The Two Secrets to Overcoming Overwhelm at Work

Posted on April 21st, 2010 by Meghna Majmudar

meghnaisfabulousMeghna heads up the High Impact Teams consulting practice at Ferrazzi Greenlight with Keith. She is based in New York City. If you have questions or want to increase your team's impact, contact her at mmajmudar at ferrazzigreenlight dot com.

Do you have so much to do at work it's hard to stop and take a breath? Then it's time to SLOW DOWN! If you don't, the universe will find a way to do it for you - you'll slip up, get sick, or worse.

Think you can't slow down? Here are two big suggestions that have helped me when I hit one of these vicious cycles of overwhelm.

1. Do just enough to check things off your list – I usually get my work done early. My documents look polished. I like to go iterate over a couple of drafts of deliverables. But in times of overwhelm, I let go of these “nice to haves” and focused on the minimum I needed to get done. So my documents weren’t as pretty, and I had to work right up to my deadline – but the clients didn’t notice and we got positive momentum on a couple of new initiatives to boot!

2. Get present and breathe. I used to pooh-pooh all the stress-management advice. I’m young, I do a lot of yoga, I got stress handled, or so I think…regardless, when overwhelmed, I know my fight-or-flight behaviors take over. I noticed I was acting “fight or flight” – impatient, feeling unappreciated, craving junk food - and reminded myself to breathe, calm down, and take a second look at the situation. This pause short-circuited the feelings of hopelessness, and helped me see the right next step.

Tell me – what do you do to get back on top of your game?

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5 comments // In Mindsets, Uncategorized
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5 Responses so far | Have Your Say!

  1. I come into the office for a few hours when no one else is there. Then I declutter my desk. That usually makes some space to breathe and to feel caught up.

  2. Prioritizing first gets me focused on what I need to do.

    Then I remind myself I can only do one thing at a time, and therefore I only have one thing to do. Realizing this calms me right down.

  3. It's one of the hardest things for me to do, so I'm practicing 'asking for help' when I'm feeling overwhelmed at work or at home.

    I also let go of the notion of perfection and go for 'good enough.'

  4. Brian Cohen says:
    April 25, 2010 at 10:43 am
    Reply

    I clear my head by exercising and burning off some distracting energy. Beyond that I will pick a project that I know I will accomplish quickly. This gives me a confidence boost which helps me get back on track.

  5. Mary Slater says:
    April 27, 2010 at 4:52 am
    Reply

    I turn off the email. Things are constantly coming in, so by turning off and closing my Outlook so I'm not alerted when a new challenge arrises, I am able to focus on one thing at a time. If it's really that important, someone will call me or come find me.

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