Are you feeling overwhelmed at the moment? It’s understandable. As a business owner, you have so much you want to achieve. But with everything else on your plate, it doesn’t take much to cause overwhelm in your life.

I’m seeing a lot of this at the moment. Many have started the new year feeling quite hopeful, setting new goals and intentions. And I get it – with everything going on in the world, we just want to get on with our lives and businesses. But often, we make the mistake of being too ambitious with what we want to achieve and our available timescales. Old habits prevent us from making progress, and we quickly get overwhelmed with what we’re trying to achieve, which can lead to overwhelm.

But there are things you can do to ease that feeling. Here are some of my top tips to help ease that overwhelm and motivate you again.

#1: Go easy on yourself

Start by going easy on yourself. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will your business! You have so much you want to achieve, but you’re not superhuman. So ensure you’re scheduling time to look after your physical and mental health. Be your own cheerleader and get into the habit of celebrating your wins, no matter how big or small they may be.

#2: Feeling overwhelmed? Break down your goals

Break your big goals down into 90 days goals. You can then break them down further into small steps and then schedule them into your weekly calendar. The key here is to break them down so much that they become simple, small action steps you can complete weekly. This will help you see the progress you’re making, but it will also help you stay motivated. 

#3: Stop trying to do it all in one month

Stop trying to achieve everything in the first month or two of the year. Be realistic with your timescales and learn from your mistakes. If you always set too much into your working day or week, learn from that and adapt accordingly.

#4: Prioritise what’s important if you want to stop feeling overwhelmed

Know what is important in moving your business forward and focus only on those tasks. Take social media as an example. You don’t need to be on there 24/7, and you don’t need to be mindlessly scrolling on every platform. But you need to know what platform is right for you and your audience and be intentional with your posting. You don’t need to be commenting on every post in your feed, but you need to interact with a few ideal potential clients daily or follow up with potential leads. Be smart with your time and the tasks you’re prioritising. [Check out ‘How visible do you need to be online?’ for more help with social media!]

#5: Schedule time to work on your goals

Finally, schedule weekly time slots to work on those priority tasks and your business goals. If you want to stop feeling overwhelmed, you need to get focused. But you also need to get some work done to achieve small wins – because this will motivate you.

If you want to stop feeling overwhelmed, the above five tips will help. It’s down to you to implement them if you’re going to see a change. And if you’ve followed the tips above but realise your heaving task list is causing your overwhelm – reach out! Let’s discuss options for getting some of those tasks off your list to free up your time and energy to focus on what is important to you. You’ll find our contact details here.