The Therapy Edit - On when you can't see the wood for the trees

Episode Date: June 19, 2023

In this episode of The Therapy Edit, Anna talks about those moments when you feel so overwhelmed that you can't see the wood from the trees.When overwhelm kicks in, there is plenty you can do to lessen the panic and start to feel more in control of what lies ahead and in this episode Anna shows you how.We hope you find it helpful.

Hello and welcome to the Therapy Edit podcast with me, psychotherapist Anna Martha. I'll be bringing you weekly 10 minute episodes to encourage and support your emotional well-being. Hello, so today I am talking about those times that you cannot see the word from the trees. Those times when everything just feels like too much everything is shouting for attention. then you've got a never-ending to-do list and there's just absolutely no give up and you feel just suffocated by the weight of it all. So if that resonates now for you, then I have got five tips, practical tips, well-being tips, things that I, reframing tips, things I think will help, things that certainly help me when I'm feeling that, oh, that heavy overwhelmed feeling

of you just literally do not even know where to begin. Number one, write things down, write it all down. What's on your mind? What are those things that are just weighing heavy, those things on the to-do list, those things that you're holding in your mind that you haven't even written down yet, the needs coming towards you.

Write them all down and apply the four Ds. So my four Ds that I apply are downgrade. What can you do? do to take the pressure out of some of those things. Some of those things there, driven by perfectionism, people pleasing, or just wanting to do more than you need to. If so, how can you downgrade them? How can you downgrade them? Think about how can you just make it a little bit smaller? How can you take some of the pressure off? Another D that I use is delegate. Is there anything on there that you can just ask someone else to do. We have so many WhatsApp groups of school

and sometimes you see people delegating certain jobs, admin jobs around the school to other parents and some parents just have a little bit more capacity in that moment. Another D is delay. Is there anything there that actually is not pressing that you can put it in the diary down the line or set a reminder next week, the week after to think about it then? Something there that is on your list that just the very fact of it being on your list just feels too much and actually it doesn't need to be done now. Another D, the final D, is discard. Is there anything on there that actually do you really need to do that? Does it have to be done? Just discard it. Cross it off. Take it off, take it off your to do list and out of your diary. And then actually I have got a fifth

the D. So I'm going to sneak it in there is do. Is there anything there that's really pressing that you could do with prioritising that is taking up a lot of headspace that you've been procrastinating over? Is there anything on there that you should just get done and get done now? So downgrade, delegate, delay, discard and do. So that's actually five D's. So write out your to-do list, all of those things, and apply those deeds and see how that feels. Second tip, number two, get the big things in first. What are the most pressing things weighing on your shoulders right now? It's so tempting sometimes just to get all the little bits done. For example, on my work days, I start with clearing my inbox, or I might, when it's all going on at home, I might just tidy up

the house, tidy up the room. All of these things keep on coming there endless, right? The more we tidy, the more gets messy. The more emails we send, them all come back. But we do this. We go to the small things first because they don't feel quite so big, do they? They feel more doable. And then we get that that little rush of endorphins, that little rush of dopamine when we've ticked off and we've done it and we feel productive and we feel good. So often we head to the little things first because it feels good. But actually we know that it's the big stuff. It's the big stuff in our days, the big work projects, the big, the emails that are hard to answer. So we get to everything else first. The things at home that feel like the mountains to approach. So we do the little things

first. So which of those big things? Could you clear the decks? Just push everything else aside for the moment and approach that the thing that has been weighing heavily for you try and do the big things first the important things first number three rest of course it's got to be in here because it's me i think it's because my whole life has been changed by my appreciation and my recognition of the importance of rest because we're actually more productive when we rest and fuel ourselves. Think about what in your life has slipped, your nourishment, your hydration, doing the things that make you feel good that so often get pushed to the end of the day. I'll do that when I've got everything else done. I'll rest when I've got everything

else done as if we need to deserve it, as if we need to work for it. Now, we can't think or see clearly when we're in stress mode, when we're living in that vital flight that comes, of course it comes when we're not rested, when we haven't met any of our needs. We move into that stress mode. So we're approaching all of these things from a base level of already being stressed. We don't have clarity when we're stressed. We can't make good decisions when we're in fight or flight. So how can you rest first, prioritize it first? I went for a walk this morning before I started my work because I knew that I needed that and I knew that the likelihood of that happening at the end of the day was very low. But I also have learned that I work better when

I have filled up in some way. I've worked, I work better. I'm more productive when I've gone out for a walk, when I've done a workout, when I've spoken to a friend, when I've read a few pages of a book, if rest feels like something it should be earned for you, know that it's a vital need that enables you to do everything else. It's not that doing everything else enables you to rest. That's when we move to a state of collapse and we flop into a heap. But filling yourself up enables you to give out of a place where you have something to give rather than scraping the bottom at the barrel. And we all know what that feels like. Number four is talk to someone. Just offload. Just even simply say how it feels to feel so overwhelmed sometimes.

We can get fresh perspective on things when we talk to people. We externally process all of these things that perhaps we're holding in our minds and on our shoulders. We can externally process. We can get that fresh respective and also someone can help us problem solve some of these things. They might have a solution. They might have a tip or a talk. that really, really helps. I spoke to a friend who was feeling overwhelmed about her workload and I shared with her, what's it called? It's called time blocking and I didn't even realize that this was a thing. I suddenly thought one day I had all of these things on my to-do list and I would look at it and I would feel immediately overwhelmed and at the end of

the day I would have crossed some things off but it was still really, really long. And what I started doing was allocating time in my diary for every single thing. I had to do, be it reply to a tricky email, be it do a bit of filming, be it write an article, be it research something for one of my kids' schools. I just started putting bits of time in my diary to do these things. And then I knew that it was covered. And it didn't all feel like it was an endless to-do list. Everything was allocated. It's like my future self was saying, hey, it's okay, you do those things. I'll do these things. And honestly, it changed so much that I shared this with her and she was so excited to do it and I cannot wait to see how it helps her as well.

But had she not spoken to me about how overwhelmed she was feeling with work, I wouldn't have shared that with her. I wouldn't have thought to. So talk to someone. And number five is practice gratitude. Along the way, when you're feeling overwhelmed, we can feel like life is moving by at a pace that we can't keep up with. Sometimes I say I feel like I'm on a treadmill and I can't find the slow down button. My legs are going faster than I can manage and I can't make it stop. We realize that life moves by in a blur when we can't see the wood for the trees and everything feels too much. So how can we slow ourselves down? I've got loads of tips for resting when you can't. And one of the big things I'm doing at the minute is not tearing

around my own home, just noticing when I'm talking or moving fast, giving my body the signal that I need to run. Something's going on. Something bad is happening. So I'm slowing down, slowing down to soften that nervous system response. Now, if you want to explore these things anymore, I've got some resources. I've got a video workshop on my website called Mothering the Mother. I've got one on overwhelming burnout, which is absolutely perfect for this. I've got the week on Worth course, which is all to do with little bits of reading each day and journaling just for a week to really help you recognize that you are worthy of enjoying the now as well and helps tweaks your tweaks your attitude towards rest. And don't forget my book coming out in August, it's called

Raising a Happier Mother and that will address all of these things in detail as well. Sending you love as you search for the wood in the trees. Thank you so much for listening. Please do take a moment to subscribe, rate and review as it really helps get these words out to benefit more. more juggling parents like us and head to anamatha.com to find my resources on everything from health anxiety to people pleasing starting at only 20 pounds and finally don't forget to pre-order my new book raising a happier mother how to find balance feel good and see your children flourish as a result i can't wait for you to have that take care and we'll chat soon