Mel Robbins breaks overwhelm into four steps: pause to stop the false urgency, name the feeling to separate it from self-judgment, deliberately slow down to breathe, and then plan systems and ask for help. She compares it to how even NFL running back Brandon Jacobs could be slowed down.
Chapters
I think the first thing that you need to do is you need to pause. Just pause. I know overwhelm creates this profound sense of urgency, but when everything is urgent, nothing is urgent. Let's just pause. Second, I want you to call it out by name because that's an uncomfortable truth that I talk about. I'm overwhelmed. We're afraid to admit it. Because we think it speaks to our incapability. Not necessarily true. Just speaks to your circumstances. So you pause, you name it, call it out, call it what it is. Let it exist outside of just your mind. I'm overwhelmed right now. Localize it. I'm overwhelmed in this moment. Sometimes overwhelm is a failure of systems that are supposed to be designed to hold you up, and you can't fix systems in a moment's notice. So you don't, you don't have to fix it all. You don't have to have all the answers. You just need to slow it down. It makes me think about this running back. His name was Brandon Jacobs. He used to run for the New York Giants back in the day. Mel, this dude was like, he was 6'4, he had a neck the size of a torso, and he was 264 pounds. Most running backs are like 210. This man was 264 pounds. And his job is to run through your face and astral project your soul into oblivion. That man was terrifying, and he was a running back. And I remember a coach was asked one time, how do you stop Brandon Jacobs? How do you, how do you stop him? And the coach laughed, said, you don't stop Brandon Jacobs, you slow him down enough for the defense to catch his breath. You don't always stop overwhelm when you're already in it. You slow it down enough for you to catch your breath. What systems you can probably set in place in the future to make sure this doesn't happen? Who do you need help from? What skills do you need to build? What part of this thing is overwhelming you? So it's able— it's being able to dissect it and figure out what part of this is affecting me most, but just slow it down. You don't have to fix it.
