I've been working from home for 5 years. I run my own business, am my own boss, and set my own hours.

I STILL feel guilty (& lazy) when I'm not at my desk at 9am sharp. When I finish before 5pm. When I take a long lunch (or a vacation day). When I don't check in on the weekends.

I'm sitting here writing this at 9:07am on a Monday morning already feeling the "not cut out for it" dread settle over me.

This gut reaction has been trained into us. It's taught us that busy and productive are the same thing, that stillness is stagnancy.

Hustle culture is so damn toxic, it makes you believe that if you're not busting your ass every second of every day you're not worthy of success.

This is true whether you're an employee or a gig worker or a biz owner.

That's because it's baked into the American concept of success and self-worth.

It doesn't matter that I'm my own boss. I still grew up steeped in a culture of "If you work hard you'll be successful."

That bullshit mantra fails to recognize the nuance of lived experience. And yet it echoes in our bones. It whispers to us that we aren't good enough, will never be good enough. That if we don't experience success it's because we don't deserve success.

Don't get me wrong. I love my job. I love being my own boss and building a business that helps others.

But I hate the guilt and anxiety. I hate that it followed me out of my work as a teacher (where we were punished for taking sick days) and into my work as an entrepreneur.

And here's the thing... I am SUPER privileged. I'm white, I'm cis, I have a Master's degree, I grew up firmly in the middle class. My queerness is something I can easily hide if I wanted to (I don't).

And I still feel this! If someone like me, who was given a pretty stacked deck, feels like I'm consistently falling short, even when I work my ASS off, how much worse is it for people who have the deck stacked AGAINST them?

Bottom line: It's okay to rest. You're doing a great job. American workaholic culture is bullshit.