That time I listed all the things I need to do in one day ... and then I cried
How to manage the overwhelm
I didn’t expect to feel so awful.
I expected to feel amazing about listing all the things I need to keep track of, focus on, fit into my day/s.
I expected to feel productive.
I expected to feel great that I’m getting organised and planned.
I expected to feel like I’m on the right track.
Like, today is my day. I’m off to Great Places! I’m off and away!1
Instead, I felt incredibly overwhelmed.
I sat on my bed staring into space. My husband asked me if I was okay and in response I started bawling.
‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me!’ I cried.
My sweetheart dog Loki jumped up, sat next to me as he repeatedly put his head down on my stomach then looked up at me to check if his cuddles were helping – they were helping, my sweet boy.
I think part of what I was feeling was hopelessness at the confirmation that I really don’t have much time for all the things I need to get done.
Of course I’ve known for a long time that my plate is piled high and that sleep is out of the question if I want to get around to all the things. (Though I’d never truly go without sleep because I love it too much.)
But seeing that great big list of things that take up so much time, written down for my brain to properly see and process, was confronting.
It was cold, hard evidence that my life is jam-packed right now. And that even trying to attempt it all is crazy.
So, what did I do?
I cried it out.
Cuddled my sweet dog and talked to my husband about it, then took the rest of the night off.
I woke up the next day ready to continue with my plan of getting organised and getting my life in order.
And I started at the beginning with what I knew I could manage. Small, baby steps.
The social media part of my list is huge. Bigger than I wanted it to be, but also not surprising, and it only includes Substack, Instagram, Facebook, plus an occasional check-in of LinkedIn, Twitter, and Threads.
One good thing it did do is confirm for me that I can let go a little on those extra three ‘occasional’ platforms and most definitely not worry about adding any new ones. I love Substack for the many possibilities here, and Instagram and Facebook have a lot of my people there already, so I’m happy to be active on those too. But any others are extras only if I have spare time (which I doubt I will have much of for a long while).
Next I created a daily social media checklist.
This is a game-changer for me and stems from my aim with online social platforms: to connect with others in a meaningful way.
To me that means not just liking everyone’s posts/stories etc. to make it look like I’m paying attention, but to actually pay attention. It’s kind of like being a good listener I suppose. I’m not always good at how I interact with other people given my anxiety and history of a severe lack of confidence, so sometimes I don’t think I come across in the way I intend, but I try to really pay attention to what a person is sharing online and respond if something resonates with me or I feel I have something to add.
Sometimes that might mean only liking and sending hearts in response to something and that’s okay, but overall I want my interactions to be meaningful.
The checklist is a way for me to track what I’m doing because otherwise I tend to keep scrolling and searching for those wonderful, friendly interactions without realising I’ve spent way too long on there. I’ve likely already engaged with others a bunch, but without a checklist I don’t get to tick it off and feel productive.
I need that so that I don’t feel like I’m wasting time. I’m building friendships and connections with people from all over the world, which should never feel like a waste of time IMO, but it’s something that my brain needs to have a limit on.
Funnily enough, connecting with people from all over the world is something I always wanted to do; even when I was a kid with no internet, I sought out a penpal program to connect with another kid overseas. I’m sad to say that didn’t last, but that longing never went away. How lucky that the internet has made this a reality and in such easy, immediate ways (though I do still long for letter-writing days)!
Did you have a penpal? Or have you always felt that longing for connection with others that aren’t necessarily in your close circle?
So with all that in mind, my social media checklist basically includes:
Checking notifications
Reading a minimum number of posts/newsletters/stories etc.
Responding to a minimum number of posts/newsletters/stories etc.
Responding to messages
Sharing my own content, and more
I’ve still got a ways to go with my process, such as creating an easier way to track every single day without writing this list out every day or week, but here’s a photo of my checklist in its current form:
It’s also worth noting that I need and do well with specifics. The more specific the better, which is why I’ve included all the groups I want to be active in on FB.
What’s next?
I’ve just signed up for Notion (huge thanks to
for mentioning it!) and will be trying that out to see if it works with a calendar and daily tasks including my social media checklist.So possibly more on that in another post, plus the weekly planning I started after my planning session last Sunday.
I’ll be hosting these sessions every week if others might like to join me in getting more organised. More info on the next one coming in a few days.
That’s all for now, mittigar!
Yanu!
This is number 1 of 24 essays/posts I’ll be sharing as part of the challenge created by over at . You can read more about the challenge here.
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I acknowledge the Darkinyung people as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which I live and work, and I pay my respects to the Elders past and present.
Inspired by Dr Seuss’s Oh, the Places You’ll Go! Of course :)
Oh my gosh, I could write so much in response to this. ❤️ First, I loved it, and I appreciate that you shared your actual lists. I went through a similar experience when I tried to organize a Word doc of various ideas/to-do items for my book marketing - it's a typed document that grew to 20 pages, and it felt utterly overwhelming. A friend told me about Trello. If you aren't familiar with it, it might be worth checking out - I've broken all my tasks into different categories and different priority levels, so I only regularly see a short list of my "do this week" tasks, but I have somewhere to put everything else and can move things into the top priority bucket when appropriate. It's been really helping for calming the overwhelm. It also resonated when you talked about not wanting to waste time. I definitely feel you there. Another thing I've been trying to do is focus only on what I want to do. Sometimes that means having more fun but sometimes it means working if I'm working on something that's genuinely important to me, even if it's not that much fun. But getting out of the "I should do this" mindset has been really helpful. And the last thing - I love letters too. I just starting reading a book about two people who became pen pals as kids in school and their years of exchanging letters, and how that changed both their lives. ❤️ The book is called I Will Always Write Back.
I am a serial "put all the to dos down somewhere" when I'm anxious or feeling overwhelmed. It's helped me somewhat at that moment, but I am not too sure if it was the right approach cause the list does not seem to reduce! I've been notion for a while now after moving from Trello, initially I had big plans for it with personal dashboards and so on but now I've stripped it to the simplicity that I need. It'll keep changing but that's me I think? I also used my agile process here in notion, you can google for free templates in notion!