Whole night my mind is active and in a deep conversation mode – I am talking to myself in the night. The questions are mine and so are the answers. Neither the body gets rest, nor the mind. This is what I call it as passing through a syndrome of ‘mid-night conversation’.
The result is also quite evident in the morning – the body is tired, and the face looks demoralised. The over-active and exhausted mind makes the body look fatigued and drained out.
Being on bed for 6-8 hours, on the pretext of sleeping, or taking rest, doesn’t help anymore. Neither the mind, nor the body, nor the soul genuinely takes rest?
Majority of this mess, if not all, is because of the work-culture prevalent in the corporate world.
The jobs have become more about the number of hours that you need to be present in the office – the mandatory presence or attendance, rather than the output. The expectations are to keep the phone handy even when you are in the washroom – “Do not miss any call as this could change the fate of the company” – I have heard such threats many times.
After spending 9 hours in office and close to 2-3 hours in traffic, one is lift with no choice to only ask questions to own-self and reply by own-self. The conversation is quite intense and the topics are also not different – daily harassing conversations, satirical mails, useless meetings, uncalled for behaviour of few people, and never-ending presentations.
One day, one of my bosses – who was passing through this unique ‘mid-night conversation’ syndrome too – called me at his house for a family dinner and candidly asked me – “Are you sleeping properly? Your mind seems to be highly occupied. Your body seems to be asking for rest. I hope everything is alright at home?”
This was enough to irk me limitlessly. I told him candidly too – “It is not about the home sir, it’s the office that I bring home every day. The nasty mails that I receive are implanted in my mind and I see them in the night when I should be sleeping. I hear your voice and many others, who expect moon out of me. In my dreams, I keep setting the presentation in the proper format even though the presentations have been concluded. The unattended mails haunt me in the night. I keep looking at my mobile whole night for a probable WhatsApp message that could spoil my remaining night and morning too. If you would have noticed, I have replied many mails during the midnight, but they didn’t reach the people – why, because and I don’t even remember if I replied them in dreams or consciously. I see snakes, tigers, and reptiles in my dreams”.
My boss was quite for some time and then patted my back and said – “I am too passing through the same process. Such office matters are affecting our lives. We have stopped living for family and self. We live only for office and would die one day in same thoughts. We discuss office matters during breakfast, during lunch and during dinner, and even while we go for any social gathering.”
I looked at him with wide eyes – as if questioning him as to who started this – and he immediately understood, and of course was embarrassed.
There are many officials in corporate world that would deliberately send you emails either in mid-night or 4 AM in the morning to show they get up much early and go for a morning walk in all this work pressure. None of them is awake – it’s just that they schedule the emails to torture rest of the team.
Most of you would agree with me that there are also some classified people in the office, who would ask you about office matters, even when they have come to attend a funeral in the mortuary.
This is of a day when we had lost one of a senior person in the office – he had rather collapsed (read mental pressure), and we all had gone to attend his funeral in Delhi. All were sad and deeply moved, more so, because we all were passing through acute mental pressure.
Suddenly I felt someone was patting me on my back – he was a senior leader from the office He looked at me and I looked at him in deep sorrow, and we didn’t exchange even a word as the atmosphere was really sad. He then again patted my shoulder and next came a whisper – “Would you be coming to office after this?” I looked at him shockingly as if knowing what is going to be his next sentence, and I was not wrong. “Actually, we need to submit a report to CEO today on budget for the next year. I would need your help. I have been looking for you for quite some-time here” – he added.
“He was looking for me in mortuary? What was he expecting?” My mind went for all the weird thought. For once I thought – people do not get peace of mind even in the graveyards. Thank God, he didn’t ask the deceased to send few slides for the presentations, before walking to his final journey – as if he was going for a foreign trip, probably Thailand.
You can imagine how much this has affected me – I am not able to forget this incident even after so many years.
People who would advise you to deal with such situations, make sure such people are themselves passing through the same syndrome.
The vicious circle does not seem to end.