Overwhelm
We get overwhelmed when we’re pulled in multiple directions at any given time. There’s our own goals, our jobs and careers, our relationships, our obligations, our responsibilities. And they never end, constantly piling up.
But such is life. This is the price of being alive. But we don’t have to succumb to it.
It starts with silence. Find it anywhere. Close your eyes and just breathe. If possible, block everything else out—get away from others, put your phone away, block any distractions. This lets you get settled and allows you to focus. If you feel guilty for this, remember that your mental health comes first.
Next, write. Write anything down that you’re currently thinking. Write it on a piece of paper, a notes app, a notebook, it doesn’t matter. Write it anywhere. Write it on the first thing you can write it on. Just write. There’s no format.
From there, identify what’s actually urgent. Not everything that feels urgent actually is. I’ll go to say that few things are actually urgent at any given time. From those few, pick one, and start there. Start with the smallest thing you can do.
Then, just do one thing. You can’t do it all at the same time. But you can do something. Just start there. And build momentum.
- Find silence.
- Get clarity.
- Start anything.
If it gets overwhelming again, return to this simple framework.
Ps. I was overwhelmed when I wrote this. It’s not the most urgent thing that I needed to do, but writing it allowed me to calm down, to eventually do the thing that I needed to do. That’s the beauty of writing. Each word and each line written down allows me to hyper-focus and block everything else out. It’s writing for me, but it can be something else for you.
December 7, 2024