things that have impacted this toxic productivity culture.
And the way it’s worked in helping professions and social justice movements is the people in those movements have absorbed these messages just like everyone else and internalized them. And then take actions and make decisions in those spaces that kind of perpetuate, is that the right word, kind of the toxic productivity culture.
So, one example, there are many. But one example I see a lot is this dichotomy that you have to choose between helping others or helping yourself. It’s kind of a form of belief propaganda fed to us in our professions from various systems of oppression. And consciously we would deny it, we’d say, “No, we don’t believe that.” But unconsciously we believe it and promote it in these spaces subtly, usually unintentionally.
People, staff, leaders and helping professions, social justice movements, communicate to its staff, or volunteers, or even themselves that you have to help others first. And helping others first will help you. You have to help others to be a good person. Well, if you don’t pitch in and take time off then all these other people in the organization are going to suffer because they’re doing all the work. Also, the exact flipside of that happens too.
When we tell people within helping professions or social justice movements, as a good, intended way to help them to say, “Hey, you have to fill your cup before you can pour from it.” Or “You can’t pour from an empty cup.” But what that message implies is the only reason, only justifiable good reason to take care of yourself and get rest is to use that energy for others. That rest is only appropriate or justifiable if it’s then used for others’ benefits and not solely for your own. So, there’s a ton of other messages promoted in helping professions and social justice movements as well.
And the last piece I want to talk about is around the first industrialized revolution. And I think in the future I’ll probably do a bigger episode on this because I find it really fascinating this time period how it’s had an impact on the workforce in and outside of public health and our beliefs around productivity and rest. But prior to the first industrial revolution and during the first industrial revolution, don’t worry if you don’t remember from history class, or didn’t have a history class on this. That revolution was where machinery increased, and mass production really began.
And prior to that work was different for many people across the world. For hundreds of years people in trades worked out of their home during hours that worked for them. And what determined their working hours was (a) their home life and (b) their projects, not often standardized. And then we also had people who worked on the farm, and worked on the land, and so what determined their schedule and when they rested and when they didn’t was the needs of the land and the time of year.
And particularly before the industrialized revolution many farmers understood the need of resting whether it was during the main crop season or even on the off season. And there’s other examples of how work was done before this revolution which again in a future maybe we can dive more into. But after the first industrial revolution we saw factories and companies exploiting their workers, forcing them to work 14 hours, 15 hours or more, paying them very, very little wage, offering no benefits or even safety precautions and a whole host of other problems.
And unions began to form and fight that. And that happened over decades. But part of today where we have a lot of organizations that have nine to five, that have benefits, that have workers comp, that have vacation time. It’s because of the unions and the people who fought those unhealthy working conditions. And I’m pointing this out because, one, those beliefs and practices from that time still are present in our own internalized beliefs, our own internalized expectations of ourself, of our staff.
But also, to point out, a working structure of Monday through Friday, nine to five isn’t what the world, or universe, or people, even God dictated as the best for humans. No, it’s just something that a set of humans decided because people with power and money had decided, hey, all these other people should work 14, 15, 20 hours a day or whatever it was. And then unions fought and then they brought it down. So, our working structure, our hours, what counts as productivity, all that is just made up by humans. It’s not dictated by the universe.
All of what we experience, and all of our beliefs are just internalized from other humans over generations and hundreds of years who have been putting out ideas. It doesn’t mean it’s the right way, it doesn’t mean it’s the wrong way, it doesn’t mean it’s the perfect way, it doesn’t mean it’s the way it’s meant to be.
So, in summary the concept of productivity itself is completely made up. The concept, what it is, how it’s measured, the idea of how important it is, what it delivers to you, what it does for you, this is so, so, so important. This is what is kind of the key to detaching from toxic productivity culture individually in your mind. But then as a society, as a workforce it’s all of our concepts and ideas around productivity are made up. Ideas of them are influenced by these systems of oppression and these historical factors, and these ways we think about our country, or about work.
All of that are just beliefs that we have kind of adopted or were passed down and we’ve internalized, and it’s all made up. Even the how to be productive is made up. The idea that a standard schedule should be work Monday through Friday, nine to five, or that have a schedule, follow tasks, put it on your calendar, check them off, have a to-do list. That’s made up. It’s not a requirement of the universe. It’s not how we were designed necessarily.
Some people work better at night than during the day. And it makes sense, thousands of years ago we needed people who worked better at night so they could tend to the fire and watch over the home at night. And then others worked better in the early morning, who got up and got things ready in the morning, and others in the afternoon who tended to the needs in the afternoon.
So, the idea that everyone should be able to be really efficient and be really effective on a standard nine to five schedule, that’s just made up. And it might not even match what is someone’s individual need or best practice for them to work at their best. And we also promote kind of this idea of there’s a ‘normal’ brain, that everyone’s brain functions the same and in the same structure. Everyone would function best if they had a calendar and a to-do list, and checked it off, and worked nine to five Monday through Friday.
And some of that comes from this idea that everyone’s brain functions the same way and in the same structure as it relates to productivity or getting work done. You all, that leaves out so many folks, folks with neurodiverse brains that may function better without a deadline or without requiring meeting start times, or not in a nine to five structure, or without calendars, or without periods, or with periods of intense work and then two weeks of a break, or without a to-do list.
Just this idea with productivity and how we think about it as a culture and why it’s kind of toxic is because we make this box and say everyone has to fit in this box and that counts as productivity. And then if you do that you’ll feel good, and you’ll be worthy, and you’ll get rewarded which that all is bullshit and a lie. It’s all made up. And we have all been forcing ourselves to try to conform and follow this made up structure for productivity and believe that if we do it right then we’ll finally feel good, and everything will be perfect, and we’ll be worthy.
And we’re exhausted, and we’re tired, and we feel like shit and that’s why. And that’s exactly why. So many of us are chasing productivity each day, trying to get more done on our to-do list, needing to get it all done at work. Having to do ‘enough’ to feel proud. And underneath all that hustle is the so conscious belief that achieving society’s definition, made up definition of productivity will solve our problems. It will get us to our goals. It will prove we’re worthy. It will deliver us more rest, and time, and fun, and happiness. That’s all false.
All this does is keep you exhausted and overwhelmed, and it’s designed to do that. Think about some of those systems that have kind of created these beliefs and promote them, systems of oppression. So, you don’t have the energy to fight the system or abolish it. So, you don’t feel rest and joy. So, you don’t live into your right, into a fulfilling life that feels good because when you prioritize productivity over rest you’re treating yourself as a commodity. You treat your mental, and emotional, and physical capacity as a consumable good.
Your health is not a consumable good and it’s not a commodity. Your health, your rest, your wholeness is valuable, it’s sacred and it’s important. And what is missing in the discussion of toxic productivity culture is that this toxic productivity culture is not a mistake. It’s an outcome of hundreds or more years of systems of oppression. Because when we believe these false and unhelpful messages about productivity and rest unconsciously, it doesn’t matter if our organization, or our boss, or even society has the most supportive system to promote rest and reduce work.
We will still be driven, overwork and undervalue ourselves to hustle our way to self-worth and rest. But detaching from toxic productivity standards and increasing rest is about changing your mindset, not about your actions, that will come later. Once you change your beliefs and mindset, the actions will come. But it’s about changing your beliefs about what matters, what is worth, what is value, what is rest, why you even do productive things.
Right now, if you’re not resting, if you’re not resting consistently in a way that really fuels you and fills you, means you don’t believe it matters more than productivity. You don’t believe it’s worth more than productivity. You don’t believe it’s as valuable as productivity. That’s okay, you’ve been told not to, okay, no shame or blame. But this is so important because we start in your mind in undoing those beliefs. And if it is about our individual minds you might be thinking, well, why do you have all the structural pieces and where do those beliefs come from?
Even if we could get the whole field to provide more accommodating and flexible structures to promote rest and reduce burnout, if our minds still believe these messages which we have internalized, which our parents internalized, which their grandparents internalized, and so on and so forth. We will keep denying ourselves rest and chasing productivity. In order to truly dismantle toxic productivity culture, we have to start with our own minds, with what we believe consciously and unconsciously.
We have to examine it, turn it over, undo our internalized beliefs about worth, and productivity, and rest, and value, and privilege, and more before we ever have a chance at changing workplace culture, society culture norms. And understanding where these internalized beliefs come from, how they work is the first step. And then coming to your mind locally and spotting those beliefs and working to undo them and seeing, you don’t have to believe that and detaching, seeing it’s not true, seeing how it’s impacting your life, deciding to believe something different.
That is how we will unravel toxic productivity in ourselves, that’s how you will unravel toxic productivity in yourself, so you can get more rest, and not burn out, and have more joy and fulfillment in your life and feel better. And then collectively that’s how we do it in our culture.
Alright y’all before we head out I want to remind you, there is still time to enter the podcast giveaway. If you didn’t do it already, if you didn’t pause at the beginning of the episode, that’s okay. Pause now and enter. Now, if you’re driving, don’t do that. I don’t want you to be on your phone and driving. But if you’re in a place where you can pause and enter, do it now, it will take less than two minutes to enter your name and email and be able to start getting points to win either a spa gift card, which come on, I know that you know you deserve this.
You deserve some time off to yourself, some pampering, some selfcare, I know you know this. Now just let me just help you by giving you this gift card. Enter the giveaway for a chance to get this gift card and support a local spa in your community because we will definitely buy local in your community to support that. And if you don’t win that you can win the Burnout book or the Rest book. They’re both amazing books that talk about some evidence based approaches and really challenge your thinking as to why we are burning out and why we’re not resting and how rest is important and so many other things.
And then also we’re doing an amazing giveaway with Omari Richins from the Public Health Millennial, one of his Health Equity Matters sweatshirt. Support, Omari, who’s doing amazing work for the public health community, for students, for young professionals. And just showing the world that you value health equity, that that matters. And you know what? Some folks don’t even know what that is. So, you wearing that around, that’s public health in action y’all.
So, click the link in the show notes. It will take you to exactly where you need to go to enter. It will take less than two minutes. You deserve this, do this for yourself. I know you’ll benefit from getting one of these prizes. So, I love you all, I will talk to you next week. Bye everyone.
If you found this episode helpful then you have to check out my coaching program where I provide you individualized support to create a life centered around rest. Head on over to mckoolcoaching.com, that’s M-C-K-O-O-L coaching.com to learn more.
Hi everyone. What is up? What are you doing? How are you doing? So good to be with you. I have had a great day. It’s been great weather. I’ve gotten a lot done. I’m ending my day early. I signed a new client. Coaching my clients are, oh my goodness, they amaze me. I love them so much. If you’re listening, shout out to you. Just the amazing transformations they’re having, insight changes, watching them grow and evolve, and become their own best friend, and their champion, and being empowered, and kicking ass, quite frankly. I love you all if you’re listening. I’m so proud of you. And I love my job. What can I say?
Before we jump into the episode which I am super excited about this episode, it’s something I have been thinking about, even writing about for a little bit. I’m excited to share it with you all. I want to remind you, the podcast giveaway is still open. Now, listen if you have just tuned in you have no idea what I’m talking about, don’t worry, it’s not too late. If you were listening last week and heard all about it but didn’t do it. Don’t worry, it's not too late you all.
Alright, what’s happening? We’re doing an amazing giveaway for our one year podcast anniversary for our 50th episode which happened last week, for our Redefining Rest podcast announcement, rebrand, refresh, up-level, whole shebang. It’s just fireworks and celebration. And it is time to party. So, three lucky winners are going to get either a $150 gift card to a local spa to get whatever treatment you want, a massage, a pedicure, a facial, even if they do hair treatments, whatever it is you get some time for you.
The second winner will get the books, Burnout, and the book, Rest. I mean the perfect combination in my mind because who doesn’t want to eliminate their burnout and who doesn’t want to get more rest? Those two go hand-in-hand. And the last is a Health Equity sweatshirt by my friend Omari Richins from the Public Health Millennial, amazing sweatshirt. Rep public health no matter where you go. I mean all of these prizes are fabulous. Listen, you all, I know you are tired, and exhausted, and burnt out.
This is the time to do something for you. Enter this giveaway to get free treatment at a spa, to get books that are going to change your life. And to get an amazing sweatshirt that promotes your value which is health equity freaking matters. So, I want you to enter. If you haven’t already or if you’ve been thinking about it, or even if you have entered there are more ways to get points because the top three people with the most points are going to be selected. That’s maybe the best way to say it.
All you have to do, we’re going to leave a link in the show notes to my website where it’s explained. You’re going to click on that and it’s going to take you to this platform called UpViral where you’re going to enter to win. You have to just rate and review the podcast, give an honest review. And submit your email and then from there you can reshare to Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever. And every action you take, rate and review, share on each platform, you’re going to get a certain amount of points. And those points, you all, those add up.
So, if you rated and reviewed last week you can keep sharing. Share on Facebook and LinkedIn and get more points to enter to be able to win. So, it takes less than two minutes, follow the link in the show note. You can hit pause now and go do that and follow. It takes less than two minutes, enter your name and email, rate and review and then share on your platforms. And we’re going to announce the winner in a couple of weeks. I’ll give more specific details next week. And of course, if you win I’m going to email you, so you won’t miss a thing. Alright, you all, make sure to enter.
And let’s talk now about toxic productivity standards. Okay, so today we’re talking about toxic productivity culture. Some of you have maybe never heard of this term. Some of you maybe have heard it recently. But people talk about this as if toxic productivity culture is just about being a ‘workaholic.’ And I actually think it’s both much bigger than that, more complex and more nuanced. And I don’t love using the word ‘toxic’ for things. But until I figure out a better phrase for this concept we’re just going to go with it.
But this is how I like to think of toxic productivity itself. We’ll get to the culture part in a second but just the toxic productivity. Because I think people think, that’s just being a workaholic. But what I see it as is when you’re continuing to chase your self-worth and feeling good by being in a constant state of doing something. So, this can be at work or at home. So, for example, working all day and not stopping for a lunchbreak, or bathroom breaks, or any break and telling yourself you have to keep working.
You work past your time, and you don’t follow your calendar, and you keep doing so much stuff, and sending emails, and all of that. Or maybe all weekend you’re really pushing yourself to do all the chores around the house, all of your to-do list, telling yourself you can’t feel good until everything’s done. So toxic productivity is not simply about being in a constant state of doing. It is being in a constant state of doing because you believe once you do ‘enough’ then you’ll be worthy, then you will feel good, then life will be better.
If you didn’t believe productivity or being productive enough would make you feel worthy or good then you wouldn’t be constantly trying to be productive. You wouldn’t be hustling all the time. Productivity, getting things done, that in and of itself isn’t toxic. As humans we don’t really want to be idle for 365 days a year our whole life even though sometimes our brains tell us we do, it’s a little fantasy. We don’t. We get bored, we want to do stuff. We want to use our mind.
So being productive and getting things done, that’s not toxic but it becomes ‘toxic,’ which again I don’t love that term, when the belief that being productive will make you feel good, and a worthy person. And it will solve all your problems. And that productivity and getting enough done is the key to finally resting. That’s what makes it toxic, and we could even say addictive. You tell yourself, in order to feel good, to get praise, to be worthy, I have to keep doing all these things until magically that happens.
Once I do ‘enough’ then I’ll feel good or then I’ll be worthy. And you keep going, and going, and going because you never get there. And not because that place doesn’t exist but because productivity doesn’t create your feelings, doesn’t make you worthy. And you can address toxic productivity on an individual level. This requires you to change your beliefs about productivity, worth, value and rest. And right now, your beliefs are driving you to use productivity in kind of this ‘toxic’ way because you are using productivity to try to get to a place where you feel good, or worthy, or accomplished. And everything’s going to be perfect and easy.
In order to change your beliefs about productivity, and rest, and worth, and value you need to examine it and understand toxic productivity culture. So, here’s the culture piece. We live in a society, a culture that promotes toxic productivity, and its ideas, and ideals. And the public health workforce and the field itself is no exception. So here are some of the messages and beliefs our society promotes and the public health field itself does too.
Productivity measures worth. Productivity will make you feel good, accomplishments make you feel good. Rest is earned. Rest is for the deserving. Some people have to work harder to get rest. In order to rest you have to be productive first. Productivity matters more than rest. Rest comes secondarily to productivity, or rest will help you do more, so you need to rest to be productive.
And here’s some of the ways that those beliefs are promoted structurally in a work setting. Not increasing the minimum wage in how many decades. Requiring workers in various industries to work several jobs to make ends meet. Jobs requiring you to accrue, meaning work a certain amount of hours to get paid time off. Jobs that have health benefits or other benefits that don’t kick in until three months after you start. Even just the retirement structure, the ideal that you work and hustle till you’re 65 and then you get to finally rest, then you finally get to enjoy your life because you’ve earned it.
Inequitable paid time off and sick leave accrual in companies, where some position in an org get more accrual, more hours, more days than other positions in the same company. Work performance measures based on output only and not quality or other factors. The norm of emails or meetings happening in our organization are in evenings, or weekends, or outside of whatever that organization’s kind of standard working hours are.
Not having clear policies or practices, or not promoting them, or encouraging them, or enforcing them, for staff flexing time out when they have to work a night or weekend event for example. Not paying guests or speakers at events, not paying staff to do extra tasks that the organization would otherwise have to pay an external person or company to do. Paying consultants way more than you would pay your own staff to do the same work. And so, so, so many more. And there’s many outside of work as well which we won’t get into today.
And all these beliefs I listed earlier, that drive the policies and practices I just went over come largely from this toxic productivity culture we have created. And culture as we’re talking about in this context is kind of norms, norms created by people’s thoughts, that drive their actions and set kind of standards across industries, or fields, or organizations, or society. So, let’s talk about where these beliefs that create those examples of structural factors that promote productivity is the most important, and encourage you to deny yourself rest and all that stuff. Where do they come from?
So, one of which, and these aren’t in any particular order is white supremacy. So, we had hundreds of years of slavery built, promoted on the idea that some people deserve rest, and ease, and money and others don’t. And even since the abolishment of slavery in the form it was hundreds of years ago our society has continued to promote this idea. Studies showing that people of color get denied jobs and promotions even when they have the same level of education, and experience, and skill as their white counterparts.
People of color in the justice system get sentenced for time for minor offences while their white counterparts for the same violation get off, or get volunteer hours. Religion, so I identify as Christian. But I’m going to talk about Christianity because it is the dominant religion. And as a Christian I recognize the ways people, whether they identify as Christian or not, people over hundreds of years have used the Christian religion because it’s the dominant religion and the religious text to promote harmful ideas.
So as one example, promoting the idea that idleness is laziness. So many pastors, and preachers, and congregations, and church members believe and promote the idea that if you are idle you are lazy. You always have to be doing something or you always have to be serving others. That if you aren’t serving in the church that’s a problem, you aren’t contributing and you’re lazy.
And even just the bigger idea that you have to as a human mark checks and x’s by these list of ‘chores and to-do’s’ as a human. Things you have to do or can’t do to be deemed a good enough person to get into heaven, the afterlife where it’s all relaxation and all rest is kind of a promotion of the idea that productivity comes before rest and rest is only for the deserving.
And here is the thing, even if you’re not Christian, whether you’re atheist or another religion, you absorb these ideas because Christianity is the dominant religion and because Christianity and people who practice it have tied it up with the patriarchy, and white supremacy, and all these other things. We are all exposed to the idea that’s promoted by this, whether or not you’re within that religion. Those beliefs still impact us, and we still internalize many of those.
Another one, the ‘American dream,’ America promotes this idea that we are the country, your dreams come true. And while maybe you could argue that’s true to an extent. I want us to focus on what comes with that idea that we also promote, well, you have to do it on your own. Hard work gets you that reward. Pull up your bootstraps. If you haven’t achieved what you want then it’s because you haven’t worked hard enough.
And then under kind of that umbrella is sometimes this nationalistic idea and white supremacy also comes into this, promoting that immigrants or non-citizens are a drain on society. Or even that disabled folks are a drag or drain on society. There’s resistance to increase social systems, support, and funding for everyone, but particular resistance for immigrants, non-citizens, disabled folks, and other marginalized identities. Also, these ideas that people have to prove they deserve to be here, or they don’t deserve to have health insurance or well-paying jobs.
We also get messages from the patriarchy, again, no matter your gender you get messages from the patriarchy, and you internalize them. Just a few examples and there’s many others, that if women want to have a career and women, and various cultural groups, and community groups have worked over hundreds of years.
The idea that women have just started having careers in the 20th century is false. I do think we think about it that way. But in the 20th century when women really started to take up careers that traditionally men would hold, and we were working out of the home a bit more. What we saw is this idea that okay, women can have a career, but they have to learn how to balance work and home life without additional support from society. We don’t dare as a society promote the idea of work life balance in the sense of providing more social support for family leave, for childcare.
And also, there wasn’t this shift at the time that was happening which then encouraged men to take on more of maybe the household duties or the home duties to balance it out as a family, that didn’t happen. Patriarchy also promotes messages that, well, women can only care for themselves if their family, and partner, and work, and neighbors are all taken care of first. This caretaking promotion. And there are many, many other messages that if you identify as male you’ve absorbed from the patriarchy, or non-binary, or trans. It affects people of all genders. I’m just sharing a few examples here.
And then I want to talk a little bit about how helping professions and social just movements themselves have absorbed some of these messages and ideals from religion, the patriarchy, white supremacy, kind of other things that have impacted this toxic productivity culture.
And the way it’s worked in helping professions and social justice movements is the people in those movements have absorbed these messages just like everyone else and internalized them. And then take actions and make decisions in those spaces that kind of perpetuate, is that the right word, kind of the toxic productivity culture.
So, one example, there are many. But one example I see a lot is this dichotomy that you have to choose between helping others or helping yourself. It’s kind of a form of belief propaganda fed to us in our professions from various systems of oppression. And consciously we would deny it, we’d say, “No, we don’t believe that.” But unconsciously we believe it and promote it in these spaces subtly, usually unintentionally.
People, staff, leaders and helping professions, social justice movements, communicate to its staff, or volunteers, or even themselves that you have to help others first. And helping others first will help you. You have to help others to be a good person. Well, if you don’t pitch in and take time off then all these other people in the organization are going to suffer because they’re doing all the work. Also, the exact flipside of that happens too.
When we tell people within helping professions or social justice movements, as a good, intended way to help them to say, “Hey, you have to fill your cup before you can pour from it.” Or “You can’t pour from an empty cup.” But what that message implies is the only reason, only justifiable good reason to take care of yourself and get rest is to use that energy for others. That rest is only appropriate or justifiable if it’s then used for others’ benefits and not solely for your own. So, there’s a ton of other messages promoted in helping professions and social justice movements as well.
And the last piece I want to talk about is around the first industrialized revolution. And I think in the future I’ll probably do a bigger episode on this because I find it really fascinating this time period how it’s had an impact on the workforce in and outside of public health and our beliefs around productivity and rest. But prior to the first industrial revolution and during the first industrial revolution, don’t worry if you don’t remember from history class, or didn’t have a history class on this. That revolution was where machinery increased, and mass production really began.
And prior to that work was different for many people across the world. For hundreds of years people in trades worked out of their home during hours that worked for them. And what determined their working hours was (a) their home life and (b) their projects, not often standardized. And then we also had people who worked on the farm, and worked on the land, and so what determined their schedule and when they rested and when they didn’t was the needs of the land and the time of year.
And particularly before the industrialized revolution many farmers understood the need of resting whether it was during the main crop season or even on the off season. And there’s other examples of how work was done before this revolution which again in a future maybe we can dive more into. But after the first industrial revolution we saw factories and companies exploiting their workers, forcing them to work 14 hours, 15 hours or more, paying them very, very little wage, offering no benefits or even safety precautions and a whole host of other problems.
And unions began to form and fight that. And that happened over decades. But part of today where we have a lot of organizations that have nine to five, that have benefits, that have workers comp, that have vacation time. It’s because of the unions and the people who fought those unhealthy working conditions. And I’m pointing this out because, one, those beliefs and practices from that time still are present in our own internalized beliefs, our own internalized expectations of ourself, of our staff.
But also, to point out, a working structure of Monday through Friday, nine to five isn’t what the world, or universe, or people, even God dictated as the best for humans. No, it’s just something that a set of humans decided because people with power and money had decided, hey, all these other people should work 14, 15, 20 hours a day or whatever it was. And then unions fought and then they brought it down. So, our working structure, our hours, what counts as productivity, all that is just made up by humans. It’s not dictated by the universe.
All of what we experience, and all of our beliefs are just internalized from other humans over generations and hundreds of years who have been putting out ideas. It doesn’t mean it’s the right way, it doesn’t mean it’s the wrong way, it doesn’t mean it’s the perfect way, it doesn’t mean it’s the way it’s meant to be.
So, in summary the concept of productivity itself is completely made up. The concept, what it is, how it’s measured, the idea of how important it is, what it delivers to you, what it does for you, this is so, so, so important. This is what is kind of the key to detaching from toxic productivity culture individually in your mind. But then as a society, as a workforce it’s all of our concepts and ideas around productivity are made up. Ideas of them are influenced by these systems of oppression and these historical factors, and these ways we think about our country, or about work.
All of that are just beliefs that we have kind of adopted or were passed down and we’ve internalized, and it’s all made up. Even the how to be productive is made up. The idea that a standard schedule should be work Monday through Friday, nine to five, or that have a schedule, follow tasks, put it on your calendar, check them off, have a to-do list. That’s made up. It’s not a requirement of the universe. It’s not how we were designed necessarily.
Some people work better at night than during the day. And it makes sense, thousands of years ago we needed people who worked better at night so they could tend to the fire and watch over the home at night. And then others worked better in the early morning, who got up and got things ready in the morning, and others in the afternoon who tended to the needs in the afternoon.
So, the idea that everyone should be able to be really efficient and be really effective on a standard nine to five schedule, that’s just made up. And it might not even match what is someone’s individual need or best practice for them to work at their best. And we also promote kind of this idea of there’s a ‘normal’ brain, that everyone’s brain functions the same and in the same structure. Everyone would function best if they had a calendar and a to-do list, and checked it off, and worked nine to five Monday through Friday.
And some of that comes from this idea that everyone’s brain functions the same way and in the same structure as it relates to productivity or getting work done. You all, that leaves out so many folks, folks with neurodiverse brains that may function better without a deadline or without requiring meeting start times, or not in a nine to five structure, or without calendars, or without periods, or with periods of intense work and then two weeks of a break, or without a to-do list.
Just this idea with productivity and how we think about it as a culture and why it’s kind of toxic is because we make this box and say everyone has to fit in this box and that counts as productivity. And then if you do that you’ll feel good, and you’ll be worthy, and you’ll get rewarded which that all is bullshit and a lie. It’s all made up. And we have all been forcing ourselves to try to conform and follow this made up structure for productivity and believe that if we do it right then we’ll finally feel good, and everything will be perfect, and we’ll be worthy.
And we’re exhausted, and we’re tired, and we feel like shit and that’s why. And that’s exactly why. So many of us are chasing productivity each day, trying to get more done on our to-do list, needing to get it all done at work. Having to do ‘enough’ to feel proud. And underneath all that hustle is the so conscious belief that achieving society’s definition, made up definition of productivity will solve our problems. It will get us to our goals. It will prove we’re worthy. It will deliver us more rest, and time, and fun, and happiness. That’s all false.
All this does is keep you exhausted and overwhelmed, and it’s designed to do that. Think about some of those systems that have kind of created these beliefs and promote them, systems of oppression. So, you don’t have the energy to fight the system or abolish it. So, you don’t feel rest and joy. So, you don’t live into your right, into a fulfilling life that feels good because when you prioritize productivity over rest you’re treating yourself as a commodity. You treat your mental, and emotional, and physical capacity as a consumable good.
Your health is not a consumable good and it’s not a commodity. Your health, your rest, your wholeness is valuable, it’s sacred and it’s important. And what is missing in the discussion of toxic productivity culture is that this toxic productivity culture is not a mistake. It’s an outcome of hundreds or more years of systems of oppression. Because when we believe these false and unhelpful messages about productivity and rest unconsciously, it doesn’t matter if our organization, or our boss, or even society has the most supportive system to promote rest and reduce work.
We will still be driven, overwork and undervalue ourselves to hustle our way to self-worth and rest. But detaching from toxic productivity standards and increasing rest is about changing your mindset, not about your actions, that will come later. Once you change your beliefs and mindset, the actions will come. But it’s about changing your beliefs about what matters, what is worth, what is value, what is rest, why you even do productive things.
Right now, if you’re not resting, if you’re not resting consistently in a way that really fuels you and fills you, means you don’t believe it matters more than productivity. You don’t believe it’s worth more than productivity. You don’t believe it’s as valuable as productivity. That’s okay, you’ve been told not to, okay, no shame or blame. But this is so important because we start in your mind in undoing those beliefs. And if it is about our individual minds you might be thinking, well, why do you have all the structural pieces and where do those beliefs come from?
Even if we could get the whole field to provide more accommodating and flexible structures to promote rest and reduce burnout, if our minds still believe these messages which we have internalized, which our parents internalized, which their grandparents internalized, and so on and so forth. We will keep denying ourselves rest and chasing productivity. In order to truly dismantle toxic productivity culture, we have to start with our own minds, with what we believe consciously and unconsciously.
We have to examine it, turn it over, undo our internalized beliefs about worth, and productivity, and rest, and value, and privilege, and more before we ever have a chance at changing workplace culture, society culture norms. And understanding where these internalized beliefs come from, how they work is the first step. And then coming to your mind locally and spotting those beliefs and working to undo them and seeing, you don’t have to believe that and detaching, seeing it’s not true, seeing how it’s impacting your life, deciding to believe something different.
That is how we will unravel toxic productivity in ourselves, that’s how you will unravel toxic productivity in yourself, so you can get more rest, and not burn out, and have more joy and fulfillment in your life and feel better. And then collectively that’s how we do it in our culture.
Alright y’all before we head out I want to remind you, there is still time to enter the podcast giveaway. If you didn’t do it already, if you didn’t pause at the beginning of the episode, that’s okay. Pause now and enter. Now, if you’re driving, don’t do that. I don’t want you to be on your phone and driving. But if you’re in a place where you can pause and enter, do it now, it will take less than two minutes to enter your name and email and be able to start getting points to win either a spa gift card, which come on, I know that you know you deserve this.
You deserve some time off to yourself, some pampering, some selfcare, I know you know this. Now just let me just help you by giving you this gift card. Enter the giveaway for a chance to get this gift card and support a local spa in your community because we will definitely buy local in your community to support that. And if you don’t win that you can win the Burnout book or the Rest book. They’re both amazing books that talk about some evidence based approaches and really challenge your thinking as to why we are burning out and why we’re not resting and how rest is important and so many other things.
And then also we’re doing an amazing giveaway with Omari Richins from the Public Health Millennial, one of his Health Equity Matters sweatshirt. Support, Omari, who’s doing amazing work for the public health community, for students, for young professionals. And just showing the world that you value health equity, that that matters. And you know what? Some folks don’t even know what that is. So, you wearing that around, that’s public health in action y’all.
So, click the link in the show notes. It will take you to exactly where you need to go to enter. It will take less than two minutes. You deserve this, do this for yourself. I know you’ll benefit from getting one of these prizes. So, I love you all, I will talk to you next week. Bye everyone.
If you found this episode helpful then you have to check out my coaching program where I provide you individualized support to create a life centered around rest. Head on over to mckoolcoaching.com, that’s M-C-K-O-O-L coaching.com to learn more.
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