Got clients who are overwhelmed by all the things they have going on?
Of course you do. Being coached is naturally the stuff of stretching beyond the ordinary and being high-achieving. As people who are “up to things”, there’s going to be a lot going on for us clients as a general rule.
So, you’re going to hear talk of overwhelm from us from time to time, sometimes as a surly push-back against the purposeful, forward-leaning coaching that you are here to give us. This pushback is an occupational hazard; not well documented, but empirically well understood.
And this pushback, even if oft recurring, is a watershed moment for you as coach. Will you capitulate and say, “Of course we can slow things down; let’s give you space to get caught up, and resume our real work when conditions are better for you.”? Or can you harness the tension of that expressed overwhelm to guide us into handling things powerfully?1Because let’s be clear: declaring oneself to be overwhelmed is the stuff of victimhood and being at the effect of life; it is NEVER coming from a place of power.
The former is table-stakes “compassionate” coaching. It’s fine. You’ll be lauded for being “in tune” with our struggles, and “wise” enough not to push. But you couldn’t call it powerful.
Powerful is inviting your overwhelmed client to let that overwhelm be yet another thing that you can help them with. It’s having the courage to push back by saying “Great, I got that: you have a lot on your plate to worry about. How about we work together to ratchet the stress of that WAY down?”
And then you deliver. Because when there’s a stressful swirl of things to do, one can tame it by writing it down. As our coach, you can guide us to do just that.
And while “writing it down” is by itself a transformative leap beyond keeping that swirl of things in our head, that vague concept itself admits even higher levels of power, power that you as coach can provide us. Let’s map out these levels:
Level 0: Nothing written down, it’s all a swirl of stuff to do, living in one’s head. These are open loops that literally cost us sleep as our brains work ‘round the clock to help us not forget.
Level 1: The things to be done are written down. But what’s written down might be vague, high-level things like “Get that next promotion”, or “Fix that relationship” or “Close on the house and move”. In other words, at this level what’s written down might include things that are big, overarching goals that are projects unto themselves. We can do better.
Level 2: What’s written down is a clear list of specific, discrete things to be done. Now we’re at the level of everything being actionable, which is crucial to letting your brain relax the “keep this in memory by recurring thoughts” routine.
Level 3: Those specific, discrete things to be done are made into a plan that spreads those items over time. This allows your brain to really relax, for now there’s a clear plan to the tune of “I don’t need to worry about this until THIS date, and that will give me plenty of time to get it done by THAT date, which will having things moving along right on time”.
Level 4: Creating structures for actually remembering to do and having time for doing those things. This is the stuff of setting aside suitable blocks of time (and putting them on your calendar) and/or setting reminders. Both are to ensure deadlines don’t just come and go (though we hate to admit it, simple oblivion is a surprisingly common way by which plans get derailed).
Level 5: Having another person holding you to account for doing what you said you would do and by when you said you’d do it. This is made possible when the plan is shared with another, including the by-when’s and an up-to-date account of “what’s done and what’s not”. Private plans are so much easier to shirk than ones we share. And in moments of resistance? The knowledge that someone out there cares and is rooting for us is powerfully motivating.
Each level gone up helps to calm the mind, to tame that swirl, to reduce that sense of overwhelm, and, most importantly, to actually follow through and close those loops for good.
All of which is to say: if your client is in overwhelm around whatever, recognize that you can help them. Because notice, and maybe even point it out to them:
Few people ever write it down.
Fewer still break it out into specific steps.
Fewer still make a plan to spread it over time.
Fewer still carve out the time and set reminders.
Fewer still have another to hold them to account.
Whatever level we are at, you can almost certainly help us move to a higher one.
As I write this, my wife and I are in the process of purchasing a house, getting our old house ready to sell, and moving out of the furnished house we’ve been living in. It is a situation rife with opportunity for our imaginations to be caught in a stressful swirl, given the host of tasks to be done, spread out over weeks, on no fewer than THREE separate fronts.
Guess what she did to tame the swirl running through both our heads? That’s right, she wrote it down.
She made a shared document with every gory detail broken down for the three operations, with bullets of to-do’s in roughly chronological order, and the date-specific bits broken out into their own day-by-day section. We turn the text green for a bullet when it’s done. We both take time each day to knock out a few things that we can, and we clearly know when it’ll be go time for those things that aren’t yet actionable. We have the joy of knowing we’re both completing things with clear visuals of what’s done and what’s not; it’s like a 2-player adventure.
It’s not terribly sophisticated; it is quite easy to create and run with. Go back to consider what I’ve described in this relatively simple solution, and you’ll find traces of all 5 levels woven in. This is not an accident. It does wonders to de-stress the whole situation, and free up mental bandwidth to handle things with grace. We’re sleeping better for it.
There’s nothing particularly unique about our situation, nor our solution. It’s just a matter of knowing how. So the next time you’ve got a stressed out, overwhelmed client? Please help ‘em tame the swirl.
Each action is a step with its own due date, for which reminders can be set, and goes to a place where both coach and client can readily see what’s done and what’s not.
Notes:
- 1Because let’s be clear: declaring oneself to be overwhelmed is the stuff of victimhood and being at the effect of life; it is NEVER coming from a place of power.
