Work can take up so much of our waking hours but how often do we look at our relationship with work. Are you a workaholic or just going through the motions? Does it inspire or drain you? What about the people we work with: colleagues, managers and those unrequited crushes or unwanted attentions? When it comes to work, things can get complicated.

Clare and Aileen delve into the tangled world of work to help you think about your relationship with work and give tips on how to navigate those complex relationships in the workplace.

Dip into some of the things Clare and Aileen chat about in this episode:

01:05 It’s personal to you

02:36 Strategies for being in a job you don’t like

13:19 Life, work, balance

19:31 Navigating relationships at work

22:44 Unwanted attention – how to deal with it

32:38 Work is love made visible

Visit our website: The Sex and Relationships Podcast for more information on the issues discussed in this episode. You can also Ask Clare a question or suggest a topic for future episodes.

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About the Sex and Relationships Podcast

This podcast is for anyone looking for information or help with their sex lives or relationships. In this season your hosts Clare Prendergast and Aileen Gonsalves deep dive into the world of relationships to give you insights, advice and top tips to help guide you through your relationships.

Your hosts

Clare Prendergast is a sex and relationships therapist and draws on her knowledge and years of experience in the therapy room to give you help and guidance.

Aileen Gonsalves is fascinated in human behaviour and drawing on her many years in the theatre has developed the unique Gonsalves Method which helps people be more present and develop authentic connections with those around them.

Clare 0:04

Hello again everybody. Welcome back to the Sex and Relationships podcast. I'm Clare Prendergast. I'm here with my pal.

Aileen 0:11

Aileen Gonsalves. Hi, everybody. Hi, Clare.

Clare 0:14

Hi, Aileen. And today we're going to talk about work. We're going to talk about my relationship with my work and whether or not that relationship is entirely healthy. We're going to be dipping our toe in the waters of workaholism and overworking. We're going to be talking about our relationships in work. So, our relationships with our colleagues and maybe our line managers and the relationships when we find ourselves either receiving unwanted attention at work or experiencing feelings for colleagues that we wish we weren't feeling, but we are. How are we going to manage all of that?

Aileen 0:54

Great. I mean, I'm laughing at that, Clare, because I'm definitely got things to say about, you know, those unrequited love affairs at work.

Clare 1:01

Oh, for goodness sake, Aileen. What are you like? What are you like?

Aileen 1:05

The relationships with people at work can be such different things within a hierarchy. You know, whether or not people who are hanging around you and you can't get rid of them, or, you know, people that you're seeking out. For me, I'll say what I think about work is, you know, I love my work, and I've been really lucky that I've always known exactly what I want to do with work.

Clare 1:25

I guess that's the thing, isn't it? It's a personal thing. Whether your relationship with your work is vocational, the same job for one person is a vocation, for another person is a job. Yeah. And being able to kind of know that about yourself is really helpful, I think. Mine is slightly different to yours. I didn't always know, you know. I dip my toe in lots of different ponds until I fell upon my what I now consider my vocation, which is working in the field of relationships. I mean, I am passionate about relationships. I just see them as the cornerstone of everything we do in our lives. I guess the sort of both the kind of blessing and the curse of a vocation is, it's very hard to switch it off.

Aileen 2:15

Correct.

Clare 2:15

It's rather than I work to live with a vocation, I live to work. And I suppose we don't want to get into a hierarchy here, do we? We don't want to judge. Some work is better than other work. It's what's important is your work is your work. But your relationship with your work is worth thinking about, isn't it?

Aileen 2:36

Well, definitely, because we spend so much time in work, you know, so much of our living time is at work or thinking about work. So, it's really important, I think, to spend a pause, to just connect to how you feel about your work. Do I actually like my job? You know, what do I like about my job? Is it the people I work with, or is it the actual doing of it? Is it creative? Would I like a job that's more creative, or to work with my hands more or be outside more? You know, there's questions like that we get asked at school, but sometimes we don't ask them again.

Clare 3:10

Yeah. I hear many people talk about feeling almost kind of stuck or trapped in their work. It might be because you've been in a particular context for a chunk of time. You've worked through various promotions and you can't replicate your earning if you if you step sideways or go elsewhere. So, there's a sense of, I'm done with this job, I don't want to do this job anymore, but I, I have no choice. I have to stay in this job because I have dependents and bills and mortgages etc, etc. And what to do when we feel stuck.

Aileen 3:48

I mean, because that's the most terrifying feeling, isn't it? And if it's about your work, that's actually very worrying because you don't then know what to do. As you say, it's about dependence. A lot of the time as well. People depend on you, perhaps, or you've got used to a certain way of living, you know, even if you're on your own, and the fear of jumping and taking a risk to do something else can seem really enormous and sometimes impossible, as you say.

Clare 4:13

And I think it's helpful to notice if that is resonating for you, if you are listening and you're thinking, no, that's me. I'm trapped. I'm trapped. We'll talk about this a bit in a bit, but I think, you know, taking the time to look at that mindset, to look at how much what you're thinking about your relationship with work is doing on top of the actual situation of your work. But there's also folk who are just holding down two or three or even four different low paid jobs just to kind of have enough to make ends meet, you know, balancing caring needs with looking after children. And there's another place where you can just feel I am trapped. I mean, I genuinely have no choice. This is my life and this is how it is.

Aileen 4:59

You know, in my profession, my gosh, and in my own life, the statistic is something like 98% of actors are not doing acting. So, what are they doing? They're doing every other job under the sun. You know, we've done everything, and that's a hard place to be as well. If there's something you know you want to be doing, you know, have a sense of a career that you want to be doing, but you can't quite get there yet. And we know, you know, lots of young people particularly are now really struggling. They're going for so many interviews and writing so many application letters but not getting the jobs that they want. And I think there is a lot to be sort of thought about. Maybe we can do that a bit later about this mindset, as you say, because mindset is the thing we can control.

Clare 5:39

Yes, how we're thinking about our situation is potentially transformative. And recognising actually this is, you know, so many hours. This is so many. You know, I don't love it. But for now, this is my best option. So how can I feel differently about it? Because actually looking at my choices, this is the best choice, and I don't want to relate to it as a trap. I want to relate to it as a choice.

Aileen 6:06

I mean, I think that's crucial Clare, what you're saying, to say I choose to do this job is such a different thing. And you can say, I choose to do it. I used to say this when people had auditions. I said, you know, you can take any job. Once you have said yes to that choice, just justify your reasoning. Is it that it's near where you live? Maybe this job is going to get you CV points. Maybe this one means that you and your partner can do the job together. There's so many reasons once you are in a job, because, you know, a lot of people complain in their jobs to each other at work, you know, but that can be very destructive of spiraling you because now you've got a friend who agrees with you. So you spend all day complaining. Whereas actually, if I always say once you're doing something, if you say, I've chosen to be here, that word choice is really empowering, actually, and I think it is choosing about how you can change how you see various elements of it. You know, maybe it's about where your desk is, or maybe you think you can adjust even your small things around you of having your desks in more light or facing a different way, or have this on it or that on it, or have a photo on it, or, you know, just thinking about actually, if I have some really nice lunch every day with that, make a difference.

Aileen 7:25

I don't know if it's a kind of weird metaphor. I was just immediately thinking of marriage, actually, and divorce and relationships, that kind of side of relationships, how we think that we're in this one thing and potentially people get stuck in this one thing. And what a huge move it is to make that change, or just even to see the other possibilities of life that are out there. It's that that's that non binary way of thinking that is incredibly helpful. It's not, as you said the other day, it's not. And and or or.

Clare 7:56

Either or.

Aileen 7:57

Either or.

Clare 7:58

It's both and.

Aileen 8:00

Yes. Not either or, but both and or.

Clare 8:03

I had a client this week say to me and and and I quite like that.

Aileen 8:08

I like.

Clare 8:08

That. Yes. And and.

Aileen 8:10

Yeah. But also because parents are of a generation and grandparents certainly that have been brought up with that mentality of job for life. And sometimes when they're advising their young people now that has a tint of that in everything they're saying. Just because that has been their experience. It is very unsettling for parents because it feels so unstable and insecure to sort of think about, well, try different things you don't know, you know. But I think that has become an increasingly new way of seeing this world. I mean, because also the other thing, of course, now, Clare, is so many people work from home that changes the dynamic of everything, really. And that's only been the last few years that people are simply not seeing other people.

Clare 8:52

Aileen 9:28

Yeah, that's a lovely way of saying that Clare. That's interesting. I think that's right. It is a very personal thing. You know, we can think that we're a teacher or we're a lawyer. We're that label, and that that label comes with it a lot of things, which of course it does. But it's about making these things our own, I suppose. I think tuning into your thing that makes you tick and makes you sort of feel energized and feels like you're doing a purpose, you know, aligning your purpose with work.

Clare 9:58

Yeah. And sometimes it's this is where I am and where I want to be. And we can see way in the distance what we want our working life to be and where I am and where I want to be. There's just this enormous gulf. It looks an impossible task to get from here to there. You know, some jobs take a lot of commitment and a lot of discipline, maybe a lot of loans. But even then, even then, if we find this, this, this job isn't when I imagined this job. The actual doing of it isn't what I imagined. And therefore it's kind of like, okay, so yes, I have invested all these years and I have taken out all these loans, but then how do I move forward? It's like it's not it's there will be a path through and a path into something else. And you know, and I was talking about I tried lots of things and I remember I mean, one of the things was teaching and oh, my God, I mean, I absolutely loved it for one lesson. And it was just catastrophic discovering that I couldn't do seven a day for five days a week, that just didn't suit me. But going in and doing one lesson. So, it's that nuance of being able to kind of go, yeah, actually teaching does have my name on, but not within the system that we have in this country. It was like, no, I just couldn't do it. I just wasn't the right person. But then I've got friends who do it and are fantastic at it.

I'm sorry. It's just saying it's really wonderful to realise with all the different skills and jobs that there are around, you can make your own. Work is a big part of it as well. I've made a huge amount of my own work because, you know, actors are always waiting for the phone to ring is the traditional thing, which is so disempowering. It's sort of beyond description. And in the past, before we had mobiles, we would literally wait at home for the phone to ring and we were terrified of going on holiday, terrified of literally leaving the house in case your agent's gonna phone you. And it was just nuts. And through the years, I've done a huge amount of my own work, but also encouraged anybody I've taught to really think about joining together with your mates and making your own work, because that's a joyous thing to do. When you realise people who are self-employed, there's a great scariness and a fear and a risk involved in that, but also a great liberation of freedom and of creative things get unleashed where you go, actually, what have I always wanted to do? You know, there was an amazing woman. I was the head of the MA in Acting. So, the MA in Acting for four years. And so we had, mature students joining us in the mix. And in my very first year there was a lady and she just says, I was quite a leading sort of eye specialist in this country, and I was going to work one day and I suddenly thought, you know, is this what I want to do with my time? And she said, I turned around, went home and started applying for drama schools. And she was 61.

So nowadays we'd call that early retirement, wouldn't we?

It was extraordinary.

Like, she took early retirement and went and took herself back to school.

I wonder if it's worth speaking about. You talked about this earlier. The work life balance. You know, the risk of work becoming everything. And there's many different reasons why this can happen. It can be sort of, you probably heard the expression imposter syndrome. Do you know folk who really just believe it's only a question of time till everyone discovers they shouldn't be doing what they're doing because they're imposters. And, you know, and there's a lot of there's a lot out there on on that. And we may talk about it more, but it's but if that's sort of in your mix, then you might be working really, really hard because you're so terrified of being rumbled as not being. But then there's also, work being a way of avoiding the other areas of your life. You know, if you're not happy in your intimate relationship or you're having difficulties with your teenage children or your aging parents, it's kind of like, I don't want to look at that. So, I'm going to just work, work, work, work, work, work, work. And it's setting you up for challenges, really. I mean, it doesn't work to only work.

Exactly. I have to say that is you're describing me in a nutshell.

Oh, really? That wasn't my intention.

Because I know. Absolutely. I mean, I used to I mean, problem with me is because I love what I do. I then think that's okay. I always think workaholic is someone who's doing it and doesn't like it somehow, but no. It's that distraction was why I was doing it. You know, when my marriage was, I was having difficulties in my marriage. Definitely. Absolutely. Throwing myself into work. You know, it's so easy to just put all of your attention in one place. That's a place where you are, actually, it's where I feel at my most organised, my most successful, my most in control. You know, I just don't feel a mess at all at work. I know what I'm doing. You know, I just and I, and I have people around me, and we all get on and, you know, it just sort of functions. It can take up every second of your day.

Or even more than. I mean, I think that's when it's, you know, it's problematic is, is it's eating into my sleeping time. It's eating into my eating time. It's it's not just my relationships that are compromised. But I wonder if you have come across the expression a of functioning alcoholic? There are plenty of folk who are holding down, you know, significant jobs and looking fine. And we call them functioning alcoholics. And you sound like you're describing yourself as a functioning workaholic, but there's something listening to you, Aileen, about your recognition that that actually wasn't okay, that there was something you were missing because of choosing to immerse yourself so however wholehearted it was, so entirely other areas of your life were being dropped out on, and areas that folk can miss. It can be your health. It can be your friendships. It can be your family. It can be your body. It can be your fitness. I mean, just so many areas just get neglected when we exclusively, exclusively work. So, if you're listening and that is you, I think it is worth kind of just thinking, oh, what am I avoiding? What you know and the temptation. But I love it, I love it. It's not a problem. Stop pathologising my relationship with work. It's. But is it? I think that's all we're inviting you to do is just ask yourself. Is it okay that I work this hard?

I mean, for me, I could skip meals extremely easily because it was too boring to eat because work was much more interesting, or I had to get that thing done. You know, definitely phone calls to people, family gone, you know, relationship disappearing just because it was this intense thing. And the problem is, is you get a bit of approval as well for work. Somebody somewhere is saying that it's good that you're working. They go, gosh, you work so hard. It's seen as actually positive. You know.

I know it culturally it's totally applauded.

Yes. Yeah. And health is the really big thing that goes out the window for me. I know that I've stopped doing exercise, you know. Definitely. That's disappeared. So for me, it's a diagnostic. When I start, when I do pause, which is sometimes really quite rarely, but I actually pause and go, actually, what was my intention today was to go for a walk that hasn't happened, was to have a rest, that hasn't happened was to eat some nice lunch. Not none of those things have happened in the day. And then you think, ah, okay, wait a minute, possibly I'm doing too much.

You know that expression you mentioned earlier? Work life balance. And I kind of, I didn't quite roll my eyes, but I was just like, oh, and I've been sitting with it since you said it and thinking, why did I have such a hostile reaction? And, and I think it's because I've not noticed before that the most important word for me in those three words is balance. And I tend to I've thought about it in terms of work, and I've thought about it in terms of life, but actually, is there balance? Am I balanced? And, you know, I could just practice that by just standing on one foot and literally physically testing how is my balance today? And it's often really poor. And if I'm out of kilter in my relationship with my work, it will affect literally my physical balance. But it's also all the other. The sort of ecosystem of my wellbeing will be out of kilter, off balance if I'm exclusively pouring myself into work.

It's interesting, as someone once said to me, which I love, they said it the other day and I remember thinking and I said it back to them. I said, actually, why are we not saying life work balance? It's very interesting. As soon as you change that round, because actually it's ridiculous that we should put work first in that sentence.

But that is our capitalist culture. We just work is venerated.

And it's quite fun though, to actually every time you reference that phrase to go, how is your life work balance?

We've said it's useful to think about what is my relationship with my work, but what about the relationships that we rub up against in work.

I mean, those dynamics are really where so much can go, right and so much can go wrong.

Isn't it, isn't it because we've talked, haven't we? We've talked about families and we're going to talk more about families and how those are is a group of people that we didn't kind of choose, we just were born into. Well, the workplace is that with bells on, isn't it? You say yes to a job; you go into a context and suddenly you're required to work with all these people that you absolutely have not chosen.

You know, you can find people that you fall in love with at work. You can have the best experiences, friends for life, and you can have the worst experiences the way you dread going in, in the same job. The relationships at work is again. How you manage them is in your control and really important to be mindful and be aware of what's happening there. Because otherwise, you know, you can think, oh, I can keep my head down. I've done so many jobs where I think I'll just stop speaking.

Yeah. And it's like we've been talking a lot about sort of from myself going out. But what about in the workplace the stuff that comes from the workplace towards us that isn't always desired is unsolicited and is sometimes really problematic. I mean, particularly if it's coming from someone who has more power than us or more authority than us. It's like, what do we do?

Yeah. I mean, I'm sort of I think I'm a sort of what would you say self-announced a people pleaser, you know? So, what then becomes tricky is I will tend to feel I have to look after people. So, I tend to get a lot of people attaching themselves to me who, yeah, I don't necessarily want to spend time with or be friends with, but I feel that I should look after them. When I start saying should, then I know I'm in trouble, that I should pay some attention to. I should actually have lunch with that person. I feel like, you know, and what's the balance between being kind but also looking after your own self needs? You know, I find that very tricky in workplaces because I sense it so strongly that I think I must take care of them in some way.

So, I think picking up your word from earlier that you used the word choice, and that as a self-confessed people pleaser, what I'm hearing is you do that in a kind of automatic way. That person looks lonely, you know, and you go in as a rescuer and you scoop them up, and then you find yourself in a relationship that you really don't want to be in. And you can see it comes from the people pleasing. I think the fix, for want of a better word, but or the strategy for that is, is your pause technique. Feeling the compulsion to kind of go in and say, do you want to have lunch together? And just taking a breath and going, hang on a minute, Aileen, do you wanna have lunch with lonely Leslie? Or actually, do you want to go and have lunch by yourself, or do you want to go and have lunch with a friend? You know? What do you want, Aileen? And then it can be. Actually, today I want to be kind. I want to reach out. And I want to, you know, invite lonely Leslie for lunch.

It's that bringing your conscious attention and making a choice. But I'm thinking about the ones who come after Aileen. The ones who go, "oh, quite fancy, Aileen". "Oh, I think I might just....", you know, I mean, nowadays we call it assaults, but I mean, back in the day, people didn't think much about pinching bottoms or just saying, you know, lewd comments. I mean, fortunately, that is mostly out of the workplace. I mean, I'm not saying it never happens. Obviously there still is. But that unwanted attention, someone letting you know that they think you're a bit of all right. And, um, it is not okay with you. And I'm giving extreme examples. It can be done much more subtly. It can be done with a slightly too long eye contact, you know, just keep coming up towards your desk, maybe standing a bit closer to your chair, maybe just hovering. It's like you're giving me the ick, but you're more important than me. Or you're in this context you're more powerful than me. How do I just go, "oh, just need to go and sort out that or......".

Yeah, very tricky all that, you know it is. How do you manage people's egos and those people in the hierarchy, you know, that there's a sense of, ah, I better not annoy this person or call them out or actually, what have they actually done? Nothing. But as you say, it's just I do feel uncomfortable. I mean, I don't know, I kind of I'm not the best person to talk to about that. I really, really struggle. I would love your advice on that. You know, it's a very tricky thing of how do you take someone aside? Do you, you know, do you always just be with somebody else? The only thing I have learnt to do is not do nothing.

Um.

Not do nothing. That's the only thing I've learned to not do.

I love that So, you know, step one of not doing nothing is noticing. I've got the ick. Noticing I feel uncomfortable noticing this isn't okay for me. You've identified as a pleaser. I have pleasing propensities as well. It's really easy to shut it down to not actually notice I'm struggling with this. It's just push it down. Just ignore it. Just ignore it. Just ignore. It's like, no, don't ignore it. Listen, take yourself seriously and then you might want to, you know, talk to somebody. Do you know it might be you know, I drop you a text "Aileen have you got time for a chat? And can I run this thing by you that happened at work today? I'm not sure. I'm feeling a bit odd", but, you know, and in the chatting with you or another friend, be able to kind of see whether this unwanted attention is problematic. There's nothing more useful than airing a concern. It's like when I don't take it seriously, the concern just gets repressed. And then I start, you know, maybe I start getting headaches or I start not wanting to go to work. But if I just take it seriously, air it, and then there'll be, you know, once the trusted friend because you don't want you don't want to get someone who's just going to get into collusion with you and you're just going to sit and go, oh, what a bastard.

You matter better than that. And then I think, what to do then? It depends on your context. You know, if you're in a big organisation, you know, with an HR department and whatever, you might want to take it through official channels. If you're in a small organisation like you, you know, a small kind of set up theatre company where maybe there's just a half a dozen of you or ten of you, it's, you know, what is our culture within the small group is like, is this something we could talk about as a community? Or is this something that I need to just speak to one other person within the company? You know, so there isn't a one size fits all. But sometimes I found when I've talked it through, I haven't always needed to take any action for myself. You know, this is I've taken it seriously. And actually, the action I'm taking is this person walks in the room, I leave the room. But, you know, sometimes there'll be somebody that you actually have to sit next to in five meetings a day and then you, you maybe you do need to go and speak to HR.

I mean, I'm wondering something. Clare is making me giggle as I was listening to you because I was just thinking. My problem is that I'm the one who is hopefully not the stalker, but what I often have unrequited feelings for people I've worked with. You know, unrequited love. You've gone into this job, and then suddenly I fancy the person over there and they don't fancy me. And that can be a really nightmarish situation. Actually, I don't know if you've ever experienced that. You don't know what to do. Do you say anything? Do you go for a drink? Or I've made an advance with someone, and it's been rejected, but now I've got to go back into work the next day.

Gosh, that is a yeah. I mean, it's almost like a textbook don't isn't it? It's like, don't mix work and pleasure.

You try you try do. Romeo and Juliet when they decide to fall for each other and then break up halfway through rehearsals.

But it's like we have this parallel universe of online meeting, and then we have this. If you are a person who works in a workplace and you go in, I mean, that is the place where you meet people and it's almost inevitable there is going to be attractions, there is going to be the possibility of falling in love and the possibility of it being mutual.

And yes, of course.

But I guess it's just looping us back all the time to the only person I can do anything about is me. How am I going to keep myself safe and well? And yes, am I going to speak up? Like you've said, there's times when you have let the person know and it's not been mutual. And like, ah, this is really awkward. And it is super awkward.

Yes. And to name that actually I've found is great that actually at some point you have to go, oh my God, this is now really hard. I don't know. And to be able to say that out loud with the person and sort of work that through was helpful. I remember that. Yeah. Because they were very kind, you know. But I think that's the thing is that balance, again, a friend outside of that environment is incredibly helpful to support you. Yeah.

Because it's a tricky one, isn't it? If you don't share. I'm feeling something here, you know. Are you are you interested? Would you like to explore? Because of the textbook - don't. And they are feeling something. And then they're also doing the textbook - don't. Then I mean, it is a missed opportunity, isn't it? If you are both single and you, you know, there is the possibility of something. So, you know, I would discourage being totally risk averse. But there is value in being self-protective. It's different to being so defended that you never actually have any possibility of of starting something new. But you do want to look after yourself if you are going to take a risk like that before you do it, just check, you know, is this am I am I up for this? Have I got the resource to cope with the possibility this isn't mutual.

Exactly. Yeah. That's the.....

And what's my plan if if I get pushed back because it's it's. Ouch. But culturally we just kind of pretend it's. Ha ha ha ha. Yeah. You know, we don't we don't honour it as the really hard thing it is putting it out there that you like someone.

I mean, it is these kind of awkward situations that can come up with things like promotions and friends getting jobs over you. Oh my God. That kind of thing. I've experienced all of that. You know, that can be really hard.

Really, really hard. And within that, the sort of discoveries of people knowing they had the promotion before they told you were sitting with the not knowing. And it's like I thought you were my friend why didn't you tell me? And it's kind of like, because I was told not to. And it's like, but where's your loyalty to me? You're more loyal to this new employer than you are to me. You say you're bad at boundaries. I've also put my hand up to that. Sometimes the rules of the workplace are different to the rules of my personal life, which are different to the different rules within my family life. We've talked about that, haven't we? That within a family there's multiple different rules. So, in the workplace there is something about not being suspicious of workplace relationships, but being real about the fact that that loyalties here are not exclusively to each other.

Yes.

There are also loyalties to the employer, to the line manager, to the fact that this pays for my rent and my bills and my shopping.

Exactly. That's so you should say that, because it kind of ties me back to what we were saying at the beginning. If you're not liking your job, that's another great thing to think about, which is it pays for what does this job contribute to the rest of your life? And actually, that's a really good way of saying to yourself, actually, yes, it's money that pays for me to go on holiday. Me to go and do table tennis once a week. Me to learn this new thing that I want to learn. You know, it's worth remembering because sometimes we forget that work is the thing that contributes to our lives. If we really hate work, we come home and we're equally unhappy there because we're expecting now home to fulfil everything that we're not getting at work. It's very unfair. So, it's worth addressing or pausing to think about work because it's affecting everything.

I'm wondering if we need to wrap up. We've been chatting for ages.

Yeah. No, it's been really fascinating.

Do you have anything else that you were wanting to mention before we finish today?

Well, there's only one thing just keeps going round in my head like an earworm. I don't know if you know the Rumi poem about work. The one line I keep thinking of is "work is love made visible". I always think that's such an interesting thought, you know, because, you know, especially when we don't like our work or, you know, the different relationship with work, it's definitely not nothing because sometimes we separate work and love. We separate a lot of things. You know, we separate our life into these little boxes. This is our work box. This is our life box as well. And actually, it does all feed each other.

Oh, I love that you've brought Rumi into the into the end of our chat about work. Wonderful. But yes, it's time to end for today. And if you've enjoyed listening to us or you'd like to see more about this subject, please, please do go and look at our website. The Sex and Relationships Podcast.com. You'll find there. We've got blogs about every episode that's in the podcast. If sometimes you prefer just to read something rather than listen. And we also have an Ask Clare button. And it isn't just Ask Clare, it's me and whoever's I'm chatting to that week, but, we'd really love to hear from you and to hear if there are particular areas around sex and relationships that you'd like us to talk about. We do want to be in relationship with you, our listeners, as well as with our subjects and each other. So, it's goodbye from me. Thanks, everyone. Bye.

Bye. Thanks, everyone.