Please note that Current of Life was previously published under the title: Living Your Potential
A Matter of When and not If Recently a woman called me for a consultation. After sharing her plans for evaluating two possible new career directions, she asked me what she could do to avoid feeling overwhelmed. I teasingly asked her, "Do you mean… What can you do when you feel overwhelmed?" She laughed and was even a bit relieved to acknowledge that it was a matter of when and not if. We then talked about what she had done successfully in the past when this feeling surfaced, as well as some new strategies she could employ. Make it Productive Overwhelm, like any other uncomfortable feeling, can be either productive or unproductive. It is unproductive when we notice the feeling but don’t gain insight from it. Instead we just get “all lathered up” and overwhelmed that we’re overwhelmed. It is more productive when we heed the message it is carrying: that some kind of adjustment is needed. I often use the phrase “breaking through overwhelm” yet I do not mean to imply that overwhelm can be wiped out. Instead I speak of breaking through to the other side. You can learn to have the rising wave of this feeling wash over you vs. knock you down. It's Information If the purpose of overwhelm is to deliver information, then what is the message and what do you do with it? Answer the following 10 questions to gain insight into what your feeling of overwhelm is trying to tell you.
Insights to Gain Where did you answer “yes” or “sometimes”? Each question correlates with a specific area:
Now, choose the area you want to strengthen. Then, go here to connect you with a technique that you can practice right away: 3 Questions: Move from Overwhelm to Momentum. The next few issues of Living Your Potential will elaborate on specific approaches you can use when overwhelm is on the rise. Here's to you, | ||||||||||||||||||||||
© 2006, Virginia M. Kravitz and In the Current®. All Rights Reserved. You are welcome to reproduce this article provided it is without any alteration, includes the copyright above, and if distributing electronically includes a link to www.inthecurrent.com. |