Does overwhelm contribute to anxiety?
Are you overwhelmed, anxious maybe both? And do they contribute to each other?
When searching the dictionary definitions I found way too many, so for the purpose of today’s message I’m going to work with these.
Overwhelm:
“to feel sudden strong emotion”:
Anxiety:
“An uncomfortable feeling of nervousness or worry about something that is happening or might happen in the future”:
Now , thinking about both of those definitions, could you say that overwhelm comes before anxiety and can you see how it contributes/leads to anxiety?
What I can share with you is this. Over the past 3 years my life was literally turned upside down and it felt like I was thrown facedown onto the ground, and all I could see was dirt . I felt so overwhelmed that anxiety came into my life and for a while it had a strong grip over me. There were days when my mind was racing, my emotions were up and down like a roller coaster and I couldn’t be in the present moment. I felt numb towards the things I normally love and I just couldn’t deal with the outside world, so my coping strategy was to minimise all interactions. I didn’t work, I rarely left the house and when I did, I felt overwhelmed and anxious.
I remember thinking, when will this end and at that time, I didn’t see any way out of it. To be honest, I didn’t even have the energy to start trying. I had this damn playlist on repeat and everyday took huge amounts of energy and effort to just get started.
I remember looking at my garden which is one of my major passions and thinking “there’s just too much to do”, I remember thinking “OMG I have too many dogs” and I even felt like “I was a burden to my friends”. A big thought was “what am I even doing here on earth, I have no purpose”. These thoughts and feelings were heavy and exhausting and it was the worst repeat playlist I could listen to. Yet each day when I work up the playlist started all over again and the thoughts and feelings were heavy and exhausting.
Does any of this relate to you?
Are you starting to recognise your own automatic playlist ?
If yes, you most likely are experiencing overwhelm but may not be recognising it.
For me overwhelm definitely lead to anxiety and let me share with you how….
As mentioned, I would wake up and the playlist would start. I would go outside to my gardens and the thought of “there’s to much to do” would start, and I would start to feel overwhelmed and after that, came the worry about “how can I maintain these in the future”. Bam! Right there is where the anxiety kicked in!.
Overwhelm for me was “a strong emotion of there’s too much to do” and Anxiety was “how can I maintain these gardens in the future”. For me overwhelm is “how I’m feeling now” and the anxiety is “what might or is going to happen in the future”
So there I was, going out to the gardens which normally made me feel calm, in the moment and provided me with joy, to not even wanting to look at them.
Now here’s some good news…the best thing about overwhelm is that you can fix it relativity easy and when you understand how to do this, you don’t need to go into anxiety.
Here’s some simple steps that work for me and might work for you.
- Listen to all the things that overwhelm you, (I say listen because in most cases they are thoughts in your head).
- Get yourself some coloured post it notes (coloured is important) and a black Texta (also important) and write down 1 thought per post it note. Examples: back garden, front garden, side garden.
- Put these on a bench, wall or anywhere you can see it. Once you’ve done that please go get a tea/coffee/smoothie/drink and go outside and enjoy that for at least 5-10 mins. Why? So your mind can have some space to let go of the overwhelming thoughts and create some space for the next step.
- If you think you can skip step 3, don’t, go and do it.
- If you have done step 3 now go back inside and for each post it note you wrote – put another underneath it and write down 1 action that needs to be done. Example: For Front Garden, I wrote “remove dead growth”. For Back Garden I wrote “fix hoses”.
- Once you’ve done that take another break
- Now one you’ve done that, you can either start to take some action on some real easy things or you can just let it sit there until you ready to start.
How does this work?
Firstly when you listen to your playlist consciously (not just let it run on auto pilot) you can start to break it up into individual thoughts, which in turn, starts to break down the repetition and the link that each thought feeds into each other. By writing 1 thought onto 1 post it note, it also breaks down the overwhelm.
When you identify 1 simple action you can take, it allows your mind to change it’s focus from “there’s to much to do or its too hard” to “there is something I can do” and this is so important because not only does it re-set the way you look at something, I found this prevented me from going into the anxiety feeling of “there’s too much to do”.
Now this method is very simple and very powerful and when you do it, all of the sudden you’ll start to experience a “want to do the things on your post it notes, it’s like your brain starts a new direction”. It also takes the thoughts out of your head and puts them onto paper and this is super important because it frees up the mind and allows the universe to help you.
Example: I started creating a garden on the verge of my property because I had so many excess plants and it just had ugly energy and the council didn’t maintain it. So I wrote a list of things that I needed, mulch, trees, agapanthus, paint fence, trees,etc. The very next day I started on the road garden and to cut a long story short, I had neighbours giving me plants to put in the garden, I was given truckloads of mulch for freed, I found paint under the house I could use and everything I needed for the garden was provided (the universe helped).
Now, I also have lists for the house, the business and the fur family and I honestly can say “overwhelm doesn’t run my life and anxiety doesn’t really exist for me either:
Going to the psychologist and talking about it, didn’t help, it was just reinforcing the playlist. What helped me was getting the thoughts out of the playlist, onto post it notes so my mind and the universe could start to take action.
The other powerful thing about using this method is that at the end of a day or the week, when you start to pull your completed post it notes off, you get this sense of achievement and satisfaction which gives you positive energy and re-trains your brain because you can see what you’ve achieved.
The other thing that helped me tremendously is using the Anxiety Gone Pack. I found that when I used the Anxiety Gone scent, it started to help me release thoughts on so many levels that the more I used it, the more I started to feel lighter and more determined to achieve the actions on my post its.
I noticed that when using the New Beginnings scent, my mind started a new playlist and I started to get positive feelings towards the garden, my self and my life. Using this combination just amped up my results. I started with the Anxiety Scent first – Whilst using the melts/candle in the morning, I wrote out my overwhelming thoughts, wrote out the actions, had my tea and then once all my daily routines were completed (aprox 1-3hrs), I would then switch over to the New Beginnings Scent and start to do the actions.
When I couldn’t burn the candles or melts, I used the scent oil and placed them one my wrists so I could sniff one and then the other!
Now that I understand how overwhelm works (for me) and also know that the post it system works (for me) I feel a strong urge to share this with you.
With the help of my dad and the universe, 5 of my gardens are now looking immaculate and have gone to the next level. People who come here are commenting on them and the plants are happy and providing me with AHmazing energy.
Solaz Scents wise, I am organising and sorting things out that used to overwhelm me and I’m even putting in daily routines which I’ve never had before, plus I have a clear vision and am absolutely loving it
I am feeling authentic, going with flow, putting alot of post-its on my “completion pile” and I’m in the moment. Most of all I am so appreciate of the Anxiety and New Beginnings Scents, not only do they smell so lovely, they have just helped so much.
I hope this makes sense to you and most of all, I really hope you give this a go. Honestly I don’t miss “being overwhelmed” or “feeling anxious” and the best thing is that I’m very quick to identify when any type of overwhelm starts and the first thing I do is put on the Anxiety Gone Scent and then get out my post its.
I am grateful this process works for me and I trust and believe it will work for you too.
Note: Texta is important to use so you can read the post-its from a long distance and the different colours help your brain to separate them (if you use one colour your brain sees them as 1 big thing and that creates overwhelm.
Oh and if your interested in amping it up, I’ve put together a few Limited Edition Anxiety Gone packs so you can really set yourself up for success.. Hope this helps, regards Aje – Intuitive & Creator @solazscents
