There's been a lot made about the age of the two Presidential candidates. I don't want to go down the political road at all. At all. I know where my vote is going, you probably know where yours is too and debating it will only frustrate everyone, but yeah, I can't deny it's crossed my mind that the two likely candidates are both significantly older than me, and I'm pretty sure I could not lay down the kind of hours it requires to competently lead a country. Particularly one facing the challenges ours does. And after 16 or so hours of constant unrelenting stress every single day, could I remain mentally sharp? Not sure because my whole being screams at me to stop short of that any longer. Of course, I don't actually know if any sitting President has to work a 16-hr day, it's just assuming on my part that between formal events, world events unfolding inconveniently not on EST workday schedules, and the volume of work there must be, it's not a 9-to-5 gig.
Of course, they do have young, eager staffers at their beck and call, which I do not. I have four aging collies and a husky who likes to sleep under my desk all day but really doesn't contribute much to the workload. But being more than a decade younger than either candidate, I'm here to tell you as much as I'd like to say you're as young as you feel, come around 9:00 PM these days I feel like I'm a 100. You would not want me in charge of the nuclear codes after 10:00 PM. The world could be ending and I'd sleep right through it. Until I needed to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom that is - another fun part of aging.
Case in point: I was intent on finishing a deliverable one night last week. Used to be if that took me to the next morning I was there until the next morning to get it done. That night I just hit both a mental and physical wall before it was even 9:00 PM. I just cannot lay down the number of hours I used to or even really need to. The brain just shuts me down. And it does feel a lot like some little munchkin inside my head just flips a switch and says, "Turn out the lights, your party is over." And I truly have to obey. It's hard to describe. But there's no option to shake it off or take a break and sit back down. Nope, I'm just done. That night, I was so intent on getting my task finished, I did try to fight with myself for a couple of minutes. I lost. My brain said, "You are solidly, 100% done for the day, I'm shutting it down."
I've read some articles that say older workers can work just as hard and be as productive as their younger counterparts so maybe something is wrong with me. There may be a correlation that older workers don't gather around the water cooler as much or show up late or ask to leave early, but when it comes to all-nighters, can we really still pull them off like a kid fresh out of college? I don't think so based on personal experience. I need time to rest and recharge now, whereas I could have made a great Energizer Bunny in my day. Well...that's not true. I was never the bunny, fast and energetic, I was the tortoise that just never quit.
Of course this opens up the whole work-life balance conversation. One tends to wonder if I spent a little more time actually balancing the two if I could work longer and better now. But there's no telling. It's history. But this question isn't, it's as relevant as it probably was in my day, I just never asked it: is it right for companies to expect anyone - whether 22 or 72 - to pull down monster hours? Particularly if your position is anything less than leader of the free world?
As a young woman in the workforce intent on proving I could run with the big boy dogs, I somehow saw my worth as a worker tied to the number of hours I could lay down. Some of my employers over the years demanded it. Others might not have demanded it, but were happy to let me live with that mindset. Clients wanted us available at all times day or night, regardless of whatever else we had happening in our lives. I think looking back on it now I wish I'd put more boundaries on all of that and in turn worked smarter and proved my value that way. But, again, the past is history. Only the future is yet to be written.
And this chapter is done for the night. I am turning out the lights.
So how do all of you do it? Those of you reading who are still in the workforce: how do you keep your energy up?
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