by Oli Anderson, Transformational Coach for Realness
Workaholics are Often Using Work as a Substitute for What They’re Really Seeking
There’s a belief that’s deeply rooted in the modern human experience that rarely gets questioned and it goes like this:
“Work is the main source of meaning in our lives“.
You see this belief absolutely everywhere:
People introducing themselves by their job title as if it’s their core essence, endless conversations orbiting around productivity, promotions, and performance, and weekends treated as recovery zones rather than actual life itself – beneath all of this is the sense that no matter how much gets done, there’s always ‘more’ waiting and soon as we’re ready to pick up again.
For some, this goes beyond ambition or diligence and becomes workaholism (an addiction to work and being a human doing instead of a human being).
If you’re reading this, then there’s a chance you’ve started to feel it yourself (which is why you landed on this page about being a workaholic) and so you have at least a subtle suspicion that work is taking up too much space in your life – not just in your schedule, but in your mind, your identity, your emotional world.
This isn’t an article about demonising work, though – work is a good thing and can be creative, purposeful, and deeply satisfying but when a good thing becomes an ultimate thing then we start to experience distortion that pulls us away from what’s REAL.
This article is about returning to your REALNESS so you can have a healthier relationship with whatever it is that you’re doing and live a life where you’re only ‘ultimate’ is your life itself.
Let’s dig a little deeper:
Table of Contents
- Workaholics are Often Using Work as a Substitute for What They’re Really Seeking
- When Work Becomes Who You Are
- The Hidden Engine: Addiction
- Workaholism as Emotional Avoidance
- The Symptoms of Being a Workaholic People Rarely Talk About
- The Way Back Home: Realness Over Role
- Some More Practical Ways to Break the Workaholic Addiction
- Workaholic to REALNESS – The Real Shift
- The Final Word: The Workaholic & Realness
When Work Becomes Who You Are
At first, working all the time feels productive and even empowering – you put in more time, think more deeply, and care more than others.
Your have higher standards, increased output, more recognition, and endless progress but – if you’re not careful – this can just lead to a shift that consumes you over time:
Work stops being something you DO …and becomes something you ARE.
In other words, you reach the state of being a workaholic which means that your identity fuses with your output and that your sense of self-worth starts rising and falling with outcomes.
Eventually, you begin to orient your whole life around work:
- Your time is dominated by it.
- Your energy is consumed by it.
- Your thoughts are focused on it more than anything else.
Over time, you find that even when you’re not working, you’re still working in the form of mentally rehearsing, planning, problem-solving, and living in anticipation and dread.
Ironically, because this level of focus often produces results, it gets reinforced and so you keep it up even though it’s taking you away from actual presence in yourself and your life.
The main cost of living like this is that other areas of life start slipping out of balance:
- Relationships become secondary.
- Family time becomes fragmented.
- Social life shrinks.
- Rest feels undeserved and so you start to burn out.
- Etc. etc. etc.
Slowly and almost imperceptibly your world narrows because everything is being filtered in comparison to the ultimate God in your life called “Work”.
This is where anxiety creeps in, burnout follows, and you start to question yourself and your life (despite things often looking good on the surface):
“Why does this still not feel like ‘enough‘?“
The Hidden Engine: Addiction
To understand what’s really going on with all this ‘stuff’, we need to zoom out because workaholism isn’t actually about work – it’s about addiction.
This may be surprising to some people to read because when people hear “addiction”, they often think of substances like alcohol, drugs, and nicotine or whatever but the truth is much broader than this which can be quite uncomfortable.
Here it is:
Human beings can get addicted to ANYTHING.
This isn’t just because of whatever the ‘thing’ is in itself but because of what the function it provides at the level of internal experience because – at its core – addiction isn’t primarily chemical but psychological and emotional.
It follows a pattern that’s common to nearly all of us to some degree or another which is that at some point, usually early in life, a person picks up shame, guilt, or unresolved emotional pain.
Shame is the big one for most people and probably the most common problem in the world (in my opinion).
When people internalised shame then it creates an inner split and so – instead of accepting themselves as they are – they begin to judge parts of themselves and then attempt to reject them.
In doing so, they disconnect from their own wholeness and become a fragmented version of themselves.
What these means in practical terms is that – in order to function in the world – they build a mask which is a version of themselves that feels more acceptable, more in control, more “good enough”.
This is what we call the ego.
Unfortunately (depending on how you look at it), the ‘parts’ they’ve rejected don’t just disappear – instead, they get pushed into the shadow self where they remain unchanged but exiled and hidden from view.
This creates a sense of inner restlessness and TENSION that caused from from the ego trying to maintain control and identity and the shadow holding everything that’s been denied
This tension doesn’t go away because we ignore it – in fact, it continues to build and because it’s uncomfortable, the person looks for ways to relieve it.
This is where addiction enters because addiction provides two things:
- Temporary release from inner tension.
- Distraction from real feelings.
Work provides both of these things too – especially in achievement-driven cultures – which is why it’s one of the most socially acceptable addictions there is.
Workaholism as Emotional Avoidance
Through this lens, a workaholic isn’t just “driven” or “disciplined” (though it will certainly look like they are) – they’re someone using work to try and SOOTHE something deeper.
They might not realise it (because a lot of this ‘stuff’ is unconscious) but they’re using work as a kind of tool to:
- Escape uncomfortable feelings.
- Compensate for a sense of not being ‘enough’.
- Maintain a controlled identity.
- Avoid facing what’s unresolved in themselves.
It’s not random that many workaholics are successful – in fact, their success often depends on the very mechanism that’s keeping them stuck because work gives them structure, validation, and a measurable sense of worth (based on how they achieve certain work-related targets etc.).
What can lead to more difficulties is that it also quietly reinforces the underlying problem because instead of resolving the original disconnection (the shame), it builds a life around avoiding it.
This is why the feeling of “not enough” never fully goes away – no matter how much is achieved, there’s always another goal, another milestone, or another level.
It literally never ends because the thing work is being used to replace – a connection to truth and wholeness again – can’t actually be replaced.
The Symptoms of Being a Workaholic People Rarely Talk About
When work becomes an addiction, the effects show up everywhere – not just in your calendar, but in your nervous system, your relationships, your sense of self.
You might notice:
- Constant mental occupation with work: Even at ‘rest’, your mind is running scenarios, solving problems, and planning next steps.
- Anxiety tied to performance: Your emotional state fluctuates based on outcomes and productivity because you’re not rooted in your core.
- Burnout: Too much “doing” (yang energy) and not enough receiving or being (yin energy) leads to becoming overly stressed and burning out.
- Neglected relationships: People close to you feel secondary, even if you don’t intend it, and over time this affects the quality of your relationships.
- Secondary addictions: Substances or habits used to cope with the stress work creates can cause even more problems in your life and cause you to create new addictions.
- Restlessness: A persistent feeling that something is missing, even when things are going well (because you’re living in the Void).
- Misalignment with values: Living in a way that looks successful but doesn’t feel true can lead to you feeling inauthentic and that you’re going through the motions instead of actually living your life.
- Externalised self-worth: Needing results to feel okay about yourself instead of just feeling good for being yourself and then building on that foundation.
- Sympathetic dominance: Living in a chronic fight-or-flight state frazzles your nervous system and leaves you feeling ‘flat’ and worked up at the same time.
All of these are symptoms but they all point back to the same root:
A disconnection from your REALNESS.
The Way Back Home: Realness Over Role
If being a workaholic is driven by disconnection from your real self and your real life, then the solution isn’t just “work less” but to RECONNECT.
This means learning to return to what’s real and it unfolds in three main stages:
1. Awareness (Deconstruct the Ego)
You can’t change what you don’t see and so the first step is to raise awareness by becoming brutally honest about your relationship with work.
You can begin by asking yourself a few probing questions:
- How much of my identity is tied to what I do instead of my being?
- Do I feel uneasy or empty when I’m not working?
- What areas of my life have I neglected?
- What am I actually avoiding when I stay busy?
This isn’t about judgement but about seeing clearly because once you see that work has become your foundation rather than just a part of your life you begin to question it and it loosens its grip.
2. Acceptance (Integrate the Shadow)
This is the part most people try to skip but, really, it’s the core because the tension driving workaholism doesn’t disappear just because you decide to “have better balance” but when you feel what you’ve been avoiding.
This essentially means:
- Sitting with discomfort instead of distracting yourself.
- Allowing emotions to move through you.
- Re-owning the ‘parts’ of yourself you’ve hidden.
Remember that emotions are “e-motion, energy in motion” and so if they’re not felt, they don’t disappear – they get stored in your emotional reservoir and then they drive behaviour from the background.
Acceptance is about letting that energy move again – not analysing it or ‘fixing it but actually just feeling it.
This is where real integration begins and you can start to shift from fragmentation to wholeness again.
3. Action (Trust Self & Life)
Once you’re more aware and more integrated, your actions naturally start to change an you’ll no longer feel the need to force everything and can start flowing again.
When you’re in a state of alignment like this, you’ll begin to:
- Make decisions based on truth, not resistance.
- Work because it’s meaningful, not because it’s necessary for identity.
- Trust that you don’t need to overcompensate to be enough.
From here, practical changes become sustainable and you can shift into a REAL life over an unreal one.
Some More Practical Ways to Break the Workaholic Addiction
To support this shift, there are some grounded, actionable steps you can take within the framework listed above (Awareness, Acceptance, and Action):
1. Take Real Breaks
Not “scrolling while thinking about work” but actual breaks where you step away, breathe, and get back into your body instead of just your mind.
Even short pauses throughout the day can start to break the compulsive loop.
2. Delegate More
Workaholics often carry everything themselves – not because they have to but because letting go feels ‘unsafe’ for whatever reason (this is why a lot of workaholics are control freaks).
Start trusting others and let things be imperfect – this weakens the identity that says, “It all depends on me” (it doesn’t!).
3. Focus on Quality, Not Quantity
More hours doesn’t mean more value – in fact, it often means less clarity so train yourself to work smarter instead of just harder.
This means introducing things like:
- Clear priorities
- Deep focus
- Defined stopping points
Then stop when you say you will instead of just ‘working’ for the sake of it.
4. Rebalance Your Life
Intentionally invest in other areas besides just ‘work’:
- Relationships
- Family
- Friendships
- Hobbies
- Etc. etc. etc.
Not as “extras” but as essential parts of a whole life (because they are).
5. Practise Presence
Presence is the antidote to distraction so instead of constantly escaping into work, practise being where you are:
Feel what you feel, and notice what’s happening internally because this builds your capacity to stay with reality instead of avoiding it and getting lost in old cycles.
If you want to start switching up your relationship with the things you use as a substitute for the truth, then check out my book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace.
Workaholic to REALNESS – The Real Shift
The goal isn’t to stop working hard but to stop using work as a substitute for something deeper because work can never give you what only truth can.
When you reconnect with your REALNESS:
- Work becomes an expression, not an escape.
- Success becomes enjoyable, not necessary in order to feel ‘worthy’ or whatever.
- Rest becomes natural, not earned.
- Life expands beyond a single dimension and you become a deeper expression of yourself.
Perhaps most importantly – you can finally stop running (not because there’s nothing to achieve but because you’re no longer trying to escape yourself).
The Final Word: The Workaholic & Realness
Being a workaholic isn’t about loving work too much but about being disconnected from yourself and using work to fill that gap.
What you need to know is that the gap isn’t real – it’s just an illusion created by judgement, shame, and fragmentation.
You can close it the moment you return to what’s true – not by doing more but by allowing yourself to be REAL again.
Stay real outh there,
P.S. If you’re ready to start bringing more balance into your life and growing real then book a free coaching session with me and I’ll help you start shifting gear.
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