The ‘What’s On My Mind’ List

We get overwhelmed, right? There are rare occasions when we’ve got it all together. Most of the time though, I find that we are somewhere on the spectrum between, ‘I’ve still got a few things on my to do list I just can’t get to’, all the way to complete overwhelm. Hopefully we’re not spending a huge amount of our time in overwhelm, but when it happens it can be, well, overwhelming. It can also be difficult to see a way out, and work out what to do next.

When I meet with a new client, I recommend they download everything they have on their ‘to do list’ onto a piece of paper or into an email, and then we can work with them to identify the areas we can help with.

So I took my own advice! I got my notebook, tore out a piece of paper, wrote “What’s on my mind” at the top, and then just totally downloaded everything. From organising kids school sports, to client work I had to do, and the fact that the house was always a mess. The list was a long one, and it was originally just going to be for me. A way to get things out of my head and onto paper, so I could start doing something about it.

After I’d written it I had to head out. Tim would be picking up the kids, and once I got home, it would be time for all the tea-time bed-time shenanigans. Usually I would have placed the list back into my notebook and put it away. Yet, as I walked out the door, I decided to ‘casually’ leave it on a table in our living room, where I could easily have just ‘left’ it, but where someone, aka Tim, would see it when he walked in.

I’m not exactly sure what I expected Tim to do. I think, possibly selfishly, I just wanted him to see ‘how much I had to do’ and ‘how hard it was for me’. He did better than that.

I got home and pretended to forget about it, but I could see that the list had been moved. Later that evening, Tim brought it up, and to my great surprise, he started going through the list with me. He identified things he could take off my plate, things he didn’t think we needed to worry about, and things we could do another time. It was fantastic! Suddenly all the things on my mind were now shared between us. We both understood what was going on, and we worked out how to tackle it.

Since then I haven’t felt the need to write a “What’s on my mind” list, but I am getting a little better at sharing with Tim what is going on my world. He is completing school forms, organising quotes we need for some bathroom repairs, packing the dishwasher like he always does, and I have better headspace to deal with those items that are still on my own to do list.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve still had numerous moments of overwhelm, but at least I know I’ve added this tool to my back pocket for whenever I need it. Next time though, I won’t feel the need to leave my ‘What’s on my mind’ list casually lying around!