Feeling overwhelmed: what to do when it is all too much
When your head is full and you cannot think straight, press the Overwhelmed button. It walks you through emptying your head, sorting it, and getting one short finishable day out of the other end. Takes about ten minutes.
Updated 8 Aug 2026
Questions this answers
- What does the Overwhelmed button do?
- It walks you through emptying your head, sorting it into tasks, projects and ideas, building one short Success Day, and planning the non-work part of your day. About ten minutes, and you come out with a briefing, a short list and a clear head.
- Can I use the Overwhelmed flow more than once?
- As often as you like. Some people use it once a month, some every Monday morning. You can leave halfway and come back, and nothing you dumped is ever deleted.
- Why does it ask me to plan the rest of my day, not just the work?
- Because most of us started a business to design our own days and then quietly replaced the job we left with busy work. Writing down the sofa and the telly makes it the plan rather than the thing you did instead of working, so you get to enjoy it without the guilt.
Overwhelm comes from having a full brain. You hold on to everything because you are scared that the moment you forget something you will drop the ball, and so you end up carrying your entire business around in your head. Emails, client messages, the proposal you still have not finished, the thing you promised someone on Tuesday.
You were never physically built to hold that much at once. So you stop thinking strategically and go into chicken mode, and then you judge yourself for it, which helps nobody.
At the bottom of the menu there is a red pill marked Overwhelmed. Press it whenever you need it. It is a tool, and using it is the sensible thing to do.
What happens
- 1It asks you to empty your head. Type it or hit the mic and talk. If you have already dumped today, it pulls that in for you.
- 2It sorts everything into tasks, projects and ideas, and tells you exactly how much it found. It is out of your head and saved.
- 3It builds you a Success Day. Not everything, a focused handful you can genuinely finish today.
- 4It asks you to carve out the rest of your day. Move your body, eat well, see someone, switch off. Pick something.
- 5Done. You get your briefing, your short list, and a clear head.
Why the last step matters
Most of us came into business because we wanted to be the architect of our own lifestyle. We wanted to design our own days. And then we get into it and quietly replace the job we left with a nine to five of busy work inside our own business, and we are still working like crazy.
So the step where you plan the non-work part of your day is not filler. Say you are going to slump on the sofa and watch telly tonight. Great. Write it down. Then you get to watch it without the unnecessary guilt, because it was the plan rather than the thing you did instead of working.
Things worth knowing
- You can leave halfway through and come back, it picks up where you left off.
- Nothing is deleted. Everything you dumped is saved before you get to the planning step.
- There is no triage or swiping in this flow on purpose. When you are overwhelmed, being made to judge fifty things one at a time is the last thing you need.
Use it as often as you like. Some people use it once a month, some use it on a Monday morning every week.
More in Your day
Did that not answer it? Ask Thinker in your own words.
Ask a question