2. Overwhelm Is Optional
In this episode, I’m offering you some immediate relief from the stress, anxiety, and overwhelm that so many interior designers experience. At the core of the work that I do is the idea that overwhelm is optional. When we look at our to-do lists or we see the emails piling up in our inboxes, it’s easy to believe that overwhelm is just something we have to deal with, but I want you to stay with me here.
I used to be an overwhelmed interior designer just like you. However, when I learned that overwhelm is optional, everything changed and I was able to view my stress from a totally new perspective. The same is possible for you, so listen closely to discover the secret to feeling calm and in control, even when it feels like everything’s coming at you at once.
Tune in this week as I share why your overwhelming thoughts are nothing more than optional sentences in your brain, and why this is the best news ever! I’m showing you what you’re missing out on when you believe overwhelm isn’t optional, and I’m giving you an amazing mindset tool to take control of your overwhelm, stress, and anxiety.
To celebrate the launch of the show, I’m giving away gift cards to Jayson Home, one of my favorite home decor sources. All you have to do to become one of the five lucky listeners to win is follow, rate, and review this podcast.
Please leave your honest feedback, and click here to learn how to enter!
What You’ll Discover from this Episode:
My story of dealing with overwhelm as an interior designer, overworking to try to prove my worth.
Why we believe that changing our circumstances is the only way to start feeling in control.
How our overwhelmed brain always goes with us when we make changes in our lives, like starting a new job.
Why your brain is the problem, but it’s also the solution to your overwhelm.
How your thoughts about your circumstances are what lead to uncomfortable emotions and sensations.
What you’re missing out on as an interior designer when you’re stuck in overwhelm.
An incredible mindset tool to start making overwhelm an optional part of your work as an interior designer, so you can take more effective action.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Enter the podcast launch giveaway by leaving a rating and review! Click here to learn how to enter.
If you love what you’re learning on the show, I’d love for you to check out my signature group coaching program, Out of Overwhelm.
Full Episode Transcript:
Hey there designer, thanks for tuning into episode two, where I’m going to share the most important tool you need to make overwhelm truly optional.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you're ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you're in the right place. I'm Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let's go.
Hello designers, welcome back to the podcast. I am so happy to be sitting down to record with you. We, meaning need my family and I, just got back from a week long adventure hiking all over the place. We started in Sedona, Arizona, went to Flagstaff, then went to the Grand Canyon, and then drove to Utah and went and did Zion National Park.
We also then drove to Las Vegas, where I have a good friend and we saw her and her adorable little baby boy on the way out and showed our kids the Las Vegas Strip. Which was just a hoot, it was such a stark contrast from the natural beauty we had just been immersed in for the past week.
So anyways, I hope you are all having an excellent fall and enjoying the changing of seasons, whatever that looks like wherever you live. So as I was thinking about what I wanted to include in this next episode, I was thinking about what I could share that would give you really some immediate relief from the stress and anxiety and overwhelm you're currently experiencing.
And I wanted to think about something I could share that's really core to my teachings that you could start using immediately, whether you're driving in the car on the way to the job site, or at your desk doing proposals or drawings. That concept is that overwhelm is optional.
And if you're thinking, “But, Desi, have you seen my to-do list? Do you know how many emails are piling up in my inbox? Overwhelm is definitely not optional for me.” Okay, I just want you to stay with me, I get it. I used to be an overwhelmed interior designer just like you, so I totally get it. But I want to offer you another perspective. This one concept I'm sharing today changed everything for me and it could for you too.
Before we dive in, I want to share a win from Out of Overwhelm, my group coaching program. Every Friday we celebrate in the group all the amazing things that these designers are creating. And there was one that felt so appropriate for what we're talking about today.
And this client shared, “There were some last minute orders that needed to be placed for the kitchen renovation that's currently happening. I felt panic set in, but instead of giving in I just made it to-do list. I carved out some time and got it all done with no issues. It felt so good to just do rather than freak out.”
This is so, so good because we don't have to control all of our external circumstances to still feel calm and in control. And that's what we're going to talk about. So let's dive into the topic of overwhelm. And, like I said, overwhelm is something I know intimately from my career as an interior designer.
I used to be a commercial interior designer before I started my residential practice. And that's kind of where the overwhelm story started. I was working probably like 60 plus hours a week, I don't even know at this point, evenings, weekends, I was so burned out. I really thought about leaving the field altogether.
And well, I started to think about what else I could do. And then I thought, “Well, I'm going to start my own residential business. If I have my own business, I will definitely have the freedom, the flexibility.” And what I ended up doing was just creating another job for myself. And, right, hindsight is 20/20, but I can kind of laugh about it now.
But basically what I ended up doing was working late again, on nights, weekends, I was feeling so pressured to meet deadlines. I had this constant anxiety buzz about what I might miss, what I might be behind on, what I should be getting ahead on. And I had this feeling of needing to be constantly available.
For me I can especially remember it being in the early mornings, those really early morning contractor calls when I would want to be enjoying and delighting in my little boy and the phone would just be ringing and ringing and I felt like I had to answer it. And I hit another point of burnout. And I felt overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious all over again.
And I thought my only option was quitting. And I thought that changing my circumstances was the only way that I could feel the way that I wanted to feel, that feeling of ease, and calm, and in control that I had set out to want to create when I started my own residential practice. What I didn't know then that I know now is that you can change the circumstances of your life all you want, but your brain always goes with you.
I was able to see this so clearly when I left my commercial job and transitioned to my own business. Back when I was an employee I was told what to do, how much and when. And in theory being the one making those decisions for myself should have alleviated the stress, but that wasn't the case.
When I left my commercial position, I took all of the old belief patterns that were driving the overworking and pressure with me. While the work I was doing was different, my same set of internal beliefs were driving everything. There was perfectionism, chasing gold stars, people pleasing, and so much overworking as a way to prove my worth. And that just all followed me into my own business. I was the problem, but what I also learned was that I could be my own solution.
When I say I was the problem, what I mean is that my beliefs or a collection of thoughts were creating my feelings and driving a certain set of actions, like the overworking, and producing undesirable outcomes, such as being tied to my desk, getting sick all of the time, and not honoring my personal priorities that I said were a priority, like my family.
So you might be relating to what I'm sharing because it's what I hear from so many of my clients when we begin our work together. What I've learned, and what I want to share with you today, is that our thoughts create our feelings, not our circumstances.
Our thoughts are really optional sentences that run in our brain. And when we have a thought, a chemical reaction actually occurs that produces specific vibrations or sensations in the body that we experience as an emotion, such as overwhelm. So we experience those feelings in the body.
Overwhelm is a feeling or that vibration, however that shows up for you. That tightness in the chest, the buzzing in the stomach, whatever it might be. But those vibrations are created by our thoughts, or those optional sentences in our brain. And this is the best news ever that I can give you because when you change the way that you're thinking about your circumstances, overwhelm truly can be optional.
What I learned was I had the power to change how I experienced my days, how I showed up for my business, and how I showed up in my life, simply by changing the way that I was thinking. We know that overwhelm is optional because two designers can have the same amount of things to do, or a certain number of projects they are managing, and think and feel very differently, right?
So some of my clients have a project load of five projects at a time and that feels perfect. For some of my clients that might be completely overwhelming. For some of my clients, they're going to be completely bored and have more time than they want to have with the five projects, right? So the circumstance doesn't change, it's the way you're thinking and feeling about it.
You might even notice this in what you experience day to day. One day you could have a certain amount of work to complete, and you feel like you are absolutely crushing it. You are so on top of it, crossing those things off, right? Amazing, you end the day feeling accomplished. But another day you could have the exact same amount of work and feel like you're drowning and like you're never going to get on top of that pile.
The only difference between those two days is the way you're thinking about what needs to get done. Yes, there are likely things you're going to want to address in your business, such as setting expectations with clients, defining work hours, staggering start dates for your projects, having a repeatable process. And you don't need to layer on the feeling of overwhelm from an unhelpful dialogue that's constantly running in the background.
That's why in my coaching relationships I coach on both of those things. What this dialogue sounded like for me, and what it might sound like for you, could be, I'm so busy. I'm behind. I'm never going to get this done. I'm not doing enough. I'm not doing this fast enough. I don't even know where to get started.
These often well-practiced thoughts are what are creating the feeling of overwhelm. You probably repeat these sentences to yourself like they're the facts of the world, but they aren't. They're a mix of interpretations, judgments, and expectations you've made up.
Think about this, if you were to tell yourself you're behind, that's going to mean one thing to you. But if you went to the design showrooms and pulled a bunch of different designers, you'd get a bunch of different answers. Like what does behind even mean?
Even if you could prove the thought I'm behind to be true, let's say maybe you had set some internal deadlines and it's a day past the internal deadline. It's never going to be useful to tell yourself that you're behind because of the way you're going to feel and act from telling yourself these things. This is why this concept is so important.
When you're experiencing the feeling of overwhelm I see clients fall into one of two categories. They either freeze up, so this could look like distracting yourself from the work by cleaning up samples, or scrolling social media, or just avoidance in general of activities. Sometimes it even looks like just sitting at your desk staring at the computer not knowing what to do.
The other way I see this show up is clients will go into a flurry of action. So lots of multitasking, starting, and stopping. But it's not effective action. Definitely not as effective as if you took action from a place of feeling grounded and calm.
So you might be thinking, “Great, so I'm the one creating the overwhelm, now what?” And remember how I said I was the problem and the solution? The solution really starts with recognizing that your thoughts aren't facts. You have to begin to question this internal narrative that your mind is creating.
And this, again, isn't to say you don't work on aspects of your schedule and business to set things up that work for you, while also serving your clients at a really high level. But when you learn to shift from primarily experiencing overwhelm and anxiety to calm, grounded and confident, the strategies you take will be so much more effective.
This is really evident when we look at a combination of thoughts, feelings, and actions within the context of the self-coaching model. The model is an awareness tool developed by my mentor, Brooke Castillo, of The Life Coach School. And it's one of the first things that my clients learn when we work together. So let me give you an overview of the model so you know where I'm speaking from.
The first thing is that it's a set of five interrelated components. There's circumstances, thoughts, feelings, actions, and results. The circumstance is the objective facts, it's what we could all agree on, it could be proven in a court of law. It could be the net pricing on a sofa, it could be the design fee you’re going to state in a proposal.
But then we have thoughts about those objective facts or these circumstances. And our thoughts are really the perceptions, interpretations, or judgments of the circumstances. Our brains are meaning making machines, and so they want to make meaning of whatever is in front of us.
And then when we have a thought, that is what is generating the feeling, or an emotion created by the thought. Our feelings are really the fuel for our actions, they drive what we do or don't do. The actions could be even things that you are mentally spinning about, or those avoidant behaviors we talked about, or the flurry of activity. And, of course, whatever we do or don't do is going to create a result or an experience for us.
So let's talk about the model with overwhelm specifically. Let me ask you this, what type of action do you take when you're overwhelmed versus calm? It's pretty different, isn't it? The way that I show this to my client is looking at the model in two different ways. We've got the default model, which is just what your brain offers up on default. It's a really well practiced automatic response to a circumstance.
But we also have intentional models, things that we want to think and believe on purpose to create a certain result or experience. So let's just look at this for contrast. We could have a circumstance of a to-do list with maybe one meeting, we need to track orders for project A and B, and then we're going to review drawings for projects C.
You could have the default thought of I'm so behind, which is going to create the feeling of overwhelm. And then it's going to fuel the action of maybe cleaning your studio, or procrastinating with emails, scrolling Instagram, maybe mentally spinning, or even looking for inspiration images for a project that hasn't even started yet. The result is you become more behind on the things that you actually need to get done that day or want to get done. So essentially, you're creating evidence that you're behind.
Now let's look at this from intentional thinking. It's the exact same circumstance exact same to-do list, but when you have the thought “I can do this,” you create the feeling of certainty for yourself. And when you're feeling certain, you're going to take the action of maybe making a plan for the day, going one by one as you methodically work through your plan. You're going to turn off notifications and stay focused. And then that produces the result of proving that your to-do list is doable. You become someone who gets things done.
So just looking at that difference between the default thinking and the intentional thinking, it's very different. How you experience your day, and the quality of your actions will be radically improved. And this is really how you go from being at the effect of everything happening around you to feeling empowered and in control. You get to be the cause of your own results.
I want you to begin feeling the relief of using this tool today. So this is what I recommend you do as your very first step to make overwhelm truly optional in your life. I've broken this down into three simple steps to get you started. So the first step is always going to be awareness. I like to say once you're aware, you're halfway there. And it's fun that it rhymes too, right?
All right, so start to notice the internal conversation or those sentences that are creating the feeling of overwhelm. One of the ways I like to picture this is your mind as the sky and the clouds are just your thoughts. They're just floating on by. And you go into the position of being the observer of those clouds, or the watcher of the clouds. So start to notice what are your well-practiced thoughts? It could be I'm so behind, I have to get this all done today, I don't know where to start. There's so many deadlines next week.
Once you notice the story you're telling yourself, move on to step two, which is to take a powerful pause. I want you to acknowledge what is happening, take a breath, and remember that it's just a sentence. You can even say to yourself, “I'm having a thought that's creating the feeling of overwhelm. I can choose to approach this differently.”
And then for step three, I want you to practice breaking it down into facts versus thoughts. This is just the beginning part of that model that I was talking about. So, for example, when you tell yourself, “I have to get this all done today,” ask yourself, “What are the facts?” Question it, what specifically needs to get done? List it all out, just like that client I was sharing the example of at the very top of the episode.
List out specifically what you need to get done. Vague tasks are going to create overwhelm and confusion. And then I'd even question the thought by saying, “Does this actually all need to be done today? And does it all need to be done by me?” It's often an option to defer or delete something or delegate it. Those are things we talk about in my group all the time because we often make assumptions about what needs to be done by us by when.
So once you start to separate out the facts, or really the circumstance in the model from the thoughts, this will immediately help you calm down. Now, why this works is because it gives you perspective. When your emotions are high, when you're in that spin and buzz of overwhelm, your intelligence is low.
There's actually a part of your brain that starts to shut down and not be as effective when you're in that fight or flight state of those very activated emotions like overwhelm. So when you solve for overwhelm, you actually are more creative, you're a better problem solver, and you're more present, both personally and professionally. You're also going to be able to identify your next best step then, which is always going to keep you moving forward.
And you can really take it one thing at a time and decide if whatever it is that you're having the overwhelming thoughts about is something to do now, later, or ever. As you move forward, the compounding effects of learning to calm down, be objective and take control of your emotions and circumstances is going to be dramatic.
Now, first of all, you're going to experience your life and business in a whole new way. You're going to be so much less stressed. You're going to be able to enjoy your days and feel like the leader of your business versus everything happening to you. And this can happen in an instant.
I love when my clients recognize everything can change and nothing has to change. Now, again, I say we work on delegating, we work on setting boundaries, we work on the systems together. And you don't have to wait for all of those things to be perfectly in place to start feeling better.
You're also going to have so much more time, both personally and professionally. Instead of spinning your wheels and fretting about things, you can actually get to work and save yourself that time. You can create time. You're going to have time to do things that actually move the needle forward. And when you're effective in your work day, you create more time to do things outside of work.
One of the things that a client in the last round of Out of Overwhelm created was what she called Me Monday, which I thought was so fun. And it was so great because she created an entire day where she could take it slow in the mornings after dropping her kids off at preschool, go to the gym, and do what she wanted.
Sometimes it's taking vacation or spending time with family and friends. Or doing a day of sourcing just for fun, or taking the weekends off. When you reduce the amount of time that you're in overwhelm, you create time for other things, whatever it is that you choose to use it for. Plus, you're going to actually be able to enjoy your time off more since you don't have to choose to feel like you're going to have to pay for it or that that work is looming over you.
You also have the benefit of more profit. When you're working from a grounded, clear place you can stay focused and move through things more efficiently, which of course is going to increase your profitability for a flat fee. And when you are billing hourly, you're going to actually be able to bill your time in full because you're going to know that it was spent really focused on the task at hand and that it wasn't you distracting yourself or kind of bopping from one thing to the next.
Learning to effectively manage your mindset is really just the beginning for anything you want to achieve personally and professionally. Which is why I'm so dedicated to bringing this work to interior designers.
Let's recap this concept of overwhelm is optional. Overwhelm is a feeling created by your thinking, never by your circumstances. Your thoughts are not facts, even if they feel really true. You're going to get started with this by practicing awareness.
Notice the running narrative that creates the feeling of overwhelm. Take a pause and question what you're telling yourself. You'll get immediate perspective when you begin to separate out the actual facts from the thoughts. I want you to pay attention this next week, to the impact of separating out the facts from the thoughts and how that objectivity can actually help you get back into action if you're working or let you settle into that time off that you'd really like to enjoy.
That's what I've got for you today, designers. I would love to hear what comes up for you as you practice this skill. You can always send me a DM on Instagram, @desicreswell or take a screenshot of the episode and tag me.
We went in-depth into the mindset of overwhelm today. In the next episode I want to share some of the strategies you can use with your calmed down self to start managing your time more effectively, I can't wait to dive into that topic. And until then, I'm wishing you a beautiful week. I'll talk to you in the next episode.
To celebrate the launch of the show, I'm going to be giving away gift cards to Jayson Home, one of my favorite home decor sources. I'm going to be giving away $50 gift cards to five lucky listeners who follow, rate, and review the show.
Now, it doesn't have to be a five star review, although I sure hope you love the show. I want your honest feedback so I can create an amazing show that provides tons of value. Visit desicreswell.com/podcastlaunch to learn more about the contest and how to enter. I'll be announcing the winners on the show in an upcoming episode.
Thanks for joining me for this week's episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit www.desicreswell.com. And if you're ready to take what you've learned on the podcast to the next level, I would love for you to check out my signature group coaching program, Out of Overwhelm.
Welcome to The Interior Design Business CEO, the only show for designers who are ready to confidently run and grow their businesses without the stress and anxiety. If you're ready to develop a bigger vision for your interior design business, free up your time, and streamline your days for productivity and profit, you're in the right place. I'm Desi Creswell, an award-winning interior designer and certified life and business coach. I help interior designers just like you stop feeling overwhelmed so they can build profitable businesses they love to run. Are you ready to confidently lead your business, clients, and projects? Let's go.
Hello designers, welcome back to the podcast. I am so happy to be sitting down to record with you. We, meaning need my family and I, just got back from a week long adventure hiking all over the place. We started in Sedona, Arizona, went to Flagstaff, then went to the Grand Canyon, and then drove to Utah and went and did Zion National Park.
We also then drove to Las Vegas, where I have a good friend and we saw her and her adorable little baby boy on the way out and showed our kids the Las Vegas Strip. Which was just a hoot, it was such a stark contrast from the natural beauty we had just been immersed in for the past week.
So anyways, I hope you are all having an excellent fall and enjoying the changing of seasons, whatever that looks like wherever you live. So as I was thinking about what I wanted to include in this next episode, I was thinking about what I could share that would give you really some immediate relief from the stress and anxiety and overwhelm you're currently experiencing.
And I wanted to think about something I could share that's really core to my teachings that you could start using immediately, whether you're driving in the car on the way to the job site, or at your desk doing proposals or drawings. That concept is that overwhelm is optional.
And if you're thinking, “But, Desi, have you seen my to-do list? Do you know how many emails are piling up in my inbox? Overwhelm is definitely not optional for me.” Okay, I just want you to stay with me, I get it. I used to be an overwhelmed interior designer just like you, so I totally get it. But I want to offer you another perspective. This one concept I'm sharing today changed everything for me and it could for you too.
Before we dive in, I want to share a win from Out of Overwhelm, my group coaching program. Every Friday we celebrate in the group all the amazing things that these designers are creating. And there was one that felt so appropriate for what we're talking about today.
And this client shared, “There were some last minute orders that needed to be placed for the kitchen renovation that's currently happening. I felt panic set in, but instead of giving in I just made it to-do list. I carved out some time and got it all done with no issues. It felt so good to just do rather than freak out.”
This is so, so good because we don't have to control all of our external circumstances to still feel calm and in control. And that's what we're going to talk about. So let's dive into the topic of overwhelm. And, like I said, overwhelm is something I know intimately from my career as an interior designer.
I used to be a commercial interior designer before I started my residential practice. And that's kind of where the overwhelm story started. I was working probably like 60 plus hours a week, I don't even know at this point, evenings, weekends, I was so burned out. I really thought about leaving the field altogether.
And well, I started to think about what else I could do. And then I thought, “Well, I'm going to start my own residential business. If I have my own business, I will definitely have the freedom, the flexibility.” And what I ended up doing was just creating another job for myself. And, right, hindsight is 20/20, but I can kind of laugh about it now.
But basically what I ended up doing was working late again, on nights, weekends, I was feeling so pressured to meet deadlines. I had this constant anxiety buzz about what I might miss, what I might be behind on, what I should be getting ahead on. And I had this feeling of needing to be constantly available.
For me I can especially remember it being in the early mornings, those really early morning contractor calls when I would want to be enjoying and delighting in my little boy and the phone would just be ringing and ringing and I felt like I had to answer it. And I hit another point of burnout. And I felt overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious all over again.
And I thought my only option was quitting. And I thought that changing my circumstances was the only way that I could feel the way that I wanted to feel, that feeling of ease, and calm, and in control that I had set out to want to create when I started my own residential practice. What I didn't know then that I know now is that you can change the circumstances of your life all you want, but your brain always goes with you.
I was able to see this so clearly when I left my commercial job and transitioned to my own business. Back when I was an employee I was told what to do, how much and when. And in theory being the one making those decisions for myself should have alleviated the stress, but that wasn't the case.
When I left my commercial position, I took all of the old belief patterns that were driving the overworking and pressure with me. While the work I was doing was different, my same set of internal beliefs were driving everything. There was perfectionism, chasing gold stars, people pleasing, and so much overworking as a way to prove my worth. And that just all followed me into my own business. I was the problem, but what I also learned was that I could be my own solution.
When I say I was the problem, what I mean is that my beliefs or a collection of thoughts were creating my feelings and driving a certain set of actions, like the overworking, and producing undesirable outcomes, such as being tied to my desk, getting sick all of the time, and not honoring my personal priorities that I said were a priority, like my family.
So you might be relating to what I'm sharing because it's what I hear from so many of my clients when we begin our work together. What I've learned, and what I want to share with you today, is that our thoughts create our feelings, not our circumstances.
Our thoughts are really optional sentences that run in our brain. And when we have a thought, a chemical reaction actually occurs that produces specific vibrations or sensations in the body that we experience as an emotion, such as overwhelm. So we experience those feelings in the body.
Overwhelm is a feeling or that vibration, however that shows up for you. That tightness in the chest, the buzzing in the stomach, whatever it might be. But those vibrations are created by our thoughts, or those optional sentences in our brain. And this is the best news ever that I can give you because when you change the way that you're thinking about your circumstances, overwhelm truly can be optional.
What I learned was I had the power to change how I experienced my days, how I showed up for my business, and how I showed up in my life, simply by changing the way that I was thinking. We know that overwhelm is optional because two designers can have the same amount of things to do, or a certain number of projects they are managing, and think and feel very differently, right?
So some of my clients have a project load of five projects at a time and that feels perfect. For some of my clients that might be completely overwhelming. For some of my clients, they're going to be completely bored and have more time than they want to have with the five projects, right? So the circumstance doesn't change, it's the way you're thinking and feeling about it.
You might even notice this in what you experience day to day. One day you could have a certain amount of work to complete, and you feel like you are absolutely crushing it. You are so on top of it, crossing those things off, right? Amazing, you end the day feeling accomplished. But another day you could have the exact same amount of work and feel like you're drowning and like you're never going to get on top of that pile.
The only difference between those two days is the way you're thinking about what needs to get done. Yes, there are likely things you're going to want to address in your business, such as setting expectations with clients, defining work hours, staggering start dates for your projects, having a repeatable process. And you don't need to layer on the feeling of overwhelm from an unhelpful dialogue that's constantly running in the background.
That's why in my coaching relationships I coach on both of those things. What this dialogue sounded like for me, and what it might sound like for you, could be, I'm so busy. I'm behind. I'm never going to get this done. I'm not doing enough. I'm not doing this fast enough. I don't even know where to get started.
These often well-practiced thoughts are what are creating the feeling of overwhelm. You probably repeat these sentences to yourself like they're the facts of the world, but they aren't. They're a mix of interpretations, judgments, and expectations you've made up.
Think about this, if you were to tell yourself you're behind, that's going to mean one thing to you. But if you went to the design showrooms and pulled a bunch of different designers, you'd get a bunch of different answers. Like what does behind even mean?
Even if you could prove the thought I'm behind to be true, let's say maybe you had set some internal deadlines and it's a day past the internal deadline. It's never going to be useful to tell yourself that you're behind because of the way you're going to feel and act from telling yourself these things. This is why this concept is so important.
When you're experiencing the feeling of overwhelm I see clients fall into one of two categories. They either freeze up, so this could look like distracting yourself from the work by cleaning up samples, or scrolling social media, or just avoidance in general of activities. Sometimes it even looks like just sitting at your desk staring at the computer not knowing what to do.
The other way I see this show up is clients will go into a flurry of action. So lots of multitasking, starting, and stopping. But it's not effective action. Definitely not as effective as if you took action from a place of feeling grounded and calm.
So you might be thinking, “Great, so I'm the one creating the overwhelm, now what?” And remember how I said I was the problem and the solution? The solution really starts with recognizing that your thoughts aren't facts. You have to begin to question this internal narrative that your mind is creating.
And this, again, isn't to say you don't work on aspects of your schedule and business to set things up that work for you, while also serving your clients at a really high level. But when you learn to shift from primarily experiencing overwhelm and anxiety to calm, grounded and confident, the strategies you take will be so much more effective.
This is really evident when we look at a combination of thoughts, feelings, and actions within the context of the self-coaching model. The model is an awareness tool developed by my mentor, Brooke Castillo, of The Life Coach School. And it's one of the first things that my clients learn when we work together. So let me give you an overview of the model so you know where I'm speaking from.
The first thing is that it's a set of five interrelated components. There's circumstances, thoughts, feelings, actions, and results. The circumstance is the objective facts, it's what we could all agree on, it could be proven in a court of law. It could be the net pricing on a sofa, it could be the design fee you’re going to state in a proposal.
But then we have thoughts about those objective facts or these circumstances. And our thoughts are really the perceptions, interpretations, or judgments of the circumstances. Our brains are meaning making machines, and so they want to make meaning of whatever is in front of us.
And then when we have a thought, that is what is generating the feeling, or an emotion created by the thought. Our feelings are really the fuel for our actions, they drive what we do or don't do. The actions could be even things that you are mentally spinning about, or those avoidant behaviors we talked about, or the flurry of activity. And, of course, whatever we do or don't do is going to create a result or an experience for us.
So let's talk about the model with overwhelm specifically. Let me ask you this, what type of action do you take when you're overwhelmed versus calm? It's pretty different, isn't it? The way that I show this to my client is looking at the model in two different ways. We've got the default model, which is just what your brain offers up on default. It's a really well practiced automatic response to a circumstance.
But we also have intentional models, things that we want to think and believe on purpose to create a certain result or experience. So let's just look at this for contrast. We could have a circumstance of a to-do list with maybe one meeting, we need to track orders for project A and B, and then we're going to review drawings for projects C.
You could have the default thought of I'm so behind, which is going to create the feeling of overwhelm. And then it's going to fuel the action of maybe cleaning your studio, or procrastinating with emails, scrolling Instagram, maybe mentally spinning, or even looking for inspiration images for a project that hasn't even started yet. The result is you become more behind on the things that you actually need to get done that day or want to get done. So essentially, you're creating evidence that you're behind.
Now let's look at this from intentional thinking. It's the exact same circumstance exact same to-do list, but when you have the thought “I can do this,” you create the feeling of certainty for yourself. And when you're feeling certain, you're going to take the action of maybe making a plan for the day, going one by one as you methodically work through your plan. You're going to turn off notifications and stay focused. And then that produces the result of proving that your to-do list is doable. You become someone who gets things done.
So just looking at that difference between the default thinking and the intentional thinking, it's very different. How you experience your day, and the quality of your actions will be radically improved. And this is really how you go from being at the effect of everything happening around you to feeling empowered and in control. You get to be the cause of your own results.
I want you to begin feeling the relief of using this tool today. So this is what I recommend you do as your very first step to make overwhelm truly optional in your life. I've broken this down into three simple steps to get you started. So the first step is always going to be awareness. I like to say once you're aware, you're halfway there. And it's fun that it rhymes too, right?
All right, so start to notice the internal conversation or those sentences that are creating the feeling of overwhelm. One of the ways I like to picture this is your mind as the sky and the clouds are just your thoughts. They're just floating on by. And you go into the position of being the observer of those clouds, or the watcher of the clouds. So start to notice what are your well-practiced thoughts? It could be I'm so behind, I have to get this all done today, I don't know where to start. There's so many deadlines next week.
Once you notice the story you're telling yourself, move on to step two, which is to take a powerful pause. I want you to acknowledge what is happening, take a breath, and remember that it's just a sentence. You can even say to yourself, “I'm having a thought that's creating the feeling of overwhelm. I can choose to approach this differently.”
And then for step three, I want you to practice breaking it down into facts versus thoughts. This is just the beginning part of that model that I was talking about. So, for example, when you tell yourself, “I have to get this all done today,” ask yourself, “What are the facts?” Question it, what specifically needs to get done? List it all out, just like that client I was sharing the example of at the very top of the episode.
List out specifically what you need to get done. Vague tasks are going to create overwhelm and confusion. And then I'd even question the thought by saying, “Does this actually all need to be done today? And does it all need to be done by me?” It's often an option to defer or delete something or delegate it. Those are things we talk about in my group all the time because we often make assumptions about what needs to be done by us by when.
So once you start to separate out the facts, or really the circumstance in the model from the thoughts, this will immediately help you calm down. Now, why this works is because it gives you perspective. When your emotions are high, when you're in that spin and buzz of overwhelm, your intelligence is low.
There's actually a part of your brain that starts to shut down and not be as effective when you're in that fight or flight state of those very activated emotions like overwhelm. So when you solve for overwhelm, you actually are more creative, you're a better problem solver, and you're more present, both personally and professionally. You're also going to be able to identify your next best step then, which is always going to keep you moving forward.
And you can really take it one thing at a time and decide if whatever it is that you're having the overwhelming thoughts about is something to do now, later, or ever. As you move forward, the compounding effects of learning to calm down, be objective and take control of your emotions and circumstances is going to be dramatic.
Now, first of all, you're going to experience your life and business in a whole new way. You're going to be so much less stressed. You're going to be able to enjoy your days and feel like the leader of your business versus everything happening to you. And this can happen in an instant.
I love when my clients recognize everything can change and nothing has to change. Now, again, I say we work on delegating, we work on setting boundaries, we work on the systems together. And you don't have to wait for all of those things to be perfectly in place to start feeling better.
You're also going to have so much more time, both personally and professionally. Instead of spinning your wheels and fretting about things, you can actually get to work and save yourself that time. You can create time. You're going to have time to do things that actually move the needle forward. And when you're effective in your work day, you create more time to do things outside of work.
One of the things that a client in the last round of Out of Overwhelm created was what she called Me Monday, which I thought was so fun. And it was so great because she created an entire day where she could take it slow in the mornings after dropping her kids off at preschool, go to the gym, and do what she wanted.
Sometimes it's taking vacation or spending time with family and friends. Or doing a day of sourcing just for fun, or taking the weekends off. When you reduce the amount of time that you're in overwhelm, you create time for other things, whatever it is that you choose to use it for. Plus, you're going to actually be able to enjoy your time off more since you don't have to choose to feel like you're going to have to pay for it or that that work is looming over you.
You also have the benefit of more profit. When you're working from a grounded, clear place you can stay focused and move through things more efficiently, which of course is going to increase your profitability for a flat fee. And when you are billing hourly, you're going to actually be able to bill your time in full because you're going to know that it was spent really focused on the task at hand and that it wasn't you distracting yourself or kind of bopping from one thing to the next.
Learning to effectively manage your mindset is really just the beginning for anything you want to achieve personally and professionally. Which is why I'm so dedicated to bringing this work to interior designers.
Let's recap this concept of overwhelm is optional. Overwhelm is a feeling created by your thinking, never by your circumstances. Your thoughts are not facts, even if they feel really true. You're going to get started with this by practicing awareness.
Notice the running narrative that creates the feeling of overwhelm. Take a pause and question what you're telling yourself. You'll get immediate perspective when you begin to separate out the actual facts from the thoughts. I want you to pay attention this next week, to the impact of separating out the facts from the thoughts and how that objectivity can actually help you get back into action if you're working or let you settle into that time off that you'd really like to enjoy.
That's what I've got for you today, designers. I would love to hear what comes up for you as you practice this skill. You can always send me a DM on Instagram, @desicreswell or take a screenshot of the episode and tag me.
We went in-depth into the mindset of overwhelm today. In the next episode I want to share some of the strategies you can use with your calmed down self to start managing your time more effectively, I can't wait to dive into that topic. And until then, I'm wishing you a beautiful week. I'll talk to you in the next episode.
To celebrate the launch of the show, I'm going to be giving away gift cards to Jayson Home, one of my favorite home decor sources. I'm going to be giving away $50 gift cards to five lucky listeners who follow, rate, and review the show.
Now, it doesn't have to be a five star review, although I sure hope you love the show. I want your honest feedback so I can create an amazing show that provides tons of value. Visit desicreswell.com/podcastlaunch to learn more about the contest and how to enter. I'll be announcing the winners on the show in an upcoming episode.
Thanks for joining me for this week's episode of The Interior Design Business CEO. If you want more tips, tools and strategies visit www.desicreswell.com. And if you're ready to take what you've learned on the podcast to the next level, I would love for you to check out my signature group coaching program, Out of Overwhelm.
Enjoy the Show?
Don’t miss an episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Google Podcasts.