How to Deal With Overwhelm: 11 Simple Tips

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Overwhelm can make you feel stuck, trapped, and unsure of what action to take. When you don’t know how to deal with overwhelm, everything feels complex and all-consuming. Overwhelm creates a level of complexity in our minds that makes it difficult to think clearly and take action.

As a time management coach, I’m often asked how to deal with overwhelm. What is overwhelm? Overwhelm is a manifestation of stress. Overwhelm happens when you have too much going on and too many obligations, which causes you to feel overwhelmed.

The impact of feeling overwhelmed includes exhaustion, confusion, and forgetfulness. It also causes procrastination, lack of focus, and an inability to make decisions and take action.

Overwhelm causes distraction and lessens your ability to problem solve and be productive on your most important work.

Overwhelm is that in-the-moment sense that you cannot handle it all. To stop being overwhelmed, there are some simple strategies you can use to prevent overwhelm.

In this article, I’ll share 11 tips on how to deal with overwhelm. They will help you feel clear, more focused and ensure you are ready to take action on your most important projects and goals.

How to deal with overwhelm

Here are 11 tips on how to deal with overwhelm.

1. Accept that you feel overwhelmed

If you’re feeling overwhelmed or stuck, it’s important to accept that you feel overwhelmed. You can’t get out of overwhelm until you recognise where the overwhelm is coming from and make the necessary changes.

When you’re overwhelmed, it is essential to pinpoint the stressors or activities that are overwhelming you. A good starting point is to look at all of the activities you are currently undertaking and identify which ones are causing you to feel overwhelmed.

Looking at your activities will help you diagnose the projects or activities that cause you to feel overwhelmed or stressed. You can then eliminate or delegate specific activities that cause you to feel overwhelmed.

2. Stop your overwhelmed thought process

If you want to stop overwhelm inducing thoughts, step away from the overwhelm. When you think that a project, challenge, stressor, or situation is too much for you to manage, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.

Overwhelm can affect your ability to think and act rationally, so get some breathing space to consider the cause of the overwhelm. When you feel overwhelmed, you can’t think clearly.

Stop your overwhelmed thought process by going for a walk, breathing deeply for a minute, meditating, or take a break from work. Do what you can to calm your mind to stop feeling overwhelmed from stress or anxiety.

When you can think clearly and logically, you can identify the cause of the overwhelm. Greater clarity allows you to take the necessary steps to reduce that overwhelming feeling.

3. Focus on the present moment

To eliminate overwhelm, stop everything you’re currently doing. When you choose to stop what you’re doing, you can diagnose the cause of the overwhelm and take the necessary action.

Overwhelm expands the more you stay feeling overwhelmed. You can’t work through overwhelm hoping it will just stop.

To stop feeling overwhelmed, focus on being present. Be present on the work that you’re doing and work on that until complete. Being present will help you stop thinking negatively about overwhelm and focus on the task at hand.

If you feel stuck with overwhelm, focus on the present moment and focus on just one thing. Take your energy and focus from everything else apart from the present moment and doing just one thing at a time.

To be more present, read my guide on 6 ways to be present

4. Take action

Overwhelm is a mental and physical paralysis where you feel unable to think clearly or take action. Feeling overwhelmed can also cause you to procrastinate and waste time and energy on unimportant projects and tasks.

The best way to deal with overwhelm is to take action. To get in motion so you can make progress and build momentum.

Take action by deciding on one specific thing to do. Start by identifying the first step and focus on getting that done. Don’t worry about anything else apart from that one thing in front of you.

Take the first step. Get it done and then move onto the second step, and so on. The simple act of taking action on just one thing will help you feel less overwhelmed.

Discover how to prioritise so you can take action faster.

5. Take some time out

If you’re feeling overwhelmed, it’s time to do something about it. To deal with overwhelm, stop being immersed in your overwhelm and take some time out so you can clear your mind and think clearly.

Overwhelm makes everything feel bigger and more complex than they often are. This overwhelming feeling causes stress and anxiety.

When you take some time away, you can look at the specific things that create the overwhelm. Identifying the causes of overwhelm enables you to get clear on actions you can take to stop overwhelm.

6. Stop saying yes

Overwhelm happens when you don’t have your boundaries set, and you keep adding more and more to your to-do list. You feel overwhelmed when you overcommit to achieve something with short deadlines.

The antidote to overwhelm is to stop saying yes to everything and start saying no to yourself and others more often. You can reduce overwhelm when you choose to take on things that you want to take on.

It’s easier to deal with overwhelm when you simplify your to-do list and manage your daily objectives rather than continuously adding to them.

If overwhelm is making you feel stuck, read my guide to getting unstuck.

7. Organise your day

If you don’t organise your day, other people will do it for you. When you have clear direction and focus, it’s easier to stop feeling overwhelmed.

A lot of overwhelm comes because you’re distracted or you’re reacting to everybody. You feel like you have too many things to do, and you don’t know which one to focus on first, so you feel overwhelmed.

Or you lose focus from your original task, so you feel like you’re falling behind.

But, if you block your time out well during the day and, most importantly, you begin the day knowing what you want to achieve, it will help you minimise daily overwhelm.

Using my one-page productivity daily planner is a great way to organise your day.

Now, there will be days when things happen which throw your planning out of the window, but they will be rare if you plan.

By knowing what you want your day to be all about and what you want to achieve you can deal with those moments of overwhelm because you have greater direction and focus

8. Take time to recharge

We often feel overwhelmed when we’re tired, fatigued, or exhausted. When you can’t think clearly and make decisions, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.

To manage day-to-day overwhelm, take breaks between projects or tasks. If you jump from one major project to another, your energy levels will drop. Taking breaks gives your mind and body a chance to reset and recharge.

Your brain needs silence between projects to bring your full focus and creativity to the next important piece of work.

If you don’t take some time away, you’ll get distracted and get overwhelmed. I always take breaks during important projects and use the 60-60-30 time blocking method.

This method allows you to work for 50 minutes, then take a 10-minute break. Then work for a further 50 minutes and take a 10-minute break. Finally, take a 30-minute break before starting again.

These breaks could be for exercise, a quick walk, meditation, etc.

9. Catch up and plan the next day

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed at the end of the day if you haven’t finished everything on your to-do list. The best way to overcome that is to have fewer items on your to-do list.

If you have so many things going on during the day, and you’re just jumping from one thing to the next, it’s difficult to get a clear handle on what you achieved, what didn’t get done, and what needs to happen tomorrow.

To stop this overwhelm, carve out 30 minutes at the end of the day to celebrate what you achieved. Take time to identify what important things didn’t get done that day and get clear on your priorities for the following day.

This way you’ll end the day feeling good about what you achieved, rather than overwhelmed, and be clear and focused about your plans for tomorrow.

Use my daily planning guide to plan a productive day.

10. Set better deadlines

We often experience overwhelm when we set unrealistic deadlines or add another project to our existing deadlines. You can reduce overwhelm by getting clarity on what a realistic deadline looks like.

If you don’t set realistic deadlines, you put too much pressure on yourself or scramble to meet other people’s deadlines. You may have a preferred deadline, but it’s essential to get clear on whether achieving it is realistic or not.

If you’re working each day without a clear deadline, it’s easy to feel stressed and overwhelmed all the time.

If you put too much pressure on yourself to deliver work in too short a window, chances are you’ll feel overwhelmed. Give yourself a bit more time, and you’ll feel clear and more confident about delivering the work.

Planning your week stops overwhelm. Read my guide to effective weekly planning.

11. Keep your perspective

If you’re feeling overwhelmed regularly, it’s important to get some perspective. Having perspective will help you feel more positive and give you the ability to deal with the challenges that create overwhelm.

You can work with a coach, find an accountability partner, or speak to your boss or a peer. Simply sharing your stresses with them, and exploring ways to overcome overwhelm will help.

If you don’t have a coach or mentor, and you’d like to work with an accountability coach, book a 30-minute call with me to see how I can help.

Summing Up

If you feel overwhelmed, the 11 strategies I’ve shared will help you learn how to deal with overwhelm. It’s important to identify the primary source of overwhelm and change your mindset if you want to get rid of overwhelm.

Handling overwhelm takes commitment and courage. You can deal with overwhelming feelings if you take some time out to identify the cause of overwhelm and focus on what’s in front of you rather than trying to power through your feelings of overwhelm.

Now I’d love to hear from you

What’s the number one things that causes overwhelm for you?

What’s your best tip on how to deal with overwhelm?

Let me know in the comments.

About the Author

Mark Pettit is a time management coach and accountability coach based in Colchester, Essex, UK. He is also the Founder of time management coaching company, Lucemi Consulting.

Mark’s time management coaching program helps business owners and leaders in London, Essex, Suffolk and across the UK achieve their goals quicker and easier without the stress and overwhelm.

Get more tips to help you ditch overwhelm on the blog.

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