The key to eliminating overwhelm is to have a structure for existence that is outside of your head.  Overwhelm is always is in your head; it is comprised of feelings and thoughts.  It does not exist in reality.  It is certainly NOT who you are. We HAVE feelings and thoughts, like having a house or a car.  And you are not your house or your car.  You don’t have control over them either; they just come and go and you decide which ones you are going to honor.  If you honor “I can’t get it all done”, that becomes truth for you and you will never get it all done.  Instead, invent the empowering context “I can get it all done” and the results will change immediately.

Thoughts and feelings will never get the job done.  Worrying and rolling things over and over in your head will never get the job done, and you will lose sleep and productivity.  Actions get things done.  A structure for existence is a system or tool you use to get all those thoughts out of head and into the world of action, and discipline will be required to manage your actions.  Your memory is the worst place to keep lists and is totally unreliable.  We WILL forget things.  The structure allows you to be totally present to what you are doing when you are doing it.

The first step is to make lists; three of them.  #1 What I am going to do now, #2 What I am going to do later, #3 What I am never going to do.  Face it, there are a lot of things that we think we have to do and we don’t, really.  Eliminating them right up front will unload a lot of burden.  Then prioritize your remaining two lists.  The first one will be short, the second very long.  As things on list #1 come off, things on list# 2 come on to list #1.  And since life will continue to life us, there will always be more things going onto both lists.  Just write the new stuff down during the day and do nothing with them until you add them to your lists.  You want to review and update your lists every day and have only ONE time during the day to do this.  I recommend the evening.  Plan the next day, not the one you are in.  What would it be like to wake up and know what there is to do today?  What would it be like to go to sleep knowing what you are already going to be doing the next day?

We’ll finish up things with more from Russ on lists tomorrow, Stay tuned!

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