Everybody feels overwhelmed in their lives, maybe even every
week haha. Something I realized what I
do when I’m overwhelmed is just stop, ignore the problem, and deal with
something easier instead and just push that problem to the future. Usually I would just say, “oh that is just me
being a procrastinator,” but as my accounting teacher said, you have to find
the root of the problem, not a symptom.
The example our teacher uses is that people go to the doctor
and say “I have a fever and a runny nose.” No those are symptoms, the problem
is you may have the flu or a sinus infection.
In the same vein, just saying I’m procrastinating isn’t enough, I have
to find the cause.
Probably a big thing is that I’m worried I would make
something worse. When you are
overwhelmed everything seems to be shaky and that one little action will cause
everything to fall apart. Since I don’t
fully know what I want to do and how to proceed in this dangerous environment,
I end up thinking that I may realize the answer later so I put it off till that
time.
An even bigger point is that sometimes I don’t want to take
responsibility for the position I’m in.
It is almost like acting is admitting you are in a difficult position,
and that it is your responsibility to get out of it. Sometimes I feel it is someone else’s fault
and that I should wait until that person makes a move before I make my
own. Maybe that person will come in and
sweep the problem away because they are responsible too in my mind. While I await the cavalry to save me, I do
nothing, never fixing the problem.
So those are two quick reasons I could think of why I don’t
act when I’m overwhelmed. It is bad to
not do things at the time you need to do things the most, but like a deer in
the headlights, problems sometimes makes you freeze.