Do you put in too many hours at the office? Are you on-call 24/7? Is your family suffering because of your job commitments?

If so, you may be what researchers are calling an Extreme Worker.

You’ve probably heard of extreme sports like rock climbing, snowboarding, or decathlons where participants push their bodies and minds to the limits, even to the point of abnormal risk and danger. Now there’s Extreme Jobs, where employees log over 60 hours a week and endure 24/7 client demands, tighter-than-ever-deadlines, and unpredictable work flows.

Yet, according to a recent study, “…extreme workers don’t feel exploited—they feel exalted. Some love the intellectual challenge and the thrill of achieving something big. Others relish the oversize compensation packages and status that come with the territory.

“Extreme jobs fuel workers’ adrenaline highs and beef up entire nations’ competitive prowess—popping up in industries as diverse as financial services, consulting, medicine, law, and manufacturing,” claims the study.

“Still,” according to Hewlett and Luce, authors of the report, there are “hints of danger afoot: health problems and family woes for extreme workers, along with eroded corporate productivity when extreme job holders suffer the inevitable burnout….”

“Extreme jobs may enrich your company in the short run. But can it live with the costs in the long run?” so concludes the report titled “Extreme Jobs: The dangerous allure of the 70-hour workweek,” printed in the December 2006 issue of Harvard Business Review

It’s been common knowledge that workers, in the USA anyway, have been putting in longer hours on the job, sacrificing vacations, and turning the office into the center of their life. The 60 hour workweek is now practically considered part-time, say Hewlett and Luce, by this type of worker.

I am not innocent of extreme “jobism” myself as I think about the large number of hours I work in meeting patient demands in my practice. Being on call 7 days a week lends itself to this type of schedule. But I have made strides in recent months in bringing a better balance to the demands of work and family, for which I’m grateful to report.

I love my work. And this is common to extreme workers. They often really like what they do, but, as the study points out, there are sacrifices made to keep up the jam-packed schedules. 69% of those interviewed said they would be healthier if they worked less extremely. A vast majority admitted their home life, children and marriage suffered because of their work habits.

I remember reading a statement in a biography on Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer of Christian Science, who worked very long days, 7 days a week most of her career, where she lamented not spending more time in prayer for herself in her earlier years. She had devoted herself so single-mindedly to the Cause she was establishing that she had neglected sufficient care for her own well being, she commented in her later years. She was still a strong and healthy woman, but she apparently would have done things a bit differently if she had understood earlier the price one pays for a 24/7 work week.

In my own prayers for avoiding the pitfalls of extreme working, I’ve had to understand better how my work and home life fit together as one.

I don’t have two lives I remind myself,—a work life and a home life. I have one Life, God, which is a good, wholesome, balanced, lovely existence filled with grace, poise, peace, health and harmony. My goal is to express a balanced blend of these qualities wherever I am, home, office or otherwise. As I stay committed to expressing this proper state of Mind, I find it brings better balance to my home/work life.

Believing life can be divided between home and office is like believing mind can be divided between north and south. It doesn’t make sense. Mind is the same wherever we go. We may use it differently in various places, but that’s a choice we make. Our consciousness make-up is the same.

We have the same life wherever we are too. The life we’re identifying with does not change when we’re in a geographically different place. How we express it may change, but the actual content remains the same.

The life we live at work, we bring home. And the life we live at home, we take to work. They are not separated. If one is suffering, it’s likely the other is suffering too.

For example, if you are harried at work, you’re probably acting harried at home. If you are stressed out at work, you’re probably bringing stress into the home. Home should be a peaceful environment filled with love, understanding and harmony. If it isn’t, then our understanding of home needs special attention. The discord needs to be healed for the benefit of home and office.

Many professionals believe they have to work overly long hours to be successful. And it doesn’t help that many corporate climates promote arduous work-weeks as the norm. In these cases, we have to know our priorities. We have to ask vital questions like, “What is most important to me in the long run? Is money and prestige worth the trade-off I make with home and family?” Each person has a right to their own answer, but no one should ever complain in later years that they were used and abused by employers who demanded long hours. If we take these jobs, it’s by choice.

I worked in a corporate environment once as a senior manager where almost all peers worked 12-16 hours a day. I had a family with young children. They did not. I could not possibly keep up their type of schedule and live true to my family. It was against the corporate climate I was in, but I made a conscious decision to go home in time for dinner with my loved ones as a rule. I reigned in my schedule with the understanding that it wasn’t long hours that translated into productivity, but spiritual mindedness. I needed time away from work to keep my spiritual mindedness intact and nurture home, and I took it.

As it turned out, my job and position did not suffer. In fact, I thrived; my staff flourished, was highly productive and was happy to come to work. We thrived together. And my family thrived too.

We don’t have to be an extreme worker to prosper in the workplace, and we don’t have to sacrifice a home life to be economically successful. We have one Life to live, God’s Life, and this Life is big enough to bless us with a full experience of home, family, and the focused purpose and mission often associated with work.

Many hold onto extreme jobs because they love the challenge of conquering new heights in the work world, elbowing with other highly talented individuals, and earning large sums of money. There may be some merit to this type of argument, but it’s crucial to one’s long term success to never lose sight of the most important job of all—working out your eternal spiritual life.

All the money in the world, all the headline success possible, and heaps of outstanding recognition from peers doesn’t come even within a zillion miles of knowing what it feels like to live a genuinely peaceful life filled with deep-rooted love, generous goodwill, and broad-based spirituality.

There is not a work life and a home life. There is one Life—God, and the sooner we live true to this Life, whether at home or at work, the sooner we’ll eliminate harmful extremism and settle into a balance that blesses one and all touched by our activities.