Step One - Switch on laptop. Done. It wasn't that hard was it.
Step Two - Manifestations and affirmations.
- I do this job everyday and I do it well.
- I am good at my job.
- I can handle anything thrown at me.
- Today will be a good, easy, quiet day.
Prior to opening work emails.
I was good last night. Other than the pint of Hawkstone cider in the afternoon at a cute village pub I didn't drink. Back to the "school night routine".
We finished Squid Game, watched Taskmaster then a comedy show on Netflix and at just gone 10:30 I went to bed.
Plan: wake up refreshed after a good nights sleep and ready to smash the working day!
Reality: My head would not shut up. No matter what I did to quieten it down it was so loud, so busy. It felt like hundreds of voices listing the type of emails I might get, how many emails, how many emails following up on emails that have already been sent because they didn't read my out of office, how many chats, how many things may have gone wrong, how many tasks I'll have to add to an already busy day, how many of these things are urgent. STOP IT!!
I tried my usual distraction techniques. "Plan your wedding, imagine the day" (ok, it's 10 years away but still, it's a fun distraction)
This might be working....this time I've planned a different location. It's beautiful.
This is working. I feel relaxed, I feel like I could go to sleep any minu....WORK TOMORROW!!
For goodness sake!
"It's not worth worrying about, just wait until the morning"
"You can't sleep, why not just go home now and open your laptop, get ahead"
"I need to sleep, then I'll work better"
"You can't sleep because we need to think about WORK!"
My head was in a constant battle with itself.
I try a Podcast, this will work. I'll put it on, put on the timer for my phone to switch off at the end of the episode. I'll likely be asleep before the end of the episode anyway, that's what I usually do.
My phone goes quiet. Meaning one thing, I didn't fall asleep before the end of the episode.
This is driving me mad.
“Remember how at school when you’d be off sick or on holiday or even after half term and you’d go back and panic that your friends were no longer your friends and that you’ve been moved. Feel those feelings again!!”
3 hours of broken sleep and I wake up one minute before my 7:57 alarm.
I kiss my fiance goodbye, grab all my things and head home.
Feed the cats, make a coffee, forget the rest of my morning routine I'd put into place to set myself up for the day in a positive way and open the laptop.
Step one done.
Step two done.
I don't want to do step three.
I don't want to look at my emails.
After opening work emails
26 unread. Only 26. I've been off for a week and a half, that's really good going.
Nothing too bad, I can cope with this.
An hour into work
I haven't got done what I planned to get done. My head is shouting at me a bit. "Oh, you thought it would be quiet like a bank holiday?" Laughing at me.
I manage to shake it off. It was naive of me to expect it to be a quiet day. And you should always plan for other things to crop up right? Especially in the role I'm in during the biggest sale event we do throughout the year.
I can handle it though.
I think.
3pm.
I haven’t had a proper lunch break. I just had something quick at my desk.
I've finally managed to get the things on my to do list done.
These things would usually take me 2 hours, but with everything else I've had to pick up it's taken even longer.
The battle in my head told me it's because I was slow. Because I wasn't working hard enough.
BUT....I wasn't slow. I was working hard enough.
And actually, my workload was triple what I thought I would have had anyway and I did it all. I’ve just had to move some of the “fun” stuff to the end of the week.
7pm.
Later than I expected to finish. I haven’t seen my children properly for a week. They’ve been home for 5 hours and I’ve barely spoken to them. Thank goodness for my mum taking one out for a walk and thank goodness for a new Xbox for the other to keep him occupied.
10:30pm
Another two days off so I can spend some quality time with my children in their school holidays, and see in the new year with them for the first time in years.
I want to feel like I beat the anxiety that kept me awake all night but in reality, I didn’t, because it kept me awake all night.
But I got my work done, and I did it well. So we can call this one a draw.
Now the final step.
Switch off.
Relax.
Drawer a line under last night and today.
Manifest that Wednesday night will involve a good night’s sleep and Thursday morning I can open the laptop with ease.
