Nope, we all don't have the same 24 hours

"Hustle culture ideology says that people are overworking not because they’re economically driven to, but simply because this is the way go-getters get what they want." – Nick Srnicek

When browsing social media, you come across lots of “interesting” topics such as this one. And yes, this user will remain nameless.

I came across the above post from Twitter (I refuse to call it X I don't care), and I immediately stopped in my tracks. “Sleep for 8 hours. Work for 8 hours. That’s only 14 hours out of 24. You still have 10 hours to cook amazing meals, workout, learn a language and walk on the beach. Time is not the issue.” What’s funny is that the math isn’t what made me do a double take at first (I mean, we all make mistakes, right?); it was honestly the walk on the beach part of this that made me blink. Imagine assuming that if everyone planned their day “properly,” we would all have time to walk on the beach. I posted about this to my Instagram account, detailing how similar this rhetoric was to healthism. And yes, even with the bad math aside (kind of hard to miss), these kinds of statements aren’t new and aren’t going away anytime soon.

We have this idea in our minds that we should be working harder and more efficiently. After all, Beyoncé has the same 24 hours in the day that we mere mortals have, and she manages to get shit done, so why shouldn't we? Let’s be clear that this statement is true, but somehow, the staff and team that work under Beyoncé (or insert any celebrity) certainly help with making those 24 hours flow seamlessly. One of the books I’m currently reading is “It Ends With Us” by Colleen Hoover, and there was something comical mentioned in the beginning. The protagonist in this book meets her future sister-in-law and is shocked at the wealth of this woman. There is a scene from Chapter Seven in which the main character is asking her soon-to-be sister-in-law how her apartment was spotless after a party that was a mere few hours ago, and the reply is, “We have people for that. There are people for everything. You’d be surprised. Think of something. Anything. We probably have people for it.” 

Imagine thinking that we all have the same 24 hours as this woman

We need to remember the truth in statements like this, even when they come from a fictionalized book. Many of us don’t have the reality of having “people” for our every whim. The biggest issue I have with these takes is that many people think that their realities are the realities for everyone else. Trust me when I say that I am so happy if someone has time to learn a new language and walk on the beach each day in addition to their everyday living. Good for them. I don’t. And many other people don’t. Here in the United States, we don’t live in a society that supports an individual and their well-being. Many people don’t have accessible or equitable healthcare, and many jobs don’t offer adequate time off, not only for being sick but also for life in general to recharge. Our economy is questionable, with affordable housing being a thing of the past and prices of groceries continuing to increase. Yes, some people are finding ways to combat all of these determinants, but it requires working multiple jobs and hobbies turning into side hustles in order to have various streams of income just to live. I’ll also add that we are all witnessing multiple global atrocities and oh yeah, global warming. Fun times.

I can’t help but notice the similarities of perfectionism, grind culture, and healthism. Let’s first review some of the definitions associated with each.

Perfectionism is a personality trait that is characterized by a tendency to set extremely high, rigid, or "flawless" goals and place excessive demands on oneself and others. It is associated with depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and other mental health problems.

The hustle and grind culture narrative promotes the idea that there's always more to strive for more money to make, a bigger title or promotion to secure, and a higher ceiling to smash.

Healthism represents a particular way of viewing the health problem and is characteristic of the new health consciousness and movements. It can best be understood as a form of medicalization, meaning that it still retains key medical notions. Like medicine, healthism situates the problem of health and disease at the level of the individual.

The message that I see with all of this is that your life, including your health, is in your hands (healthism). You just have to work harder (hustle and grind culture) in order to get it correct (perfectionism) because there is an exact formula for success in everything. I personally refuse to subscribe to the idea of perfection because of the roots in which the concept was formed. I wrote about it in a newsletter back in December. Click the below to check out “What is wrong with the word healthy”:

Here’s the thing: we tend to put the onus of many things in society on the individual. I’ve said this before, but we live in an individualistic society, which can be described as people being motivated by their own preferences and viewpoints. Individualistic cultures emphasize attributes like uniqueness or individuality, personal goals, independence, self-reliance, self-sufficiency, and privacy. 

Doesn’t this sound familiar? Independence. Self-reliance. Self-sufficiency. These are all associated with the idea that if we just tried harder, we could improve ourselves. If we just worked harder, we could improve our finances. If we just ate better, we could improve our health. We could if we just focused and put in effort. Never mind the systemic barriers that are put in place that prevent this, but we individuals could really improve our lives and make a difference. Pull ourselves up by our bootstraps.

Not everyone is afforded the privilege of hyper-independence. Independence works well when the individual already has a certain stepping stone in place in the form of privilege. Many of us have privileges even when we think that our lives are in turmoil and everything is going wrong; we might have multiple privileges that are stepping stones. There is white privilege, male privilege, thin privilege, privilege in education, privilege in housing, privilege in being able-bodied, being cisgender, and I could go on and on. I want to make it clear that the only reason why these are privileges is because of the way our society uplifts these identities. It has nothing to do with the individual themselves.

I often feel like a broken record whenever I talk about the social determinants of health. But when I come across individualistic rhetoric, I realize that maybe it’s not being spoken about nearly enough. Just look at the comments under any post regarding new cooking gadgets or products in grocery stores being put in containers pre-peeled or chopped. People are so quick to label such ideas as “lazy,” but some of us forget that there are about 61 million people in the United States with a disability who benefit from having these accessible items. Some folks also forget that there were 37.9 million people in poverty in 2022 and that 8.4 million people are working multiple jobs. But sure, let’s blame time management issues for our woes.

We all have 24 hours in the day, but we do not have the same 24 hours in a day. We all have different lifestyles and circumstances to consider. We are all navigating this game called life, and some of us receive extra pieces to the game, and others need a headstart before the timer begins.

I couldn’t help myself, I had to fix this math.