Worrying is Planning Without the Plan

Hi! How are you?

I have been doing my overwhelmed routine. You know, worrying about everything that has to get done and wondering how I am going to get it done.

Vision loss makes things take longer

Vision loss only compounds the problem. Things take more time and effort. For example, I went to the photo competition at the fair and had trouble finding my own work...what’s that? Oh, I did well; I guess. I had won second place out of three entries. And who said a VIP can’t be doing visual arts things? So there! ;)

Reading with a visual impairment

Back on track, then I came home and tackled, in succession, an online training I had been nibbling at and 85 pages of reading for DBT. You know what fun those things are! Fortunately, my Mac desktop computer has built-in magnification. Taking advantage of the Chafee Amendment, I have the book in PDF form. I let my reading program read it and I follow along and underline in the hard-copy book. It is slower and definitely not as convenient but it works.

Feeling overwhelmed

The dictionary defines overwhelmed as being overcome completely in mind or feeling. Yep. I recognize that. Do you? I usually get that way when I look and there is a seeming mountain of things that need my attention. Over the years, though, I have developed a plan of attack.

One step at a time

First of all, I try to remember how you eat an elephant. The answer to that riddle is an essential bit of life survival knowledge. That answer is, of course, one bite at a time. I cannot eat the elephant in one bite or even in one sitting. Just the same, given time and perseverance, I can get the job done!

Planning

My husband complains I am the queen of planning. Panning has become even more essential to me since I have become visually impaired. I got to the fair yesterday only because I had a plan: my husband took me to the Y for classes, I would shower, change, walk to the fairgrounds and then meet the bus mid-afternoon at a respectable distance from the chaos. I got my goals accomplished because I had a plan.

Worrying

Somewhere I read worrying is planning without the plan. How very true! With a plan, I know what I am doing. Worry is cut down considerably because there are not as many uncertainties. With the online study and DBT reading, I planned to “nibble” at them until I could see the light at the end of the tunnel and then run for it! I finished the three-hour study program over four days and I am now about a third of the way through the DBT reading material. Getting there and I feel better because there is slightly less on my proverbial plate.

Prioritizing

Picking and sorting my daily “targets” follows a simple formula: urgent (as in time-sensitive) is first and after that everything is ordered by importance. I went to the fair yesterday because it goes for nine days and is, therefore “time-sensitive.” Yesterday was also the best day for the logistics of getting a ride. While my online training did not have to be done until the end of November, it was the last thing I had to do to renew my professional license and I wanted to get it DONE. That made it important to me.

What's your system?

I suspect you get the idea. I also suspect you have put together similar systems for yourself in the past...or maybe even now. However, I also know the shock of developing vision loss can cause all that stuff to flow out your ears. Hope this was a helpful reminder.

Now back to work. I have 13 pages to go to have read half of my reading assignment. Subgoal! Make use of those, too!