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I try to describe my work days as having a feeling of accomplishment, but mostly what I gage as success is a moving target. I love interviewing and speaking to clients and of course, like some people, loathe administrative tasks. But one thing I overheard yesterday afternoon while I was ass up in my garden were two people riding by on their bicycles and one said to the other, “It’s just the same endless routine there. Nothing ever changes.” The glorious part about being an investigative reporter is things change constantly.

Today someone sent me this and asked if I might be a workaholic:

Daily LaunchTip, March 9, 2009
March 8th, 2009 · 1 Comment
From Victoria Colligan, Founder and CEO, Ladies Who Launch

Being addicted to your work is as much an addiction as any other. Apparently, as with any addiction, the “workaholic’s” brain becomes triggered by a rush of adrenaline and feel good chemicals (the high), ultimately resulting in a crash or let down when these chemicals wear off. From what I understand of addictions, the experience of unintended, consequences that are negatively life altering is what separates addictions from passions. Isn’t it funny that the line between passion and addiction can be so fine? I’ve examined this workaholic tendency in myself and other entrepreneurs for quite some time now and have recently come to a somewhat startling conclusion: True work addicts create chaos and actually thwart their own success in order to feed their work addiction due to an unresolved fear that they might have “nothing to do” and “not enough adrenaline” in the absence of such chaos. So if you are wondering if you might be afflicted, the only question you have to ask is: Are you doing this to yourself? Only you can provide the answer.

Uh, a resounding yes, it is defacto that I am a workaholic and I have been trying to overcome this need to constantly do and learn how to simply be. I have guilt when I am not “accomplishing” something, anything. I know that Tatjana came into my life to help me learn how to simply be but sometimes when I am running back and forth and watching her just be, it all seems so otherworldly how she can be so still, so focused, so relaxed. It’s almost mesmerizing if I could stop long enough to observe her.

Maybe success for me will be feeling entitled to relax without first thinking I have to earn it.

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