Hello!
How has your week been? This week I’ve intentionally taken as many of my meetings as possible out walking this week (despite the Manchester weather) - and even did one as a running meeting. It’s definitely helped my energy levels (and my step count!)
I shared here about my trip to Cambridge for an inperson coaching session last weekend as part of voluntary project I’m part of. I was also able to see some friends that I’ve not seen for ages and it was so good to catch up.
This week I’m writing about the experience of overwhelm - I’m sure this is something we can all relate to! Do let me know if this resonates with you!
Have a brilliant weekend whatever you are up to!
Rachael x
PS. I have space to start working with one new client in the w/c 26th Feb (after that the next start date will be the w/c 25th March). If you’re interested in discussing how my evidence based invididualised coaching can support you to prioritise your wellbeing without sacrificing your personal ambitions, reply to this email or complete the enquiry form on my website here and we can arrange a time to chat.
When did you last feel overwhelmed?
The other morning I sat down at my desk to turn on my laptop ready to start my working day and felt the familiar sensation of overwhelm creeping up on me. And it was so interesting - because absolutely nothing had changed since the day before in terms of my responsibilities and what needed to be done. But how I felt about things really had.
Overwhelm is always a common topic in coaching sessions. It’s often part of the reason that people seek coaching, because overwhelm keeps us ‘stuck’ and unable to move forward in the way that we want to. It’s really common if you’re under lots of stress and approaching burnout, partly due to the exhaustion, stress and reducing levels of confidence that you’ll often be experiencing.
Whilst our experiences of overwhelm are all unique, it’s generally agreed that overwhelm is usually not useful and often unpleasant.
Looking back, it’s something I used to experience a lot and I’d kinda just accepted it as part and parcel of a normal busy life. It got worse the more burnt out I got. But what I find really interesting is that my experiences of feeling overwhelmed didn’t necessarily correlate to the actual demands placed upon me (exactly like the other morning)
Some weeks I was spinning so many plates with lots of responsibility with total ease. And yet other times I was dealing with a fraction of that load but was completely drowning in the experience of overwhelm. My emotional experience wasn’t quite fitting with the facts of the situation - which made it even more confusing and stressful.
And this isn’t just me.
But why?
Well, there’s multiple reasons for this and they all interlink.
Tiredness, hunger, strong emotions, stress (think HALTS - Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired, Scared) all affect our brain’s ability to remain calm under pressure, to problem solve and look for solutions.
This means that we can much more easily end up drowning in fear driven negative thought patterns (‘What if it all goes wrong? What if I can’t handle it? What if I can’t cope with this?’) which only perpetuates the experience of overwhelm.
This means it’s harder to identify with the facts of the situation (I need to do XY and Z by tomorrow) and instead we can end up embroiled in the secondary reaction (I don’t have enough time, I don’t know where to start, I’m meant to be the person leading this but I haven’t got a clue, no-one else is supporting me etc etc..) which is usually a combination of automatic responses and your inner critic doing it’s best to protect you - It would rather keep you in the familiar safety of overwhelm than have you being brilliant, resilient and thriving in case this opens you up to the risk of failing or facing other challenges.
Overwhelm and hormones
Interestingly, this isn’t just confined to those who are juggling lots of plates and are under lots of stress and pressure.
I also see a lot of overwhelm in patients I see wearing my other professional hat as a women’s health and menopause doctor, seeing women with peri and menopause symptoms as well as PMS.
Becoming easily overwhelmed is a common symptom of hormone related changes, most likely due to the role that oestrogen, progesterone and testosterone have upon our brain function - and this can have a really huge impact on confidence and emotional wellbeing for women, as you might expect.
The impact of hormones on overwhelm doesn’t just occur in isolation, as stress and burnout also negatively impact our hormones - everything is interlinked. And of course, the pressures on women often rise significantly from the age of 35 upwards - often due to a combination of work, parenting, caring for aging parents - as well as the low level but pervasive cultural and systemic gender inequity that we continue to face.
Moving forward
So for me, the other day, once I’d taken a moment to notice what was happening, it was clear that I was feeling overwhelmed because I was tired (I hadn’t slept well), I was feeling hormonal. I was frustrated and couldn’t concentrate because there were some workmen outside using one of those horribly noisy pneumatic drills. Knowing this made it a lot easier to separate myself, my thoughts and my feelings from the facts of the situation and meant that I could identify what I needed to do to feel calmer and take positive action to move forward with what needed doing instead of being stuck in the cloud of overwhelm, not actually getting anything done.
And this is exactly what I support my clients to do in our coaching sessions - which enables them to step back from their experience, notice what’s going on, do what they need to resource themselves and approach the situation in a more helpful way. And ultimately this is something that serves them long after we’ve stopped working together.
Here’s some questions to ask yourself that might help you to explore your experience of overwhelm from a more useful perspective:
When I’m feeling overwhelmed - what’s really going on? What’s the experience of this in my body, my thoughts and my emotions?
What are the facts of the situation and what is my interpretation?
What are the factors impacting my experience at the moment? Am I HALTS? (Hungry/hormonal, Angry, Lonely, Tired, Scared)?
What action could I take to support myself in this moment?