What you will learn in this episode: 

• How overwork leads to overwhelm

• How to create a work-life balance

• Changing your mindset to avoid overwhelm

Today I want to talk to the designers who are feeling overwhelmed, stressed out, and anxious – all of those horrible words that none of us want to feel.

I find that this overwhelm and stress comes from three different scenarios, and that is what I want to share with you today.

One, you are overworked! You have taken on too many projects, and you can’t manage the workload. 

If you have so much work happening that makes you really excited, yet there are 3 to 4 things that aren’t going well, and that is due to missing details. Why this is happening is because you have too much work!  No one wins if you take on too much work at one time. Your clients won’t get the high level of service they are paying for and expecting. Even if you do as well as humanely possible, it won’t be as good as if you have fewer jobs and feel calmer about your workload. 

If you have jobs currently going on, there isn’t a whole lot you can do except take a moment and break it down. Every project comes in stages and follows the same order of steps, and you can plot those out to know what decisions and selections you need to make. 

The second is work-life balance. Let’s be real – we have lives outside of what we do for a living. And when that balance gets out of line, it can create stress and anxiety. 

While things can feel really, really urgent, the reality is they can wait. What we do for business is a luxury. Nobody needs to redo a bathroom. Nobody needs to redo a kitchen. Nobody needs an addition added to their house. These things are an investment in their property. 

Does it mean it waits a week or a month? No.

But it can wait until there is a moment that is appropriate for me to handle that situation. 

And lastly, if you’re not feeling confident about skills and knowledge, and experience, yes, that can become overwhelming as well.

But here’s the thing – everybody has a first day. Everybody has a first project. And until you get pasts those first firsts, they will feel overwhelming. But you can switch up your mindset about it and look at it as an opportunity to learn something new and offer and apply it to future projects. 

Remember, your first day will end. Your first project will end. And then all of a sudden, you’re like, “Wait a minute. I actually do know this!”

As always, please feel free to reach out to me at renee@devignierdesign.com or DM me on Instagram @devignierdesign

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