Blinkers are the cups placed on a horse’s harness with the purpose of allowing the horse to only see what is straight ahead and not get distracted or spooked. So when I say put your blinkers on, I mean that it is critical to focus on only one problem, or a small subset of interrelated problems and no more. Otherwise it is very easy to become spooked by the size of your troubles. One way to focus on only the one problem is to write it down on a piece of paper. Some people like to write lists as they solve problems, this is primarily a way of drawing the focus to only the one problem at hand and discarding everything else. If you’re not a list person you need to be strict to keep focusing on the one issue, and if you cannot keep focused then stop trying to solve the problem right now. Wait until you’ve calmed down enough to work just one step at a time.
The next step is to be clear on what the problem really is by breaking it down into smaller chunks. In the case of the yard being a mess, I broke down my problem into a list of all the things that needed to be cleaned up or repaired before I could sell the house. All I did was break down the list of smaller chunks, I did not commit to how I was going to solve these smaller problems.
These two steps promptly dissipated my overwhelm as I was able to focus on the task at hand and get moving without actually doing any difficult work or making any difficult choices yet. That sounds so simple and obvious and not really worthy of mentioning, but I know that I do experience overwhelm often and so I need to do this. Maybe you do too?
Once I have determined what each of the smaller problems are in amongst a big problem, I go back to the blinkers. I focus on just one smaller problem and shut out everything else. Yes, this is tunnel vision, but it really is necessary when solving particularly difficult issues. So I will pick one sub-problem which seems to be the easiest or should be tackled first because the problem has a definite order. I will then either brainstorm ideas for how to solve the problem and then pick the method that seems the best after researching the possible alternatives. Sometimes I’ll write down pros and cons, other times I’ll just talk to people about their experiences, read books or articles or just listen to my intuition.
Once I have picked the solution that I think is best it is time to move. Paralysis of analysis must be avoided at all cost! Doing nothing will only make your problem bigger. Doing something might potentially shift the problem to a new problem, but then again it probably won’t, so you have a good chance of being better off by taking action. Being stuck and doing nothing has a good chance of everything getting worse. Get a quick win under your belt by swiftly tackling this sub-problem. SOLVED! This should give you some much needed confidence before you tackle the next thing on your list.
Often I find that the solution that worked for the first sub-problem can also work for more sub-problems on the list. If so, just roll out the same solution again, but this time you will tick off more than one issue at once. SOLVED, SOLVED and SOLVED. If not, keep tackling them one at a time. With the example of my yard tidy-up which I was describing before, I tackled the first sub-issue on my list which was that the front yard was full of ugly overgrown shrubs. I solved this one quickly by calling a gardener and asking him to remove all of the shrubs. Once this had happened I could see immediately that it had improved the look of the place substantially, and it was not as expensive as I had thought. So I called a gardener again and asked him to fix up a number of other things that were on the list. Three quarters of the list solved in one fell swoop! I did have to pay for someone else to implement the solution, but due to my anxiety paying to have it done was a good idea. When I had been feeling overwhelmed I had been unable to come up with such a simple and effective solution, but it turned out to be the right way to go about things.
Right now I am working on solving my issue with regards to needing to find a job and a home in my current city when I have only one week before the end of my current job and two weeks before my house settles and my husband is living interstate. Firstly, I am separating my fear from my problem solving. I process the fear and worry at some times and at other times I think about the solution. Secondly I have broken down my problem into smaller distinct problems:
- I need to find a job (that I like and will be able to live with)
- I need to find a home (that I like and will be able to live with, located near to the job)
- I need to decide what to do with the job I am supposed to be starting in the new city
After confirming with my husband that he definitely wants to come back to our home city (bounce avoidance) the easiest sub-problem to solve was deciding what to do with the new job. I called the manager and explained what had happened. He said no problems, if things change again and I want to move to the new city then there’s a job here for me. Great, problem solved. First win!
Second problem to solve is finding a good job that I like and I can live with. While adding a few constraints, the extra clause is important because I want to avoid another bounce where I rush into the first job and then hate it and want to quit. So for now I have decided to focus on getting the right job first and foremost which means that if I run out of time I will have to come up with a urgent solution for housing (short-term accommodation, or staying with my husband interstate – the latter of which is the most likely). For me this feels intuitively to be the right order to tackle the problems, but perhaps someone else would tackle the housing first.
So next I focus on the requirement of finding a job and I break down that into smaller pieces. Make enquries with friends and old colleagues, reply to job ads, update my resume, make phonecalls, send the resume with a well formulated e-mail to potential leads etc etc. My focus is already starting to pay off after only one day. Being focused is crucial. I will keep focusing on solving the job problem until that is done, no matter what gets in my way. Given this will probably take a couple of weeks to fix I will likely not solve the house issue on time, but I have already worked out the plan B for that one.
Breaking down the chunks and using focus like this is very helpful for me, and I am sure for you too. It allows us to keep moving forwards even when terrible things are happening and it seems everything is crashing down around us! Well it isn’t really, because as long as we keep moving and solving things as they come up and avoiding bad bounces, good things start to happen as well as the bad. Things start to even out and new opportunities start to pop up. You start to notice flowers again!
I’ll keep you posted on my progress with this current set of issues. I have a few good techniques for finding work which I will share soon.
Petra’s note later in the evening: I have a job interview booked in already, and another two successful enquiries to the hiring managers. My job seeking is working quickly.
Petra’s note 06/06/10: This article shows how difficult it can be to avoid ‘bounce’ at times, especially when you have two people independently trying to solve the same problems at the same time. While my problem-solving methodology worked out perfectly (I had both a job and an apartment lined up after one week of massive action), it turned out that I had to cancel the job and apartment offers and go to Melbourne anyway as my husband was already there and after thinking about it for a week he had second thoughts about coming back. So this process does work, but sometimes the solutions don’t suit everyone and you need to backtrack. This is life afterall!
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