Manager flips out on employee after they talk about their 'side project' with their coworkers

Should you be allowed to talk about your side hustle at work?

In this economy, lots of people are turning to side hustles to fill out their bank accounts. Or maybe you have a passion project that you want to spend your time and energy on. Either way, it's a common thing that you should be allowed to have. But just because you're allowed to have that doesn't mean that other people aren't going to try to stop you from enjoying it. For example, maybe you're working on a book during nights and weekends, and you want to talk to your coworkers about it at lunch. Should that be allowed? Or is that taking away from company time?

The best managers know how to encourage their employees without clipping their wings. They cheer them on from the sidelines while keeping them on task. Sure, you don't want them losing focus on the job at hand, but you also know that they are people with full lives who need to be treated as such. We all have lives outside of work, and we should not pretend like they don't exist. That would only be doing a disservice to ourselves. But what are the boundaries around talking about your outside project at work? Should your manager get to swoop in and tell you what's appropriate and what isn't?

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_{Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.}
The person in this story learned the hard way that their manager wasn't going to support them holistically. What they thought was an innocent conversation turned into a tough one, one that gave the employee a lot of insight about their workplace. You want to feel yourself at work, and like you can talk about the things you want to talk about. You don't want to feel like you're walking on eggshells, hoping you don't offend anyone, and thus losing yourself in the process. That's the conundrum this person found themselves in when at work. They weren't sure whether they were crossing a line or if their manager was. Keep on scrolling to find out what happened here and see what you think about it.
My manager freaked out on me because of my side project.

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