5 Zodiac Signs Overworking Despite Nearing Retirement Age

Some people, well, they’re just lazy. They seem to be born shiftless and indifferent. The only time they expend any kind of effort is when they’re avoiding work. They take advantage of everyone else’s generosity and frequently leave horrible messes that they expect you to clean up. In the interest of kindness and civility, I won’t mention which lazy, shiftless, and inconsiderate zodiac signs I’m referring to here.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum are those tireless, driven, determined, tenacious, industrious, and dedicated signs who tend more toward hard work, clean livin’, and financial responsibility.

They’re the type who, well into their sixties, will be still working overtime when everyone else their age is sitting on a pool chair at their timeshare in Florida. But even though it can be bad for their physical and mental health, they have their own reasons for staying active.

Here are five zodiac signs who lean more toward workaholism than laziness. All three Earth signs are represented here—and in the top three slots at that.

1. Capricorn

The reason you keep working so hard isn’t because you love working (you don’t) or because you don’t have enough money (you do)—it’s because no one ever made you feel safe. No matter how secure your life may seem to an outsider, deep down you’re still that child who had to grow up too quickly and was forced to learn to take care of themselves when most kids were watching cartoons and playing with toys. Working and planning and scheming and budgeting makes you feel as if you have some kind of control over the great dark unknown that looms over all of our lives. 

2. Taurus

Your legendary stubbornness is the reason you won’t let go of the working life. You would see it as a form of surrender, an admission of defeat. You don’t want to be inert. Sedentary. Gathering dust. Decaying slowly. Plus, being ruled by Venus makes you one status-obsessed bitch. You have expensive tastes that cost money. Caviar doesn’t grow on trees, and diamonds aren’t cheap. So you find yourself running in place on a treadmill, working hard so that you can play hard, which only forces you to keep working hard. It’s a vicious cycle.

3. Virgo

Your innate perfectionism is what makes you a tireless workaholic. You can get intensely stressed if you have one hair out of place or there’s one word misspelled on your report. If you’re baking a birthday cake for a loved one, every last curlicue of frosting on that goddamned cake has to be absolutely perfect, or you’re not getting any sleep tonight. Your unbridled lust to surround yourself with perfection can often spill over into obsessiveness and then outright anxiety disorders. You need to learn to enjoy the stillness and the quiet. You’ll learn to relax once you realize that nothing in life is perfect.

4. Aries

You are a blazing fireball, and you won’t slow down until you burn out. Ruled by the warrior planet Mars, you see life as a constant battle, a never-ending life-or-death struggle. There’s no time to rest, especially when you fancy yourself as a fearless general on the battlefield amid pitched fighting and you will either seize victory or die trying. It can make a person intense. If it all sounds like some cheesy action movie, that’s probably where you got the idea in the first place. Your competitive spirit is a fire that burns bright inside you, consuming everything in its path. You keep working because you hate coming in second place. Personally, I think you need to take it down a notch.

5. Gemini

Your brain is a perpetual-motion machine. You were born with a burning desire to have all questions answered. You can’t stand the fact that there are things you don’t know. You have an extremely active mind. There’s no “OFF” switch to your thoughts. Many is the night you’ll almost be completely asleep, and then you’ll get a new idea that forces you up and out of bed and toward a notepad or your phone. Your mind keeps you busy, and you don’t have a problem with that. Life is for the active. You’ll have plenty of time to rest once you rest in peace.