what to do on a 1 hour train commute

We've all been there: You tell people your commute is 45 minutes each way, but every day, there's a delay. An blow. A broken downwardly train. Inclement weather condition. A barge hit the span you have to cross to get to work and causing a four-60 minutes traffic backup (true story).

To compensate for the inevitable delays, y'all leave the house earlier and earlier. And to exit earlier, you have to go to bed earlier—or be exhausted for the whole day. Yous spend most of the commute staring at the clock and panicking at the offset sign of brake lights in the distance.

And one time you're finally at work, you realize: You have to do information technology all over again tomorrow.

If your commute is making you miserable, join the gild. There's ample scientific research showing that the length of your commute negatively impacts your productivity, your satisfaction at piece of work and domicile, and both your concrete and mental well-being.

What Research Says About the Impacts of a Long Commute

Countless studies take been conducted to measure the impacts of long commutes on productivity, health, and happiness, and the findings are dour.

• A 2017 study from the University of the West of England found that "every extra minute of commute time reduces job satisfaction, leisure time satisfaction, and mental health."

• A 2015 study of European commuters conducted by Ford Motor Company found that 63% of people are belatedly to work one time a month due to traffic, and most all commuters leave for piece of work early to avoid existence tardily considering of traffic concord-ups.

• A 2006 study led by Daniel Kahneman institute that people feel more negative emotions during their morning commutes than any other action they engage in throughout the rest of that twenty-four hours.

• A 2017 study from Mercer found that people with longer commutes are more likely to suffer from low, to have financial concerns, to report feeling stressed by work, and to be obese—and less likely to become seven hours of slumber each dark.

• A 2019 study of Australian commuters constitute that people with longer commutes accept more unplanned absences than those with shorter commutes. Additionally, people with shorter commutes are more than "relaxed, calm, enthusiastic, and productive."

No affair how yous piece information technology, commutes are never good for you.

People feel more negative emotions during their morning commutes than any other activity they appoint in throughout the rest of that solar day.

Of course, there are times when having a long commute is unavoidable. There may non be jobs in your field close to your home. Y'all may need to live further from piece of work to take care of family members or to avoid moving your kids to a new school district. Yous may just not be able to afford a home in the area where your workplace is located.

But other times, we put ourselves into a position where nosotros endure through commute-related stress in favor of some other incentive.

Is a College Salary Worth a Longer Commute?

In a 2017 article published in Harvard Concern Review, researchers discussed the results of a written report they conducted where they asked subjects to choose between two jobs:

• Job #1 had a 50-minute round-trip commute and paid $67,000 a twelvemonth.

• Chore #2 had a xx-minute round-trip commute and paid $64,000 a yr.

84% of the participants in the study selected job #1, as researchers wrote, "expressing a willingness to forfeit 1 hour each workday to their commute—250 hours per twelvemonth—in exchange for simply $iii,000. That'southward $12 an hour of commuting fourth dimension—less than half their hourly rate at piece of work!"

They ended that people were unable to "fully appreciate the psychological, emotional, and concrete costs of longer travel times."

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And across the bodily costs of commuting long distances—in terms of hours invested and travel costs like insurance premiums, gas, and car maintenance—some other study constitute that adding an boosted 20 minutes per twenty-four hour period to your commute has the aforementioned outcome on your job satisfaction as taking a 19% pay cut.

If you take a choice in how far yous live from where you work, information technology's worth examining if the costs of a long commute are truly worth it. Taking a pay cutting to piece of work closer to domicile—or paying a higher cost of living to live closer to work—may be worth it if the actual and psychological costs of your commute are more detrimental than the benefits of earning a slightly higher salary.

But if there are reasons why y'all don't want to/can't move or find a job closer to domicile, there are some ways to combat the stress of a long commute to feel happier and be more than productive both at work and at home.

How to Increase Your Productivity by Combating Commute-Related Stress

You lot may be stuck with a long commute, but that doesn't necessarily mean you lot have to suffer through the more than detrimental consequences of commuting long, highly trafficked distances to and from work.

Researchers have found multiple ways that you lot can make commuting less stressful so y'all feel refreshed, engaged, and ready to be productive both when you get to work in the morning and when you get habitation in the evening.

Use your commute to gear up yourself to transition into your next role

At home, you play ane function. Peradventure yous're a roommate, a parent, a partner, or a caregiver. At piece of work, you play a different role.

While studying the impacts of commuting, researchers from Harvard Concern Schoolhouse found that people who use their commute to mentally prepare for the transition into their next roles were less probable to suffer the negative impacts of a long commute.

They took four groups of people and instructed each group to appoint in a different activeness during their morning commutes:

• One group was instructed to do something they enjoyed like listening to music, looking at social media, or reading the news.

• Ane group was told to spend the time planning for what they would practise that solar day/week at work and thinking about how those activities would assistance them reach their goals.

• Ane group was told to divide their fourth dimension between doing things they enjoy and planning for the day/week of piece of work.

• The terminal group was given no specific instructions and told to just exercise whatever they normally did during their commutes.

They found that many people—particularly those who experience "greater work-family conflict"—were able to featherbed the negative consequences of a long commute by planning alee for the day at work.

Here's the specific prompt participants were given:

Many people notice information technology helpful to focus on making a program of their workday, or week ahead, and reflect on how those plans volition assistance them achieve their personal and career goals. Ask yourself, for example, what are the strategies you have for the week to be productive? What steps tin can y'all take today and this week to become closer to your work goals, too as your personal and career goals?

If you're suffering from commute-related stress, it'due south worth trying this do for a few weeks to see if information technology helps. Past thinking nearly large-flick piece of work items and goals on your way to piece of work—and making personal life plans on the mode abode from work—you may observe information technology easier to switch into the office you're moving into during each commute, improving your work-life balance.

Find an alternative to driving to work

There are a lot of different ways to get to work. You lot could drive, have public transportation, hail a cab, ride a wheel, or walk. Of all of those methods, driving is the most stressful.

Y'all'll suffer fewer of the negative consequences of a long commute if you choose a method of transportation that doesn't require you to drive. If yous have a pick between driving and riding a train/subway or taking a autobus/cab, you'll be less stressed and more than productive after your commute if y'all avoid driving.

Notwithstanding, multiple studies accept found that the best way to commute is actually to ride a bike or walk:

• A 2019 study of Australian commuters plant that people aged 35-54 who walk or bike to work cocky-report college performance at work.

• A 2017 study from researchers at McGill University found that people reported feeling much more energized when arriving at piece of work after walking or biking—as opposed to driving or taking public transportation—even when the weather was bad.

Loong, C., van Lierop, D., & El-Geneidy A. (2017). On time and prepare to become: An analysis of commuters

• A 2017 study from the University of the West of England plant that walking or biking to work increases people's satisfaction in their time away from work.

Of form, if it takes yous 45 minutes to drive to work, information technology'due south unlikely that you're going to make that walk or ride a bike that distance. Just there are some alternatives. For example, you could walk or ride a bike to a double-decker/train stop instead of driving to become some of the benefits of a more active commute and avert driving altogether.

Find a mode to make your commute more social

The lower the score in the Net affect column, the more negative feelings people reported having during that activity.

Before, nosotros mentioned that a report led by Daniel Kahneman constitute that the morning commute inspires more than negative feelings than any other activities people engage in during the day. Only interestingly, Kahneman plant that people felt far fewer negative feelings about the morning commute when they were accompanied past someone.

Other studies support the finding that commuting is less unpleasant when it's a more than social experience. A series of studies conducted past researchers at the University of Chicago found that people reported having a much more positive commute when they spent fourth dimension speaking with strangers while using public transportation.

But if striking up conversations with strangers on the train sounds similar your worst nightmare, there are another options for making your commute more social.

• You could carpool with coworkers who alive near y'all. This gives you the benefit of being social and lets you split the driving between your carpool participants so that no 1 has to deal with the stress of driving every single day.

• If no one you work with lives almost yous, you could class a carpool with people who live and work well-nigh you using a service like Rideshare or Waze Carpool.

• Y'all could take a cab and chat with the commuter on your way to work or employ an on-demand carpool service similar UberPool or Lyft'southward shared rides and conversation with the other passengers.

If your commute is making you miserable, it may even exist worth adjusting your schedule slightly or driving a petty out of your manner to share your commute with a roommate, partner, friend, or spouse so that you both get to enjoy the stress-free benefits of socializing during your commute.

Develop a morning routine

In the previously mentioned 2017 article published in Harvard Business organisation Review, behavioral scientist Francesca Gino discusses the results of a study she conducted that establish that people who "maintain small routines on the way to piece of work—such as checking the news on the train—experience more excited about the twenty-four hours ahead, more than satisfied with their jobs, and less stressed-out than those who had no set routine."

And this approach actually nicely supports the research that shows that having a commute isn't inherently a bad thing. A 2001 study from the University of California Transportation Heart found that people relish having a commute—every bit long every bit that commute is reasonable. The ideal commute time they calculated was based on the mean of all responses: 16 minutes.

They write: "On the whole, these results support the contention that commute time is not unequivocally a disutility to be minimized, but rather that at that place is an optimum to be achieved which tin can be violated in either direction—i.east. information technology is possible (although insufficiently rare) to commute as well piddling as well as likewise much."

A commute is, in its ain way, a routine. And as nosotros discussed before, if you lot spend it thinking about the role you're switching into, information technology helps gear up yous to make that switch and makes the transition less stressful. And then even if y'all work from dwelling house and your commute consists of—as mine does these days—walking upward a flying of stairs, it can withal help to have a morning routine you lot follow to create some predictability for your twenty-four hours—to accept something to look forward to in the morning.

That might be getting a cup of coffee from your favorite coffee shop, catching upwardly on social media or the news, or listening to your favorite podcast. This can help you prepare for the solar day whether you lot drive for an hour to get to work or but movement from the couch to your desk.

Considering the Impacts of a Long Commute equally an Employer

While you should certainly consider the impacts of a long daily commute on yourself, as an employer, it's as well important to consider how your employees are being affected by long commutes.

Allowing employees to work from dwelling house—fifty-fifty if only occasionally—can assistance ease the stress of a long commute. And according to a Mercer written report, accommodating flexible working arrangements has an fifty-fifty more positive impact on productivity than any piece of work—even fully remote piece of work—with an inflexible schedule.

And according to a 2015 commodity in TLNT, some companies take even gone as far as offering incentives similar annual bonuses for employees who choose to live closer to work, while others have reduced turnover past weighting location more than heavily when hiring to make full open positions.

If You Tin can't Improve Your Commute, Abandon It

If you simply can't movement closer to piece of work or observe a chore closer to dwelling house—and if none of the strategies in this piece help you transform your commute into a more positive daily experience—there'south one more than option: Find a job where yous tin can work from home.

• Look at remote-only task boards like We Work Remotely.

• Filter jobs on AngelList past those that are fully remote or remote-friendly.

• Include the term "remote" when searching for jobs on sites like Glassdoor and LinkedIn.

• Have a expect at the open roles for these 25+ fully remote companies.

• Zapier is a fully remote company, so check out our job openings.

Street traffic image past Alexander Popov via Unsplash ; crowded train image past Gratuitous-Photos via Pixabay ; wearied commuter by Lily Banse via Unsplash

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