too much to do? read this first

How much time and energy do you waste 'doing overwhelm'?

Last Sunday night, my nearly 13-year-old morphed from calm to super cyclonic in a matter of minutes.  It went something like this:

Her history assignment was due tomorrow!  She wanted a good mark!!  She couldn't set the table - she was busy!!!  She had to dye the assignment pages with cold tea and burn the edges with a candle!!!! SHE DOES HER BEST WORK UNDER PRESSURE!!!!!

It was teen drama at its best and, as I left her to it on the bathroom floor with a live flame and the second cup of English Breakfast (as my husband inadvertently tipped the first one down the sink), it occurred to me that I'd seen this 'overwhelm strategy' somewhere before...

The first time most of us come up against Too Much Work To Do is in high school.  As young teens, we invent an approach for dealing with this, which we reinforce as we run the same pattern again and again over the next few years.

It's as natural as covering your bedroom wall with posters and thinking your parents were born yesterday, but a great question to ask is this: How much has your 'overwhelm strategy' changed since high school? 

Are you still being a 'drama queen', doing things the way teenagers do (catastrophising, exaggerating, avoiding, making a meal out of your 'to do' list, flapping around, getting attention...)? 

Or are you handling a high workload like an adult?

This week, I asked a group of middle-managers in a workshop how they 'do overwhelm' and they came up with the following techniques:

• Panic

• Tell myself 'I can't do it'

• Tell everyone around me how much I have on and that it's all too much

• Wonder how I'll get it done

• Tell myself 'I'll fail'.

• Tell everyone else 'I'll fail'

• Complain

• Avoid

• Distract myself with something else

• Leave it even later, deliberately creating the pressure I need to do my best work...

Next, I asked them to give that behaviour an 'age'.  They looked at the strategy they'd outlined as a group and said, uniformly and without hesitation: 'teenager'.

So I'm wondering - is relying on an approach that we developed at a time when we were prone to maximum drama really the best way to deal with things now?

If not, what would be a grown-up strategy for overwhelm?

• Remaining calm

• Telling yourself 'I'm capable, I'm fine, I can do this'

• Breaking the 'to do' list into categories - what needs to be done now, by you, what can be delegated, what can be postponed and what can be cancelled

• Making necessary phone calls, emails or other arrangements to support getting you through this peak work period

• Breaking each big task into 'chunks'

• Asking 'what is the purpose' of each task on your list.  If what you're spending your time on doesn't fit with your top priorities, do something else.

• Choosing to do the tasks that will put the biggest dent in your list, rather than the easiest activities

• Asking 'what is the very next step?' and doing that

• Seeking guidance from others, including your manager, about what is your highest priority

• Taking care of yourself: eating well, having regular breaks, exercising, having adequate sleep, having 'me time' and time for interests and family

These are the techniques that the group brainstormed in the workshop - you might have many more.

Next time you have a lot on your plate, ask yourself if you are 'doing overwhelm'.  Are you choosing behaviour that assists you to deal with pressure and make good progress - or are you stuck in a teen flashback?