How To Feel Less Overwhelmed and More in Control of Your Life

Life can be overwhelming

Work, tasks, chores. Duties, responsibilities, expectations. To-do lists, priorities, deadlines. Family, friends, relationships. Each day, innumerable things threaten to throw you off balance and overwhelm you.

Whether you are working, a stay-at-home parent, or someone who’s trying to build a career, this is a common problem experienced across the board. The more ambitious you are, the more you struggle to feel in control of your life.

Contrary to what you may feel, most times, it’s not the workload or the lack of time that makes you feel overwhelmed. It’s how you (mis) manage things and live your day-to-day life that is the culprit.

Here are seven ways to deal with overwhelm and feel more in control of your life.

1. Organize your life

Clutter, chaos, and mismanagement are amongst the top causes of feeling overwhelmed for most people.

You know the feeling well. You waste time looking for things, forget to carry out essential tasks, miss deadlines, and fail to keep up your commitments. Your life is one big mess, and you find it challenging to navigate your way through it all.

The easiest way to sort things out and fix the problem is to get in control of your life. Lay down the rules, create a morning and evening routine, make lists for everything, follow patterns, and practice a strict no-clutter policy.

Small tweaks and minor changes in your daily life can bring a sea of difference and help you streamline your life and keep it running smoothly.

2. Create boundaries

People can take advantage of you only if you allow them to walk all over you and be taken for granted. There’s a thin line between being agreeable and having no sense of boundaries.

If you’ve been playing the always available game, now is the time to draw the line and set your boundaries. Others will respect you and hold you in high esteem once you start treating yourself well.

If you don’t want to feel overwhelmed by emotional commitments, muster the courage to say no. When you don’t want to do something or entertain someone, say the word. Communicate it clearly to the other person without feeling guilty.

You’ll be in control of your life when you start being your own person and choose yourself over others. You owe it to yourself to honor your needs and priorities and treat yourself with dignity and compassion.

3. Stop chasing perfection

Much of the overwhelm in your life occurs when you set unrealistic standards for yourself to achieve and strive for perfection.

Life doesn’t always go your way, and no matter how much you try, there’s every possibility that you won’t get things perfectly well.

Perfectionism will always keep you stuck in unhappiness, and the more you stretch yourself to measure up to the impossible expectations, the more frustrated you’ll get.

You have your strengths and abilities, and you can only try your level best at whatever you do. No amount of sweating or fretting will improve your performance, so stop running behind the elusive goal.

4. Keep off the social media

If you’re one of those for whom hanging online is the first thing in the morning and the last thing at night, you cannot escape feeling overwhelmed by the constant newsfeed, torrent of information, and the updates from your friends.

The only way to overcome social media fatigue, feel at ease, and be more in control is to limit the time you spend on virtual platforms. Use the time and mental energy thus saved for reading or doing meaningful activities.

Instead of wasting time on mindless comparisons on social media, Invest in personal development and strive to become your most superior version. This will boost your sense of self and help you feel good about yourself.

5. Make time for yourself

Your life is supposed to be all about you, but most times, you prioritize other things over yourself and push your needs on the back burner.

To keep your bearings and enjoy good mental health, you must carve out time for yourself on an everyday basis.

Once you commit to focusing on your well-being, you will be able to take time for yourself despite the hectic schedule and the piled-up work.

Spending time alone will safeguard you from feeling overwhelmed and give you a breather to understand where you are headed in life.

When you set aside time for your own self, you give signals to your brain that you are important and you matter. This can do wonders for your self-confidence and help you feel motivated to pursue your goals with renewed energy and enthusiasm.

6. Deal with the sources of overwhelm

Often, a blanket treatment for dealing with overwhelm doesn’t work. In such a case, you need to get to the root cause and identify what is taxing your mind and causing mental anguish.

Broadly, there are three areas of life: work, personal life, and relationship issues that lead to emotional stress and overwhelm.

There are no watertight compartments in life, and problems in one area cause ripples in other areas, hampering your focus and productivity and jeopardizing your mental health.

It is, therefore, critical to address the issues that are robbing you of your happiness and preventing you from living a balanced life.

7. Keep it simple

Life can get complicated and overwhelming when you bite off more than you can chew.

You have only so much time at your disposal each day. No matter how hard you try, you cannot be everything to everyone. So stop being that nice person and spreading yourself too thin.

Train yourself to say no to random things thrown on your plate. Keep your priorities at the front and center and take up only as much work as you can comfortably tackle.

You’re a human with a finite amount of time and energy. Stretching yourself beyond limits and being an over-enthusiastic productivity fan with only lead you to overwhelm and burnout.

To accomplish your big goals and live a quality life, keep things simple, focus on things that truly matter, and take consistent action.

In Conclusion

Work and stress are an inseparable part of you, but don’t let them negatively impact you by overpowering you and making your life a journey of eternal suffering.

Allowing yourself to feel overburdened, overworked, and overwhelmed can have repercussions on your life besides taking a toll on your physical and mental health.

So the next time you feel weighed down, press the pause button, attend to the problems brewing in your life, and set things straight.

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Dr. Roopleen is the author of ‘And So Can You’ and From Average to Awesome