How To Overcome Overwhelm and Get Focused on Your Priorities
It’s all too easy to feel overwhelmed as our lives have become so overloaded with “things” to do, activity-driven schedules to keep, and making the most of the increasing variety of technology enabled options in our lives.
The Internet, Blackberrys, iPhones, iPads, texting, Twitter, Facebook, and others, while giving us greater options to access and receive information, keep in contact, make new contacts, and communicate with speed, immediacy, and diversity, also can create overwhelm, and ironically, disconnect…
Information overload is a biggie, with the pressure to read more, and deal with the information bombardment that comes our way each day.
Overwhelm undoubtedly causes stress, frustration and exhaustion, but it also leads to procrastination, paralysis, feeling “stuck”, and inaction…
Many of you also may be pursuing your dream of building your own Home Business, while still in full-time employment. This requires major commitment, focusing on priorities, and good planning.
Otherwise it can just feel like “it’s all too hard and too much.” And just giving up (ugh!… sigh…) may seem like the easier option…
While you’re overwhelmed and overloaded, with all the noises on the channel that it creates, you will not hear the inspirational, intuitive and creative nudges coming to you and tapping, that can transform your life.
Here are 10 Top Tips to help you work your way through the overwhelm, and find a clear pathway to help you prioritize what’s Most Important, and what’s not so important after all…
1. Do a “Brain Dump” – to start with, this is where you get it all out and write everything down in one place. There’s great benefit in getting everything down on paper or on your computer screen.
It helps you identify and capture what needs to be done all in one spot, rather than letting the nagging thoughts keep popping up, sneaking up on you unexpectedly, randomly in your mind, out of control, and scaring and stressing you out about ALL that needs to be done.
Just the simple act of doing a Brain Dump brings a sense of relief and a clearer picture. It’s like rounding them all up and corralling them in an enclosure.
2. Rate the items as High, Medium, Low, and focus on the High items first. As you’ve got everything down in the Brain Dump, you know you can rest assured they’re listed and you can always go back to the lesser priorities later. At least they’re all captured and recorded.
3. This becomes your “Must Do List” or “To Do List” – I prefer to call it your “Must Do List” because it has that much more important absolute imperative, focus and high priority tone.
Now, next you Focus on the 1 or 2 most important items on your Must Do List or To Do List.
4. Not To Do List - Alongside your To Do List or Must Do List, put together a Not To Do List - the things you don’t really have to do, or can delegate or outsource to others, freeing up your time for the essential High and Medium Priority Items.
It’s important to try to simplify and de-clutter our otherwise over-complicated and overloaded lives, as much as possible.
5. Keep in mind the 80/20 Pareto Principle rule and focus on the 20% that will give you 80% benefit impact (or more realistically as some people believe it’s more like 95/5, or 5% that will give you 95% benefit impact).
Focus on the 1 or 2 most important tasks that will give you the biggest and best results, the “biggest bang for your buck” for that day – the “bang or bust”, the “do or die”…
Ask yourself when considering each task – will this task have a “make or break” impact on my business, career, personal life, or is it just small stuff? Will it take me a big step forward, and propel me into a quantum leap jump ahead, or is it irrelevant, borderline, small stuff?
What is the most important thing for me to do that will “make a difference”, and support and help move me toward achieving my overall, bigger, longer term goals? Only give major priority to those things that move you toward achieving your Goals.
6. Pick 3 days this coming week where you can try this approach – and then stick to it. Make it 3 consecutive days, and give it a fair shot.
7. Devote/block out a ½ day to doing the annoying little things like replying to emails, admin stuff etc.
Get them all done, get rid of them, and sweep them all away. You’ll get a lot done, stop the annoying feeling of needing to get them done, and get a high feeling of satisfaction from having completed those tasks. You’ll be surprised… And, you’ll feel so much lighter, happier and satisfied.
8. The Balancing Act - many of you may be pursuing the dream of building your own Home Business. You’re at work each day at your place of employment, plus developing your own business, so you’re balancing 2 separate priorities – current employment versus nurturing and developing your self-employed business dream.
It helps to separate them, compartmentalize them.
Obviously while you’re working for an employer, you need to attend to the major priorities there, probably first thing in the day.
Then make a commitment and block out time, to attend to the 1 or 2 most important things you need to attend to in developing your new business, and stick to it. Do the latter after work in the evening in your own time, or on the weekends. Do whatever it takes to achieve and succeed.
9. Tackling New Things Can Be a Challenge – If you’re pursuing developing your own Home Business, inevitably there are many new things you will be learning, doing and applying, and this can lead to overwhelm, procrastination and inaction.
For example, you may be getting into keyword research for the first time… you’re doing something new, so it can be a bit difficult to jump into it, and you can end up putting it off.
To make it easier, set aside a small chewable chunk of time, and take the first step. Try to set aside a ½ hour and “Just Do It”.
It’s easier to make a commitment and get into it if you set a ½ hr time slot to get started. If you find you’re on a roll, and can continue for a bit longer, then do so for sure.
I love the quote by Dr. Martin Luther King -
“You don’t have to see the whole staircase; you just have to take the first step.”
10. You can only get so much done, so don’t beat yourself up. Most importantly, be kind and go easy on yourself.
Please do let me know your thoughts by entering your comment below.
To Your Success!
Kathy
P.S. Don’t forget to grab my free gift e-Book by entering your details below.
Kathy Baker
http://www.YourSuccessMasteryNow.com
http://www.ALLInteractiveSolutions.com
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Comments
15 Comments on How To Overcome Overwhelm and Get Focused on Your Priorities
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al on
Fri, 2nd Apr 2010 2:27 pm
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Kathy Baker on
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Kathy Baker on
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Olga Degtyareva (Peaceful Productivity) on
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Kathy Baker on
Mon, 9th May 2011 12:19 am
Sometimes I think that a lot of my life has been a series of swings into and out of overwhelm.
This post is certainly the single most helpful series of tactics and ideas I’ve come across.
Any plans on writing a short book on this?
…it would have to be short mind!!
Great post, thank you Kathy
You’re most welcome Alex!
And, thank you for your most gracious feedback. My intention is to help others as much as I can with practical information and tips, and when I receive comments such as yours, I feel most heartened.
Yes a short ebook is in the pipeline…
Kathy 
Thank you for useful tips, awesome job.
Nice story! I have been looking thru search engines for several hours looking for relevant facts about this, they absolutely should position your site higher!
Kathy I absolutely love this post…
I myself am experiencing overwhelm and seeing these tips has helped me greatly…I’ve subscribed to your feed so I can keep updated with new insights by you.
Currently I’m studying a diploma in hypnotherapy so have lots of essays to write, practical to sort…I’ve just agreed to film and edit a friends wedding (so need to sort out all that) and at work I’m in a new department working with Slovakians so having to learn new processes as well as a new language….Arrrgh is the short expression I feel like using.
Thanks alot for this post.
Regards
Andy
You wouldn’t believe it but I’ve wasted all day digging for some articles about this. You’re a lifesaver, it was an excellent read and has helped me out to no end. Cheers,
Thank you Andy for your feedback which is very much appreciated.
Yes indeed, you have quite a bit on your plate. Remember to take one step at a time, stay focused on the next most important thing to tackle and get done.
I find “being” in the moment, and staying in that moment very helpful, clearing and setting aside thoughts about other competing priorities, until the task at hand is done. And then being generous and reward myself for getting the task done.
Andy, if you would like me to address any other particular topic, please do let me know, and I’ll certainly take it on and do my very best.
Wishing you the best!
Kathy
My cousin recommended this blog and she was totally right keep up the fantastic work!
Heya, my very first comment on your site. I have been reading your blog for a while and thought I would completely pop in and drop a friendly note. It is great stuff indeed. I also wanted to ask…is there a way to subscribe to your site via email?…
Excellent tips Kathy! I especially like the “Not to Do” List. I teach my productivity coaching clients about this all of the time. I recently created a compilation post on overcoming overwhelm and I’d love for you to share your thoughts in the comments. You have some great ideas in this post and I know my readers would love to hear from you too.
To your success!
Stephanie
[...] you’re just operating on hope and a whim, and can easily fall back into the fog or the overwhelm of information bombardment and everything you need to [...]
Thank you Stephanie for your feedback! I’m heading on over to your blog to check out your overcoming overwhelm compilation post right now…
Cheers
Kathy
Thank you Kathy – this is SO helpful!!!!
Hi Kathy! Great post and it is speaking right to me: someone who has a day time job trying to set-up my own home business. Often overwhelmed.
I loved when you said about picking a 1/2hour time to do one new difficult thing, or to get all those other little things out of the way. I find it is the most powerful tool for me – set a timer for half an hour and just do it! It saves from overwhelm when you are worried about too many things as well as procrastination. Timer lets you keep focus on just this one task, and make all other worries non-existent!
I would add another powerful tool here – a Weekly Planning of priorities (I call it a Weekly Summit, and I wrote a blog post on it recently http://wp.me/p16Fuk-5w).
Thanks again for sharing. Waiting for more. Olga
Hi Olga! Thank you so much for your feedback.
Your Weekly Summit idea is a great one. I’ll pop on over to your blog and read your post.
Another great technique is to identify 3-5 tasks you really enjoy, and 3-5 tasks you don’t enjoy, but have to do.
Then using the 1/2 hour time slot again, alternate by addressing a task you don’t enjoy and get it done, followed by a task that you do enjoy. And so forth…
Thereby, you are “rewarding” yourself with the 1/2 hour spent on the task you do enjoy. And you break up the pattern of the day.
You also find that you actually get more done that way, as you end up being more time-efficient, with less time-wasting on a task you don’t enjoy that may drag on if you don’t have this system in place. You know you have a fun task coming up soon within the 1/2 hour…
As long as you stay true and accountable to yourself, don’t fritter time away, and put your ALL into getting the less enjoyable task done with integrity.
And, this makes for enjoying yourself more overall at the same time… Here’s to having more FUN!
Kathy
P.S. Here’s another one I’ve just been introduced to in a Coaching Webinar:
“The “Pomodoro” Technique” – 25 mins block of really FOCUSED work, then 5 mins break.
After 4 sets (2 hrs) take a longer break – 15-30mins.
No interruptions! Airplane mode, Skype and email off.
Interrupted Pomodoros are VOID. You start over again!
http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/products.html by Francesco Cirillo
You can view direct or via Scribd – Enjoy!…
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