Good morning.
Today, I’d like to have a quick word with you about overwhelm. I think we all feel it. And we’re now entering, or we’ve entered, what is often called the silly season, which is appropriate I think.
It’s that time of year when there’s just so much going on, but we’re still trying to run a business well and there’s so much to juggle. You know, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. And I have a little tip for you that I’ll talk to you about today.
I’m Alison Vidotto from Push! business training and mentoring.
Now, we get overwhelmed. I think many of us get overwhelmed at this time of year, because it is so busy. There’s so much going on. We’ve got so much to do. So many deadlines to meet, including the whole gift buying and Christmas plans.
Our personal life starts to take precedence over our business life. It’s all one life in my book, but that’s another video. Dealing with overwhelm at any time of the year is a challenge, but heading to the end of the year, when we’re feeling exhausted and tired out, it can be a bigger challenge than most.
The reason we get so overwhelmed is because there’s so many things on our mind. You know, and it’s just this well of information in there. It feels like it’s floating out of our ears sometimes. And we get worn. Our plates are too full there’s too much to deal with and we simply can’t process at all.
And before we know it, analysis paralysis kicks in and we start to procrastinate the bright shiny objects are sparkling madly. The list keeps growing and so the pressure intensifies, and then we become fearful, and it just seems too much. Because it is it is too much!
So, what we need to do, is we need to take some things off our plate. And So, here’s what I’m going to suggest you do, if you’re feeling overwhelmed.
The first thing to do is… Our brains are just chock full of information and we need to get it out. So we do what is known as a “Brain dump”. So grab a pen and a paper and just start writing.
Similar to morning pages, if you’ve ever heard of that, but it’s at any time of the day. Every single thing that’s on your mind, everything you can think of that you’ve got to get done. Everything that’s worrying you. Anything you think of, just write it down.
Make a list and keep writing. Keep adding to that list, until you can’t think of anything else to add, that you need to get done.
Basically what you’re doing is you’re dumping the contents of your brain onto the page.
Now, once that’s done, and you can write a substantial list, depending on what you’ve got going on. But once you’ve got that done, just take a step back, take a deep breath, have a cup of tea, have a drink of water, and then come back to it.
Then go back through that list. Get a new piece of paper and choose the top five things that you believe you have to get done. Ignore all the rest for now, just look at the top five.
Write them down and then choose two of those items that you’re going to delegate to somebody else. Or, they’re not as urgent as you thought, and you can postpone it.
You’re going to end up with three items left on your list. And with those three tasks you’ll prioritise them. Number one, number two, number three and then go back to number one and start working on it. And get that one done.
Don’t think about the other items on your list, just deal with that ONE thing. And when that’s done, go to the next item on the list, and then the next. You can go back to your original list, and you can go through and prioritise the next three.
Having a clear page, and a clear mind, lets you actually focus. And having just one to three things to get done, the overwhelm disappears. Because you can deal with one to three things.
And because you’re not feeling overwhelmed and you can focus, productivity kicks in and you start to really get things done. You’re feeling back in control, and back in charge of things.
It’s a much, much nicer way to go into the silly season and you’ll be amazed at how much, where are we today? About the tenth I think?
So, there’s still a couple of weeks before Christmas, if you just do this each day, choose three things off your list, and tackle those three things, you’re going to have a much more productive end of year. You’re going to feel much better about yourself, and you’re going to go off and enjoy your break on a high note.
So grab a pen and paper and give it go.
Have a great day.
Thank you. Bye.