Remodeling Overwhelm right into a Inventive, Productive Power

By Leo Babauta

I speak to dozens of individuals each month — Zen Habits readers, teaching purchasers and Fearless Dwelling Academy members — who wrestle with a sense of overwhelm from all the issues on their plates.

Overwhelm from duties, messages, and extra is totally regular. It’s based mostly on a worry that we are able to’t deal with all the pieces coming our approach. That we’re going to fail at juggling all of those balls, and drop them, and be a failure. It’s a worry of inadequacy, that exhibits up as anxiousness.

So what can we do with that worry? What we are able to notice is that it’s simply an vitality, current in our our bodies. We now have all types of vitality: pleasure, love, gratitude, optimism, disappointment, harm, grief, anger, energy, and extra.

These sorts of energies in our our bodies have a number of properties we are able to discover from observing:

• They’re non permanent. Energies shift all through the day, relying on what we’re occurring, how a lot sleep we obtained, how persons are appearing in direction of us, how we’re doing with our actions and intentions, and so on.
• We create them. It’d look like the vitality of, say, anger, is attributable to how another person acted … however we create the vitality of anger as a response to the vitality of harm … which we create due to how we interpret their actions. That doesn’t imply it’s a “dangerous” interpretation, however the level is that we’re the creators of our vitality.
• We will shift them. If we’re the creators of the vitality, that’s excellent news, as a result of we are able to then create no matter we wish. Have you ever ever accomplished gratitude apply? It’s a extremely easy apply of reminding your self of what you’re grateful for in your life. Doing this would possibly rework no matter unhappy or complaining vitality you at the moment have, into gratitude and contentment. That exhibits that it’s potential to shift issues deliberately, with apply.

So if we are able to shift our vitality, how can we take care of the vitality of overwhelm? There’s not one method to take care of it, however I’m going to recommend a strong apply.

1. Get current to the vitality of overwhelm, in your physique. Discover that you just’re feeling overwhelmed. You would possibly discover since you’re both avoiding, or dashing to get all the pieces accomplished. You’re feeling anxious about what number of issues there are. Simply pause, and see how the vitality of overwhelm feels in your physique. The place is it positioned? In your chest? What does it really feel like? Get curious.
2. Play with the vitality. The vitality of overwhelm is simply vitality — it will probably really feel like worry, anxiousness, panic … however we are able to additionally really feel it as pleasure, journey, creativity. These are all simply labels. How will you use the vitality to generate braveness? To make you rise up and dance? To mild a hearth below your self? Play with it, as if it have been a hearth you would use creatively to no matter function you’d like.

On this approach, the overwhelm doesn’t turn into a factor that controls us, however fairly is one thing we are able to really feel, love, and use nevertheless we like. It turns into the clay for our inventive act.

I notice this all would possibly sound a bit bizarre to some folks, however I invite you to not dismiss it, since you’ll be lacking out on a strong and delightful method to work with one thing that exhibits up for you recurrently.

You get overwhelmed since you care. Might you by no means cease caring.