I recently got an Oura ring, a device that monitors your sleep and heart rate. After a few weeks, it reported that my heart rate remains elevated for an abnormally long time after I fall asleep, a symptom of “chronic stress.”
Not surprising. I’ve been sprinting, flat out, since my co-founder and I started this company.
In the beginning, we’d hunch over a long roll of butcher paper in my apartment and sketch out ideas. It felt like a group project. Two girls in their sweatpants.
But once the idea started working, the adrenaline started. We raised money, hired a team. The stakes got higher. We weren’t sleeping. Every morning I’d look myself in the mirror and say, “Please don’t mess this up.”
I am a machine fueled by anxiety. It makes me obsessive, consumed. I care, a lot. Of course I want “work/life balance,” but I don’t know what it would look like for me. Partly, I fear I’d no longer be a good CEO if I found it.
At least when I can’t sleep, I can always text my co-founder. She’s up too.
We have nothing in common, other than our love of Harry Potter, and the fact that we decided to tie ourselves together. She grew up in India, I grew up in San Francisco. She loves poker, I love painting. She’s Muslim, I’m Jewish.
My other half. We divide and conquer. Cover for each other. When my courage is running low, I borrow some of hers. When she’s in despair, I lend her my levity.
I’m still looking for work/life balance, but I think I’m pretty good at another kind: sitting on the other end of the seesaw from someone you love, taking turns lifting each other up..
Justine Palefsky is Co-Founder and CEO of Kindred, the members-only home swapping network. livekindred.com
