Hustle culture
Hustle culture is pervasive within many different professional domains and, perhaps more so, across social media platforms. While there is merit in the concept that success is dependent upon hard work and dedication, hustle culture takes this principle to an excessive level of expectation and demand, resulting in many unwanted and undesirable effects.
Hustle culture can be defined as the perception that there is always more to do and accomplish. This relates to the number of hours worked, amount of money and accolades earned, material objects possessed, and the list goes on. This paradigm can lead to a false equivalency between self-esteem, self-worth and the number of hours worked and material items earned. Unfortunately, this culture seems to be progressively more celebrated in society, particularly in those fields considered to be competitive, such as healthcare, and on social media platforms. While there is merit in the concept that success is dependent upon hard work and dedication, hustle culture takes this principle to an excessive level of expectation and demand, resulting in many unwanted and undesirable effects.
Ultimately the cause of hustle culture is a misperception regarding the true determinants of success in association with a lack of appropriate boundaries to ensure time away from work. There are many additional contributors to this culture. Within the professional domain, there is a false expectation that we should be continuously available to work and respond to messages and emails. There is an over-index on competition with and comparison to others, many of whom are likely exhibiting elements of hustle culture. There is overlap with scarcity and fixed mindsets, which have been discussed in more detail in a previous article. To summarize, these mindsets tend to presume and reinforce the belief that resources and abilities are limited and not subject to improvement over time. In response to this belief, the need to work harder and longer hours and be constantly available is misperceived to be essential in order to obtain the proverbial ‘piece of the pie’ which is thought to be of limited size.
The impact of pursuing hustle culture can be profound. The false perception of what we are seeking to pursue can lead to working excessive and unrelenting hours, blurring boundaries between various roles in life, and an overemphasis on obtaining material objects. The goal and endpoint are continuously changing because once the initial target is met, for example in the number of sales, the tenets of the hustle culture will push the individual to redefine those goals in order to obtain more of what was initially sought. This can be highly related to the misperception that whatever is obtained is never sufficient and must always be replaced with something greater. This impact can be particularly reinforced and propagated by social media influencers, particularly those expressing the misperceptions of hustle culture and displaying lavish lifestyles. Ultimately, participation within hustle culture can lead to physical fatigue, exhaustion, excess stress, increased anxiety, burnout, and resulting deleterious impacts on mental, emotional, and physical health.
Given the negative impact of hustle culture across many, if not all, aspects of life, the next consideration becomes how to overcome it. This requires an intentional and deliberate attempt to recalibrate what is truly important and what we most want to accomplish in our various roles in life. The starting point of this process is to become clear on our passion and purpose across our roles in life. This promotes clarity in our most important goals, which we can then follow to promote activities that will support achieving these objectives. There must be a recognition that success in any, and all, aspects of life requires health and wellbeing, not only physically, but also mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. This can only be achieved if we deliberately pursue and ensure sufficient recovery and restoration. Setting boundaries around our work schedules and tasks to allow pursuit of health and wellbeing is essential, as is an intentional recovery regimen. It is also important to develop a perspective that avoids the fear of missing out that is pervasive in society and is a large component of the hustle culture. With respect to social media platforms, as with other professional pursuits, it is important to ensure that work is being done purposefully and not solely for the sake of doing it and accomplishing more. Participating in these tasks with purpose and passion in mind can be very helpful in this regard.
By overcoming the hustle culture, it becomes possible to pursue a paradigm that is aligned with passion and purpose and follows a growth mindset. This promotes development and learning of skills, habits, and abilities that support the goals of what is most important, rather than blindly working to obtain more objects and accolades. This approach also respects and emphasizes the understanding that in order to be successful over an extended duration of time, recovery and restoration are essential to create sustainability.
At House Call Media, we provide clinician led social media management and evidence-driven content development for healthcare professionals. We aim to avoid the pitfalls of the hustle culture and rather aim to follow the preferred paradigm described above.
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