And what to do about it
You do so many things in your life that sometimes you feel overwhelmed and don’t know why exactly.
It happened to a couple of my clients lately, and they were both on the edge of extreme exhaustion.
It’s common for passionate people to feel that they can’t or don’t want to let go of anything: they care deeply about almost everything they do.
But at the very least, they need to know what’s draining their energies or contributing to not recharging them so they can do something about it.
Analyzing the current state
In this situation, I usually make clients list all the activities they have going on and then score them in terms of how much energy those activities are giving to them and stealing from them.
Even really draining activities can recharge you because you enjoy them very much. The opposite is true, too.
But until you analyze them, you won’t know and will risk having an ever-present feeling of being overwhelmed or dissatisfied.
Moreover, when your body budget is depleted, you won’t be able to self-regulate your behaviors and emotional states, and trying to focus or make decisions will be difficult for you.
I learned about the body budget concept during my training with BeAbove Leadership. It comes from Lisa Feldman Barrett, and it is a financial metaphor to explain how the brain manages our energy and uses predictions to keep us alive and well.
The metaphor shows how it is a matter of energy deposit and withdrawals and how it becomes impossible to “spend” energy on something when we don’t have any.
Taking countermeasures
Luckily, once you know what drains your energy and what, on the other hand, recharges you, you can choose what to do.
With my clients, I saw two main approaches coming up:
choosing to cut out some of the draining activities,
or choosing to increase some of the recharging activities.
There could also be a third way: cutting out the draining activities and increasing the recharging ones.
It’s your turn to self-explore and discover
If, at the moment, you’re feeling overwhelmed or dissatisfied and don’t know why:
make a list of the activities you have going on,
and score them from 1 to 10, first in terms of how much energy they’re giving you, then in terms of how much energy they’re draining from you.
Look at your list: what does it tell you?
What do you want to do with this information?
Let me know in the comments how it went!
Want to explore with me?
I’m used to working with multi-passionate people who love to juggle different activities and helping them not to burn themselves out. I can support you, too! Schedule a chat, and let’s explore how. Schedule a chat, and we’ll explore how.