5 Common Mistakes That Lead to Overwhelm—And How to Reverse Them

Dr. Christine Li [00:00:00]:
Welcome back to the Make Time for Success podcast. This is episode number 282. If you are currently feeling a bit of overwhelm or a lot of overwhelm, I want to let you know that I think that is good news. I think that's good news because overwhelm is a temporary state, and it is a state that I hope to help you understand much better. Inside today's episode, I give you five different mistakes that we all can make that can thrust us into a state of overwhelm. But I also, of course, provide different options for getting yourself out of that temporary state. And of course, we want to be free from overwhelm. So let's go listen to this episode together now.

Dr. Christine Li [00:00:53]:
Hi, I'm Dr. Christine Li, and I'm a psychologist and a procrastination coach. I've helped thousands of people move past procrastination and overwhelm so they could begin working to their potential. In this podcast, you're going to learn powerful strategies for getting your mind, body, and energy to work together so that you can focus on what's really important

Dr. Christine Li [00:01:17]:
and accomplish the goals you want to achieve.

Dr. Christine Li [00:01:20]:
When you start living within your full power, you're going to see how being productive can be easy and how you can create success on demand. Welcome to the Make Time for Success podcast.

Dr. Christine Li [00:01:35]:
Hi, everyone. I want to introduce to you the topic of this episode, and that is to explain some of the core reasons why people fall into overwhelm. I have noticed that it is a very common state that people can find themselves in. I certainly am not immune to the state myself, but I do understand it, and I do want to share with you five of the most common mistakes that lead us to have only overwhelm as a choice. And then, of course, I'm going to explain how to reverse engineer that overwhelm so that you get rid of it and so that you can just live your life and do the things that you really want to get done and feel the way you really want to feel. So I'm going to start with the list of five mistakes, and then I'm going to do a short ending message about how to reverse engineer the whole thing. The first mistake that I see people making is they are working without a sense of a bigger vision for what they want to see happening. So essentially, they're lacking vision.

Dr. Christine Li [00:02:44]:
It's not that they don't want things to be great, they really do. But in some ways, when you're lacking the big vision picture, every day can feel the same. Every single thing on your to do list can feel of equal importance or of equal unimportance, if that's a word, which it probably isn't. And we can easily fall into a feeling that there's only stress because it's just one to do list item after another, this never ending cycle. We're just workhorses. We're just laborers. We're just the doers. And we're not really enjoying the fact that we're on a larger path towards a larger vision.

Dr. Christine Li [00:03:30]:
And I think that is why the overwhelm kind of creeps in. Because we're not taking time to really celebrate. We're not taking time to see where we are on our journey. And we keep thinking that we're on ground, the ground floor level zero all the time. That every morning feels like a big weight instead of, oh, I am really halfway towards my goal, or oh, I'm so proud of myself for getting to the gym. Two out of the five days that I've had. There is that feeling like, what is this all about? That you're wondering what your purpose and your vision are. So I'm going to suggest now that you take a moment to really figure out what are the details? What is the path that I'm trying to build? What is the end goal that I'm looking towards? And then see yourself as being on that path rather than being on ground zero all the time.

Dr. Christine Li [00:04:34]:
The ground floor, the ground level. I'm mixing all the words, but you know what I mean. Have a vision. See yourself as gliding towards that vision and just be committed to that vision too. I think that really does help to stave off overwhelm, is when you think, I've got this nailed down. I know where I'm going. Nobody can stop me. So that's the first mistake is lacking vision.

Dr. Christine Li [00:04:59]:
The second mistake is that you are in overwhelm because you're guided by your fear rather than by any vision. When we don't have vision, then what happens? Our fears creep in too. The fear and the overwhelm step in to say, hi, we're here, we're visiting, and these are unwanted visitors. We don't want anything distracting us from our pure power, our directedness, our intention, our commitment to getting those goals. And so what do we do if we have fears? We start saying, oh, what if all my preparation fails? What if I forget something right in the middle of my path? What if it starts raining in the middle of my big event? What if I forget my words while I'm on stage? We can, what if ourselves to death, honestly. And I don't want you to do that. I want you to get away from the negative predictions. Those are the what if statements, the what if questions we want to say instead of what could go wrong.

Dr. Christine Li [00:06:09]:
We want to really dig into. How am I going to feel when I achieve my goal? What is it going to look like when I fulfill my vision? And then guess what happens? There's no room for fear at that finish line. There really isn't, because you're going to be enjoying yourself. So there really shouldn't be room for fear and overwhelm when you're starting. Even if you are on the ground floor of your path, you're at the starting line. You should clear yourself of fear. You're allowed to, of course, think any thoughts you want, but don't let yourself get stymied by imaginary monsters, imaginary accidents, imaginary negative outcomes that are really going to terrify you and take your full power away. So don't make the mistake of being guided by your fear.

Dr. Christine Li [00:07:06]:
Be guided by your vision instead. The third mistake that I see people making is that they are working with no joy involved. So it's like I hear people talking about the projects that they need to do. Oftentimes it's clearing clutter, because I am offering people help with clearing clutter. So I hear a lot about clutter. And let me tell you, people are not excited about dealing with the clutter. The layers of generational stress and those ghosts of the past and those tea sets and the china that you don't know what to do with. It really generates a lot of negative feelings, a lot of hopelessness, a lot of feelings like, I don't have space and time for myself.

Dr. Christine Li [00:07:57]:
Even in my own home or my larger property, I'm crowded out by stuff that does not bring me joy. That is why Marie Kondo made such a splash with her book about decluttering and sparking joy. To show you which items you want to keep and which ones you want to discard. Her big point, which went global, was that we should only keep and tolerate items and mementos that bring us joy. When we don't, we are living with things that bring up other feelings like distress, wastefulness, feeling constrained, feeling overwhelmed. And we just want to spark joy in our spaces. We no longer want to be looking around our house feeling overwhelmed and stressed and unhappy. So figure out, how do I add joy into my environment? How do I add joy into my work process? Whether it's setting yourself up in the morning at your desk, or if you're working on a farm, for instance.

Dr. Christine Li [00:09:11]:
How do you get yourself up feeling fully energized and excited to greet the day and the tasks of the farm? No matter what your occupation is, there is a way to add joy, especially if you've been living in overwhelm for the past weeks or months. It's time. It's really time. You are very much allowed to create your work style and to add joy wherever you can. We need to change things up in this direction, and joy never hurt anyone. Okay. The fourth mistake that I see people making is that they are in a state of decision paralysis. So what is decision paralysis?

Dr. Christine Li [00:09:57]:
It sounds bad, right?

Dr. Christine Li [00:09:58]:
It sounds like you are afraid to move. And that's what it is. It's not a literal paralysis, thank goodness. But. But emotionally and cognitively, your brain and body are telling you you are too overwhelmed to make a good decision, so you must stop. And that leads to a feeling or a state of decision paralysis where even small decisions like what do I need from the grocery store? Triggers overwhelm. And it's an overwhelming trigger. Both are happening.

Dr. Christine Li [00:10:32]:
And of course, we want to be able to wake up in the morning feeling like, I've got the groceries covered. That is easy. I've got my next decisions handled. I've thought this through. I trust myself, and I'm going to go forward. Even though it feels challenging, even though I don't know everything about what's going to happen in the outcome, I'm going to go with this feeling of confidence. And that's really what happens when you get out of decision paralysis. You find confidence.

Dr. Christine Li [00:11:04]:
When you're in paralysis. All you're stuck with is a whole batch more of fear, a whole batch more of time loss, a whole batch more of stress, because you know things are eventually gonna have to be decided. So do yourself a favor, and the moment you sense decision paralysis coming in to join fear and overwhelm, you think to yourself, okay, what am I going to choose? Because guess what? When you make a choice, although it's never guaranteed that you're going to win, on the other end of a choice, you are going to get freedom from paralysis and you are going to get information, because you have done the big girl, big boy movement of saying, I choose this, and things are gonna get clearer because you made that choice. So paralysis is never the best option, in my view. So avoid making that mistake. The fifth mistake that I wanna tell you about is when we decide that we're so in love with our thoughts that we lose sight of the Fact that we need to take action, too. So the fifth point is basically that you are stuck in a pattern of overthinking without maybe even knowing it. So you may just be thinking to yourself, oh, I just need to think this through again.

Dr. Christine Li [00:12:32]:
Oh, I just need to rewrite this a fourth time. Oh, I need to delay the deadline because I'm not ready, and I have more thoughts to review or to come up with. So it might be creativity that you want to have room for. It might be feeling like you just need a little more time. But there comes a time when you really are overdoing things and you are overthinking things. And by the very nature of the word overthinking, you've already diagnosed yourself that you've already thought enough, that you've already done a sufficient amount of consideration. And we don't want to forget that we need to add action to every path that we're on. Otherwise, it's really not a path, it's just a thought.

Dr. Christine Li [00:13:25]:
So thought plus action equals a path, let's put it that way. And without thought, action can be problematic. And without action, thoughts are just thoughts. So make your life a little more exciting. It's okay. You can handle the excitement. And you will always be in control of your own life and your own energy. So make sure to avoid the paralysis and make sure to avoid just thinking, because thinking can be fun and all, but adding action really gets you going, and it really clears the overwhelm.

Dr. Christine Li [00:14:04]:
So to review the five mistakes, they are. One, lacking vision. Two, being guided by fear. Three, feeling crappy and lacking joy. Four, staying in decision paralysis. And five, being all thought but no action. So all of those states and those states combined, of course, will invite fear and overwhelm to just escalate. And no wonder we're feeling like we can't do anything.

Dr. Christine Li [00:14:37]:
We're burned out, we're tired, we're frustrated, and we're overwhelmed. So instead of yelling at yourself, which will make you more afraid, more embarrassed, and more overwhelmed, I want you to stop and I want you to do one of these five things, which is the reverse engineering that I talked about at the beginning of this episode. One, you want to develop a vision. So it can mean five minutes with canva.com, making great pictures of what you want to see, what you want to do, what you're envisioning, what you're hoping for. Get yourself clear about what you really want to have happen. Two, you can move away from fear. Remember that fear is false evidence appearing real. That's the acronym.

Dr. Christine Li [00:15:27]:
Fear is when you're really kind of obsessed about the outcome that you don't want to have happen. And I'm going to advise you to get obsessed with your big vision instead. It is always more fun and you will always get a better payoff when you focus on the right things. The third thing that you could do is add joy. For me, it's always breathing. It's always stepping outside. It's always taking a break. It's always remembering, oh, this is going to change soon anyway.

Dr. Christine Li [00:15:57]:
It's remembering I could put on some Disco or Michael McDonald on the radio and I know I can change my mood, my energy and my joy just by adding music. Sometimes I take a nap because naps are wonderful. So figure out what enables you to add joy right away and add it into the recipe of productivity that you have at any point that you want. The fourth thing that you can do is start making choices. You can handle it. It's not that scary. It's a little scary, but you can handle a little scary. Because at the other end, on the other side of facing your fears is all the information and all the good stuff that really is waiting for you to step in, step up, step out, go out and get into action.

Dr. Christine Li [00:16:47]:
And that's the fifth thing that I would have you do. Take some action. Get into flow. Go to the gym. Take that first step. Send out that email. Ask the person out on the date. Decide you're going to go to bed earlier.

Dr. Christine Li [00:17:02]:
It's all okay. Make a shift that makes you feel like you're changing the landscape. You're changing the odds. You are getting closer to your vision because you get to do all of those things. Nobody is holding you back. Your fears and your overwhelm might be, but no one else. No other factors are. So step up, step out, go have fun.

Dr. Christine Li [00:17:24]:
I hope this really helps you get out of any state of overwhelm or fear that you might be in now. It really is time to emerge. I hope you have the most beautiful day. If you would like a worksheet to figure all this out and remind yourself of the five mistakes and the ways to get out of overwhelm, I invite you to go to maketimeforsuccesspodcast.com/joy again, it's maketimeforsuccesspodcast.com/joy and you'll be off to the races. I'm sure I will see you next Thursday. Thanks so much for joining me on the podcast. See you soon.

Dr. Christine Li [00:18:04]:
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Make Time for Success podcast.

Dr. Christine Li [00:18:09]:
If you enjoyed what you heard, you

Dr. Christine Li [00:18:11]:
can subscribe to make sure you get notified of upcoming episodes. You can also Visit our website maketimeforsuccesspodcast.com for past episodes, show notes, and all the resources we mention on the show. Feel free to connect with me over on Instagram too. You can find me there under the name Procrastination Coach. Send me a DM and let me know what your thoughts are about the episodes you've been listening to. And let me know any topics that you might like me to talk about on the show. I'd love to hear all about how you're making time for success.

Dr. Christine Li [00:18:44]:
Talk to you soon.