October 27, 2024What Do You Do?
Transitions from full-time work. I finished my last full-time work role a year ago. It was time. I have worked since I was 16 years old, and my last day at work was fifty years and one month after my first day. My work life was varied: I was a bank clerk, a postman, and working in a meat packing plant. Then, working for large corporations running factories. A mid-career break to gain an MBA and then straight back into corporate life in senior strategy roles. My final phase was the world of startups and small growth companies.
There was a particular weirdness to it all as well. I succeeded in many respects and told myself I was living my best life. Even three years ago, I would boldly say that I would work until the day I dropped. Yet I wasn’t enjoying work. I’ve written elsewhere about my struggles with anxiety and depression throughout my youth and adult life. I found one of my journals recently in my home office, and rereading it was, in some ways, shocking. I hadn’t enjoyed at least the last four years of my career.
The truth, I guess, is that the long hours and high pressure of a senior executive role created enough white noise in my mind to stop me from addressing what was troubling me. If I was busy, then I didn’t have to look in the mirror too hard. Through the years, I have looked hard at some of the self-sabotage mechanisms I sneakily deployed and had a crack at dealing with some of them.
Work has defined me to a great extent and I was always able to answer the emotionally-stunted conversation-starting question, “What do you do?” No longer.
Removing Coping Mechanisms
Drinking too much was one of my avoidance strategies. While in the warm glow of the first few drinks, my mind didn’t have to deal with the corrosive and non-stop anxiety that plagued me. The deadening effect was my escape from … from me. The hangovers and post-session self-loathing were, for many years, the fair price of the game. But more than six years ago, I stopped drinking and have never missed it.
With that major step taken, I was able to double down on seeking the proper mental health support. I’ve been on anti-depressants since 2018 (although there have been previous periods, too.) I’ve worked with psychotherapists and psychiatrists throughout that period, too. Do I feel better? Yes, I do, but I I must pay attention to it daily. I don’t believe I will ever escape the issues that trouble me. I see it as a challenge: there’s a better life if I keep working at it.
The transitions from full-time work over the last year hasn’t been as hard as I thought it might be. As I said, I hadn’t been enjoying it. I wasn’t the best to work with at times, which troubled me. My day-to-day way of being was unpleasant, with dark periods and turbulence being the norm. It’s a lonely place, too. Collectively, we humans are not well-equipped to deal with one of our tribe suffering mentally. Words such as “I’m here for you 24/7” and “You can talk to me at any time” must be considered hollow.
Dealing with a mental health issue isn’t the most straightforward matter, and at times, I wasn’t fully conscious. But the human spirit is also strong.
Over an extended period, I have tried to make my way, sometimes stumbling, to a place where I can come to terms with myself. One by one, large parts of my life and some harmful coping mechanisms have been removed. And still, the search for me continues. The non-negotiable is the need to make concrete changes; staying in one spot and hoping for salvation is not a recipe for improvement.
My Brave New World
Now I had dropped my anxiety-fuelled commitment to work forever, and it was time to look at life in a very different way. Gone were the 70-hour weeks and unrelenting pressure. I wasn’t waking up, mind and pulse racing, at 3 am. I wasn’t out of bed and overcaffeinated by 5:30 am. That’s good. Right?
The flip side of transitions from full-time work appeared. All of a sudden, the days stretched before me. As always, I needed a plan. Some of my moves were obvious. I wanted to pay forward some of my long experience in business and felt that I could help small growth businesses and their CEOs. In addition to my business experience, I qualified at a high level as an executive coach 15 years ago. I set myself the goal of finding roles with small growth businesses in my first year, and that’s been achieved.
And what else? A challenge for me is how to use my time meaningfully. I filled my days with stressful activities for many conscious and unconscious reasons. The stuff lower down Maslow’s Hierarchy was dealt with; my work rate ticked off security and survival. A lot was thrown into climbing the ladder, of kidding myself that I was getting to Maslow’s self-actualisation.
I would guess that it was more complex than that, and part of me was running away and not running to. With that stripped away, there are bigger questions for me. Who am I? And what the heck do I do with myself? Will I ever understand myself, let alone find the nirvana of self-actualisation?
Real Changes
My physiology has changed, which sounds like an odd thing to say. For many years, I have tracked my health closely, including taking blood tests. My cortisol level used to be dangerously high, and it’s now dropped into the lower part of the normal range. It’s a clear indicator that my stress has plummeted.
The other area of change is sleep. Even as a child, I had severe sleep issues and remember being treated for insomnia by the local doctor. He told me very seriously that if I took the whole barbiturate tablet, I would go to sleep forever. Sleep was always an issue throughout my early adulthood and growing up. But now I’m sleeping seven hours a night, and very often eight hours. If that doesn’t sound a lot, I can tell you that for me, it’s the somnolent version of Bob Beamon’s long jump.
Despite my recent bad luck with cycling injuries, I’m in good physical condition. The virtuous interplay of a settled mind, regular exercise, and the ability to recover while sleeping is a blessing. Transitions from full-time work include physiological changes, and I have enjoyed the positive changes.
My mental acuity doesn’t appear to be an issue, as I can tell by the thorough reading I put into any article on dementia and my crystal-clear clear recall of said articles.
This is all good news. But looking after myself and supporting a couple of small growth companies doesn’t take me 70 hours, that is for sure. That’s a good thing, right? Except in my case, this meant the mirror is thrust in front of me more often.
Searching For A New Me
A year into the major life change, it’s become apparent that if I’m not careful, I will simply live a diluted version of my old life. Taking on more advisory work, because it’s a comfort zone. And letting this patchwork of roles dominate my diary, giving me the perfect excuse to have no quality time to explore me, new opportunities, and the possibility that there’s a different way to live.
It’s taken a year for me to understand this. I read that many people at the end of their working lives are struck with worries about being irrelevant, and this is something that’s bothered me. It’s one of the reasons why I have continued to work. If I don’t work, who am I, and who will remember me? The reality is that once you have walked out of work for the last time, any memory of you disappears like a footprint in the wet sand. I’ve come to terms with the subject of relevance.
The case is made in my head that living a diluted version of my former professional self blocks me from getting on and exploring the rest of my life. Transitions from full-time work must be thoroughly examined; it’s an easy trap to end up with a diluted, shrunken version of a former being.
Now What?
I’m a fortunate man. I’m healthy and have a loving wife and some great friends and I don’t have any financial concerns. I understand I’m in a position that many would envy. My mental health has improved, although it needs daily work, in the same way my physical health needs daily work. I’m well-set in many respects to address the transitions from full-time work.
Meaning in life is a nebulous concept. I thought my meaning in life was clear, but I haven’t tackled the subject at all. I’ve thrown up false idols and manufactured skewed arguments for paths I have taken. The path is cleared for me to explore who I am. Exciting and scary in equal measure.
It’s a journey, and perhaps one with no end. Yet, realising that I’m on a journey has immeasurably helped me. As has the realisation that the behaviours and norms built up over decades can be challenged. We all have the ability to enact real change in our lives, but without accepting that truth, many of us never enter into the change zone. I’ve entered it. Now what? [...]