Confessions

I Dread Going To Work, So I Take Taxi Or Ride-Hailing Almost Every Day

I practised the discipline of taking public transportation to work when I started working. Also, because I didn’t have much salary to work with to afford taxis and ride-hailing.  In a recent job, I dread waking earlier to prepare for work every morning because work is usually very busy and tiring. Some days I even have to skip lunch to complete my tasks, and I usually end work late. I work about 10 to 12 hours a day.  Although the job pays 15% better than my first job, I realised that I was always almost spending all of my salary and unable to save money, compared to my previous job.  I end up taking taxis or ride-hailing to work almost every day because I am always unable to motivate myself to wake up. After work, I also feel so tired that I end up taking private transportation as well.I googled endlessly online whenever I had break time, wondering what was happening to me and how to manage my increased transportation costs.   The whole point of changing jobs with a salary increment was to have more money to spend or save, right? Was it worth it to spend it on transport costs and be unable to watch my money grow?  Google “said” that if I found myself dreading going to work each day, it was likely that the job was not a right fit for me. About 49% of workers also feel such dread once a week, according to this LinkedIn survey. So surely, I was at the worst end of the spectrum because I dreaded going to work almost every day.  I tried to cut down on private transport, but that made me tired when I got home too. In the end, I had to find a new job and was okay with no increment.   If I could keep some savings and not burn out, I was happy. This article is part of TSS Confessions, a weekly column where we delve into personal finance topics that are unscripted and genuine real accounts from people.