Today Plinky asks me, ‘What keeps you up at night?’
It’s the mundane, really. These days, I don’t worry about global crises and whether or not I’m making an impact. (Well, I’ve stopped worried about it regularly anyway.)
Still, it’s worry that keeps me up, rather than excitement or ideas. I know people whose brains buzz with such interesting thoughts that they can’t get to sleep. That’s not me. No, I’m afraid my mental resources are lower.
I’ll struggle to sleep if I’m very worried about deadlines. This week I have four deadlines. I began the week with one. Once again, I’ve taken on too much. It’s so easy to overshoot.
I often console myself with ‘At least I’m interested in all this work I’m doing.’ It’s true. I’d rather be stressed and stimulated by the work, than stressed and bored.
Another thing that keeps me up, but which happens infrequently, is when I’ve offended someone. When I think that someone is unhappy with me, I mull over it almost obsessively. It’s all I can do to not throw myself at his or her feet and apologise, even if I’m not sure what I should be apologising for.
Today, I will sleep easy. Today, there is nothing to worry about.
Ooooooh now I’m going to have trouble getting sleep b/c I’ll be thinking about all the things that keep me up!!
hehe / just kidding.
I’m like you — deadlines are killer. They not only keep me awake late but once I do fall asleep, I am constantly waking up, almost every 20 minutes to make sure I’m up early enough to get into work early to have enough time to finish everything!!
When I’m stressed and worried about work, my body shuts down and I tend to get really tired and sleepy. I would sleep, but would wake up in panic attack every couple of hours. My heart would raced a 100 mile an hour.
What keeps me up is when there is something I am really excited about the next day. For example, like something that I have planned for a very long time and it is finally happening. And I would be awake all night thinking how everything would go smoothly and everyone would think that I am the BEST! HAHA…
Anxiety and coffee keep me up at night.
I made my deadline with 13 minutes to spare 🙂
hetelleb, I hope the day you’ve planned for so long lived up to your hopes!
I thought ‘stress’ was a predictable response to the Plinky question but when I looked through other people’s replies, no one mentioned stress. I think people were creative — they said ‘my son jumping into our bed’, or ‘a good book’, or ‘the internet’, or ‘traffic noise’.
I must admit, the internet and books have kept me up before. Also ‘window shopping’ on eBay 🙂