There’s a thing in a car called the odometer, which tells you how many miles you’ve driven. It’s all digital in newer cars, but on an older vehicle it’s mechanical. When a mechanical odometer counts up high enough that it can’t go any higher it clicks back over to nothing and starts again, so it’ll go from 999,999 to 000,000.
I thought about that recently. I’m quite a stressed man, all the time, mostly due to decisions I’ve made — I only work school hours, but worry constantly about not earning enough money! I moved to a small village where I didn’t know anyone and get upset that I don’t have any friends! I say yes to every bit of work that comes my way even if I don’t want to do it, don’t have time or have no idea how to do it, then sit there looking at it, sweating, terrified, a strange clicking noise coming occasionally from somewhere near my throat that isn’t meant to make noises!
The feast/famine manner of freelancing means I’m constantly either panicked about not having enough work on or panicked about having too much work on. But now my life is so structured around my not having a traditional job that I can’t get one (and, to be fair, don’t want one — I love how much time I get to spend with my daughter, I could just really do with making about twenty thousand more pounds every year). All decisions I’ve made, all massive sources of stress.
Next week I’m doing two talks, one in Cardiff and one in Cambridge. This is terrifying to me — I’ve never done anything like it before. People are leaving their houses for these events. My name’s on them. Loads of money is being spent on books, hotels, trains. There are people and institutions involved that are, frankly, a lot better than me, and shouldn’t be involved in anything I am at the centre of.
It’s been stressing me out a lot. It feels like someone’s made a really stupid mistake by arranging this, and then because I’m polite I’ve just gone along with it. I know it’ll be absolutely fine — I’ve worked hard on it, and I’m reasonably bright and funny — and fine is all it needs to be. It’s an affable talk about a fun book. I’m not trying to win a Perrier.
But I’ve still been really, really panicked. Last Friday I was trying to write my talk and work out some of the logistics, and I was shaking uncontrollably. An email came in about it and I screamed, bellowing wordless rage into the void (and my kitchen).
And then… nothing.
I got so stressed that I couldn’t be any more stressed, and then I just… wasn’t. I wasn’t stressed, I wasn’t relieved, I wasn’t relaxed. I wasn’t anything. I reached a weird Zen place, like I’d got in such a fluster that I had transcended the capacity to feel. It was amazing. My stress odometer had clicked over from 999,999 to zero. I’ve gone from, “Oh no, I’m really anxious!” to “I don’t really care about, or feel, anything!” It’s… kind of great?
That’s what I’m calling the odometer model of stress management. I’m going to write it into a self-help book where the main lesson is, if you’re stressed out because you’ve taken too much on, take some more on until you implode and become an oddly fearless vacuum. It’ll sell millions, and eventually Hollywood will come calling, and they’ll make it into a film, and it’ll be the talk of the town.
And I’ll say, “The actor from Whiplash is playing me in the movie Odometer.”
And someone’ll say, “Miles Teller?”
And I’ll say, “That’s what an odometer is, yes.”
Thanks. It’s my birthday.