Michael woke up in the middle of the night and looked at the clock: 3:33 AM. He tried to go back to bed, but couldn’t. He had another nightmare where he was fighting for his life against faceless people, battling for unknown reasons. In this nightmare he was screaming for help but no one could hear him. Everything was happening in slow motion as he tried to evade his attackers. They were closing in and were about to ambush him when he woke up in a deep sweat with his heart racing and head pounding. He had been having trouble sleeping the past few months, which had contributed to the stress that ultimately caused him to pass out during his run. While he was recuperating the last few days he had read a book on stress and sleep that described the vicious cycle he was caught in, in which stress affects your ability to sleep, and then a lack of sleep causes more stress.

Sarah and his friends kept telling him that he needed to relax, but how could he relax when he was building a business, and his family and company were depending on him? How could he relax when he had been in sales his whole life, and now an entire company was looking to him for leadership and guidance? Every decision he made mattered and had repercussions for employees, clients, and families. When he was in sales, all he had to do was sell and collect a large paycheck. Now he was the one signing the paychecks. He had mastered the art of sales over the years, but no one had taught him how to lead people, and nothing could have prepared him for the success and challenges Social Connect was experiencing. He wouldn’t tell anyone, but he felt unprepared and inadequate, and feared letting his wife, family, and company down. This was everything he had worked his entire career for, and he couldn’t fail. How could anyone relax with this kind of burden? Michael wondered, as he gave up on going back to sleep and walked down the hall to his home office. He turned on the computer to look at Social Connect’s sales numbers from the last few days. Sarah had forbidden him from checking on sales, but he needed to know for his own well-being. If she caught him looking, he would tell the truth: Not looking at the numbers was causing him more stress than seeing them.

He was relieved to see that sales were steady and some new business was still coming in, despite his absence, but he worried the trend wouldn’t continue the longer he was away from the business. I have to get back to work, he thought. Not being there is killing me more than being there would. He then left a voicemail for his assistant asking her to call him when she got to the office to give him an update. Then, he walked to the other side of the house to check on his kids, who were sound asleep in their rooms. The quiet before the storm, he thought.