In a sequence of events that she will certainly not regret, 26-year-old Noor Alamudin has the night off and is now spending the entire evening deciding whether she should do work or take the opportunity to relax, thus negating the joys of a free evening altogether.
“I haven’t had a free night to myself in weeks, so I should definitely make the most of it,” she told reporters gathered at the scene. “I just haven’t been able to decide whether ‘making the most of it’ means taking this time to finish some personal work or taking this time to relax, so I’ve settled on this in-between stage where I am wholly unfulfilled.”
Sources confirm Noor has refused to get up from the desk in her bedroom until she’s made a decision about how to spend her night. This tactic backfired, as she has now spent the entire night at her desk.
“If I work, I could be really productive, but everyone knows you have to give your body time to recuperate after a long day,” she continued, writing down the pros and cons of each option as her precious free night ticked away. “I’ll definitely feel guilty about relaxing if I choose to relax, though, so I won’t be able to relax at all.”
Noor has been pondering her options for hours now, but by not making a choice, she has instead chosen to exist in a fugue state where she is at once stressed about not doing work and not relaxed at all.
According to doctors, this is a common phenomenon in young professionals.
“New members of the workforce are not used to being able to leave their work at the office because their office is their bedroom,” said psychology researcher Tyra Manzetti. “At the same time, they have all these side-hustle aspirations, but also believe that work culture is toxic. All of these ideas basically cause their brains to short-circuit, so they spend any free time feeling guilty for having free time and any work time feeling angry that they’re not engaging in enough self-care.”
When reporters relayed this idea to Noor, she said, “Oh,” and appeared to dissociate for 10 minutes.
As of press time, Noor had decided it was probably too late to get any meaningful work done anyways, so she should spend the remainder of her night relaxing, then turn in early. The remainder of her night, however, was extremely short, so she decided it would be best to watch Love Island until 3am, thus negating the opportunity to go to bed early in the first place.
