I am extremely overwhelmed. Now what?

 


But first, where is my little mouse?

"Now become your mouse self. It can't see far, but it knows what's right in front of you. Ask it, "what's the smallest step I can take now to move me toward my eagle vision?"

"Make sure the step is small. Mouse-small."

When I am reaching that breaking point of being overwhelmed, I have to stop, breath, and just admit that I am overwhelmed. I woke up tired & overwhelmed this morning. It was improvement from yesterday being burnout. So, before I got off my bed, I went over all the reasons of why I am overwhelmed this week. Accepting is important, because my first reaction is trying to fight it, or feeling shame in my inability to control it.

This week I applied for three business grants. One was easy and fast, but one was more intense. I took two two-hour webinars. Missed another one because I got the time wrong, and another because there was a lot of echo in zoom. 

I had two bad sleepless nights. One because I had two nightmares. The other one because I was having headaches for mowing the lawn on Sunday, as well as bad back pain. I was trying to ease my pain at 3 in the morning with ice, a massage machine, and ointment. My chiropractor adjusted some things, and it helped.

I had three appointments this week. I also had my final physical therapy appointment because I can't keep paying. The physical therapist gave me a plan to continue at home. I am a little worried, but I have confidence it will work out.

Confidence - this word.

 I am also tired of so many exercises!

I had my first meeting with a potential customer this week, and emotionally, it was intense. I had a lot of anxiety. I went into this panic of "what if I am not good enough?" "What if I am not ready?" "What if I don't know what I am doing?" So, I prepared for it. A lot. Which is also emotionally intense, but this is what I have always done to ease my nerves, prepare. To a certain degree because conversations can't be predicted.

My sink started squiring water all over the place, and I had to call a plumber to fix it. The blessing in disguise here is that I had just spoke with him and scheduled the meeting to speak about his business and my bookkeeping services. Meeting him before our meeting and with me as a client actually helped me to ease my anxiety.

In the past months, especially during the past weeks, I have been reminding myself to do what I started doing when my mental health was at its worse-

Accept- If I am overwhelmed, I have to accept it. If my head hurts and I am in pain, I have to accept it.

Focus- This is the biggest thing with overwhelming feelings and emotions- there is a lot happening all at once and my brain is trying to process everything at the same time. I am trying to go back to that tactic - focus on what I have in front of me at the moment- figure it out. If it is a complex problem, it's ok, it can be figured out no matter how difficult as long as I stay focused.

Adapt- adapt to what's happening; do what is necessary. This normally involves change.

Focus. Accept. Adapt. I have been working on this for a long time, actually. I have memorized these 3 words, going back to them often.

This is where my little mouse comes back into my life. I read about this idea of the eagle and the mouse in the past, but I found it again this week -exactly what I needed.

"What is the smallest step I can take?"

"Mouse-small." 

Keep going.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Two of the quotes helping me this week: 

"I prayed to God to make me strong & able to fight." Harriett Tubman.

"Let me fall if I must fall. The one I am becoming will catch me."

And one of the many questions I have this week: If love is the goal-end of a journey, how do I make it there, to love?

Here,

Paty ♥
Love. Zeal. Balance.

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