GSD anxiety

Well, it finally happened after almost 10 years… I got called into report for jury duty. I’ve been getting summoned consistently every 2 years but have not been called to report since my first time in New York. While I do get a bit excited to do my civic duty, I’m also getting a bit of anxiety for my to-do list.

For lack of better terminology, I call this my GSD anxiety. This all stems from years of focusing on work and building. I believe anyone who has built or currently building a startup or business probably gets this quite often. It’s the feeling that you need and should be getting more things done at work. In a way, it’s a never ending loop as there’s always more to get done when you’re building a startup.

While being a great driver of getting shit done (GSD), it’s also a double edged sword as it can give you a feeling of shame when you are not as productive. For myself, this lack of productivity could be due to life events like jury duty or personal obligations, work related blockers, or probably the worse of them all, burnout.

My anxiety started to hit yesterday. I was in the office and didn’t have the most productive day. I had meetings starting in the early morning to the early afternoon and afterwards, I felt a bit lethargic and tired. I tried to power through and was able to get through some, but not all the work I wanted to be through. Then in the evening, I got the notice that I was to report for jury duty the next day.

Anxiety filled my brain and I immediately felt awful about not being more productive that day. This of course is all fabricated in my head. In fact, I had been in the office from 8-4pm and did a bit more work in the evening. Perhaps it wasn’t the most productive day, but I got a lot of shit done. As for jury duty, that’s something that I can’t really control and just part of life.

It took a good night sleep and a nice meditation this morning to stave off the GSD anxiety. I don’t really have an amazing solution for this other than recognizing when it happens and trying to calm my brain out of this mindset. The first step in solving it though is recognizing when the GSD anxiety rears it’s ugly head.