Support group to cope with hustle culture

A support group to cope with the burnout of hustle culture will be formed in Bengaluru on Sunday. Hustle culture is a state of prioritising work above everything else.

The group will be formed after a 90-minute discussion on the topic ‘Exploring the impact of hustle culture’. It will be facilitated by psychological counsellor Sahiti Gavarikar.

She says hustle culture covers freelancers, gig workers, people who do a job and business side by side, employees who work beyond office hours, and even those who work aggressively and are constantly available. It has always been criticised for valuing productivity and material success all the time and the pandemic only exposed these gaps.

A lot of youngsters got their first job during the pandemic and they did not know how to set boundaries for a personal and professional time while working remotely. “It would slowly get to a point where they felt anxiety and emotional distress. They were not having time to look after their physical and mental health,” explains Sahiti.

“The idea that they were not succeeding despite working long hours led them to be consistently available for work. This played havoc in their personal relationships,” she adds.

Bengaluru’s cut-throat startup culture is also part of the problem. “It believes that if you’re passionate about something, you should give it all your time and energy without taking breaks,” she says.

Young people are being increasingly thrown into a work culture that traps them in the cycle of high efforts and low rewards. “They are underpaid, given bare minimum insurance coverage and have low mental health support resources. But the expectations for them to not only sustain but thrive in such a culture are high,” she notes.

This burnout is also propagated by social media. “Influencers talk about hustling but a lot of them come from places of privilege and don’t necessarily have to work in harsh working conditions. They end up glamorising such a culture.”

The Sunday session “will acknowledge people who cannot leave their current work situation or make drastic changes”. She says, “How they can cope with hustle culture and how one can hack their way through capitalism are some topics we will discuss.”

*On October 30, 4 pm to 6.30 pm, at Bangalore Creative Circus, Yeshwantpur. For details, message The Restory Project on Instagram.