Work-life balance is harder than ever in the digital age.

In this story, an employee realized their phone and inbox had become a 24-hour extension of their job without consent.

He has not agreed to this unspoken rule, so he decided to finally set clear boundaries.

Read the full narrative below for all the details.

I never agreed to be accessible outside work and won’t be!

I do not remember agreeing to this version of work.

Where my phone and inbox are treated like a 24-hour extension of my job.

Somewhere along the way, it just became normal that coworkers, managers, clients, and random vendors expect instant replies.

No matter the hour. Nights, weekends, vacations.

It all blurred together without anyone actually asking if that was acceptable.

This employee recognized an unspoken rule that having a phone means being reachable.

What bothers me most is that it is never framed as pressure. It is subtle.

Messages that say “no rush” still quietly demand attention.

Group chats where decisions get made fast mean that if you are not constantly checking, you fall behind.

There is the unspoken rule that having a phone means being reachable.

Choosing not to respond starts to feel like a failure of character instead of a reasonable boundary.

He’s done pretending it’s fine.

At this point, I am done pretending this is normal.

I never agreed to be accessible outside of work and I am not going to keep acting like I did.

This is not a productivity issue. It is an accessibility issue.

One phone number and one email tied to everything makes you permanently reachable by default.

Opting out feels harder than opting in ever was.

He decided to push back and set clear boundaries.

I am actively pushing back now.

Fewer notifications, slower replies, clearer boundaries.

If that makes me look less available, so be it.

How are other people handling this type of stuff?

Let’s read the responses of other people to this story.

This user shares some helpful suggestions.

This one has a simple solution.

Here’s a valid point from this person.

No calls after office hours, says this one.

Finally, short and simple.

“Always be reachable” isn’t part of the job description.

If you liked that story, check out this post about a group of employees who got together and why working from home was a good financial decision.