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Guest Column

Until all the work gets done, stress will be my sidekick

By GEORGI DAVIS
Published October 1, 2006

The other day a neighbor and I were talking about stress. She was telling me that lately she was feeling very stressed at work. She was feeling so stressed that she was thinking of changing jobs.

I told her that lately I was feeling rather stressed myself. But, I said, I felt that most stress was from internal, not external, forces. Whenever I felt stressed, I usually had to stop and take a look at what was really stressing me.

I decided a long time ago that it was because I had things I felt I had to do that I didn't really want to do. They just didn't fit in with my agenda for the day.

Sometimes I stress myself out because I put the wrong priorities in the wrong place.

Take the other day, for instance. I woke up and practically jumped out of my cozy bed. Now, I didn't really jump because I'm not that kind of person. Usually I can feel jumpy, but it doesn't show. So let's just say that my brain jumped out of bed.

I sat down with my husband for our morning coffee (which I didn't really need on that morning). He asked me the usual question: "So, what's on your agenda for today?"

I replied that I had to write 11 articles for the paper, I had two new places to go and take photos and get information. Then I had two more articles to write. Before I did that, though, I had to get to the store or we wouldn't have any bread or lunch meat.

I told him that when I was finished with all of that, I wanted to start painting the trim on the house. I also said that I had thought about scrubbing the floors and sweeping the rugs.

He asked me what I was going to do in the afternoon. I gave him one of those "What, are you, crazy?" looks and replied, "Well, for starters, I have to go to Rome and repaint the Sistine Chapel. When I return, I thought I'd try my hand at painting a picture of the Mona Lisa using watercolors instead of oils. A new medium might make her look better. Then, of course, I would have to make supper."

I asked him, "So, what's on your agenda for today?" He replied, "I'm going to work."

"That's nice," I said. "Is there a reason you wanted to know what I was doing this afternoon?" He replied, looking a little sheepish, that he needed a pair of shorts ironed and a button sewn on the shorts.

Then he just wondered if I had time to bake him some of those peanut butter cookies that he likes so much.

My adrenaline kicked up a couple of more notches. Being one who likes to please, I was mentally trying to adjust my agenda so I could iron, sew and bake cookies after I finished what I felt had to be done.

So you can see what I mean by internal stress. The world would not end if I painted another day, if I sewed buttons the next day or ironed the day after that.

In fact, the world would not end if I never painted the trim on my house. But, in retrospect, that was the one thing I really wanted to do. The rest I enjoy doing, but not on that particular day.

There are times when we have to do what we have to do whether we really want to do them or not. So we do them.

It's kind of like that old Nike commercial: Just do it.

I find that if I don't, I wake up in the middle of the night doing it in my sleep. That is, I am mentally doing it, but when I awake I still have it to do.

It's like writing these articles. I like to write these articles. If I put them off and say I'll write them tomorrow, I dream about what I will write when I go to bed. So it is easier on my sleep habits to write them when the idea springs forth.

I have never been very good at procrastinating. My brother, however, is an expert. He believes that anything that can be done today can be done tomorrow.

I wish I could be more like him. He doesn't dream in his sleep about what he was supposed to do or what he has to do. How can this be when we came from the same gene pool? I would like his genes better. I think they are a better fit. I still think his genes are from a different manufacturer.

He will probably live longer, but that is yet to be determined.

At any rate, I guess we are who we are. I have heard that your personality is formed by the time you are 3. Wow!

Someone must have put a bug in my ear early on in life. If anyone out there knows a cure for a Type A personality, please let me know. And to think that I am the one who last week said, "Don't sweat the small stuff and everything is small stuff." Hard to believe, isn't it?

I will end by saying this: When my husband and I went on vacation this summer, we sat and read books, lay on the beach, played golf and never once worried about what we had to do. I believe my only true cure is to go on a permanent vacation where there is no house to paint, no floors to scrub, no bills to pay and no suppers to be made.

As long as work is around me, I will see the need to do it.

Thought for the day: I quote my grandmother: Man sweats and slaves 'til setting sun, but a woman's work is never done.

P.S. I'm getting better. I still haven't sewn that button on that pair of shorts, but I'll dream about it!

[Last modified October 1, 2006, 06:59:30]