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The Only Black Guy in the Office
Why I Stopped Feeling Guilty About Taking Time Off
I traded my ‘no days off’ mentality for PTO and peace of mind
Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.
Being a Black man in corporate America has taught me many things — from the value of privacy to how to dodge lunch break guilt — but one of the most potent lessons was just how dangerous it is to convince yourself that you’re invincible.
Every now and then, my mind floats back to my last marketing gig, when I’d regularly put up a front. I’d rip and run from the crack of dawn ’til sundown, juggling projects like it was nothing. Then I’d do it again the next day. And the next. It didn’t matter whether I was as tired as a cliché. “No Days Off” was the mantra I lived by — not necessarily because I wanted to, but because I thought I had to.
To this day, I’m not sure why I was so hung up on being a Black superman, the guy who could “handle it,” the team player who would never inconvenience his co-workers by actually taking advantage of the company’s generous paid-time-off policy. Foolish, I know. As I sit here on my fifth day off since the start of the summer, bare feet kicked up on the couch next…
