Untangling Stressful Habits – Overwhelm

If you have been in my world for a while, you will know that I am passionate about habits and untangling unhelpful habits to live a fulfilling and whole-hearted life as a well-being. So I am writing a series to shed some light on some stressful habits that have come back in to my awareness recently.

Before I start sharing about stressful habits, let’s have a look at what stressful habits are.

What Are Stressful Habits?

Basically – habits can be useful or not so useful, helpful or not so helpful, stress inducing or not. Sometimes we are conscious of our habit/s (i.e. often chosen and intentional) or the habit/s can sit within our blind spots or the unknown.

When I refer to stressful habits, I am referring to habits that are impacting our overall life, business or well-being. They could be adding extra stress, suffering or draining life force energy in our lives. The stressful habits could be showing up in one or a variety of areas within our lives (i.e. physical, emotional, mental, financial, environmental or social).

In order to start to untangle from stressful habits, we need to develop self-awareness, so we can be more responsible and take ownership of our own life. Today I wanted to introduce overwhelm.

Stressful Habit: Overwhelm

Have you ever had that feeling where the number of tasks on your ‘to-do’ list is completely out of control? Maybe you are continually running late for appointments? Or missing deadlines or important events? Chances are you are familiar with overwhelm and don’t worry, you are definitely not alone! That place of overwhelm is familiar…

Some definitions of overwhelm include –

• “bury or drown beneath a huge mass of something, especially water” ~ Google
• “to overwhelm completely in mind or feeling” ~ Dictionary.com
• “to burden excessively” or “to overpower in mind or feeling” ~ the Free Dictionary.
• “That our lives are somehow unfolding faster than the human nervous system and psyche are able to manage well” ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn, and
• “to affect (someone) very strongly” or “to cause (someone) to have too many things to deal with” ~ Learner’s Dictionary.

Anything you would add to these definitions of overwhelm? Feel free to share below

Where Does Overwhelm Show Up?

Overwhelm can show up in many places within our lives. For example from our work to our relationships to our financial situation. When overwhelm shows up, it often spills over in to the rest of our life, so it is important to take the times to recognise it. Once we recognise it, we can then discover ways to help befriend and then untangle from the overwhelm.

Over to You…

Now you have this awareness, what is your next step? Feel free to share any insights on overwhelm or a reflection below.

If you are ready to take yourself on the adventure of getting to know yourself (your true Self), why not join the Toolkit? A place where I share tools, inspiration and ideas to live a courageous and openhearted life.