Overwhelm is Optional
- This is the podcast for big-hearted, highly driven professionals who want their life back.
- Each week, we explore ways to gently rebel against the idea that overwhelm and exhaustion are just the price you pay for success. You don’t have to push through—it’s time to work with ease, reclaim your energy, and create the life you want.
- 💡 Meet Heidi Marke
I’m Heidi, a Coach, Teacher, Podcaster, and Author. Having painfully burned out—losing my career, confidence, health, and financial stability—I discovered a better way. Now, I quietly lead The Gentle Rebellion, helping you to:- Stop pushing through overwhelm.
- Redefine success on your own terms.
- Reclaim your time, energy, and life.
Thank you to purpleplanet.com for the music.
Overwhelm is Optional
How I dealt with a dose of travel overwhelm
Here's what I did when travel overwhelm hit me just before going on my Pacific North West adventure.
Want the fastest most effective way to turn your overwhelm into the joy, satisfaction and ease you're working so hard for? Book a Curiosity Call and discover what it's like to be coached by me. I look forward to meeting you.
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🎧 Free Audio: The One Minute Marke
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Welcome to the Gentle Rebellion, where overwhelm is optional. In this week's episode, I want to talk about travel anxiety. So I'm about to go on a big trip to the Pacific Northwest, and we've looked forward to this for a long time. It's a big deal, it's exciting. It's three weeks. It involves packing up my business safely, all looked after, making sure my clients are looked after for three weeks, and my partner managing to take three weeks off his various working activities is a big deal as well. So obviously it matters that we have a good time, and what I've realized has been building up over the weekend actually not really building up anyway, I don't know what happened. We had a really lovely weekend. It felt very relaxing. Um spent time with family yesterday. It was really really lovely, got a lot of gardening jobs outside because the sun came back on Saturday and it was actually really nice.
Speaker 1:But for some reason, when I went to bed last night, I suddenly couldn't get to sleep. I was like what's going on? And so I read for a bit and just chilled out about it. Sometimes, sometimes you just don't go straight to sleep. That's okay, it's no big deal, right, but it was a bit annoying. And then I realised what happened was I was having lots of thoughts about the journey.
Speaker 1:Now I've done a previous episode about travel anxiety and using a magic carpet where you just imagine that you arrive and everything's wonderful and everything works out really, really well and that can be really, really helpful. However, it's quite hard to do that, I find, when I'm in the middle of what, if this, that and everything's not quite. I'm not quite sure what, where it's coming from. So I needed to back that up. I couldn't go straight into that, because this is a big trip and there's some stuff we're not that organized at the moment. It doesn't feel that I'm sure we are organized, but my mind is concerned that I'm not that organized. So this is I'm going to describe what's what's happened to me this morning, because I think you might find this helpful, and also just to say that because I'm going away by the time you get this episode, I will be in. Where will I be? Oh, where will I be? I think I mean, yeah, I'll be in Portland, actually. So I've already been to Mount Rainier, going to Portland, um, for the weekend, and then we are off to the Columbia River Gorge and Mount Hood, and then then we're going to see my cousin in Corvallis and then we're off to the Redwoods and, oh my goodness, it's just gonna be amazing, right?
Speaker 1:So what is my mind up to? Disturbing my sleep, disturbing my peace? What's it up to? This is what I found out, so I'm just gonna I've tried to write it down as it happened to describe what goes on in my head, to see if it resonates with you and see if anything that I did, which is practice, what I teach and talk about all the time, which has become the gentle rebellion so this is the reason that I've done this work this morning is I'm not prepared to push through it. I'm not prepared to carry this anxiety and worry and thought bombing from my head over the next few days. I'm just done with it. That's not how I want to live. So that's why I've sat down this morning and dealt with it. This is what I did.
Speaker 1:So I'm calling this overwhelmed before going on a journey because it might not be a holiday, it could be any sort of journey because what happens when we go on a journey is we're out of the familiar and there's all of the unknowns the could your luggage get lost, could your flight be delayed, you know, there's just so many things Right and it's very easy for the mind to latch on to those startling stories of doom and it takes the joy out of the journey. So it could be for any journey, is my point. So first of all, I noticed that it took me a while to get to sleep and what was going on in my head was travel plans. If this, then that? You know, I'm not sure. If so, obviously I have to let my partner do what he's doing towards it. And then I'm like well, has he done that? So there's that anxiety. Can I trust somebody else to organise things? So, is the airport parking now booked? And I'm not sure, and that was partly keeping me awake. Do we have parking? I don't know, and we were supposed to take some time over the weekend to sit down and just do another check, but we did that on Friday and, honestly, we had such a lovely time yesterday with family that wasn't going to happen, and that's okay, because actually all this is in hand. But this is what was thought-bombing me.
Speaker 1:And then things like where do we get the car from? There's been a change of plan over when we can get the car, so we're going to have to go somewhere else first. How difficult is it to get there? Will we feel horribly jet lagged just the whole thoughts about journeys and timings and energy and luggage. What if the luggage gets lost? Or what if we have to walk miles with our luggage? You know the stories that happen. This is what goes on in my lost. Or what if we have to walk miles with our luggage? You know the stories that happen. This is what goes on in my head anyway. What if we have to walk several miles with our luggage? Like why is that? Now I'm saying that to you. I'm like, why is that even going on in my head? It seems very strange because there's a choice there you have to walk several miles with your luggage. There you don't have to walk several miles with your luggage. So wasted time and energy.
Speaker 1:So, instead of arriving feeling good and then, um, oh, there's something else coming up for me here. So this, this is interesting. So I was just going to mention the wasted time and energy. But there's also more wasted time and energy below the possibility of wasted time and energy, and that is. We carefully thought about our flight plans so we would arrive in a way that would enable us to get a really good start to the journey. So we're obviously going back in time because we're going from England to Seattle, which is great, and so if we can just stay awake, the jet lag might not be too bad going that direction. It's going to be pretty wrong coming back, but you know, hey ho, it doesn't seem so important on the way back and it's always harder coming, I find, coming west to east. But we we've put we've put time and energy into thinking about this.
Speaker 1:What if that previously thought, you know, uh, patterns of thought and energy and time and effort gets wasted, as well as the wasted time and energy of arriving. See what my mind's up to here. It's like, even if I rationalize one thing, there's something else that that could possibly go wrong. That you know. There's something for me, obviously there about waste time and energy is not a good thing. Whoa mind, what are you up to? So it was the wasted, the possibility of wasted time and energy to the start of a holiday, which means you won't get off to a good start, which means might not feel so good, which means we could have an argument, and I desperately don't want to have an argument. I want this to be an amazing trip, because in my head this is a trip of a lifetime and this is part of it. Right it becomes. It becomes high stakes. The more high stakes it is, the easier it is to get from my mind to make stories up about how it could all go wrong. So that's what was going on in my head.
Speaker 1:So when I woke up this morning and I did sleep and I feel fine to try and alleviate the anxiety and control for the possibility of things going wrong, so that I could alleviate the anxiety of things possibly going wrong, which meant that my poor partner was woken up to could we change that hotel? To which he said I don't know, maybe let's talk about it later quite sensibly Backed off, got himself ready for work and disappeared before we went. I apologized because I thought oh, you're so mean, so now what's happening? So, in order to try and make things better, I didn't behave in a way that I see as good towards my partner by bombarding him with a question about hotel bookings when he'd just woken up. So then I felt guilty about that and then I was worried that I wasn't behaving in the best way possible towards him, which I also felt guilty about and thought, and then I got trapped in the. He shouldn't behave like that. That's appalling. Now he's going to be cross, which isn't true because clearly he just went. I'm not talking about that right now. He's not easily sucked into to my madness. He has his own stuff. You know, we all do. We all have our own stories going on in our mind. So so, on top now, I was at a stage where, on top of the thought bombing about all of the you know practical stuff that could happen by going on a journey, by living my full adventure, there was then the. Now I've let my partner down, so the not being good enough came into that as well. Hey-ho, this is fun, and it's also weird saying this out loud in such detail, but what I'm hoping is that you get to resonate and go oh my God, she's human too. Yeah, we're all humans. This is what our minds do, right, it's just trying to keep me safe.
Speaker 1:So the next thing that happened is it was coming to a head. I was like I don't want to start my day like this. This is not how I start my day. What's going on? So this is when I'm starting to gently rebel Actually, I didn't gently rebel to start with. I tried to rebel fiercely, and this is why the gentle part of the rebellion is so important. So I tried to run away from it. I tried to suppress it Normal response. So I tried to run away from it. I tried to suppress it normal response. I don't like this feeling. I'm going to do something to run away from it. I'm going to try and push it out of my body with yoga or I don't know, just trying to get rid of it. But that doesn't work. It doesn't work for me. And if it does work, it's temporary and also there's useful information there. So then I stopped fighting it and just went into the gentle rebellion. So I don't want to start my day like this. I want to restart, and we can in any moment. A new beginning.
Speaker 1:So I sat on the floor. I actually sat cross-legged in front of the mirror. I just looked myself in the eye and went I hear you, I've got you, I love you, everything's going to be okay. This is normal. This is what human minds do. There's nothing wrong. There's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing wrong with any of it. It's a big deal.
Speaker 1:You booked the flights in January. It's now September. It's a big trip, it's exciting. Of course you're going to be worried about it, of course you want it to go really well, but everything's okay. And that helped. But there's still some other stuff. I could still feel it. I could feel it in my heart, in my solar plexus, like something, something, something else to shift here.
Speaker 1:So I just stopped trying to change it and noticed, so I let it come up. So now I've created a safe space for myself. I was able to see what needed to be seen. So I just noticed all the thoughts, the anxiety, the guilt I wasn't good enough, could have behaved better. Then I noticed the attempts to avoid suppressed, run away and distract. So I noticed all of it and just sat with it. Not for long this is moments, not big deal and as I sat with it I was able to notice all these thoughts and feelings and then notice the layer of judgments about myself and my thoughts and feelings, and then I could allow myself to be myself, to start where I am to be, where I was in that moment, not where I thought I should be or where I wanted to be, which was a superhuman who just glides through the stuff as if she does it every day. Now here's the thing if I did do big adventures every day, it wouldn't be a big deal because it would just be a normal habit. But it's because it's so important, because it is a big deal that this stuff's coming up, and that's okay, because it's just what happens, that's okay. So then I started to notice there was an ease happening. The acknowledgement helped, the compassion for myself helped. So things are starting to shift.
Speaker 1:And then I played one of my favorite tools follow the fear. So asking what's the fear? So what's the fear below? What's going on? So this needs to be played as a game, not done as like some serious doom laden rubbish, because your mind does that anyway. You don't need to. You don't need to practice that like we're all masters at following loops of doom. It's not that tool, it's a game play follow the fear.
Speaker 1:So it goes like this. So I put myself in the position. So we get off the plane and we're really tired and grumpy and we get our luggage and then we find that to get to the hotel is really hard work and and it's just like by the time we get to the hotel we're just exhausted and we're grumpy and we're arguing and it's horrible. So follow that. What's wrong with that? Well, that means the whole, the whole trip's doomed because now we're not getting on. Clearly, this isn't true. So you keep following the fear.
Speaker 1:What happens is you get to what's really going on and what really I find, when I followed it and followed it and followed it, was that it feels really high stakes, that the journey is smooth, so that we don't end up arguing or, more importantly, I don't end up starting an argument because I'm grumpy, because I haven't slept well, because I believe things could have been better organized, or something in my desire to control my own emotions and the universe so that everything goes smoothly. So is is it true that if we had a rough start to a three week road trip, the whole thing's doomed? Clearly that's not true. Clearly that's not true and clearly I'm more than capable of using all my gently rebellious skills to turn that around very quickly, to learn from it, to believe that it's for me just as I'm starting to do now as I talk this through with you which is really helpful thank you for listening um, that the process of going through this stuff creates more freedom, so it's not true that this could be a disaster. Oh, my dog's having a little scrap over a bone there. Sorry about that. I gave him a chew. I hope you can't hear him chewing a bit of loud chews chewer chewers. Sorry. Anyway, it's all settled now.
Speaker 1:So what I've discovered in doing this is that I can trust myself more, even more, that I have the skills and the intention to turn things around. What that means is whatever happens, I'll be okay. And also, if I then use the gently rebellious lens of if this is for me, in what way is this for me? So what if everything's for me, including this yucky process I've found myself in this morning? Then there's a gift. And what's the gift? Well, the gift in not going to sleep as quickly as I would have liked to last night and then deliberately examining what that was about and then creating a podcast episode out of it, so that you too can find more freedom to be yourself, so that you can feel seen and heard, because it's not just you. This is what our minds do. Well, there's masses of gifts in there. It makes me more generous as a coach and a teacher, which I like because I love my work. It makes me reflect back to myself just how skilled I am at dealing with this stuff. It enables me to practice more self-awareness, which leads to more self-knowledge.
Speaker 1:This is what happens when you go on, when you don't go on enough trips, heidi. It's a good excuse there, good excuse if I need excuses. So the truth is it's because it feels scary. It feels like this huge deal and that if some connections don't work or if luggage went lost or some some of the normal kind of trip stuff the organizing, practical stuff if some of that went differently than I would like to, is it true that everything would be a disaster? No, it's not, but it feels like it because we haven't been on an adventure together for a long time for various reasons, and so it just feels like this huge deal and I just want it to be the wonderful trip it could be, and it's really important to me that we get on. And when you're on a trip, maybe you're not always going to get on and maybe that's OK and it's not a disaster, which means that I'm safe. It's safe for me to go on adventures. It is safe for me to feel anxious about going on adventures. All of it is safe. It's all okay. This is the human experience. Right, this is definitely the Heidi experience.
Speaker 1:It's easy for me to get stuck in my head and get overwhelmed and thought-bombed by all of the things that might go wrong, particularly when something feels high stakes. And what's been really helpful for me about this is realizing that the thought bombing and overwhelm, the anxiety, the unease is coming from the belief that if it doesn't all go right at the beginning, we could have a terrible three-week trip, and also the fact that this three-week trip is really, really important, like if it wasn't wonderful, something terrible would happen. That's not true. What the real truth is I'm going on a three-week trip around the Pacific Northwest which is going to be absolutely beautiful and lots of unexpectedly lovely things will happen. And even if we had terrible weather, traffic delays, um, lost luggage, grumpiness, even if we had a shouting match in the middle of seattle, nothing terrible is actually going to happen. Not really, not really at all, because my life is good and I have the skills and the self-knowledge to negotiate things and and anyway it's all good, like there's just so much beauty to look at. So it could go from one moment from feeling irritated to feeling a sense of awe.
Speaker 1:Sometimes I look at the trip. Actually, one of the funny things about this trip is I've actually felt completely overwhelmed by all the things there are to do, like there's just so many hiking trails, so many mountains, so many beaches, so many opportunities for the most wonderful adventures and beauty, and all that's actually been seriously overwhelming me, because I can't choose. And I'm very grateful that my partner's come up with a menu because at least we've got you know like well, we agreed together, but he started it like we could do this here's, here's a, here's a road trip, that's this shape that might work and that really helped, because I just couldn't. It's like there's too much. And then that's also linked, isn't it, to this idea that if something's high stakes, like this, is a one-off thing and it has to be amazing, otherwise you never get to do it again. That's not true. For a start, we've already said that we're not going to do the bit. Where is it? Northern Washington? Into Vancouver? Because it's too much to do in three weeks. We don't want to be rushing around too much. So we've already said we want to go back.
Speaker 1:You can always go back. Not, I don't mean yeah, I don't like that phrase. You can always go back. Can you always go back. No, I don't mean that. I mean you can always go back to a place again. It doesn't have to be a one-off. And part of this pressure is coming from the belief that I need to live a full adventure or I will be grossly disappointed with myself. I will be so upset if I don't have the most wonderful time on earth. You know, it's that it's like I have to live a full life. Big pressure, big pressure. But I am and it's all fine and can always go to the pacific northwest again. Will I run out of time to go all the places I want? Yeah, that's okay. It's like your to-do list. Your to-do list is endless. The amount of ventures you could go on endless. There's always going to be more than I can do, but that doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:So when I look at the overwhelm of this trip from a point of view, there's so much I don't want to miss it. I'm going to miss a lot of it, and that's okay. And the fact and how silly is it that there are, I'm being thought, bombed by stuff that I might miss it because there's too much beauty and wonderful experiences to have. Surely that's a good thing, because that means actually, whatever happens, I can't really make a mistake, because if there's beauty everywhere, it doesn't really matter where I look, as long as I can see the beauty, because I'm not stuck in my head being thought bombed by missing the beauty and that's it, isn't it? This is why this is so important. This is why it's so important to make overwhelm optional, which is exactly what I've done.
Speaker 1:This morning. I've realized I'm stuck in my head being thought-bombed by fake emergencies and I've said no to it and I've worked through it, and this is how I worked through it and this is a skill and it works. It works really, really well. Does it mean it'll never happen again? Clearly not, because I'm sharing this with you, but that's not the point. The point is not to wander around as some super human where nothing ever affects you like you, just like you could have. Just don't go out of the house, don't leave the house, stay in and never go on the adventures that that call to you. Would that stop any overwhelm? No, it wouldn't. You'd have other overwhelm. I'm choosing to deal with overwhelm caused by or related to wanting to go and travel, and that's okay, because actually, the skills used to deal with the travel overwhelm are exactly the same skills to deal with the staying at home overwhelm it's all the same stuff. It's all about living more skillfully.
Speaker 1:Where we place our attention matters. So when my attention is placed on and drawn to as if it's some terrible, terrible emergency and I must pay attention to it or I won't be safe. Which is what's going on? Terrible emergency and I must pay attention to it, or I won't be safe. Which is what's going on? Then all like all of my attention, all my experience, isn't. It's much fun about this trip. When I dare to look at that and allow it to be seen and acknowledge that there is some anxiety about traveling, about blowing the trip out of the water by having an argument, by being grumpy, with jet lag on the first day, then I can see and I'm able to laugh at myself gently and say, heidi, that's not gonna happen, you're not gonna ruin the trip by being a grumpy monkey, everything's okay. Oh, now I want to just say, bless, heidi, bless the little grumpy monkey inside my head warning me that I could cause absolute doom over the most wonderful trip that we're going on, and instead I can just take my attention off that now and put it back onto.
Speaker 1:Well, today's Monday, on Thursday we fly, thursday afternoon we step off a plane. How amazing is that? How amazing is a plane? We step off a plane onto American land, land actually where my ancestors landed. I don't know exactly when and I'm looking forward to finding out more about that. That will be fun and, yeah, go and hang out with whales, hopefully.
Speaker 1:Go kayaking. Go and see the redwoods. Mount Hood, mount Rainier oh my goodness, mount Hood, mount Rainier, oh my goodness. So many places, so much fun, so lucky, lucky me, woohoo. Anyway, you can see, now that I've lifted the pressure off myself to make this trip perfect, which will now allow it to be perfect and allow myself to see the wonder around me and not be stuck in my head, I can feel the ease in my heart and I like myself a lot better now. Well, I hope you enjoyed that little insight into what goes on in my head some mornings and I hope it makes you feel seen and heard and allow deep love for yourself and compassion. Keep gently rebelling. It's worth it. Right? I'm going to take a break from the podcast, so this will go out for the first weekend I'm away and then there'll be a two-week gap and then I'll come back and let's see how my trip oozes into these episodes. Okay, have a great couple of weeks and I'll be back with you soon For more resources to help you gently rebel.
