By now, I’m sure we’ve all binge-watched Emily In Paris, whether it was out of hate or love. As someone who works in social media, it’s a bit cringy to watch someone take your profession on screen and make somewhat of a mockery of it. Just check out #MarketingTwitter. It’s a field day in there.

The Netflix series follows marketing executive Emily Cooper who is unexpectedly told to move to Paris to help with their sister marketing firm. Emily is met with drama, love, fashion, and above all, trying to get in the good graces of her co-workers. Spoiler alert: she eventually does! 

When I watched the first season of Emily In Paris, I will admit. I was more smitten about the fashion and storyline than the horrendous marketing choices. Now with the second season, I’ve opened my eyes a bit more and Later actually did a fantastic blog about what they could’ve done better.

But today, we’re not here to nitpick her marketing strategies. 

One episode, in particular, struck a chord with me that I cannot get out of my head. In season 2, episode 2 (Do You Know the Way to St. Tropez?), Emily and Luc have a phone call that goes a bit like this: 

Luc (In French): Hello. How are you?

Emily: I’m in St. Tropez. I want to stop by that club we sent a couple of cases of Champére to. What was it called?

Luc: No, you know, we’re not allowed to answer work calls on weekends.

Emily: At Savoir?

Luc: No, in France.

Emily: That’s absurd.

Luc: That’s the law.

AND SCENE

This was an ongoing topic throughout the episode, but you get the point. I’m not sure if this is actually a law but let’s just say it is. (Quick google says no) But why can’t we implement this more often in our daily lives?

Emily Cooper’s character did get it right that Americans, AKA me, LOVE to work on the weekends even if we don’t really want to but feel the need to. Who else gets the urge to check your Slacks or Email “just for a second” to see if there are any wildfires? 

Yes, I chose the world I live in, which is working in marketing, and alarms are bound to go off at literally any time. But, this isn’t just for anyone working in social media. The mentality of “I need to get ahead of next week’s schedule” because we’re constantly feeling so behind is toxic. 

I genuinely don’t know how we’ve grown to accept this mentality to bend backward for your employer. Sure, they can be amazing but do we really need to be sacrificing our well-earned and guaranteed precious time off on the weekend to fix something? 

The jury is still out on that one…

Personally, I’m continually learning to be much nicer to myself. To remind me that not everything is going to hell if I don’t look at my phone and happen to miss a vital Slack. 

Your manager (manager’s manager or someone else higher up) may think otherwise, but that’s what we call… boundaries. 

It’s honestly easier said than done. But I can think of multiple times in my career where I’ve given up a whole weekend to post a Story on Instagram that’ll undoubtedly be gone in 24-hours. Oh, it pains me to think of that. 

Or, I think of the times I made a typo, and my Slacks were going off as if someone died. It’s a typo… If I’m the only one that can fix it, that’s a huge red flag. If someone can’t jump in to help you out, knowing they can’t get to you, I don’t think that’s your problem. That’s the company’s problem for not staffing the number of people they need to keep the ship floating correctly if one of their staff is down.

That metaphor went downhill, but you get what I’m saying.

All in all, my final thing is, can we all be kinder to ourselves and log off on the weekend?*

*I know not everyone has the luxury to not work every weekend, and when work calls, you need to work. But at least give yourself a break when you can. Or heck, use that comp time!