Five things to do when life begins to overwhelm you

Being a driven person who takes life more serious than she takes it easy, I have been overwhelmed by life more times than I would like to be. My recent experience with this made me take a hard look at my situation, and say some truths to myself. I realised that I was not the only one who needed to hear these truths because there are so many people going through similar things. So I have decided to share these tips to help everyone, apart from obvious things to do like 'rest' and 'pray', cos really, we are all going to be overhwelmed at some point in our lives, so we can learn from this.

1. Remind yourself that life is mostly vanity

Some of us are naturally prone to taking life too serious (I’m the number one culprit here). While we need to approach life’s assignments with determination and focus, always remember that there’s a place for balance. And in the end, we take nothing six feet below. Only our legacy and impact in the lives of others will count.

2. Learn to push back 

Say you have 30 tasks to complete in a week, and you humanly speaking, you can only finish 7, ask yourself
“what is the implication of not meeting my target?” If it won't result in dire consequences like the death of someone or cutting someone's life’s journey short, then don't spend all your energy worrying about it. You will only get more overwhelmed and become less effective. Just ask for leeway from the people who have placed expectations on you, or you can totally back out of the tasks. Because really, when you push the excess tasks to a later time, there might be another set or 30 waiting for you

3. Stop watching or listening to depressing contents 

Your life is already hard enough at the moment. This is not the time to binge of deadly women, killer kids and nightmare next door. While they are very good and worth watching, overdosing on them or watching them at the wrong time may constantly drive us to a moody state. And when you need something happy to hold on to, your happiness bank would be empty because it has been depleted by gloomy contents. When life overwhelms you, it is best to switch was your mind consumes to more positive and optimistic materials

4. Surround yourself with encouragers

You might not have time to take breaks like a day off or a movie night because you are in an overwhelmed stage, so give your mind a positive environment by surrounding yourself with people that make you happy either by words of encouragement, being entertaining, or merely by their presence. They'll make your passing through the overwhelming phase lighter

5. Honestly evaluate yourself 

If being overwhelmed has become a pattern, Ask yourself truthfully. Why is this so? Do your time management skills need to be worked on, are you refusing to delegate where you can, are you being too nice, accepting responsibilities and always saying yes when the ball is passed to you? The earlier you find out the issue, the better for you because there's a limit to how long you can sail through life in a state of being constantly overwhelmed. And once you pinpoint the cause, deal with the issue immediately.

At one period or the other in our lives, we will all be overwhelmed, and feel like we can’t go on anymore. Always remember that it is just a phase. Knowing how to deal with it at that point is what matters, and coming out unscathed is the most important.