Stress, love, people not understanding me, me not understanding people.
What keeps you awake at night?
Question
How would you describe yourself in three words?
Identity & self
Question
Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?
Identity & self
Question
What has been your biggest disappointment?
Failure & regret
Question
When were you happiest?
Time & hindsight
Question
What is the worst job you have done?
Craft & work
Question
What is the worst thing anyone has said to you?
Failure & regret
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A long-running fixed question in The Guardian's weekly Q&A questionnaire.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Thinking I’ve upset somebody.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 26 October 2024 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 196 →
Mathew Horne
English actor
Insomnia. I go to bed at 9.30pm and listen to Radio 4.
Martin Freeman
English actor
Thinking about all the worst possible things: losing people, dying, how am I going to die? All that sort of stuff. I stay awake thinking about furniture and shoes as well. It’s not all death.
Chris O'Dowd
Irish actor and comedian
The baby monitor. Followed by my own fake snores.
More from Lucy Beaumont
View profile →Lovely but useless.
Thinking that I’m right when I’m wrong. But not only that – being able to convince other people I’m right and then finding out I’m wrong.
That money doesn’t buy happiness.
I remember going to my auntie Pauline’s house in winter when I was eight or nine and she made me a roast beef sandwich. I ate it and fell asleep next to a fire. I felt like a cat, fed and left to nap.
I worked in a paper factory at five o’clock on a Saturday morning when I was in my early 20s. I’d go out raving the night before, get an hour’s sleep and then go to the factory. I was covered in paper cuts and used to think I heard people talking to me; they gave me a lot of breaks because they thought I was going mad.
Some man in the street stopped me and said: “If you were a few inches taller you’d be dangerous.” I’ve no idea what he meant.
More on daily life
- What single thing would improve the quality of your life? 206 answers
- What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing that you love? 30 answers
- In the last five years, what have you become better at saying no to? 22 answers
- When you feel overwhelmed or unfocused, what do you do? 22 answers
- In the last five years, what new belief, behaviour, or habit has most improved your life? 20 answers
- What does the first sixty minutes of your day look like? 16 answers
Also answered this
Suzanne Vega, Jason Derulo, Lil Nas X, Joely Richardson, Michelle Visage, Giovanna Fletcher
Search the directory for somebody in particular.
Explore further
- All daily life questions
- The The Q&A questionnaire — 25 questions from the same format
- Explore the archive — by field, age, era, and subject