Up All Night

Beck had a brilliant song out last year called “Up All Night”. I’ve watched the video on YouTube many times: a story of an ordinary teenage-ish girl who puts on imaginary armour and goes to rescue a male friend from an out-of-control party. As an individual who is frequently “up at night” (although, thankfully, not ALL night), I often lie in bed singing this song to myself, worrying about everything under the sun and thinking about the girl-in-shining-armour.

I know we all go through various sleep cycles in our lives. Until about 3 years ago I was always a great sleeper: I didn’t have trouble falling asleep and rarely woke up at night, meaning I was well-rested and ready to take on every day. My overwhelming desire for  control means I battle anxiety related to things I cannot control, and a few years ago this started to take a toll on my sleep. So I tried different things, and discovered that eating a paleo/whole30 style diet (no grains, sugars, dairy, alcohol, legumes) had a positive impact on my sleeping pattern. One of my Chosen Few and I delved deeply into the whole30 lifestyle for a while and quickly noticed how well we slept, and how rested we felt, usually waking up before our alarms feeling ready and raring to go. But the whole30 lifestyle wasn’t really manageable for me long-term, plus I just LOVE chocolate. And cheese. And wine. So my bad food habits crept back in. Then work-related anxiety began to ratchet up, based on some significant challenges and changes within my organization.

Fast-forward another couple of years, I’ve (gratefully) received promotions at work and additional responsibilities. Despite my efforts to try to remain focused on only a couple of “passions” outside my job, marriage and close friends/family, I’ve managed to spread myself a little thin. I go to bed quite early (remember, I get up 4:15-4:30am, so being in bed before 9:00pm is a must!), and I go to sleep quickly, my body and brain quite worn out. However, I usually wake up after a few hours and BAM, my brain is fired up! At 12:30am or 2:00am I’m running over my to-do list, planning tomorrow’s conversations in my head and thinking about the people (clients and team members) I need to check on or encourage during the next day. I’ve got my metaphorical armour on and I’m on a rescue mission! I’m Up All Night!

Interestingly, many of My Chosen Few seem to be in the situation. It’s almost a joke with some of them: when we meet to run early in the morning, we shake our heads ruefully and laugh about who had the least sleep the night before. We’re all women around the same age; I suppose in the same “season of life”. But our careers, family situations and personalities are remarkably different and yet we all struggle with this 21st century disorder of anxiety-induced insomnia. And let’s be honest, we’re not all lying awake at night worrying about the possibility of nuclear war with North Korea or how the declining bee population could lead to a massive decline in the world’s food sources. Those are REAL PROBLEMS. Instead we’re worrying about whether we pissed off a colleague when we gave them an honest answer to a question, or if our husband is angry because we asked him to fold the laundry.

I believe that 21st century women are facing a huge barrier: we want to be perfect. The perfect wife, perfect mother, perfect friend, perfect career women. We want to have the cleanest and most perfectly decorated house, make Pinterest-worthy meals from scratch every night, have bodies worthy of Shape magazine covers and spend our weekends making our own gluten-free superfood muffins and crafting original greeting cards for everyone we’ve ever met. Reality check… WE ARE NOT PERFECT. I think this is a Gen-X phenomenon – as women we recognize and appreciate that we have opportunities that perhaps our Baby-Boomer mothers did not, but we feel obliged to pursue all these opportunities in the quest of perfection. Which, undoubtedly, results in feelings of failure when we admit to ourselves that we did not meet our own expectations. And we continue to push ourselves still harder, the “perfect” life just always over the brow of the next hill.

I’m continuing to seek a simpler life. To reduce my responsibilities and pursue my passions. But I can quickly allow myself to get caught up in the “busyness” and start comparing myself to others. And then the anxiety quickly follows, as I worry that I’m letting people down and try to shoulder even more burdens in an effort to prove myself. I’ve got my armour on and I imagine I’m going to be Up All Night for a while, at least until I can finally give myself permission to relax and let go.