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Travelling for Work: The Dark Side of Work Travel [Updated for 2020]

There are many positives to regular work travel ranging from increased career opportunities, more visibility inside your company and of course you get a chance to see different parts of the world on the company’s dime. But the truth is travelling for work has a dark side.

In a 2019 study , NextTravel reported that 1 in 5 business travelers said traveling for work negatively affected their mental health. 25% of respondents noted difficulty in maintaining personal or family relationships and 23% noted having missed an important family event for work travel.

Bottom line : traveling for work has a dark side.

Travelling for Work – quick overview

This article examines the dark side of travelling for work on a regular basis. Specifically, readers will learn five downsides to regular work travel . Here’s a quick summary, before we dig in:

• You are alone a lot
• Sleep schedule / patterns off
• Hard to eat healthy
• Miss family events
• Tough on personal relationships

We deep dive into each of these elements of regular work travel so you know what to be on guard for if you take a job traveling for work. As a frequent business traveler myself I live the grind of recurring work travel every single week and use this insight to share some of the downsides of a life spent on the road.

You are alone a lot when traveling for work

Regular work travel can take you all over the country (or world). You may get to see amazing sights, visit bucket-list destinations and eat at once-in-a-lifetime restaurants – all on the company dime . Except you are likely doing it alone .

When you travel for work there is one consistent element: lots of alone time . For example, on a work trip to Oregon I had some time to kill and took the long way back to the Portland ( PDX ) airport. It was incredible. While wandering around a pretty neat castle in Poland I was, surprise, alone.

In a sweet Mustang convertible (courtesy of National Rental Car ) I drove up the Oregon Coast with the top down. Cute seaside towns, a great lighthouse, a cave full of seals and craggy windswept cliffs. Truly incredible stuff.

But I was alone .

I would have loved to share this experience with my wife (who loves lighthouses) but alas – I was travelling for work again – and thus, oh so alone.

Speaking of Oregon, you might want to check out my post on Things to Do (and eat) in Salem Oregon

Whether it’s night after night by yourself in hotel room, or a tour of the Empire State Building, you are often alone when travelling for work. It’s a huge downside.

In fact, if you’ve ever watched the now famous George Clooney movie, Up in the Air, you know that one thing was very apparent in the actor’s life: he was lonely. Now, in his case, he also had no family and intentionally detached himself from friends and family. But he was alone and his loneliness was a key part of the story.

If you take a job that has travel , try to avoid alienating yourself from friends and family. Invest in these non-travel relationships. If you have a family, make it count when you are home.

Sleep schedule / patterns off when you travel for work

Regular work travel typically means numerous time zones which means it can be incredibly challenging to maintain regular sleep patterns. I live in on the West Coast and often, when travelling for work, I head east.

Waking up that first morning in Eastern or Central Time Zone is BRUTAL. And while many years spent travelling for work have allowed me to hone my body rhythms to not care so much about the time zone I am in, it’s still rough .

The copious amounts of coffee I drink probably help (but are likely not healthy!).

Jetlag , or as the Mayo Clinic defines it , “a temporary sleep problem that can affect anyone who quickly travels across multiple time zones” is a real thing and it can cause fatigue, sleeplessness, mood changes, and put your body in a position where you can be susceptible to sickness (never mind the prolific amounts of germs you come into contact with while travelling for work!).

Bottom line: with work travel, you will be tired . It will be hard to sleep, at times. But you soldier on!

PS…this we wrote about How to get over jet lag while you travel 11 Jet Lag Tips for every traveler , check it out!

It’s hard to eat healthy when you travel for work

I’ve written an entire article on staying healthy while travelling for work because this is such an important subject. It is darned hard to eat healthy (and stay healthy overall) with regular work travel!

When travelling for work, you will eat out for every meal (unless you shop for food which is not always convenient). That means you have an opportunity to eat lots of unhealthy, calorie-laden food!

Don’t get me wrong, it will be GOOD food…good as in tasty in many cases (eating dinner with customers at nice restaurants is a nice perk). But, man, it’s tough to eat healthy. And hard to stay hydrated.

This is a big downside to regular work travel that can sneak right up on you if you are not careful!

By the way, here are some healthy travel snacks ideas

With work travel, you will miss family events

As I write this post I am preparing to head out on another business trip. And unfortunately, with this trip I will miss my children’s choir recital. It’s not the first “kid” event I’ve missed and it always hurts.

I hate being away from my family and I hate missing their events. I’ve missed piano recitals, school plays, soccer practice and more.

It sucks! It really does. But I’ve sat down with my kids and explained to them this is how daddy makes his living. And my wife and I have made a calculated trade off.

This job (which I am really good at) is how I provide for them. I explain I don’t want to miss their events, and I always work REALLY hard not to miss them. I also make sure to be PRESENT when I *am* home.

In fact, that’s Habit #7 of my 7 Habits of the Healthy Business Traveler: How to Stay Healthy While Traveling for Business: Staying Connected ! Whether its regularly texting your loved ones, or using Google Hangouts , or Facetime and making sure you are HOME when you are home – staying connected is critical to maximizing your relationships with your kids.

And I strongly encourage you to have a sit down with your children and explain to them your travel job.

Traveling for Work can be Tough on personal relationships

After years of travelling for work, I can personally attest that it is very difficult on personal relationships. While I’ve been married for over 23 years, we’ve had our rough patches.

One of my job had really heavy work travel and it had me on the road almost every week of the month. It took a brutal toll on my marriage. It came to a head and I had to tell my boss fire me if you want, but take me off the road for a bit.

He was a gracious boss, liked me, and didn’t bat an eye. I took a breather (for a year or so) and worked on my marriage. Then, in a better place (both of us), we agreed it was time to start focusing on my career again – and that meant travel.

Time apart is not on the only challenge on personal relationships for the person with regular work travel. Long periods of time with the opposite sex, including regular work dinners and drinks (all under a work context) can occasionally create situations that can be devastating to a marriage or committed relationship.

The regular work traveler has to be on guard against these things.

How to survive frequent work travel

To summarize, there’s a few key aspects to surviving the downsides of frequent travel:

• Be home when you are home!
• Maintain non-travel friends and family
• Sleep when you can!
• Enjoy the sights as best you can (don’t stay in your hotel room)
• Eat as healthy, but don’t over rotate.
• Take advantage of Bleisure whenever you can
• Bring your family with you if you can
• Travel smarter whenever possible

Employ these tips and you life as a business traveler may not be perfect, but it won’t be all bad.

Final Thoughts on Travelling for Work and Downsides of Regular Work Travel

At this point you might be seriously wondering if there are ANY good things about travelling for work. This is, obviously, quite the list of negatives to travelling for work. And no doubt – that’s true.

But, there are also many positives to a job that travels for work. For example, greater opportunities with your company, higher profile jobs, a chance to meet with clients important to the company, travel with the boss , and more are just some of the pluses to a job with regular work travel.

Additionally, you may get the opportunity to see the world (or parts of it) on the company’s dime . To visit locations you might never get to visit, and to eat at places you might not ordinarily get a chance to eat at. For example, I recently visited Krakow , Poland and it was incredible. Next up (for company work travel) is a trip to England, Copenhagen and Norway. Yep…can’t beat that.

Suffice to say that like any job, you should carefully weigh the pros and cons. A travel job can be incredibly rewarding, but it comes with some downsides. I urge you to consider both the pros and cons of such a job!

If you liked this content, please do us a favor share it on social media and click the “like” button below and don’t forget to follow us on social media including Twitter , Instagram , Pinterest and Facebook .

And, of course, if you are interested in more travel tips and travel advice, you might like these great articles:

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Affiliate Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. I may also earn commissions from other affiliate programs as applicable.

Jeremy Ballou is the editor of the CBoardingGroup.com and a long-time writer in both the travel and tech industry. Most days he's in thinking about travel or writing about it.

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Travel annoyances abound in the air and on the ground. Here's how to fix a few of them

What do you hate about travel? And is there any way to fix the problem, besides staying home? 

For Brett Manders, the answer to "what drives you crazy?" is simple. "The carousel cozy-uppers," he says. You know, the folks who crowd around the baggage carousel after a flight lands. 

"I'm 100% certain that your bags will not come out any quicker the closer you are to the baggage carousel," says Manders, an international airline pilot who wrote the book "Behind the Flight Deck Door."

The solution – at least to this problem – is simple, too. Some airports draw a line around the carousel and tell everyone to stand back until their luggage arrives. 

As the busy holiday travel season begins, let's talk about our travel annoyances and how to fix them. There are no reliable surveys that examine the entire travel experience, from planning to arrival. But you already know what grates against your nerves, right?

Hate to plan? Here's the fix

Travelers love to hate vacation planning, for example. Rey Alton, a travel advisor with Travel Leaders in Houston, says your anger is justified.

When air travelers go all DIY, they often purchase tickets they don't understand. "I see this issue arise more and more," he says. "Basic economy fares don't allow you to choose a seat, and to upgrade to a confirmed seat assignment can be pricey."

I think the fix for this problem is pretty straightforward: Make these stripped-down "basic" fares illegal. I mean, who doesn't fly with a bag or need a seat assignment? Whose plans never change? Not mine! 

Meantime, people like Alton – professional vacation planners – are the solution. A travel pro will keep you far, far away from these absurd airline tickets.

Travelers hate lines, too

How about long lines? Do those annoy you? Sure they do. I spoke with dozens of frequent travelers who loathe lines more than anything. "One of my least favorite things about traveling is waiting in line for TSA checks," says John Linden, a furniture designer from Los Angeles. "I understand that it's for our safety. Ultimately, that's a good thing. But no one wants to stand in line for 45 minutes."

Airports with the worst TSA lines:   These are the days and times you'll want to avoid

The solution: Hire more agents and add them at the busiest times. But the government moves even slower than those TSA lines, so good luck with that one.

In the meantime, passengers like Linden are applying for known traveler programs like TSA PreCheck , Global Entry  and CLEAR . That should move things along.

Interested in TSA PreCheck?  It might soon be cheaper and easier to sign up

Renewing or applying for airport fast pass Global Entry?  Brace for lengthy delays

Travelers can't stand travel industry deception

Travelers want the unvarnished truth. Consider what happened to Lauren Wolfe, an attorney in Washington, when she tried to book a hotel in Florida a few years ago. She discovered that after she selected the hotel online, it added a mandatory $25 per night charge. "I said to myself, 'This has got to be illegal,'" she told me. 

The hotels say it is legal. " Resort fees ," which cover extras like the use of a gym and "free" Wi-Fi, are common in the hotel business. Wolfe started a site called Killresortfees.com and made it her mission to destroy the fees. And that's the long-term solution to these unwanted extras. There ought to be a law.

Congress takes on 'hidden fees' at hotels and resorts:   Here's what it could mean for travelers

Keep an eye out:   These are the most ridiculous travel fees to look out for

The new norm in Las Vegas resort fees?   $50 a night at top hotels

No wonder we arrive exhausted when we're on vacation

Is it any wonder that travelers arrive at their destination exhausted? It's the indignities we suffer in transit. That's what you hate about travel. 

The travel industry thinks suffering is a normal part of the travel experience. So it doesn't hesitate to sell you an airline ticket with stupid restrictions or a hotel room with an outrageous fee. It doesn't care if you have to wait in a long line. Or if you can't figure out how to plan your trip online without losing your shirt.

None of this should happen. The travel industry ought to set the standard for customer service. But until they do, at least we know we're in this together.

How to handle the hate

Take a deep breath.   That's the advice of Christine Scott-Hudson, a licensed psychotherapist. "Your deep, long breaths stimulate your vagus nerve," she says. That, in turn, promotes feelings of general well-being and safety. 

Take inventory of your situation.  Put your problem into perspective. Your trip will eventually end. You'll be home, far away from the stress of holiday travel. Might as well take another deep breath while you're at it. That's right. Breathe in. Breathe out. There you go.

Take action.  If you experienced something that made you hate to travel, try to eliminate it from your trip. Whether you're starting a site to protest resort fees, or just avoiding an airline or hotel in the future – do something.

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The Future of Work Issue

Hating Your Job Is Cool. But Is It a Labor Movement?

Inside the rise and fall of r/antiwork — the Reddit community that made it OK to quit, but couldn’t quite do anything else.

Credit... Illustration by George Wylesol

Supported by

By Oliver Whang

• Feb. 15, 2022

Alec Wetherington didn’t know anyone in Portland, Ore., when he moved there in late 2020. His friends were in Seattle, his mother in Idaho, and he was lonely, so he started spending more time on Reddit. He found like-minded people on subreddit pages such as r/lostgeneration, r/millennials and r/exChristian. There was a certain amount of drama and trolling, but in general the posters were intellectual, thoughtful, young, a little radical — a lot like Wetherington. Reddit, for him, was a bit like an echo chamber and a bit like a group chat with friends. Time online was time spent socializing. It was surprisingly refreshing company for someone in a strange city.

Among the similarities he shared with his Reddit friends (and his offline friends too): indebtedness. In 2006, Wetherington took out more than $30,000 in student loans, and in subsequent years, because he wasn’t earning enough to make payments, he requested forbearance. The loan companies were always quick to extend it to him — “like candy,” he says. He didn’t understand the effect that deferring these payments would have on the money he owed, however, which was to capitalize the interest, increasing his debt. Nearly a decade after taking out his original loans, he had repaid about $17,000 yet owed more than the original loans. He regretted his degree. His English major and theology minor went unused, except in conversations with friends. And on Reddit.

It was the spring of 2021 when Wetherington started seeing posts from a subreddit called r/antiwork, whose motto was “Unemployment for all, not just the rich.” It had a couple of hundred thousand members, and stories from the community were popping up all over social media. (On Reddit, subreddits are called “communities”; their participants are known as “members.”) People wrote posts about poor treatment from bosses, about quitting their jobs.

“Where you at,” asks Chris, a boss, in a screenshot of one exchange of text messages posted on Antiwork.

“?” the worker responds.

“You told mark you could work night shift tonight.”

“No I did not. I told mark I couldn’t work monday.”

“You told him you couldn’t work in the morning but you could work normal hours.”

“As you know, I found out yesterday that my dad passed away. I’m gonna go ahead and at least take the one day I get a week off to mourn his death. I am so sorry for any inconvenience this will cause you.”

“My uncle died a few days ago. I lost my grandma. Stop being a victim.”

“Mail me my check. I quit. And go [expletive] yourself.”

This conversation appeared in a post with the heading “Who’s the boss now?” in the fall of 2021. It earned 176,000 upvotes. By this point, the group had around 500,000 members.

Wetherington did not find the Antiwork mind-set fully convincing. He was working as a senior account executive at a transcription company, the latest in a long line of part- and full-time jobs going back to high school: at a video-production company, a Panera, a Noodles & Company, school cafeterias. He didn’t see how stopping work altogether — whatever that even meant — was possible or desirable. He had bills. The transcription work was dull, but the pay was good and seemed as if it would keep climbing. In 2019, five years after he was hired, Wetherington was making more than $22 an hour. He did not get a raise in 2020, but he felt lucky to have a job when the pandemic hit, one that he could do full time from home.

As Antiwork grew, Wetherington saw that the community wasn’t just complaining about mean bosses. At least as much energy seemed to be devoted to discussions about improving pay and working conditions. Plans for protests would be made on Antiwork; then, three days later, they could be seen taking place on YouTube. The percentage of employed people who quit their jobs had increased sharply in the summer of 2020, but by the fall the quit rate was higher than it had been in two decades. It kept rising in 2021, and by the end of last summer it reached 3 percent. In May 2021, Anthony Klotz, a professor at Mays Business School, coined a term for this trend: the Great Resignation. Wetherington could see it happening among those of his friends who were quitting their jobs. In Antiwork, it seemed that a force was emerging — a community of people, mainly low-wage and blue-collar workers, fed up with their working conditions. By September, Wetherington had joined.

Doreen Ford, who became a member of Antiwork in 2014, the year after its creation, didn’t take the community too seriously in the beginning. It was just a handful of people hanging out online, sharing articles, ideas and jokes about work. One early post: “Friends Without Benefits: It is not enough to love your employer — you must love all employers.” But when I spoke to her in November, two days after thousands of McDonald’s employees around the United States walked out to push for better working conditions, Ford said that her biggest concern — by now she was Antiwork’s longest-serving moderator — was figuring out how to turn the group’s increasingly chaotic spirit into action. “We can see that people are angry,” she said. “They feel dejected and want somewhere to put their energy — what are we going to do with this?”

‘I’m starting to panic. Can anyone help? I cannot make myself work anymore.’

The most popular post in the Antiwork community at the time encouraged people to turn the McDonald’s strike into an even larger general strike — to force the company to pay its employees $25 an hour. When I asked the poster, who wanted to remain anonymous, what he hoped would happen in response to his post’s popularity, he brought up GameStop, whose stock price soared in early 2021 almost entirely thanks to a Reddit community called r/wallstreetbets. He said he wanted to bring that same power to labor rights. Soon after his post, he created and shared on Antiwork a sign with the slogan “McDonald’s Employment Boycott” above an image of a worker swinging a hammer. People started printing it out and taping it up in fast-food franchises. By that point, the group had more than 1.2 million members.

At the top of the subreddit page, Ford regularly pinned a general discussion thread in which members shared stories and memes, vented and planned action. Comments often took on a confessional tone. “My unemployment will run out in like a month,” one user said in a fall discussion thread. “It has been great not having to sell myself to live, but I’m becoming anxious at the thought of having to work again.” Another wrote: “I’m starting to panic. Can anyone help? I cannot make myself work anymore. I have a mental block against it. If I lose my job, my whole life will fall apart. But I just can’t bring myself to log in and do it.” To this, someone responded: “Idk but if I was in your place I’d save as much as possible and start looking for something easier to do.”

As I spent more time on Antiwork, it became clear that workers in the group weren’t impulsively quitting their jobs so much as navigating various entangled personal decisions. T., a 25-year-old machinist’s mate in the Navy who requested anonymity because he feared retribution, told me that while Antiwork provided a kind of fellowship with others who, like him, endured abuse at the hands of superiors, he worried about leaving the military when his six-year contract is up in the middle of this year. Antiwork sometimes makes quitting seem simpler than it really is, he noted. “The younger me would’ve, but I just had a kid,” he said, “and the dynamic has changed for me.”

In December, Antiwork had more than 1.4 million members and was consistently among the five busiest pages on Reddit, with daily averages of about 1,500 posts and 30,000 comments. Ford is a student, a part-time dog walker and an anarchist, but there are also communists, libertarians, mechanics, cashiers, teachers and government employees. In speaking to dozens of people in the community, I found what seems to be a general solidarity under its variegated surface, beyond the resignation sagas and the efforts to organize. But whether this community has wrought change in the analog world is harder to say: Antiwork straddles the already fuzzy line between the internet and offline life.

By the end of 2021, Wetherington was on Antiwork more often, convinced that it would play an important role in the next phase of the Great Resignation. But he couldn’t help noticing that the efforts to initiate strikes were fizzling out. The user who tried to start the McDonald’s strike went silent about it a couple of weeks after his first post went viral; pictures of his sign stopped showing up online. He was too swamped at his own job to do anything more, he told me.

The lasting impact of Antiwork has seemed to fall largely on the psyches of individual members. “What would you do if you didn’t have to work full time to survive?” one popular post asked. The responses that followed — there were more than 4,000 — included things like painting, growing a garden and sitting in cafes. A number of people said that they had already cut back on their workdays. “Those extra hours have made a huge difference in my mental health and time I dedicate to my personal life,” one said. Someone else echoed the sentiment: “This is what I did too and worth it completely! Life is too short to be exhausted for most of it.” Another person answered: “I would transform my semi truck into a ‘free’ crepe shop. I’d drive it here and there, stop in a parking lot, make crepes for an afternoon and then bugger off home.” To this, someone responded: “Marry me.”

For the members I spoke to, it was nice to be part of a community. Troy Simoes, a 26-year-old lab manager in Colorado who first started browsing Antiwork after starting in his current job in 2020, told me that he found himself spending more time on the subreddit after his therapist suggested he try to make connections. “The fact that people are just kind of done working in jobs that they hate for nothing, I just found that relatable,” he said.

Wetherington’s own growing dissatisfaction with work peaked when he received no raise for a second year in a row. The day he found out, he started browsing online job listings. By now, he had fully embraced the Antiwork ethos. It took him less than a week to find a job in a factory that produces semiconductor-making machines. The entry-level position on the night shift promised to pay $6,900 more annually than he was making at the transcription company.

In early January, a day after he handed in his two-week notice, Wetherington told me that he felt bad about leaving his co-workers; all of them, he thinks, are good people. Although Antiwork helped inspire him, it didn’t lead him to submit a biting letter of resignation. His supervisor, who hired him seven years ago, was the first person he told that he was leaving. The two of them had become friends, and when they talked on the phone, he says, the supervisor was understanding and even a little impressed.

A week later, Doreen Ford was interviewed by Jesse Watters on Fox News. Ford appeared on a grainy video feed from her apartment, the light from her monitor reflecting off her glasses, obscuring her eyes. She spun back and forth in her chair throughout the three-minute interview. Watters, on her side of the screen, was calm and composed.

Watters: “You’re 30, OK. And is there something you want to do besides being a dog walker? Do you aspire to do anything more than dog walking, or is that kind of your pinnacle?”

Ford: “I love working with dogs. If I had to do this for the rest of my life, I wouldn’t be super complaining. Dogs are wonderful animals. But I would love to teach, I would love to work with people and stuff like that. ...”

Watters: “Teach. What would you teach, Doreen?”

Ford: “Philosophy, mostly.”

Watters: “Philosophy. ...”

Ford: “Critical thinking, reason, stuff like that.”

Watters: “Well I would love to take your class, Doreen. I would just be taking notes the whole time.”

In the hours that followed, the Antiwork subreddit imploded. The interview was universally considered a disaster. The community questioned why Ford felt she had the authority to represent the movement. One especially popular comment: “1 person has, potentially I’d like to add, ruined what antiwork and the progress it has made, for 1.7 million people.”

Within 24 hours of the interview’s release, the entire subreddit was made private, and no one except the moderators could access it. Theories started to bounce around about some outside corporate mastermind controlling the moderators, trying to turn the community against itself.

In the days afterward, Ford told me that she agreed to do the interview in order to get some traction for the movement. “I had good intentions, but, yeah, that only does so much,” she said. People continued to harass her online, sending her graphic threats and insulting her appearance. It felt as if the world was collapsing in on her.

After Antiwork was closed to public access, a different page called r/WorkReform appeared. Its motto was “Food, Healthcare, and Homes: for ALL WAGES,” and it soon became the fastest-growing subreddit on the site. Within 12 hours it had 150,000 members; 12 hours later it had more than 400,000 members. One of the top posts read, “Regardless of anti works intention or your views on it we have to take this seriously. Going in front of the media and uttering the words anti work, people who don’t know WILL take it at face value and dismiss it. ...All I want is a clear and shining light to the public that encapsulates the reality of the [expletive] world we live in when it comes to work.”

Then the Antiwork subreddit was reopened. All traces of Ford’s account had been erased from the community. Within a few days, posts about abusive bosses started to dominate the content again, and a couple of days later a post titled “Americas transgender wage gap” was pinned to the top of the page. WorkReform’s growth spurt slowed at around 450,000 members, and Antiwork’s numbers stayed around 1.7 million. Posts on both pages express the same frustrations, and both have been growing steadily.

When we were talking one evening after he started training for his new job, Wetherington told me that he didn’t really know where he fit into the Antiwork community anymore. He still felt a sense of solidarity with the other members, whether it was in Antiwork or WorkReform. He remained a member of both groups, but he wasn’t sure whether he belonged or if he was just an appreciative spectator. He believed in the community’s collective potential — after all, the group had helped persuade him to leave his job — but it was difficult to gauge how realistic it was to hope for a Reddit revolution. And now he liked his job. It paid well.

“When I say that I quit because of what’s called the Great Resignation, I wonder how much of that is created by the ‘movement’ on Reddit and stuff, or whether it’s just how the economy works,” he said. He decided not to post about himself in the Antiwork community. The situation, he thought, was too complicated for that.

Oliver Whang is a freelance journalist who studies philosophy at Princeton University.

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19 Things People Who Seriously Hate Traveling Can Relate To

• https://thoughtcatalog.com/?p=565422

1. Not knowing how to gently tell your friends that, no, you don’t want to go on a two month backpacking trip through Europe. In fact, you’d rather pluck out all your own eyelashes and glue them to paper like macaroni art.

2. Getting stuck going somewhere because you couldn’t bring yourself to be the Debbier Downer who said, “No, count me out because that sounds terrible.”

3. People asking if you have travel plans after graduation and 100% sincerely saying, “Yeah, over to my couch. I’m exhausted.”

4. Finding a place you feel comfortable and love, and never wanting to leave.

5. Like, ever.

6. Gagging whenever you see the word wanderlust .

7. Hardcore wishing teleportation was a feasible option. Way less hassle.

8. Quietly smiling in the corner when all your friends obsess over all the cities they can’t wait to visit.

9. Not having a prepared answer for when people ask where you’d most like to go.

10. Or, alternatively, having a prepared answer that isn’t necessarily reflective of how you feel. Just something to say because it’s easier than explaining you’re the freak who doesn’t care about travel.

11. Cringing at the Plague-like germ count on airplanes.

12. No, seriously. It’s disgusting.

13. Needing a Trip Survival Kit, and not like, for first aid purposes. But with things to help you simply survive the stress. Like sweatpants. Oh man, so many sweatpants.

14. Having suuuuper cute panic attacks when flying.

15. Occasionally getting the urge to look at Airbnbs in far off locations, but after perusing them for a few minutes quickly deciding, “Lol, naahhhhhh.”

16. Getting your fix to see the world by watching travel programs.

17. Wondering if people who are always on the road know there’s this extraordinary thing called Netflix.

18. Enjoying solo trips.

Ari Eastman

✨ real(ly not) chill. poet. writer. mental health activist. mama shark. ✨

Keep up with Ari on Instagram and Amazon

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Your last-minute guide to Monday's total solar eclipse

A total solar eclipse will cross North America on Monday , offering millions a rare opportunity to see afternoon skies temporarily darken as the moon blocks the face of the sun.

Tune into NBC News NOW as Lester Holt hosts a two-hour special at 2 p.m. ET Monday from Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The eclipse's path fortuitously cuts across Mexico, 15 U.S. states and a small part of eastern Canada. In all other states in the continental U.S., viewers will be treated to a partial solar eclipse, with the moon appearing to take a bite out of the sun and obscuring part of its light.

Here’s everything you need to know about the rare celestial event.

What is a solar eclipse?

Solar eclipses occur when the sun, moon and Earth align. The moon passes between Earth and sun, temporarily blocking the sun’s light and casting a shadow on Earth.

A total solar eclipse is when the moon fully obscures the sun, whereas a partial solar eclipse means it blocks just a portion of the sun’s face.

Solar eclipses occur only with the new moon. Because the moon’s orbit around Earth is tilted, the three bodies don’t always line up in a way that creates an eclipse.

“Imagine if the moon’s orbit were in the plane of Earth’s orbit around the sun — if that were the case, then every new moon, you’d have a total solar eclipse and every full moon, you’d have a lunar eclipse,” Neil DeGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, told NBC News. “So, because things don’t always align, it lends to the rarity of the event and the specialness of the event.”

Where and when will the eclipse be visible?

This year’s eclipse will follow a slightly wider path over more populated areas of the continental U.S. than other total solar eclipses have in the recent past.

NASA estimates that 31.6 million people live within what’s known as the path of totality, where the total solar eclipse will be visible. An additional 150 million people live within 200 miles of the path, according to the agency.

The path travels through Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. Tiny parts of Michigan and Tennessee will also be able to witness totality if conditions are clear.

After the eclipse crosses into Canada, it will pass over southern Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton, at the eastern end of Nova Scotia.

Those outside the path of totality can still take part in the astronomical event by viewing a partial solar eclipse — visible throughout all 48 states of the contiguous U.S. — or a NASA livestream.

The timing, including how long totality lasts, depends on the location, but some spots will see the moon fully cover the sun for up to 4 minutes and 28 seconds.

Below is a list of timings for some cities along the path of totality, as  provided by NASA . A number of other resources, including NationalEclipse.com  and  TimeandDate.com , can also help people plan.

• Dallas: Partial eclipse begins at 12:23 p.m. CT and totality at 1:40 p.m.
• Little Rock, Arkansas: Partial eclipse begins at 12:33 p.m. CT and totality at 1:51 p.m.
• Cleveland: Partial eclipse begins at 1:59 p.m. ET and totality at 3:13 p.m.
• Buffalo, New York: Partial eclipse begins at 2:04 p.m. ET and totality at 3:18 p.m.
• Lancaster, New Hampshire: Partial eclipse begins at 2:16 p.m. ET and totality at 3:27 p.m.

How to safely view a solar eclipse

It is never safe to gaze directly at the sun, even when it is partly or mostly covered by the moon. Special eclipse glasses or  pinhole projectors  are required to safely view solar eclipses and prevent eye damage. Failing to take the proper precautions can result in severe eye injury,  according to NASA .

Eclipse glasses are thousands of times darker than normal sunglasses and specially made to enable wearers to look at the sun during these kinds of celestial events.

Sky-watchers should also never view any part of the sun through binoculars, telescopes or camera lenses unless they have specific solar filters attached. Eclipse glasses should not be used with these devices, as they will not provide adequate protection.

However, during the few minutes of totality, when the moon is fully blocking the sun, it is safe to look with the naked eye.

Beware of fake eclipse glasses. On legitimate pairs, the lenses should have a silver appearance on the front and be black on the inside. The manufacturer’s name and address should be clearly labeled, and they should not be torn or punctured. Check, as well, for the ISO logo and the code “IS 12312-2” printed on the inside.

If you don’t have eclipse glasses, you can make a homemade pinhole projector, which lets sunlight in through a small hole, focuses it and projects it onto a piece of paper, wall or other surface to create an image of the sun that is safe to look at. 

All you need is two pieces of white cardboard or plain white paper, aluminum foil and a pin or thumbtack. Cut a 1- to 2-inch square or rectangle out of the center of a piece of white paper or cardboard. Tape aluminum foil over that cut-out shape, then use a pin or thumbtack to poke a tiny hole in the foil.

During the eclipse, place a second piece of white paper or cardboard on the ground as a screen and hold the projector with the foil facing up and your back to the sun. Adjusting how far you hold the projector from the second piece of paper will alter the size of the image on the makeshift screen.

What to look for while viewing the total solar eclipse

For people along the path of totality, there are some fun milestones to keep track of as the total solar eclipse unfolds.

As the eclipse progresses and the sun gets thinner in the sky, it will start to get eerily dark, according to Tyson.

When the last beams of sunlight are about to become obscured, look out for the “diamond ring effect”: The sun’s atmosphere will appear as an illuminated halo, and the last light still visible will look like the diamond of a giant ring.

As the sunlight decreases even further, an effect known as Baily’s beads will be created by the moon’s rugged terrain. Tiny “beads” of light will be visible for only a few seconds around the dark moon, as the last bits of sunlight peer through the moon’s mountains and valleys.

When the moon is fully blocking the sun, it is safe to remove eclipse glasses and look at the total solar eclipse with the naked eye.

Some lucky sky-watchers may even catch a glimpse of a comet .

Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks — nicknamed the “ devil comet ” because an eruption last year left it with two distinct trails of gas and ice in the shape of devil horns — is currently visible from the Northern Hemisphere as it swings through the inner solar system.

The comet can be seen in the early evenings by gazing toward the west-northwest horizon. During the eclipse, when skies darken during totality, it may be possible to see the comet near Jupiter, but its visibility will depend on whether it’s in the middle of an outburst and thus brighter than normal.

Most likely, all eyes will be on the alignment of the moon and sun.

“Most people won’t even notice,” Tyson said. “But if you know to look, it’s there.”

When is the next solar eclipse?

The next total solar eclipse will be in 2026, but it will mostly pass over the Arctic Ocean, with some visibility in Greenland, Iceland, Portugal and northern Spain. In 2027, a total solar eclipse will be visible in Spain and a swath of northern Africa.

The next total solar eclipse visible from North America will be in 2033, but only over Alaska. Then in 2044, a total solar eclipse will cross Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, parts of Canada and Greenland.

The next total solar eclipse to cross the continental U.S. coast-to-coast in will occur in 2045. The path of totality for that eclipse will cut through California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia and Florida.

Denise Chow is a reporter for NBC News Science focused on general science and climate change.

Lucas Thompson is a content producer for the NBC News Climate Unit.

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'I Hate My Job': How to Cope When You Feel This Way

Rachael is a New York-based writer and freelance writer for Verywell Mind, where she leverages her decades of personal experience with and research on mental illness—particularly ADHD and depression—to help readers better understand how their mind works and how to manage their mental health.

Rachel Goldman, PhD FTOS, is a licensed psychologist, clinical assistant professor, speaker, wellness expert specializing in eating behaviors, stress management, and health behavior change.

If you hate your job, you’re not alone. According to a 2022 Gallup report on the global workplace, just 21% of employees feel engaged at work while the rest feel emotionally detached (60%) or downright miserable (19%). With the average person spending 81,396 hours of their life at work, that kind of dissatisfaction can have a ripple effect across the rest of your life.

Chronic job dissatisfaction has been linked to a weakened immune system, lower self-esteem , higher rates of depression and anxiety, and increased strain in workers’ home life and personal relationships.

So if you constantly find yourself saying "I hate my job," you’re right to be looking for solutions. Even if you can’t get out right away, you can work on setting boundaries to limit the stress it’s causing you while also taking steps toward finding a job that allows you to thrive.

Is It Normal to Absolutely Hate Your Job?

As the Gallup report mentioned earlier shows, it is definitely normal to hate your job. The same report noted that nearly half of employees worldwide feel stressed at work while 40% feel worried and 23% feel angry. This shows that, unfortunately, a lot of people aren’t very happy with their job, and a sizable minority are deeply unhappy with where they work.

Is It OK to Quit a Job You Hate?

It absolutely is ok to quit a job you hate, no matter what your reasons are. With that said, your job is likely your main source of income and, as the widespread prevalence of job dissatisfaction shows, there are lots of bad jobs out there. You need to make sure you avoid quitting one bad job just to end up in another job you hate. So before you take the leap, answer the following two questions before you do:

• How will you pay your bills without this job? Do you have savings to fall back on? Do you have another job lined up? Do you have family or friends who would support you while you’re in between jobs?
• What specifically are your reasons for quitting? Whether it’s the workplace environment or the work itself, you want to understand why you hate your job as clearly as possible so that you know what red flags to look for while hunting for another job.

How Long Should I Stay at a Job if I Hate It?

This really depends on your circumstances. If you feel unsafe or that staying would harm your physical or mental health , quitting immediately is likely the right call. But if your dissatisfaction with the job isn’t an immediate threat to your wellbeing, it might make sense to keep working while you figure out your plans for the future.

Staying at the job allows you to continue earning money and avoid a gap in your resume, which can be important advantages if you don’t have savings or family to fall back on or you’re not sure what other job you’ll find.

Rather than putting a time limit on the job itself, make a plan for getting a better job, estimate how long that will take, and use that as your timeline. If you want to find a similar job, commit to a consistent job hunting schedule to try to get something better as soon as possible. If you’re considering a career change, for example, you might need months or more of education or training.

What to Do When You Hate Your Job but Can't Quit

Most people aren’t really in a position to quit a job, no matter how much they hate it. As stressful as that can be, there are ways to cope and ways to work toward something better even while you feel stuck where you are. Here are some strategies to try:

Create Your Exit Strategy

You may not be able to quit right now, but that doesn’t mean you have to resign yourself to spending the rest of your life at a job you hate. No matter how hopeless it might seem right now, it’s always worth planning your exit. Doing this will not only help you get a better job, it also helps you cope with the bad job you’re in now. Knowing that an end is in sight can give you the strength to endure.

Your plan might include steps like:

• Identify your target income by creating your ideal lifestyle budget. This is the hypothetical budget that allows you to pay your bills, get out of debt , and pay for anything else you might want like a new house, a family, or enough disposable income to travel the world.
• List the traits of your ideal job. Don’t think in terms of a “dream job.” Instead, think about the more practical qualities of the job like flexible scheduling, better work-life balance , or a collaborative work environment. Also, add the kind of work it would entail. Do you prefer digging into the details or managing the big picture? Do you prefer active or physical work over sitting behind a desk?
• List your strengths and weaknesses. What kind of work comes easily to you? And what kind feels especially difficult? Use this to guide you toward the kinds of jobs you should look for.
• Decide what you’re willing and able to do for a new job opportunity. Can you relocate? How far? Do you have the means to go back to school if necessary? Are you willing to accept a lower-level position than your current one for the chance to work your way up to the job you want?
• Pursue certifications, education, or training that can help you land a job that matches your criteria.
• Talk to people doing the job you’d like to do.
• Send out applications, even if you feel underqualified.

Break your plan down into daily or weekly milestones so that you’re always working toward that better future.

Stick to Your Job Description

There’s a lot of pressure in our work culture to go above and beyond your job description. That feeling like you have to take on extra responsibilities or stay late can be a major factor in job dissatisfaction, especially if your paycheck doesn’t match that extra effort you’re putting in.

If this sounds familiar, try to start setting boundaries at work to keep your workload and stress at more manageable levels. Here are some tips to actually enforce stricter boundaries around your job:

• Don’t answer work calls or emails outside of work hours .
• Don’t volunteer for tasks, even if you feel like it’s expected of you.
• Embrace being “good enough” at work. Don’t turn in bad work, but avoid perfectionism or the pressure to exceed expectations. Just get the job done and move on to the next task.
• Wear headphones or turn on your away message to signal to coworkers that you’re in deep work mode and unavailable to assist with other tasks.
• Take lunch and other breaks somewhere where you can’t be interrupted or asked to do any work-related tasks.
• Use your time off, and don’t be reachable while you’re gone.

Make Time Outside of Work for Joy and Purpose

When you have to endure a job you hate, it’s more important than ever to make sure you’re finding ways to enjoy life outside of work. Even if you feel too exhausted to do anything but watch TV, try to incorporate some more rewarding activities into your free time.

Play with your dog. Go for a walk. Sit at a café and draw the people or things you see. Eat dinner in your backyard when it’s nice out. Do volunteer work on weekends. Take a cooking class. Bad jobs can drain your energy and make you feel like your life lacks any joy or meaning. But you can use your free time to inject some of that joy and meaning back into your life.

Vent Your Feelings Regularly

You might feel like complaining about the same bad job day after day is a burden on your loved ones. But being able to just say the things out loud that you maybe had to hold in for the sake of keeping the peace at work can help you decompress.

Tell your friend or partner that you’re not looking for advice or solutions. You just need to complain for a bit to let it out. Make sure you’re offering to be the sympathetic listener when they need to vent, too. You might even turn it into a weekly ritual. Every weekend, go for a hike or head to your favorite bar with your friend and take turns venting whatever you need to vent from the week prior.

State of the Global Workplace: 2022 Report . Gallup; 2022.

Extremera N, Mérida-López S, Quintana-Orts C, Rey L. On the association between job dissatisfaction and employee’s mental health problems: Does emotional regulation ability buffer the link? Personality and Individual Differences. 2020;155:109710. Doi:10.1016/j.paid.2019.109710

By Rachael Green Rachael is a New York-based writer and freelance writer for Verywell Mind, where she leverages her decades of personal experience with and research on mental illness—particularly ADHD and depression—to help readers better understand how their mind works and how to manage their mental health.

When is Eid al-Fitr 2024 and how is it celebrated?

The three-day festival celebrates the completion of the fasting month of Ramadan by Muslims across the world.

As a new moon was not sighted on Monday evening after Maghrib prayers, Muslims in Saudi Arabia and neighbouring countries will fast one more day, completing 30 days of Ramadan. The first day of Eid will then be celebrated on Wednesday, April 10.

The first day of Eid al-Fitr is determined by the sighting of the crescent moon marking the start of the month of Shawwal, the 10th month of the Islamic (Hijri) calendar.

Keep reading

A ramadan no palestinian will ever forget, the cost of a ramadan iftar meal around the world, ramadan 2024: where do your dates come from, in washington, dc: celebrating ramadan, protesting israel’s siege of gaza.

Lunar months last between 29 and 30 days so Muslims usually have to wait until the night before Eid to verify its date.

Other countries follow independent sightings.

When the sighting has been verified, Eid is declared on television, radio stations and at mosques.

How do Muslims celebrate Eid?

Traditionally, Eid is celebrated for three days as an official holiday in Muslim-majority countries. However, the number of holiday days varies by country.

Muslims begin Eid day celebrations by partaking in a prayer service that takes place shortly after dawn, followed by a short sermon.

On their way to the prayer, which is traditionally held in an open area, Muslims recite takbeerat, praising God by saying “Allahu Akbar”, meaning “God is great”.

It is customary to eat something sweet before the prayer, such as date -filled biscuits known as maamoul in the Middle East. This particular festival is known as the “sweet” Eid – and the distribution of sweets is common across the Muslim world.

Muslims usually spend the day visiting relatives and neighbours and accepting sweets as they move around from house to house.

Each country has traditional desserts and sweets that are prepared before Eid or on the morning of the first day.

Children, dressed in new clothes, are offered gifts and money to celebrate the joyous occasion.

Girls and women in many countries decorate their hands with henna. The celebration for Eid begins the night before as women gather in neighbourhoods and large family gatherings for the application of henna.

In some countries, families visit graveyards to offer their respects to departed family members right after the morning prayers.

It is common for Muslim-majority countries to decorate their cities with lights and hold festivities to commemorate the end of the fasting month.

Eid amid the onslaught in Gaza

For some 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza this Eid, this will be the first Muslim religious holiday after more than 33,000 people have been killed in Israeli attacks. With little food aid, and very limited water, Gaza’s Eid al-Fitr will be mired in destruction amid the continuing attacks.

What are common Eid greetings?

The most popular greeting is “Eid Mubarak” (Blessed Eid) or “Eid sa’id” (Happy Eid). Eid greetings also vary depending on the country and language.

The video below shows how people say Eid Mubarak in different languages around the world.