That anxious voice inside my head
An argument with a voice in my head after spending several hours working on book layout:
Time for a break.
But we’ve still got so much left to do. You’re on a roll. Why stop now?
I’m tired. I’m cold. My hands are feeling shaky. And all those rows of file names are starting to get tangled up in my head.
But this is important. It has to be done. The sooner it is done the sooner you can move on to the other stuff.
Yes. But it does not have to be completed today. I’m going to go take a bath.
The voice is quiet while I get up from the computer, have a bath, and then lay down to rest. Then it is back.
You have to pick up kids in an hour. What if you don’t wake up in time. You really should go back downstairs and get some more work done while they’re out of the house. Once they’re home you won’t be able to focus on work.
I have a timer set. It will beep and wake me up. All that other stuff is true, but the work can wait. The work is supposed to wait. I’m supposed to pay attention to the kids in the afternoon.
I then went to sleep, but the voice romped through my dreams making them feel restless. It plotted sneaking off to do work after picking up the kids, then it put that into my dreams. Defiantly, I kept sleeping until I heard the timer.
I really do have a lot to accomplish this month. All the things are important and I will feel much more relaxed when they are done. But pushing too hard and stressing myself only gets them done a little bit faster and it seriously impacts my enjoyment of life. I don’t need to run around in an anxiety driven panic. I just need to do some work every day until all the things are done.