[00:00] Katie Stoddart: Welcome back to the Focus B show. This is Katie Stoddart here aka the Focus B. And on this show I interview high performers and leaders around the world to discover their secrets on peak performance, productivity, mindfulness and leadership. So if you want to take your performance and your leadership to the next level, then you're in the right place. Listen up and connect with the magic.

[00:39] Katie Stoddart: How can you decrease overwhelm? Overwhelm is such a common feeling. This is something I feel from time to time, though I've worked on it. It's something most of my clients feel a lot of the time. And there are a few key things that really help me to decrease overwhelm. But first and foremost, lets try and understand where does it come from? How do you end up in a position where you feel overwhelmed? Lets go back to the root and then we could look at some tips to help you to decrease overwhelm. There are three main types of overwhelm Personas. The first one is the high achiever. The second one is the people pleaser. And the third one is the procrastinator. And all of these Personas, and we all have a bit of each of them are what contributes to this feeling of overwhelm. So how does this work? Let's look at the high achiever. For instance. As a high achiever, you're driven by achievement. You get your feeling of self worth and recognition by achieving great results. If you don't achieve something, you feel discouraged, your self worth and self esteem decreases. This isn't ideal. You can learn to work on your high achiever and get recognition and self worth for just being who you are and not actually feel the constant need for achievement. But this is a topic for another episode. I think the idea of shifting from high achiever to high performer, this is something I know I covered a few episodes ago. I'll put a link in the show notes. So coming back to this high achiever, how did this lead to overwhelm? Pretty simple to see the correlation here. If you're a high achiever, you take on more projects. Why? Because you feel better. The more achievements you have and it looks good. People will celebrate you for making progress on important projects. So you take on more and more and more. Next thing, you overwhelm because overwhelm is when you've taken on too much. Although you feel that your mind and your brain and your thoughts can't compute the amount of projects that you've taken on. What's interesting is between two people, one person can be dealing with 100 projects and not feel overwhelmed. The other person dealing with ten projects and is feeling overwhelmed might want to wonder what's that due to? From what I've seen, it's a combination of how the person is processing all of them. Are you multitasking? Are you single tasking? And are you getting a feeling of frustration when you're not progressing as much as you like on the different projects? Because this is something else that I've seen with a lot of high achievers, is that they want to feel a constant sense of growth and progress and achievement, and if they don't overwhelm again. So how do you work on this? Well, one thing is you work on your high achiever. Like I said, I discussed this in a previous episode, but also start to recognize when your high achiever is in you is making you take on more projects than you can actually handle. Pause and reflect. Maybe there's something you need to say no to. And this actually leads us to our second type of Persona, which is the people pleaser. This is correlated and most of us have a bit of all of these people I coach are pretty much always high achievers, and people pleasing is also extremely common. People pleaders struggle with saying no. So needless to say that if you're a high achiever and you take on a lot because you want to achieve great results, and you also have a people pleader that doesn't like saying no. Recipe for overwhelm how do you work on your people pleaser? People with people pleasing tendencies genuinely care about other people, but they pull other people's needs before their own needs. This means that if something doesn't feel fully aligned, they might still say yes because they'll make the other person happy and that means a lot to them. Now this is wonderful. If you have this tendency, it means that you genuinely care about people. It means you're generously minded. But if it goes too far, this decreases your own well being. This decreases your own energy bucket. And after a while you will start to feel resentful towards the other people, whether in your work or in your personal life. Because this isn't actually how you won't be spending your time and energy. So you're doing them a favor by saying no to something that's not aligned because you are refilling your cup so that when you say yes to their next project or opportunity, you feel better. How can you train yourself to shift this people pleasing behaviour? First of all, start to when does it come up? Is there a pause between when someone asks you something or do you instantly say yes? If you just allow this micro pause by saying, thanks a lot for suggesting this can I let you know in a few minutes? Can I let you know tomorrow? You're allowing yourself to breathe and to ask yourself, is it aligned? This is the next step. Once you've taken a pause, check in with yourself. Does this feel right? Is it a hell yes or is it a no? Does this feel aligned? Is this something that excites you? Of course, there are some moments in life where we more or less have the choice to say yes or no to projects, depending on work circumstances. But there are quite a lot of times when you do have the chance to say no, and then you can use the sandwich no method. First you say thank you so much for your offer. Then you say, unfortunately, this is a no. And third option you say, however, I would be happy to put you in touch with such and such. Or maybe we can do it in the future. Or you give them an alternative. Actually, the maybe we could do it in the future. It's sort of a cop out, so we'll avoid this one. Something more realistic, putting them in touch with someone else, giving them an alternative. So you finish on a high. This is a sandwich no method. More than anything else, to overcome people pleasing behavior takes practice. Notice. When it comes up, start to shift your behavior, have those uncomfortable conversations, and after a while you will get more familiar with assertive behavior, assertive communication, having those boundaries in place, and it will become easier with time. Third type of overwhelmed Persona is the procrastinator. If you constantly procrastinate and put off activities that are important at one moment, they will all add up and you will suddenly feel overwhelmed. How can you avoid this? Well, a few things. Again, just like with the people pleaser be, when are you putting off tasks? Is this a current recurring pattern or is it a certain type of activity that you put off? Then start to see the difference between postponing. We all need to postpone activities sometimes to prioritize other ones, and procrastination, which is this is the activity that would be the priority now when you're choosing not to do it. Also, don't actually label yourself procrastinator. I'm using this for simplification as a Persona. But if you make it part of your identity, you believe you need to procrastinate to be congruent with your feeling of identity. So start to see yourself as someone who is proactive, who is taking on action, who can do things, who is rapid and effective in the way you function and then you will become that person. This is something I discussed in a previous episode on identity Shifting. So you want to shift your identity from procrastination into proactivity. And if that isn't sufficient, have an accountability partner that keeps you on track, that helps you to stay grounded and make progress on the important activities. Break it down into small chunks and like I like to say, confront the beast, which means look at the fear in the eyes, look at the resistance and go through it. Resistance and fear overcomes you when you avoid it. But if you look at it and you say, yes, I'm afraid, yes, this is uncomfortable. Yes, I have huge resistance to this activity, yet I'm doing it. As you do this, you build self discipline, you build self confidence, you transform your identity, and you make progress on your projects. So those were the three types of overwhelm Personas, the high achiever, the people pleaser, and the procrastinator. Now that you're aware what's the route? It will make it easier for you not to take on projects that aren't aligned or take on too much because you like to achieve or constantly procrastinate. And this means you don't build up this feeling of overwhelm. And if you're in a place of overwhelm right now, best thing you can do is a pause away from technology, away from work, maybe a long weekend away. Anything to rest the senses so that the brain can finish processing what it needs to and tackle on the projects. Clear minded. And then when you start your work or your activities again, single task, one thing at a time. Best recipe for overwhelm multitasking. So if you're in a place of overwhelm, single task emails off one activity at a time breaks. That helps. But being clear on your Persona will also help you to not generate more overwhelm for yourself in the future. Hope you enjoyed this episode. Thank you so much for tuning in.

[10:34] Katie Stoddart: Thank you so much for tuning in today to the focusbee show. I would absolutely love to hear your feedback, so let me know in an Apple review or YouTube comment what was most valuable for you. And feel free to share this episode with a friend friend or a family member wishing you a wonderful, magical, and focused day ahead.