Loneliness and lack of human interaction
To a certain extent, your co-workers are your social circle. Sometimes it is hard to explain to others that all your friends are online.
If you don’t have family members home with you when you’re working, you might have the opposite problem: isolation. Even with internet access and tools like Slack, you might still develop “cabin fever” from being in the same place for too long all by yourself. “It is too easy to get the habit of working from home all day,” says CEO of ad tech firm MonetizeMore, Kean Graham, “and then remain in your home for the remainder of that day and sometimes for subsequent days.”
Perhaps remote work jobs should come with a Warning: you might become a hermit label. “Finding the courage to go out into an unforgiving world and talk to potentially scary human beings” can become a new challenge, editor Michael Crider says.
People who work in shared offices experience impromptu “watercooler” moments of interaction and maybe even share meals together or after-work drinks. Remote workers? We often work asynchronously with our teammates and perhaps have only our houseplants to talk to.
This one’s going to take effort, especially if one of the reasons you enjoy working remotely is to get away from being around too many people. It’s about striking a balance.
Include social breaks in your schedule, if you can, by working a few hours then spending an hour or two doing something social outside of your home, such as lunch with friends, then going back to work, Kean advises. Just going out and grabbing a snack while chatting with the counter person can be rejuvenating.
Try working at co-working spaces or coffee shops so you’ll at least feel like you’re still a part of society. You might just find, as Conrado Lamas has, that you’ll make friends with the people who work at and from the coffee shop. Continue reading How to not feel isolated when working from home