What do you do when you feel overwhelmed?

[midwestmedia]

I am totally overwhelmed and have come to a point where I just don't know what to do next.

I seem to have a to-do list a mile long, and everytime I cross one thing off, I remember two more things I need to add.

What do you do to help with feeling overwhelmed? I feel like I can't pinpoint the right thing to do at the right time anymore because I have so many things to do. If I'm not installing a script, fixing a template, writing an autoresponder message, or trying to actually finish an article, I'm doing one of another million things.

I just feel like my momentum is completely gone!

Any advice? I sure could use it!

Thanks!

Jen

[Eklavya]

" For every problem under the sun

there is a solution or is none

if there is one, try to find it

if there is none, never mind it "

It may sound incredible but you need a break dear.

Today, just finish the most important tasks. Only those which really matters.

From tomorrow take a break and do nothing. Just keep lying on your bed, take ur spouse for a long drive, eat , drink, dance and sing.

There is more to life than just work work and more work.

The world is not going to finish if you stopped doing your duty.

Had I been in your situation, I would take a break, contemplate over my situation, evaluate 'what's going wrong', prioritise my work, make a time table and start afresh.

But first of all I'll take a break. Just like when my PC gets cluttered with so many programs at one go, I shutdown it and reboot it after sometime.

Regards

[WAHumor]

Plan, plan, plan.

Then schedule, schedule, schedule.

And then stick to it.

Only by knowing what you intend to accomplish in what particular time frame can you maintain whatever sanity you possess.

You can do a search here for "time management" or "work schedules" and the like.

You can also see what I've been cracking down on here:
http://www.wahumorway.com/wahumor/forum ... .php?t=465

Hope that helps!

[Sunshine]

Jen,

I've been where you are right now. And every now and then I fall back into that same rut but that only happens when I stop following the advice I'm about to give you.

My suggestion is get a notebook with different sections - each section will be for each of your sites. Then, sit down and write down everything that you need to do for each site. This may take several days. But if it does, don't worry about it - take whatever time you need. After you've listed everything, go back and prioritze your list.

Once you prioritize your list then each day that you want to work on your sites, go and get your notebook with your list and then try to accomplish 1 or more tasks on your list.

This works for me. It might work for you as well.

Sunshine

[Lynn Terry]

[midwestmedia]

[WAHumor]

[Lynn Terry]

Hey, check out this article from Carmen:



I just found this post on her blog this evening, and thought you might enjoy it. Particularly the links to the workflow diagrams.

[90PercentAttitude]

Hi Jen,

Hopefully by now you've had an opportunity to do both a brain dump as well as take some well needed rest. Walking away for a day or two is both one of the most difficult tasks as well as the most cleansing.

I just did the same thing over the holiday weekend and the renewal and focus that I have has paid bigger dividends than if I had used the same time to push through the exhaustion.

I would like to hear how it all turned out for you and where you are with it at this point? Also, assuming you completed the brain dump, it may also help to look at the list objectively and ask yourself if the world would end if it all didn't get completed in 48 hours.

There is the diligent work ethic that drives us to accomplish our goals, but at the same time, it is equally important to put it all in perspective in the bigger picture. Yes, this is our livlihood and we all want to do our level best to be perfect in all our endeavors. Those are honorable goals, but at the same time, realizing that our health and mental well being are equally important, if not more so, makes us that much more "fit" to live up to the expectations we place upon ourselves.

Have FUN & Fortune!
Stephanie

[rodgerc]

Hi Jen,

I know how you feel about having a seemingly endless to-do list

One approach that I've found very helpful, at least for me, is to distinguish between your projects and your tasks.

Your projects represent your high-level outcomes that you are trying to accomplish, and your tasks are the things you need to do for the projects.

Having a master project list that is separate from your task list helps you see and prioritize the "big picture" because the projects list is often much smaller than the task list.

Like Lynn said, prioritization is very important. I've found that prioritizing your projects based on how important they are to your overall goals, whether they are money makers, etc., is a big help.

If you decide that a project is just not worth doing right now, you can take out all of the tasks for that project out of your to-do list. Not delete them, just delay them until you decide it is worth it to continue with that project.

Prioritizing your tasks for a project helps because you'll often get to a point where the project is "good enough" and you can delay or even eliminate some of the less important tasks.

Having a task list that you can filter by project lets you focus in on just the tasks for your current project without being overwhelmed by everything else on your list. At the same time, you can keep track of all your tasks.

Looking at things from a project perspective can also help you make time for important projects that you would have neglected otherwise because their tasks are burried somewhere in your mile long to-do list

I know this type of "project based" planning/thinking style doesn't work for everyone, nothing does. But if you'd like to give it a try, you can find out more in some of my articles:

http://www.timethoughts.com/time/write-things-down.htm

http://www.timethoughts.com/time/priori ... 0-rule.htm

http://www.timethoughts.com/timemanagem ... o-list.htm

What are you using to keep track of your to-do list?

I'll put in a plug for my Achieve Planner software that is based on these ideas. You can read more about it here:

http://www.effexis.com/achieve/planner.htm

I'm just about to release a new version, and I've prepared a getting started guide that gives a good overview of what the software can do. If you are interested, right click on this link to save it to your hard drive (it's a PDF).

http://dl.filekicker.com/send/file/1833 ... dGuide.pdf

I'm in the process of creating some training videos for it as well, but they won't be ready for a couple of weeks.

Anyway, good luck with everything.

Best regards,
Rodger

[RKramkowski]

Hi Jen,

I have a few additions and confirmations of some of the earlier posts. I agree with the brain dump. In particular, I am using a PDA to keep my calendar and task list. Once an appointment or meeting is in the calendar, I don't have to think about it again. I check it at night to see where I need to be in the am and when, and I also do the same around noon. Besides, it beeps at me to notify me of upcoming events. I used to try to do it from memory but just got overwhelmed with stuff (ooohhh, my brain hurts!). It is also easy to schedule recurring meetings or events and reschedule very easily - something that was a real pain when I used a paper based system.

Being a project manager by day, I'd add something else to the project management approach. I use MS Project to manage my projects (which most people won't have) but tasks aren't just a list of things to be done. there are also dependencies between them. For example, when building a house, you can't paint the walls if the sheetrock isn't up (so if the walls aren't up, you don't need to hurry up and buy paint!). Likewise with tasks. I don't need to see or worry about those that cannot be done yet because five other things have to happen first. By maintaining an order of when tasks need to be done (not by time, but by what has to be done before that particular task can be done) I can focus on those that I can do something about now. As tasks complete, others come into focus.

Hope this also helps,
Bob

[Nate]

Jen,

Sometimes I don't know whether to scratch my head or wind my watch! I know one thing, you have to keep your sense of humor or you'll go nuts. Maybe you should do an e-book on how to handle the feeling.

One thing I'm gonna do is make a list of step one, step two, step 3 etc to accomplish each project...then folow it thru...I am a great believer in simplification. Stick to one project at a time if possible. Guru Matt Bacak says too many things at once will put you into bankruptcy.

Get one project done and successful and then on to the next.
(And of course a little Jack Daniels might help)

Hang in there!
Nate

[lifechanges]

jen...

some tasks are ongoing and others are immediate. set aside time once a week to work on your ongoing tasks list. figure out what you have to do daily and then after that schedule certain times of the day that you will do the immediate to do list. so you have your daily todos every day anyway you wont have to freak out about, you know you have to do them so you get em done. then you have a time each day like me from 12-5 to handle all the things on my immediate to-do list. This may be something for business or my family, and this is the time I schedule doctor appointments etc. but the point here is that you have to get the main things out of the way first, then knock of what you can each day from the list of to dos. Then once a week for me its Saturday I sit down to do things like writing articles or blogs, or editing scripts or documents etc. These are usually administrative things that my CUSTOMERS arent affected by. ANYTHING that affects my customers is worked into my DAILY todo list because WITHOUT CUSTOMERS you arent making money right? So you might feel overwhelmed, but as long as you dont allow it to affect your paycheck you are doin alright. Also if you are working at home, FLY Lady has great ideas for home organization. I 'shine my sink' every night and do a '30 minute mission' every morning, lol. The site for that is Best of luck with everything and I hope I have helped at least a little.

Peace and Wellness,