Episode 294 Transcript
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[00:00:00] You are listening to episode 294 of the Peaceful Mind Podcast.
Welcome to the Peaceful Mind Podcast, a place for creating the peace of mind. You need to be the best mom. You are created by God to be. If you want to bring more balance, more joy, and more peace to your motherhood, this is the place for you. I'm your host, certified life coach at Catholic Mom Danielle Thienel.
In the name of the father of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Let's get started.
Hello everyone. How are you? Is it turning like fall, like weather where you are right now? Oh goodness. First of all, I just wanna thank you for being here. I am just so grateful for [00:01:00] the listeners for this opportunity, for you giving your time and attention, and just hope you like the podcast and you find it helpful.
I haven't really asked for it in a while, like personally here. I think in my outro of if you listen all the way, it will say something, but if you could, if you are getting value and help from this just clicking on the show, there's a place that shows you says to rate and then, add those five stars and then say something that you've been helped with or what you like about the podcast.
Something that if you were scanning podcasts and looking at reviews, right? They're so important for other people out there to decide whether they're gonna listen to or not. For all of you. Let me just in advance that, do that for me. May I just say a big heart filled thank you to you. Okay.
Today we're gonna talk about my jam. My jam is overwhelm. This [00:02:00] is what I was what I, my, in my personal life, what led me to coaching was the overwhelm. That I found in my motherhood. And so this is what I decided when a coach actually helped me. And, and then after being certified and deciding on what kind of coach I wanted to be, this is why I focus on this subject.
Okay? I wanna help you today be overwhelmed if you find yourself overwhelmed right now, and I want you to be able to find more balance in your life. And so I'm gonna provide seven ways that we can beat overwhelm, okay? All right. So let me just ask you something. How many times this week have you felt overwhelmed?
Have you felt like you were drowning? Are there a whole bunch of things just tucking at you at once does. Does a whole bunch of things that feel like loose left [00:03:00] undone. If you are saying yes, then I'm excited to be able to give you some solutions to that. I know that for some of us, I know it was for me, overwhelm ends up becoming like this really unwelcome companion to our lives and I just want you to know that overwhelm is not your destiny.
Okay. You are not destined to be overwhelmed until the kids grow up and they're off on their owns. And I want you to know that balance is not some mythical unicorn that only exists for other people. It is possible for you. I know I have it in my life. I live it out daily now. It took a bit, it took some time and attention and investment in myself to get here, but I want you to know that it's possible and I just want [00:04:00] to help us understand overwhelm a little better.
Okay? This is important for me to underscore for you. Okay. That overwhelm is a feeling. It is an emotion. Okay? Overwhelm is not caused by anything outside of you. Overwhelm is internally created. Now I know that we look to our outside situation and then that triggers our thinking and then we choose. A lot of times it can be subconscious, it can be, it can feel automatic 'cause we've practiced a lot, but our brain will default on what's easy and it will choose those thoughts that then create that feeling of overwhelm in our body.
But in general, the way that we are habitually looking at overwhelm, and I will open and talk about that in that same way. [00:05:00] That's because I know it's relatable. It would sound something like it's when our capacity is exceeded by how many commitments we have. It's having that feeling of having more on our plate than we could possibly handle or take care of in a day or a week or a month, right?
Overwhelm can be when we have many emotion emotions, right? That we feel like we can't process or allow or just, actually feel. Overwhelm is when we have more decisions to make. Then your brain like, feels like it can actually compute, but here's something important. Overwhelm is often not about having too much to do, but it's about having too little.
Clarity about what actually matters most or that what you, in your human capacity, that has limited time [00:06:00] and energy can actually focus on in a human way. So when everything that's going on in your life feels equally urgent, right? Nothing then gets the actual attention it deserves to follow through to get to completion, and we end up spinning our wheels instead of making some tangible.
Real progress on the things that we feel like or have thoughts about that we are overwhelmed by. And lemme tell you, the enemy loves overwhelm because it keeps you stuck, and that's exactly where the enemy wants you to be. Okay. When we're overwhelmed, we can't think clearly. We definitely can't hear God's voice.
And we can't show up as the moms, wives and women that God's called us to be. So that's why I [00:07:00] wanna offer you seven ways today to be overwhelmed and to help you find more balance in your life. Okay, so let's just start way one. Okay. I want you to get clear on your non-negotiable. And yes, like not just in your brain, I'm talking about, I'm going to set aside this time to decide on my non-negotiables and write them down, right?
Getting crystal clear on your non-negotiables, the things that absolutely must happen for you to feel like you can and your family can function well. And these are different for every mom out there. And they might include things like family dinner together, bedtime prayers with the kids, your morning coffee, prayer time, weekly date nights, right?
With your husband, right? What are your non-negotiables? Is it that you do bath time every night for your kids, [00:08:00] right? Is your non-negotiable that you, yourself work out again? There is no right, wrong, or any judgment, certainly not on my side for what you would choose as your non-negotiables. And when you know them, you can build your life around them instead of hoping you'll find time for them.
And then what it does is it prioritizes so that everything else becomes negotiable and we are going to have negotiable stuff. Again, because we're human with limited time and energy, so the house can be messier, dinner can be simpler, activities can be skipped, but you want to be somebody who protects your non-negotiables and that will allow you to stay over out of overwhelm.
So I would love to urge you to write down your top five [00:09:00] non-negotiables. What are the things that, when they happen, make you feel grounded and connected to what matters most? Protect these with everything you have and you will feel more balance in your life. Alright, number two. The second way to beat overwhelm is to practice the power of one.
I have another coach that I follow and has helped me with actually organizing like the backend technical side of my business. And she also uses this phrase, the power of one, right? So when you're feeling overwhelmed, your brain wants to solve everything at once, but overwhelm gets defeated one task, one decision, one focus, one breath at a time.
That's really how we overcome overwhelm, is that focus on one task. Okay? So instead of looking at your entire to-do list and feeling [00:10:00] para paralyzed by it, we're gonna choose one thing, just one. Do that one thing and do it completely, and then choose the next one thing.
And this isn't about being like less productive. It's about being more effective. In Proverbs 16, nine, it tells us that in their hearts, humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps. So I just want you to focus on the step in front of you, not the entire staircase, and bring God into it.
Call on your faith in whatever you are trying to focus on. Get, to whittle way through what you're overwhelmed by and God will establish your path one step at a time. Okay, so practice the power of one. Think of it, I have worded this a different way too in other podcasts [00:11:00] where it's a tool in my mom toolbox called constraint.
And so practicing the power of one is basically saying practicing constraint when you focus on one of the tasks at a time. Okay. Way number three that will help you beat overwhelm and find balance is to delegate and ask for help. I will never stop preaching this from the top of the mountain. I know.
I know. It's easier, right? To just do it yourself. That was that. That line of thinking was my personal demise. That was stress and overwhelm. Come on in whenever I chose to think, you know what? Forget about it. It's just easier. I'll just do it all myself, right? This thought that I can do it faster, better without having to explain anything or teach somebody.
But mama, let me just tell you, this mentality is keeping you trapped [00:12:00] and overwhelm your children can help more than you think. Your husband wants to support you, even if he doesn't always know how. Your friends and family would love to contribute, but they can't read your mind and they can't help if you don't ask.
This is where a lot of you will benefit from starting small in this, right? Can you ask your 8-year-old to pack their own lunch? Can your teenager begin to be responsible for their own laundry? Can your husband take over a little bit of the bedtime routine on certain nights? Can you ask your mom to help with grocery shopping or ask a friend a carpooled soccer practice?
Look, asking for help is not where you are saying, admitting like a defeat. It is admitting you're human and I always love to remind, like I'm so [00:13:00] grateful when people ask me to do something for them because that allows me, I benefit from it if that is something I say yes to. Let's just think even Jesus had his team of 12 disciples, right?
Was helping him on his mission. Just know to have more balance in your life and to really beat overwhelmed, you don't have to do everything alone. Okay? Way number four is to create some systems that serve you. So when you don't have any systems, you are constantly making decisions from scratch, which then drains your mental energy and creates decision fatigue.
I know about last month I did an episode on. Decision fatigue. So go check that one out as well, which will really help you in this way that I'm offering you. And systems are simply ways of doing things that become a little bit more automatic, right? So [00:14:00] is it, do you need one for meal planning, right?
So you're not standing in front of the fridge at 5:00 PM wondering what's for dinner? Do we need one for laundry so it doesn't pile up so huge that you think you're in front of Mount. Wash more. Oh, goodness gracious. All right. A little laundry humor there. A system for getting you out of the door in the morning so you're not frantically searching for shoes and backpacks, right?
It's just there. Where in your life can you just ask if I had a little bit more of a system? And then let me just tell you, somebody else has created a system. That would help you in that area. So just like find your place where you want more help and then just go Google it, right? And or YouTube and find out.
And it doesn't have to follow somebody else's way perfectly, but there might be some aspect of [00:15:00] that system that you could start to incorporate in a small way. And it doesn't have to be, perfect and so impressive. Just the ones that really work for your life and your real family. Okay.
All right. So way number four. That was to create systems that actually help you and serve you and support you. And then way number five, to find more balance and to be overwhelmed is to establish your baselines. I have a close coach friend who, this is something what I love, she calls it minimum baselines.
And so I want you to establish what your minimum baselines are and what that means. Is that overwhelm often comes from when you have unclear expectations about what actually needs to be done versus what you think should be done. Okay? And so we wanna [00:16:00] identify our personal baselines and what those are the minimum standards that keep your family functioning and you mama feeling sane.
So your baseline for housekeeping might be. The dishes need to be done and laundry rotated and just the main living areas that you can see picked up. Okay? Your baseline for meals might be that everyone is fed with a reasonably nutritious food, even if it is simple hello. It could be, spaghetti one night.
Tacos. The next your baseline for your family time might be something like, okay, if we have one meaningful interaction, connection, conversation point each day with each child, then that is the minimum. That's the good enough standard is another way to word what your minimum baseline is. And once you know these, you establish you're good [00:17:00] enough for everything.
Then, right when, this is how overwhelm is when you think you have to do it all. But the way to beat overwhelm is for you to know oh no, I just literally, I feel good when I have these minimum baselines at least tackled, right? Good enough, housekeeping might mean bathrooms are cleaned weekly instead of.
Daily good enough. School involvement might mean attending the important events, but not volunteering for every committee. The key here about your standards is to not let perfectionism decide for you. And then when you know what your good enoughs are, you can stop second guessing yourself and putting energy into things that don't actually matter, right?
It'll free up your time and mental space for the areas where you want to go above and beyond. And those areas will be different for everyone [00:18:00] here. Everyone's good enough is different, and instead of looking to what other people are doing, establish what your good enough standards are, your minimum baselines.
Okay? Way six. That is to batch similar tasks together. I am actually doing that right now. I batch, like social media posts, I batch emails, I batch episodes for the podcast. I do several together. Okay. And this is how I don't get overwhelmed. And so instead of scattering, doing things throughout the day.
I want you to look at what you, how you could group similar activities and do them at once. So you can have, and the reason why is because it'll reduce this, like mental switching that happens when you like jump from one thing to the other. It's today I'm going all in podcast episode creations, [00:19:00] right?
So maybe you batch your phone calls together. Or texting, right? Instead of making them throughout the day, maybe you do your meal prep, right? On one day instead of every day. Maybe you batch errands, right? I know we all, you try and do this, but you could think more like a ahead of, okay, how can I make one trip instead of multiple trips?
It really helps you get into a rhythm and flow when you batch. That's much more efficient and less mentally exhausting than constantly switching. So just again, ask yourself are there more activities that I'm doing that I could batch and really be more less overwhelmed by more efficient?
Okay, and the last way that I wanna offer you to beat overwhelm and to find balance. Is to build in buffer time, and I'm smushing two things together. And to [00:20:00] build grace into your life. So building buffer time. So maybe think about that as far as your schedule building buffer time into your schedule, but then building grace into your life.
Meaning like giving yourself more grace, stop scheduling yourself so tightly. That one small delay will throw off your entire day. Extra time between appointments, right? Extra days before deadlines, and then definitely extra grace when things don't go as planned because we can plan with such good intention, but life will always throw us things we don't expect.
And buffer time is not wasted time because you're not being like. Productive. It's sanity time. That's what I want you to think of it as. It's the space that allows you to breathe to be a little bit more present, to handle that unexpected that I mention that will come. [00:21:00] And I want you to build more grace into your life instead of like the panic when there's, we're just so overwhelmed, right?
And when things still go wrong, because they will. Extend yourself the same grace you would give to your best friend, right? You're not perfect and your life doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful and building in buffer time and giving yourself more grace is definitely the way to beat overwhelm, and to find more balance.
All right, those are the seven ways everyone. But before we close, I do want to address something important, this word balance. Balance doesn't mean that everything gets equal time and attention. Balance means that over time, like the collective like chunk that the important [00:22:00] things get the attention they deserve.
The things that matter more most get the attention they deserve. And there will be some seasons that will require more focus on your family, more seasons, sometimes others will be on work, others on rest and restoration, right? Because perfect balance is a myth and it will keep you frustrated and feeling like you're failing.
But sustainable balance is a rhythm that honors. Your family's priorities. Your priorities, while also giving you grace that there's a little ebb and flow and that there are harder times and easier times that kind of go back and forth, right? That's real life and for sure your, the way what you feel balanced about will look different from your neighbors.
It'll look different from your sister's type of balance, or the mama you follow on Instagram, right? [00:23:00] That's, it's not only just, okay, that's how it should be, right? Because God gave us each a unique calling. He gave us unique children, unique circumstances, unique gifts, and your balance should reflect your own unique life.
So again, that is up for grabs to decide what your own balance is. And lastly overwhelm is a signal. Okay? Overwhelm is a signal. I don't want it to be your life sentence. It's your inner wisdom telling you that something needs to shift. Maybe you need to simplify. Maybe you need to ask for help. Maybe you need to rest.
Maybe you need to reorganize your priorities, but you're not stuck in overwhelm forever. I do not want you to be stuck in overwhelm. I was stuck in it for so long because I put the blame on the other things and the blame [00:24:00] my to-do list. I blamed time for not being enough. Look, everyone overwhelm is self-created by choosing.
The way we're looking at our life circumstances in a way that, that we're thinking things like, this is too much. Okay? But you're not stuck in overwhelm. You have the power to create a life that feels manageable and peaceful. You have the wisdom to evaluate and decide on what your family needs most. You have the strength to make the changes that will serve your peace.
This week, I hope that out of all the seven ways that you could just take one of them, write it down, right? Create a simple system like know your non-negotiables. Practice that power of one. Whatever you choose from the seven ways, start small. Be patient with yourself and [00:25:00] take ownership. If we are feeling overwhelmed, it's because we're choosing the thoughts about what's going on that's creating this, right?
And we don't have to solve all of our overwhelm like this week, right? You just need to take the next right step towards that balance that you that's available to you, right? We're not meant to live in constant overwhelm. We're meant to live from a place of peace. That is why I do the Peaceful Mind Podcast.
I want you to lead your family with a calm confidence. I want you to enjoy this beautiful, sacred season of motherhood that you're in. And I hope that this episode was a little step closer to helping you do that. Alright, everyone, again, so grateful that you're here. Thank you for being a listener. And until I meet you back here, may peace be with you [00:26:00] always.
Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode of the Peaceful Mind Podcast. If you found value in today's episode, I'd be so grateful if you could subscribe and leave a review. It not only supports the podcast, but ensures you don't miss out on future episodes packed with insights and tools. To create peace of mind in your busy mom life.
And if you're of the Catholic faith, like me or any Christian mom seeking to feel better in any area of your life and to show up more calm, connected, and confident, I can help become an empowered mom who knows how to bring about the changes you desire, no matter the circumstances. Whether you need one-on-one guidance to get there, prefer a group coaching program with like-minded women or a self-study course I've got you covered.
Explore my private one-on-one packages. Join my Busy to Balanced group life coaching program or delve into my signature course Divine Time. To find out [00:27:00] which path is right for you, let's meet and see what's the best fit. Schedule a free call with me at daniellethienel.com or send me a direct message on Facebook or Instagram @daniellethienelcoaching.
And also don't forget to get your copy of my book, the Cyclone Mom MethodHow To Call On Your God-Given Power To Remain Calm, In Control, and Confident as a Busy Mom. dive into the digital and bonus audio version when you go to book.daniellethienel.com/new-book. You'll find all the details in the show notes too.
Until next time, peace be with you always.
