Zzz
Y’know, I’ve always been a late night person, even since childhood when I used to sneak a flashlight under the covers to read books after my parents put me to bed (eventually I moved to the closet so they wouldn’t see the light under my door). But as an adult, I’ve also been a bit of a morning person. I don’t mind getting up early, actually I enjoy being up before or at sunrise. However, until a few years ago, I never had a reason to get up early in the morning. In the game/tech industries, it was always pretty acceptable to get to work around 10am and work until 7 or 8PM. But…things have changed.
Over the last four years or so, I’ve really been challenged to get enough sleep. There have been long stretches, up to three months, where I’ve averaged 5 hour less hours of sleep per night. I know that’s not healthy, but I think I’ve been so driven these last few years that sleep has taken the backseat to living.
I suppose it started back when I was getting Heatwave up and running. There was a stretch there at the end, right before Christmas, where I would work my job from 9am-6pm and then go home, have dinner, put the kids to bed and then work from about 9pm-2am on getting Heatwave up and running. I did that for a good 3 months until Christmas break and I distinctly remember after sleeping in for a few days in a row, waking up the day after Christmas and thinking…”Oh, THIS is what it’s like to be awake!”
I’m not quite pushing that hard anymore, but I do tend to go to sleep during the week at about 1:30 in the morning and I get up every day by 6:45. I figure I average 5.5 hours of sleep during the work week and about 8 on the weekend. So the question is…why? Well…honestly, I love what I do. I can’t stop thinking about it. I get up everyday thinking about all the things that should get done and what can I accomplish and how I’m going to address this issue or that concern. Am I going to nail the big deal? How am I going to resolve this employee issue? I lie in bed at night thinking the same thoughts. I think I’m just charged up by the challenge. I love making things work. I love setting ridiculously high goals and then scrabbling my way up there, pulling my team members up with me and looking around for a higher peak. I didn’t know I was really like this, but the more I do it the more I enjoy it. Even failure fuels the fire. It just irritates me and makes me try harder. What, that didn’t work? Okay, let’s try it another way.
Does anyone else hop out of bed excited to go to work? I mean, I’ve always enjoyed my jobs in the game industry and looked forward to work (well except for part of my stint on SWG), but I wonder, is there anyone else out there that sleeps so little because they can’t stop thinking about work? Or am I the only one awake all the time?
Hmm…maybe I’ll get to bed early tonight for a change. Right.
Recent Comments