#238| Beat Overwhelm By Deciding What's Essential: Overwhelm, Productivity, Time Management & People Pleasing

What if the real reason you feel overwhelmed isn’t your workload—but your inability to say no to things that aren't essential?

If you’re constantly busy but still feel behind, this episode, a review of Essentialism by Greg McKeown, will hit home. Most working women are told to manage their time better or try new productivity hacks, but the real issue is prioritizing what actually matters. Without that clarity, your to-do list keeps growing while your energy drains.

In this episode, you will:

•  Learn how to identify the small percentage of tasks that truly move the needle in your work and life 
•  Discover a simple “pause” technique that helps you stop overcommitting instantly 
•  Understand how to eliminate nonessential tasks without guilt and make your priorities easier to follow through on 

Press play now to learn how doing less can finally help you feel calmer, more in control, and actually ahead.

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Life can be overwhelming, but on this podcast, you'll discover practical strategies to overcome overwhelm, imposter syndrome, and negative self-talk, manage time effectively, set boundaries, and stay productive in high-stress jobs—all while learning how to say no and prioritize self-care on the Overwhelmed Worki...

Transcript

Why Less Creates More Calm

Michelle Gauthier 0:00

Once you know what matters, you have to start saying no to what doesn't.

Michelle Gauthier 0:08

You're listening to Overwhelmed Working Woman, the podcast that helps you be more calm and more productive by doing less. I'm your host, Michelle Gauthier, a former Overwhelmed Working Woman and current life coach. On this show, we unpack the stress and pressure that today's working woman experiences. And in each episode, you'll get a strategy to bring more calm, ease, and relaxation to your life.

Michelle Gauthier 0:35

Hi, friend. Today we're going to be talking about a concept called Essentialism. And it's based on a book that I read and loved called Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McEweon. I loved this book because instead of talking about time management, it really talks about prioritization management. And in the book, he talks about how if we can do less, we can do less better. And it helps us understand what things really move the needle and what things we really need to do in life instead of being so focused on. I need to get all those things done. So when you'll listen today, you'll learn about why doing more is keeping you stuck and overwhelmed. And the key ideas from the book that you can take away. I think there's some great, really easy takeaways that you can take away from this conversation today and how to start doing less without feeling like you're falling behind.

The Essential Pause Before Yes

Eliminate Nonessential Commitments

Michelle Gauthier 1:28

So let's jump into it. One of the core ideas in essentialism is that most of us never pause to decide what's truly important. We just react. So we get a request from someone to do something, we say yes, something pops up, we add that to our list. Essentialism starts with a pause. And I love the powerful pause. It's asking, what is actually essential here? So if you even just think about your to-do list, you might have 12 things written down or 38 things written down. But if you're honest, only two of them really matter. I'm actually in this exact situation today because I am going out of town tomorrow. So my essential items for today are to record this podcast and to see the four clients who are on my schedule today. I have many other things on my to-do list that I will honestly just not be getting to today, including working out, which is one of my most important things that I do most days. But today is just not a day where that made it to the top of my absolute essentials list. You can get clear on what actually matters and where you're spending your time. If you think about, let's just think about your work for a second. I heard my friend Sarah Arnold Hall, who is another coach, talking about what moves the needle at work. And you think about the 80-20 rule, 80% of what you do is probably more busy work. And 20% of what you do is actually moving the needle on the progress that you're making. I think that's also true in our personal lives, in our parenting lives, in our relationships, all of those things. If you think about what is the 20% that really moves the needle in my life, that can help you get clear on what actually matters.

Michelle Gauthier 3:06

Once you've done that first step of getting clear on what really matters, the second premise of this book is to eliminate what's not essential. So if it's not a clear yes, it's a no. And this is where it gets uncomfortable. And this is what we talk about a lot on this podcast. Because once you know what matters, you have to start saying no to what doesn't, just crossing things off the list. This might look like telling a friend, I can't commit right now, canceling one of your evening plans so you can actually take a rest, asking at work, what's the goal of this meeting instead of automatically attending. Because every time you say yes to something non-essential, you're saying no to something that actually matters and something that is essential. In my old corporate job, I used to be a Six Sigma black belt. If you don't know what that is, it's not a karate person. It is a person who optimizes processes and the flow of business. We would go into these big meetings and talk about what a particular team or group was doing, and we talk through their whole process and everything that they did in their jobs. And then I would ask them, what is on this list that you can just literally stop doing right now? I challenge you to think of some things. And they could always come up with some things that they would just literally write a line through and say, nope, we're not doing that anymore. So think about that for you. What is something that you can just cross off the list? I am not doing that anymore.

Make The Important Things Easy

Michelle Gauthier 4:30

The third idea that I pulled from this book that I liked a lot is about execution. Most people think the solution to everything is to try harder, be more disciplined, be more productive, but essentialism is the opposite. It's about making the decision for what's important and then making the important things easier to follow through on. So instead of deciding to make dinner every night, you create a couple go-to meals. Instead of constantly checking your email, you check it at set times. I use Spark email. And if I open my email during the day, the homepage of it will say, You're up to date. Check your email again at 6 p.m. Like it reminds me, you don't actually need to check your email right now. You can check your email three times a day and that works just fine. Now, if you're like, I don't have a job where that would work, think about what could work for you. At my old job, I couldn't have gone the whole day without checking my email. And this job I can, but can you check it once an hour? Can you check it in between meetings twice a day or something like that? Remove friction so you don't have to rely on your willpower because when something is truly essential, it shouldn't feel chaotic to maintain it, should feel supported.

Michelle Gauthier 5:33

So if I had to summarize Essentialism in one sentence, it would essentially be do less, but do what matters most and make what matters most easy for yourself. Most people skip the first two steps and just go straight to trying to be more productive. But if you're executing and being productive on the wrong things, you're just creating more overwhelm faster.

Reviews And Where To Find Me

Michelle Gauthier 5:54

So if this resonates with you, I suggest that you take a tip from something that I just said and try to apply it to your life today. Or if this is really resonating with you, get the book. It's a great read with some fresh perspectives, and I really liked it. You know what's just around the corner is the three-year anniversary of this podcast, Overwhelmed Working Woman. I can't believe it. You were listening to episode number 238, which is just crazy to me. Over time, I have made this podcast an essential, if we're talking about essentialism, an essential part of my work. And I love seeing the numbers grow and seeing how many new listeners we are getting all the time. If you are one of those new listeners, or even just an old OG listener who hasn't left a review, I would so appreciate it if you would take the time to leave either a rating, which is just clicking on the five stars, or a review where you write a couple sentences about what really resonates with you. That is so helpful because it gives us basically street cred and our podcast gets shown more when people are searching for things like I'm overwhelmed or how do I be more productive or how do I manage my time better. Thanks for doing that. I really appreciate it, and I hope you have a great week. Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast. If you want to learn more about my work, head over to my website at MichelleGauthier.com. See you next week.