The Annoyances of Job Searching, or

why do I need to have an undying passion for my job that I should feel requires me to work longer hours, sacrifice my personal life and compromise my integrity without any sort of extra financial compensation?

I will never, for the life of me, understand why it is expected of employees to always be excited about their job, to love their job endlessly and to be willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of a job. Perhaps this is because, in my short life, I have failed to enjoy most of the jobs I have had for any appreciable length of time. However, I've always been under the impression that even if you ARE passionate about your work and love your job, that doesn't mean you become your boss's or company's bitch whenever they demand it without being compensated in some way for the extra time you are putting in. I understand that when you're a salaried employee, OT isn't always an option. Still, I feel a bit put off, perhaps alienated, when I read job descriptions that openly state that employees will be EXPECTED to work long hours, be on call 24 hours a day, etc., and have a serious passion for the job that goes far beyond a professional setting. Are there actually people in this world who are like that? Are there enough people like that that employers can weed out those who aren't and staff entire companies?

Don't get me wrong. I feel like I have a great work ethic. I don't generally like to half-ass things or put something out in to the world that I'm not proud of. I love to write. I love to create. And given the choice of going back to restaurant work and making more money, or sticking out my current situation, I'd prefer to stick out my current situation even though it, at times, becomes intolerable. But I fail to grasp when it became acceptable for a company to demand that my job become the most important thing in my life; that my job IS my life and becomes who I am. None of those, I think, should ever be the case (unless someone pays you to be alive).

I get that companies want the best employees who do have a passion for their work. I just don't understand why every aspect of a job is supposed to get me excited, or why I am supposed to walk around all smiles and sunshine every day I'm at work, regardless of what is going on in my personal or professional life. If that's how its supposed to be, perhaps I should just work from home.