What Should You Do When You Feel Overwhelmed

A person is said to become overwhelmed when he/ she believes the stressors are far too great to manage. To be fair, emotional overwhelm entails much more than just being stressed. By definition, being emotionally overwhelmed means "to be completely submerged by your thoughts and emotions about all of life’s current problems, to the point where you lack efficacy and feel frozen or paralyzed". 

How To Identify If You Are Feeling Overwhelmed

Sometimes, it is far more difficult to even put a finger on our actual state. According to the Harvard Business Review, signs of you feeling overwhelmed includes mental slowness, forgetfulness, confusion, difficulty concentrating or thinking logically, to a racing mind or an impaired ability to problem-solving.

Use The 5-4-3-2-1 Grounding Technique

Your mind may wander as far as you pull it back to the present moment. The 5-4-3-2-1 Grounding technique is here to pull anxious mental energy back into the body (through your senses), grounding and calming it so that you can release stress and focus in the here and now again...

It is simple and very effective:-

Working backward from 5, use your senses to list things you notice around you:-

Acknowledge 5 things that you can see around you

table, desk, chair, screen, flowers/ plants (I love to incorporate lots of natural elements in the surroundings- making grounding far easier)

Acknowledge 4 things that you can touch around you

your skin, the chair, your phone, cup, anything you can touch

Acknowledge 3 things that you can hear around you

rain, water flow, music, traffic, chatting (focus on one voice in this case)

Acknowledge 2 things that you can smell around you

flower, food, smoke, perspiration, anything you can smell..

Acknowledge 1 think that you can taste around you

sweet, salty, spicy, tangy, etc.

When you are hustling, irrespective if it is for work, or your studies, it is easy to feel submerged and not having any ability to get a grasp of anything. That is the moment you want to take  a step back, do your grounding, breathe deeply, drink plenty of water, and start calmly... 

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