Overwork | Overwhelm

Overwork | Overwhelm

2023 is a very stressful time for most of humanity. We are now several years into a pandemic that has receded but not disappeared, and deep into the mental health pandemic following closely in its wake. There is increasing social upheaval, war, ecological catastrophe, economic uncertainty, and astrological intensification. We are passing through a societal collapse, and a rebirth. It is a very strong and chaotic time for many people. These factors create an environment that is filled with threat cues. When we don’t feel safe, it is harder for us to access our Connection systems, the biological fountain of wellbeing and resilience. This makes us more prone to the cascading and deleterious effects of stress.

Many people who have the good fortune to be working are experiencing an increased sense of pressure. This can lead to us feeling overworked and overwhelmed. Within a differentiated model of the stress continuum, overwork/ overwhelm is distinguished from physiological overwhelm by being generally cumulative in nature, and connected to work. It is a build-up, over time, of the cumulative impacts of being unable to keep up with the demands on us. This can clearly intersect with personal, social, societal, and collective features of stress to contribute to ill-being. In this section we focus specifically on addressing impacts of work overwhelm.

There are different types of being overwhelmed. The feeling of being overwhelmed-a feeling of sinking, of being overcome, of being unable to keep up, or to process, can come from many types of overwork, but as we work to discern how to dig ourselves out, there are some clarifying questions that will help us. This framework aligns with the model we lay out in 3 Steps: Assess, Down-Shift, Connect, so that may be a useful resource.

Assess

First, are we overwhelmed by tasks (volume of things), intensity (emotional demand), or both? Sometimes we are overwhelmed by tasks, and this turns into being overwhelmed by intensity, as we become more and more stressed and our bodies turn against us and we grow more resentful.

Yet the first discernment is about type of overwhelm.

If we are overwhelmed by tasks, it can be useful to think in terms of

-Organizing: what things can I batch together, put in piles, structure, or otherwise arrange?

-Automating: are there things that I can create a program a sequence for so that they happen automatically?

-Delegating: are there things that someone else can help me with?

When we go into overwhelm, it is very hard for us to see clearly, think clearly, discern clearly, because the parts of the brain that make good decisions (i.e., Executive function, connected to the medial pre-frontal cortex) are not online. Often, without this online, we will begin to engage in self-sacrificing or self-harming behaviors, become a martyr, try to tough it out, etc., depending on how we personally react to stress and pressure. If we adopt a more self-compassionate approach, we can reach out for help, rather than isolating or going rogue. If you are feeling overwhelmed, find someone to reach out to. Simply being able to discuss it with someone else (tell them that they don’t need to fix it, just to engage in reflective listening) is often quite helpful.

If we are overwhelmed by intensity, it can be useful to organize an awareness of what is happening.

Are we having difficult emotional interactions or getting tangled up or confused about how to respond to people, or situations? If an emotional situation goes unresolved, we find ourselves carrying it in our nervous systems whether we wish to or not. If this happens with enough frequency, soon we will find our autonomic nervous system responding by taking us into anger, or anxiety, or overwhelm. Sometimes this leads to a sense of panic or feeling out of control, sometimes it abruptly shifts into depression.

If we are feeling overwhelmed by emotional intensity, the emotional yoga practice is a very useful awareness-based practiced for increasing emotional clarity and uniting the head and the heart. If it is too hard to sit still, consider beginning with Qi Gong, The Secrets of Natural Movement, or Yoga.

Emotional energy is subject to accumulate, and we hold it in our bodies. For different people, based on our history, constitution, personality, and emotional make-up, we often have default areas of holding emotional stress. This may show up as physical tension in the body, the back, the neck, or as gut issues, or as heart issues. It may show up as panic, or anxiety.

Engaging in movement practices, and grounding exercises can be useful.

Mindset

Many of us are very identified with our work. As a result, there is little space for us to step back, and say, “My work is over there, and I’m over here.” Overwhelm creeps in upon us, coming in closer and closer until it gets inside. This is something that you can begin to address by re-affirming to yourself that you are not your work. Creating a boundary can be very important. Start with a spoken boundary.

Bodyset

It can be helpful to physicalize this sense of boundary through self-protective motor gestures. See our film Turning on the Connection System to learn more about this class of gestures. Basically, with your movement, you visualize putting the work over there, and yourself over here. This is part of learning how to Change the Inputs. Consider also if specific sensory systems are overwhelmed. In our modern era, there is a profound physiological impact for many people from staring at screens.