How to Overcome Overwhelm

As women, we have a lot on our plates. You have your regular home stuff. If you’re a mom, you have your mom stuff. If you’re a wife, you have your wife stuff. You have your career stuff. And then for many of us, entrepreneurship on top of all of that. It’s easy to get overwhelmed.

What did I do when I was overwhelmed? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. It’s like having so much to do that you do nothing. And what result did that give me? I would start a lot of things, but I would get nothing done. I would just spin in overwhelm. More things pile on top of those things and the cycle continues.

Overwhelm perpetuates overwhelm.

So here’s how I overcame this:

1. Knowing that all feelings are caused by thoughts, I did a Model on myself to get the culprit thought. If you’re unfamiliar with The Model, please get into this life-changing goodness here. Trust me.
2. By asking myself “Why am I overwhelmed?”, I get my culprit thought, “Because I have so much to do.” This is the thought that’s causing my current suffering.
3. Thinking that I have so much to do causes my brain to spin in the problem. So I choose to think something else instead so that my brain can work for me, not against me. When I look at the things to do, I ask myself “How can I make this easy?” My brain immediately goes to work looking for solutions.
4. The first solution it gives me is to make a list of the things to do. We try to keep all of this stuff in our heads, which adds to the overwhelm. I get it out of my head and onto paper.
5. Then prioritize this list based on when it needs to be done or order of importance. I break big items up into smaller pieces if necessary.
6. Schedule each of these items in my planner. Each item goes into a TIME SLOT, not just a particular day.
7. Voila! Now that that’s done, I don’t need to use brain power to figure out when things will get done and how I will fit everything in. All I have to do now is follow the plan. By any means necessary. Period.

Truthfully, it’s not as easy and it looks or sounds. It took me a while to get it. But it helps me to keep things in perspective and get things done. If you need help with these steps or just working through overwhelm or anything else, please reach out to me. I’m here to help. I offer free mini-sessions that can help give you some relief.

Gabrielle, The Thought Trainer