Overwhelmed by the gap

When the gap is too big between where I am and where I’d like to be, it can seem insurmountable, uncrossable, impossible. 

It’s a huge step towards a big goal. After all, we’ve been told to ‘dream big’ haven’t we...

While we know every journey begins with a single step, it can look more like a leap or pole vault from where we are. The gap may be too big for us to imagine crossing or closing. 

And then ... ‘oh hello overwhelm, you cheeky beast!’

To identify what brings about our own overwhelm is a discovery that’s worth the work. My overwhelm may be different to yours, which could be different to theirs. 

No deep probing and analysis required; just watch your patterns. 

They are there. 

The next few times you’re overwhelmed hold great insight. These give us the chance to redefine the often generalised use of the word ‘overwhelm’. 

It’s then that breakthroughs for better ways of thinking, working and living will come.

To be able to facilitate better is one of this decade's critical skills for leadership

These elegant, collaborative and engaging capabilities aren't just for trainers, presenters or coaches.

Executives, business analysts, project managers, middle level team and people leaders and those new to managing and leading experience the benefits of being able to:
🌕engage with a group or team,
🌕draw information from that group, and then
🌕help them collaborate to achieve an agreed outcome.


Leaders can do so much better to create the right environment and set up the processes that will help that team work together and collaborate.

But make no mistake, facilitation is not ‘soft’ work. 

Better Facilitation will help you balance:
- Achieving outcomes
- Boosting engagement
- Driving productivity
- Encouraging contribution.

Make meetings and workshops better, engagement and collaboration better ... and results and impacts better.

Overwhelm that comes from the future

It’s not even here yet and we’re already thinking about it!

The workshop that’s next week. 
The presentation we have to finish. 
The job interview we’re preparing for. 
The proposal for the client. 
The book to read. 

It’s all in the future ... and our thinking about ‘that which is yet to come’ adds so much to our feelings of overload and overwhelm. 

Running scenarios, preparing options and imagining plan As, Bs and Cs : it all takes time, attention and energy. 

Check to see if you’ve started working on something before you’ve, you know... actually started working on it!

Don’t dismiss all that thinking as ‘nothing’ or ‘just’ thinking. It’s adding to our cognitive overload and our sense of overwhelm. 

No wonder we feel the burden of too much going on!

Catch yourself - and your team - if you’re heading off on a thinking tangent or going deep into a wombat hole that may take even more effort to get out of. 

Notice. 

Noticing where our attention and focus is - in the past, the present or the future - is a powerful behaviour. 

It’s a practical thing to do to reduce the feels when ‘it’s all too much’. 

The world needs us to think and work differently

Here’s a resource full of ideas, inspiration and practical wisdom on how to do that. 

It’s all coming together in the full colour book ‘Better Ways of Thinking and Working’. 

I’ve collected, selected and edited many of the ideas I’ve shared that are relevant for these times of change, evolution and revolution. 

Now they’re coming together in the one place. 

Order via my website or shop 

‘BETTER WAYS OF THINKING & WORKING: How changing the way you do things, changes what you can do’. 

Engagement myth : ‘Once you lose them you lose them’.

It’s not true. 

We lose focus and attention all the time. As leaders, speakers or trainers, we can’t hold people’s engagement all of the time. 

So yes, we will ‘lose them.’ We all drift away. But it doesn’t mean they are forever ‘lost’.  

Attention ebbs and flows. We can’t give 100% attention, 100% of the time. 

The task becomes: how do you get them back... and when they come back, how do you catch them up with what has been happening - whether they’re ‘gone’ for 15 seconds or 15 minutes?

The work then is to firstly DESIGN for engagement. 

And then to invite, welcome and DELIVER for reengagement. And repeated reengagement, because our attention lapses. 

Rather than the control freak in us expecting or demanding 100% attention, work to earn engagement and to hold it, understanding that it will leave at times. 

And then work to always encourage and welcome re-engagement, whenever it comes.