my feelings of overwhelm, led to my feelings of shame

Sometimes we all feel a little pressure that too much is filling up our plate. Overwhelmed feelings can lead us to do not so good things if we do not have a few coping mechanisms in place that are productive. The key word here is productive. Believe it or not, feeling overwhelmed can cause us to reach for a little comfort such as a big bowl of ice cream or a bag of Cheetos. For others, it can lead to undesirable behaviors such as frustration, resentment, and even a victim mentality. Learning to just sit and breath and make a game plan is way more productive but not near as fun lol. Unfortunately, if we do fall victim to the bag of Cheetos, then we go on a self-loathing episode of why we ate the entire bag of Cheetos rant. The reason I wanted to talk about the feeling of over-whelm is simply because I think it comes up with us a lot more than we might think, and we don’t recognize the feelings. I was experiencing these feelings this weekend. I had a friend that was coming to Dallas and wanted to have lunch on Saturday which was so much fun. However, I really needed to be working on my school project that is due soon. While there in Dallas, my mother in law had fallen and was being taken to the hospital by ambulance. I rushed to the hospital and luckily all is good. She has no breaks, just soreness. I get home that night and see that I need to get the plants in the ground that are on the patio before the bark is delivered. Oh my, the list keeps getting a little bigger and I have these uneasy feelings. Yep, that is the over-whelm feelings that I do not like at all. I am kind of a control freak on certain things and this has been a problem with me for years. I get these feelings and then I want to start a pity party for myself. Yes, I know, it is not something I am proud of. I will even start picking on my husband for little things that have not been done. It is unbelievable how stupid this is. I put too much on my plate and then start blaming him for things on his plate that are not on mine. Let that sink it. How unloving, mean spirited, or just stupid is that. I realized what I was doing and felt a deep shame. Especially, with all that he has been thorough lately with his appendix and kidney, this was simply unacceptable. So, what did I do? I did not apologize but started immediately being nice. However, as I sat down this morning with my coffee and thought about my behavior and realized I was not happy with myself. I changed my mind on this blog and decided I wanted to write about it so I would learn a valuable lesson. I am embarrassed to admit that I have done this before and I am not proud. I am not going to eat the entire bag of Cheetos, but that would have been a better choice instead of picking on Louis for not taking care of something. So in the future, I want to first identify overwhelming feelings, talk with myself about it, and then do a deep breathing practice to get grounded in how to tackle the unwanted feelings.

Breathe in, counting slowing to five….Hold breath and count to five…..breathe out and count to seven. It really does work. And it creates such calmness. Try it. This does work!

Have a beautiful day!