No doubt women are working in the 21st century (which really boils down to making us all worker bee’s) – however, I want to talk about men in this article since men generally work the longest hours. I look at many men around me and see a couple of different things. Many men who are working the standard 9-5 job for someone else and men who are busting their proverbial balls trying to get out of a life of working 9-5. I am one of the men that would be in the latter group. I generally work 10-14 hours a day Monday-Friday and another dozen or so hours on the weekend.

Although I do love the challenge and struggle of it all – I alway have my eyes set on the horizon. Do I really need to work 10-14 hours a day? Obviously not. I work the additional hours because I want something different for my life. I’ve lived the traditional 9-5 drudgery and I rather shoot myself than go back to that.

I don’t work 10-14 hours a day because I want a fancy car. Although, I have some nice things – the goal isn’t the nice things. The goal is freedom with options. The goal is doing something that interests me. The goal is doing something that is challenging yet endearingly creative. The goal is also fuck you money.

I see many men striving for the same. Many men working endless hours, taking significant risks and living a cycle of failures and wins. Men who are enshrouded in the stress, sleep deprivation, the neglect of “fun time”, the sacrifices and the painful uncertainty which their lives revolve around. I see the look in there eyes, as if they are just on the horizon peering out over an un-zombified life.

Why are so many men taking this difficult path in the 21st century? Because most men are seen as nothing if they don’t. Men are judged by their accomplishments more than anything else in life – especially in the 21st century. Long gone are the days past, where a man could have reasonable accomplishments and be generally accepted amongst the world as a “Grade-A Guy”. The man of today is nothing more than Sisyphus to the judging eyes around him.

The worst part about the worker bee paradigm for men is that since society only looks at the outcomes – the mans struggles are completely ignored. In fact, not only are they ignored but they are completely shunned. Society doesn’t want to hear about how hard you had to work. Society doesn’t want to hear about the 2 years you spent eating ramen and shitting fire. Society doesn’t want to hear about all the disasters of your come up. Society only wants to know that you’ve made it and you’ve made it right now.

I know that many people I have talked to from my past make comments to me about me. They often say, you’re so lucky; or, Don’t worry about bills you have plenty of money – must be nice. Anytime I mention the difficulties of getting to this position – they desperately want to ignore it.

Lets not forget to throw in the “bitchers™”. The ones who say I’m successful because I’m a white male. I often ask “those people” how much they work. They usually answer between 20-35 hours a week. How cute.

At the end of the day, I enjoy working hard. But not for the reasons of getting societies respect – because even if you do become successful you just get the “bitchers ™” anyway. I enjoy the challenge, the potential freedom, the creativity and even the risk. So for the men out there, if you do choose to be a worker bee (you’ll probably have to anyway) – do it for yourself and not for the hive.