Tag Archive: stress

Dreaming of exam panic

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Mon. January 19, 2009

This past weekend I found myself in a bit of panic. This was all due to what seems to be a recurring dream for me. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does it feels raw each and every time, making me feel quite uneasy. Upon waking I have to take a moment or two to regain my bearings and assess reality from make-believe. Yeah, it’s that bad.

Well, what’s the dream? It involves university and being on the brink of graduation. Usually, in the forefront of my mind there’s something nagging, telling me that I’ve missed the exam for some subject. It varies from dream to dream: French, Psychology 101, Sociology, English, etc. See, in the dream I apparently went to one or two classes of the subject but then decided that I didn’t need to go. I then totally ignored the class to the point where I forgot the scheduled exam. In some variations I’m in a panic over whether I’m actually still enrolled in the class. Sometimes I haven’t been to that class for so long that I was suddenly un-enrolled. Whatever the case, the result is that I suddenly don’t have enough credits to graduate–leaving me in a panic over how I’m going to make it up.

When I wake up from these dreams, my mind is often in overdrive trying to figure out when the exam for the course was supposed to be. Sometimes I have to second-guess what day of the week it is just in case I was dreaming that I missed it. Of course, THERE IS NO EXAM. After a few moments of figuring things out, I always realize that I have my freaking diploma, and that I’ve been out of school for a few years now.

Wow, so what the hell is with this dream? I think the obvious interpretation is a general fear of failure. Maybe these dreams come to me whenever I’m going through a particularly stressful time at work. During these periods there’s a definite need to perform. I guess I’m carrying that stress home with me. Why is it manifesting itself in the form of dreams of missing exams/skipping class? My academic career has had ups and downs. I’ve never gotten to the point though where I’d miss something outright from classes through exams. See, tuition cost too much to allow me to forget, know what I mean?

You know, for once, I’d like to have one of these academic dreams where I’m actually victorious. I can joke about not being the ideal university student. Why? I’m not. Period. However, I worked hard when it mattered. In the end I got the job done. What more is there? Why can’t my subconscious celebrate that achievement for once?

*grumble*

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Man and machine

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Tue. December 16, 2008

While I’m at my desk at work, more often than not I’ll have my ear buds planted deep in my ears. Sure, I like my music, and it allows me to get a firmer appreciation for some CDs that I’ve been on the fence about. Really, more than that though, it allows me to block out the rest of the environment. It’s not that I don’t appreciate everyone around me, but in some cases blocking the world out allows me to get more work done. I recognize that I can’t always be an island, so I sometimes compromise by having on ear bud in and one ear open to listen to all of the chat topics around me. Lately I’ve been hearing my name in conjunction with “he’s a machine!”

I guess that label started sticking after the work effort I put in during the last code launch. I worked like a madman to whip the queue into submission. And whip it, I did. I’m kind of proud of it, because otherwise the queue would have just looked overwhelming. At some point my project manager just started saying that I was a machine. Fair enough. It was in a good light, right? I remember one time I replied to a request with: “Acknowledged.” Some people picked up on that and imitated me in a robotic voice. Sure, sure: fine. Now that it’s been a while, I’m just tired of it. When I hear my name in conjunction with “machine” I have to roll my eyes. These days the usage morphed to something like “Oh, I’m sure Jason can do it in half the time because he’s the machine, you didn’t know?” Ugh. Whatever.

Yeah, I guess it’s in a sense of admiration. At the same time, when I think of the word “machine” I think of something that’s devoid of emotion or feelings. Sure, give me a repetitive task, and I can probably brute force my way through it to completion. It’s not magic–it just requires focus. Unlike some robot though, I feel fatigue. There’s a risk of me feeling bored and unmotivated if I’m lacking stimulating work. Prick me, I bleed. Call me a machine if you want, but I’m so much more.

*sigh*

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Phantom bugs

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Wed. November 12, 2008

You know, I was going to post pictures of cake for today’s post. No shit. However, I had a hard day at work today, so I just need to unload a little bit.

We’re currently in a period where projects are under test before going live. The testing was supposed to end today, but we were stuck figuring out solutions to one or two bugs. One in particular has been rather nasty in that none of us in house could produce the bug. People on the client end were able to produce the problem, but only once per computer, after which it could never be generated again. Most of us dealing with the bug spent many hours trying to find a viable solution, but nothing worked. A few of us stayed for about 10.5 hours from just trying to provide support. We were completely worn out.

As I was packing up for the night, someone not working on the release commented about how great it was to work on such tasks. I was genuinely puzzled when I got that comment. He continued to say that time flies and then oops, all of a sudden we’ve banked 2-3 hours overtime. I just laughed at it, but on the inside I was still dumbfounded.

Why should I consider having to stay overtime a good thing?
Why should I be pleased when I haven’t been able to solve this phantom issue?
Why is it supposedly an easy period when I’m expending so much mental energy just brainstorming for solutions?

I don’t know, man. I couldn’t help but feel that our priorities were really different. It’s late, and I’m still kind of down about today’s failure. I’ll be in tomorrow for 8 in the morning. I hope that we can make better progress tomorrow with a fresh set of eyes.

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Bull-headed staying power

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Mon. November 3, 2008

Until this current release is done (which will be this month at some point) I don’t think I’ll be able to sit through a relaxed period at work. Today I was feeling like I was fending off a barrage of issues. Just as soon as I finished one thing, something else was fired off in my direction. It’s always been my intention to shrink that bug list. Maybe I’m foolhardy, or just arrogant in my abilities, but I had no intention of letting that QA list get out of control. For the most part, I’ve succeeded. I mean, the list hasn’t really shrunk, but it hasn’t exploded in size. That’s great, but I have to ask what toll all of this has taken on me.

In this type of situation, I can’t help but feel that I’m under the gun. Some days I feel like no one else is taking this seriously. I know that it’s not true, because I’m sure everyone takes pride in their work; I just happen to have more bull-headed staying power than is healthy. I recognize that it would be unfair to foist my standards on everyone, but still.

So this recent pile of work finally got to me. I didn’t walk off crying or yelling at everyone. Nope. This time I just got up, stormed away from my desk and walk around town for 45 minutes listening to my iPod, just trying to cool my head. What was the trigger? Well, I was frustrated with this one ticket and off from the corner of my eye I see my colleagues goofing off doing some other business. That usually wouldn’t bother me because I’m prone to bouts of silliness too. In this case though, it was just the little bit that brought me past the tipping point. I resented the fact that I was working hard to keep things under control, and other people had the time to fool around. So, I walked off.

It’s harsh. I know that everyone gets work done. I know that things get accomplished. Some days I wonder though what would happen if I were to take myself out of the equation. People will manage, but that would require them to work harder. Is that such a bad thing?

Well, walking helped somewhat because I didn’t feel as angry when I got back. Instead though I felt defeated. I had no choice–I had to continue doing what I was good at: the job had to get done.

In a few weeks it’ll all be under control. I can look forward to it.

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Cracked mirror

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Sat. September 27, 2008

I’ll save y’all from another post on running for now–there’ll be plenty of time for that tomorrow. I’m trying to conserve my energy (such as it is) so when my mother asked me to go with her to Walmart to show her how to work that digital picture machine I was kind of put off. It was raining so I parked in a garage area with some cover overhead. Spots were few and far between, so I eventually settled for a spot next to a concrete pillar. It was a tight fit, but I made it in.

At Walmart we chose the photos and submitted them for developing. I swear, my mother would be so capable of doing these on her own if she’d only show some interest in learning, you know? Anyway, we had an hour to kill so I just wandered around the mall. After what seemed like an eternity of just aimlessly wandering from store to store we met back in Walmart. I was tired and kind of hitting some low-level energy levels. I thought about that and found it to be extremely odd because I’m usually still all right midday. Instead though, I was irritable and just wanted to be back at home curled up in bed. We were supposed to head to the supermarket after but my mother decided that we should just go home. I guess my mood was pretty obvious. Weeell…that can’t be helped. I’m not about to start masking everything now.

Aaaanyway.

We got in the car and I started backing out. I was thinking about how shitty I was feeling. I turned over to my right and started turning. Suddenly, we were both startled by this loud crack. What the fuck?! My side mirror caught the pillar that I had parked beside and completely broke off. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I mean, it was a bit past noon on a Saturday. Would people be available at such a time to replace the thing right away? I needed to take my car downtown to the race. My mind was being pulled in so many directions. I was freaking out.

I got home and started calling several GM dealerships. I finally found one that would take me, but they were closing in an hour so I had to rush over. I actually took my car on the highway. I basically stayed in one lane the whole time just to minimize the risk of anything else bad happening. Occasionally I’d look at the broken mirror expecting to see behind me but of course I couldn’t see anything–it’s such an odd feeling.

Anyway, $275 later all is well and everything is fixed. I need to take a nap to get my stress levels back to normal levels. Enough is enough, damn it.

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Burning things down/building things back up

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Wed. September 24, 2008

On Tuesdays and Wednesdays I’ve been coming into work early just because I have to leave earlier in order to make it to my evening runs up north of the city. On a regular day I’d probably start my commute at 8:30am; on Wednesday I try to leave the house at 7:15am. It’s been like this for what seems like ages, so you’d think that I’d have this schedule down easily, right? To be honest, finding the motivation to get up has become more and more difficult. I end up arriving at my workplace at the usual time, but I also end up leaving early. I don’t feel too bad though because I always make up the missing time later in the week. It all seems well and good, however, I have to question whether arriving at work later than when I want is more symptomatic of something else.

Work has been entirely stressful as of late. I try to keep my frustration down, but–especially as of this past week or two–I’m been entirely grumpy in the mornings. I know it doesn’t reflect well on me. Whether or not it’s actually true, I know that it looks like I’m going to kill someone. I can’t help it though, I’m very much an open book. See, I internalize, but what I have is so strong that it shines through. I’m trying to be more relaxed and more positive, but I still slip into dark moods very frequently.

I wonder if there’s something periodical that I’m going through that spans a couple of weeks. It’s only when I burn things down that I can build things back up, right? Oh man. The last quarter of the year is around the corner. I just want to be in a stable state of mind, you know?

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Over the edge

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Thu. August 14, 2008

I have a tendency to overwork. Given certain circumstances, I will pour all of my efforts into getting the task done. On the surface it sounds like a great thing. Unfortunately for me, if I don’t keep it in check, I will run myself into the ground. I have a certain amount of staying power when it comes to this sort of thing, meaning I’ll be on task long after I know I should have taken a break. Usually I can keep all the stimuli at manageable levels, but once in a while I’ll go over the edge.

Today, I cracked.

We’ve been short on manpower over the past few weeks, leaving me to handle client support on my own. Things have been humming along, but in recent days I’ve really started to feel a huge amount of fatigue. Things have been continually piling up and I’ve been working my hardest to keep the pile from becoming overwhelming. I told myself: “I can handle this. No problem.” And I did…the pile has shrunk. It’s all under control. Thing is, the continuous pressure I’ve been placing on myself has finally taken its toll.

I’m not under any illusions about this. The pressure I’m under is really self-induced. Sure, the client has wants and needs, but it’s still up to me to pace myself, right? Anyway, today the client made a joke about a certain task being the most important. Something like that would’ve just rolled off my back under normal circumstances. Today though, it seemed like it pushed me over the edge. I put my head on my desk to give myself a rest. I started shaking. Then, all of a sudden tears started flowing. I try hard to compose myself, but I was in a pathetic state. I messaged a colleague that I’d officially cracked. He suggested that we take a walk over to Tim Hortons. I agreed and just walked out. I wasn’t outright bawling or anything, but I was overflowing with unchannelled energy.

The walk did me well. I just needed to get away from my desk. Several of my colleagues have told me to just not work so hard. My team lead reminded me that I just needed to take it easy and not push myself. Sure, I already know that. I guess, I just needed an event like this to drill home the importance of pacing. Another colleague of mine suggested that I take a sick day. I considered it, but as my mother said: I shouldn’t run away from my problems. Sure, as I type this I’m still a bit jittery, as if my stress chemical levels are still high throughout my body. However, I can’t let this keep me down.

I’m just one man. I am capable of doing a lot of things. It seems though that the greatest thing I can do for myself right now is to draw some boundaries and respect them. I hope that I’ll feel a bit more balanced by tomorrow morning.

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It’s my carrot

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Sat. January 12, 2008

Doesn’t it seem like the year is flying by at a good clip? Mid-month/pay day is just a few days from now. It seems like it was only a very short while ago that we were going through the whole new year thing.

I remember that host Jay Ingram on Daily Planet once spoke about a study that seemed to suggest that people experience the passage of time at a faster rate as they age. It’s interesting stuff there. If I think about how I experienced my childhood, it seems like time periods stretched out far beyond what was expected. Back then I didn’t really pay attention to that fact though. I guess at that point in life people can afford to be carefree, right? As soon as expectations and responsibilities start creeping into the picture, that’s when things become tougher. All of a sudden there aren’t enough hours in the day to accomplish what needs to be accomplished. It’s like your eyes are suddenly opened after years of clouded vision.

A big difference that I can identify between life now and life back then is the fact that now the things to strive for happen more frequently. Does that make sense? In elementary, school is just routine, with maybe summer vacation as the main delineator. Sure, there are tests and exams, but they didn’t feel like they were of too much consequence (whether or not that’s true is another matter). Now, there are deadlines galore where my ass is on the line. There’s also pay day which really acts as a time marker of sorts. With these things always looming on the horizon, there’s enough to keep me moving forward. It’s that transparent dangling carrot that Alanis sings about–at least, it’s my carrot.

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