here* is a weekly newsletter for the burnt out and languishing. Each issue looks at the changing landscape of work, tech and life, and how to make it all just a little more bearable.

Let’s get into it.

this week:

• 📰 Happenings: Companies are getting work-life balance all wrong, Gen Zers are hiring party coaches, and bathroom camping is now a thing

• 🧘 Wellness hacks: Hobbies, campfires, and cortisol hacks for your morning routine

• 🧠 Good jobs: Our friends at ActBlue, Personified, and Crisis Text Line are hiring. 10/10 recommend.

• 🫶 Things I’m loving: Changing relationship norms, getting offline, and season 4 of The Bear.

• 💯 The main bit: A closer look at the shift toward a less work-centric life — and what it means for businesses and people.

Work, tech, and life are ever-evolving (it’s exhausting). here* is the latest.

• 🙅 Some companies are doubling down on long hours and no boundaries at work — and I hate it.

• 🎉 Gen Zers are now hiring party coaches to curb social anxieties. That’s one strategy, I guess.

• 🚽 Young people are also heading to the bathroom for emotional reprieve. Learn more about the self-prescribed therapy turned TikTok trend, bathroom camping.

There are only 24 hours in the day. here* are your weekly wellness shortcuts.

• ☀️ Revamp your morning routine with these simple cortisol hacks.

• 🔥 It’s summer bb, make a campfire and transform your mental state.

• 🧶 You’re not stressed, you just need a hobby. Try this happiness hack hailing all the way from Denmark.

I scour the job boards so you don’t have to. here* is a list of jobs that are actually good for the brain.

• Autonomy + flexibility: Our friends at ActBlue are hiring multiple roles, fully remote.

• Community + belonging: Can confirm that the people at Personified are some of the best humans in the business. Check out their open roles if you are looking for a strong community and sense of belonging in your next gig.

• Values aligned: If you value mental health support for young people, Crisis Text Line is hiring and with recent budget cuts to 988, now is the time to support such an incredible cause.

Have a job or org you want added to the next issue, reply to this email!

The things I’m loving and likely won’t shut up about.

• 🫂 I talk a lot about how we prioritize relationships in modern life, especially platonic ones. A new(ish) movement, relationship anarchy, is rejecting relational hierarchies and emphasizing all authentic connections rather than just the romantic ones.

• 📱 More people across the world are finding ways to get off their phones, including this aspirational movement in Europe, The Offline Club. Their work is so good and partly responsible for our launch of Unplug in Indy.

• 🐻 Season 4 of The Bear which I binged in a weekend. I hate when it’s over. I’m not ok.

Gimme that soft life.

For years, work functioned as a primary source of structure, identity, and value. It was an organizing principle of adult life. That relationship is beginning to change.

The shift has been gradual. Fewer promotions. Fewer bios tied to job titles. More people stepping away from roles they once worked hard to secure. The pattern is growing. People are hating when life and work feel unreasonable to maintain, and reassessing what work means to them in life.

Micro-retirement is one version of that reassessment, an intentional pause from full-time work, often lasting weeks or even months. Some use the time to recover. Others use it to recalibrate. There is no formal structure. No institutional permission. And no guaranteed outcome. These pauses are a strategy to prioritize life over work in the near term rather than waiting for what feels like an increasingly out of reach retirement plan at 65.

Young people are “soft living” too, showing a conscious move toward ease, rest, and good vibes rather than relentless achievement. For many of us, we aim to build a life that feels tolerable, without every hour optimized. Sometimes that looks like working less. Sometimes it looks like saying no to a promotion or advancement. Sometimes it means doing the job well and letting that be enough. 

There is a TikTok trend where people are posting non-work related content with the text I almost forgot this is the whole point. The videos are simple. A walk. A quiet breakfast with a friend. A moment of stillness. These are not aspirational. They are not extraordinary. They are reminders that life has dimensions beyond corporate output.

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Most businesses have not adapted to this shift in priorities. Performance expectations remain unchanged. Narrative norms at work still emphasize upward momentum, a climbing of the proverbial corporate ladder. The infrastructure of work has not quite caught up to the reality of how people are living.

For people managing teams or shaping workplace policy, here are a few ways to respond with intention:

• Create nonlinear career paths that give people options to grow without climbing the ladder

• Build in structured flexibility through formal leave programs like sabbatticals

• Replace vague language around "balance" with clear expectations and boundaries

• Treat breaks as a mandate, not an optional perk

• Focus on clarity and consistency: in role definitions, feedback, goals, and communication rhythms

And if you’re trying to evaluate what role work should play in your life, just know that clarity takes time (I’m on year 5 and still figuring it out). Here are a few places to start:

• Track how often you think about work outside of work

• Notice what types of tasks give you energy versus drain it

• Take note of how your body responds on Sunday evening

• Write down your actual needs from a job this year—not the ones you were trained to want

• Pay attention to when you feel most present, and whether those moments happen on or off the corporate clock

That’s all for this week.

I’ll be back in your inbox next week. Until then, I’d love to hear from you. Let me know what content you liked or what you’d like to see more of in the next issue. You can always reply to this email for a response from me!

<3 from Santa Monica, CA!

Meg