How I Spent My Time Productively Even After Office Hours

I have been working in the government for more than 10 years and perhaps a few years more, I will be retiring already. Being in public service offers a lot of privileges and the compensation package is somehow competitive. The greatest advantage of being in government is the security of tenure. Meaning, once you entered the services, you can be assured that you will have a job until you reach the retirement age.

My Daily Routine

I am a morning person. I would wake up as early as 4:30 in the morning. I love to watch the sun as it slowly peep in the horizon. I love growing flowers and I spend my morning in the garden while having my morning coffee. The view of the nature mesmerized me every time.

I don’t usually take heavy breakfast because I can have my snacks while at the office. A bread or cookies would be fine. Most of the time, I am ready for work before the clock hits 7 o’clock in the morning.

Our office is only a 15-minute drive from our house. We are renting the house we are currently staying at because our home place is located in another city which would take us more than an hour of travel. Having a house nearby would mean less gas expense and we can save on time as well.

I am particular with time and as much as possible I don’t want to be late when going to work or in any gathering or appointment.

Nature of My Work

I am assigned in the finance unit with work mostly related to money. Our office is not a collecting agency so we don’t collect payment from clients. The main source of our funds is from the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).  Apart from performing admin task, I am also handling various programs so from time to time, I need to visit other local government units especially if there are invitations to discuss topics under the program I am handling. One of the tasks given to us by the president is to provide technical assistance to the local government units.

Combining technical and admin tasks is somehow complicated. But I don’t regret being given the tasks because I am learning new things every time. The challenges would always form part of every duty. When you love your job, you are willing take the risks associated with it.

My Life After Work Hours

I am an introvert type. I don’t really hang out with groups. I prefer to be alone most of the time or just with a few friends. But I am a busy buddy and here are what I spend my time with when I am not at work.

Visiting Places

I love driving and whenever I have a free time, I would drive around the city or other places in our province. Driving is one of my stress relievers. With music playing and good view, it makes my day complete.

The last place I visited was a resort on top of the mountain. It was not as exciting as I expected it to be, but rather a nerve-racking experience. My colleague and I agreed to go on a swimming after we rendered an overtime in our office. Another officemate suggested that we go to this resort because it is just a few minute-drive from the city.

As we came closer to the place, the road gets narrower. We asked the people that we met along the road if we can bring the vehicle to the resort and they answered us that there is a plenty of space on the resort. The last part made me really nervous…the road is too narrow and only one vehicle could fit. There are two concrete path on each side of the road that is just enough for the left and right wheels of the vehicle. Both sides of the road are steep and even we wanted to turn back, we just couldn’t do it. One wrong move and we will tumble down the mountain. I decided to continue until we reached our destination on the top of the mountain.

Though the place is good, I just couldn’t enjoy the moment because it made me too nervous. We decided to go home and had a milk tea.

But that kind of experience rarely happens. So I won’t consider it as a hindrance for my future travels. I am still planning to visit as many places as I could. There are a lot of beautiful tourist spots around my place that I have yet to reach. Since the weather is good, I could probably allot my weekend during this month for road trips.

Gardening

Despite my busy work schedule, I can still devote some of my time working on my garden. I planted flowering plants in my garden such as yellow bells, bush clock vine, blue ternate, white sky vine, and other plants such as strawberry and lettuce.

Gardening is a stress reliever and I love the feeling of being close to nature. Something I want to do more often when I retire.

Writing

Even if I speak on various occasion I am a typical silent type person. I don’t easily give my opinions on any issue or topic without making a research or knowing the whole truth. But I love writing. This is one of the things that releases me from work-related stress.

I used to write on my own blog and other websites. I once wrote for Hub Pages, Bitlanders, Experts Column, and many other sites. I also write for other blogs as guest blogger.

Working Online

I started working online since 2011. Though I never considered it as my full time job but I do enjoy the experience and the things I learned and those I have yet to learn. I used to work as an auditor and later on as a mediator in Humanatic. I also worked in Spare5 and other sites offering micro tasks. I am still writing in various forums such as Forum Coin and myLot.

Being an online worker provides a higher level of happiness. So as long as I can do it, I will always set aside a time for my online work.

Cryptocurrency

I discovered cryptocurrency in 2013. It was a great experience. It’s easy to collect and save satoshis.  It was only last year when I discovered Bitcoin Cash through noise.cash and read.cash. Though I can’t allot more time with read.cash during that time, I was active with noise.cash. It was just recently that I decided to become more active with read.cash and I find the site pretty enjoying and worth the time and effort.

On the final thought…

Though we may be busy with our day job, having something to spend our time with after office hours can help us in one way or another. It can help us divert our thoughts away from the stressful work and we can also get an extra income for some tasks. For me spending time with other sites is better than reading and viewing toxic posts in Facebook.

Disclaimer:

The content of this post is based on my personal opinion and does not in any way represent the organization I am currently connected with. Moreover, I am not a financial expert and the information I am sharing with you is the product of my own research and ideas.