No time? A 3-step process to escape the busyness trap

March 18th, 2022

Ann Collins

I used to be someone who always replied, "Really busy!" when asked how I was. And it was true - I did feel busy. Too busy, in fact. When I started coaching, I noticed I wasn't alone! When listening to my clients, I recognised their stories as my own and with them, I started to question this narrative that I had made my own and was so keen to hold onto.

I saw in my clients and myself that we were holding onto a very safe conversation stopper: "too busy" is an easy way to say no and an easy way to stop any further analysis. Some may even say that there is a certain amount of status around it: those in high level positions frequently are very busy and work long hours.

Except, I could see that for myself and my clients, this was not only about time. Being "too busy" was also sometimes a cop out of putting emotions into words: maybe I was actually tired, fed up, frustrated or even on the positive side, actually feeling very energised by the amount of work that I had!

The interesting thing about this response is that the ambiguity is acceptable and we rarely look further for the real causes of feeling either overwhelmed, tired and overstretched or needing to show our worth by being important and "busy"!

What do we lose by using "too busy" as our stock response?

We lose the chance to stand back from our own situation and to get perspective, To nurture a growth mindset, to make any kind of meaningful change in our lives, this part of the process is vital so that we can see our "reality" clearly and challenge it.

Getting off the hamster wheel isn't always easy. Firstly, it can take some time between realising the need for change and being ready to take the plunge. For many clients who are ready for coaching, they tell me that they have a fear of change and a fear of not changing.

Considering what is important, what your values and your purpose are, provides the compass for change and helps to build a vivid picture of what that future could look like. Taking the decision to create that picture of the future is often the point of no-return: stepping off the hamster wheel becomes fairly easy.

Having decided to put your personal development at the top of your list, I've devised a simple 3-step process that helps you to take real steps forward towards escaping the busyness trap.

Here are 3 Step Process to escape the busyness trap

Clarify the WHY: what is really important to you

Forget about "me time" with candles and spa trips: putting yourself on the top of your list is about making the decision that you have a purpose and a mission that is important. You matter. Your contribution matters.

Creating your purpose by discovering and evaluating what is really important to you is the next part of this step and is the start of forever stepping off the hamster wheel: when what you are doing is important to you, the hamster wheel is redundant.

Without much further effort, prioritising actions becomes more simple: delegating, deleting, defering or doing becomes easier. Willpower is not required as the vision is clear.

Think about ENERGY not TIME

Finding time to put yourself on the top of your list is not as important as shifting and changing your energy. How are you showing up? What is your intention? Are you truly present in meetings?

When we channel our energy and focus our attention, we can have life changing conversations that last 10 minutes, we can improve someone's performance in a short chat, we can make thoughtful decisions.

This decision to use energy rather than time creates a huge impact on our productivity and our results, allowing us the space (and energy) to focus on our own performance.

Manage your emotions effectively

We've all experienced time "flying" or "dragging"! Our emotions play a huge role in our perception of time and when we're in the busyness trap, feeling a range of unhelpful emotions: overwhelmed or stressed or stuck, it can be hard to exit!

Interestingly, by managing our emotions we can often, even in times of extreme busyness, get out of this feeling of scarcity of time and back onto an even keel.

By acknowledging and accepting emotions as data, we can move onwards quickly from a negative emotional response, freeing up energy to take action. This takes us out of a mindset of "not enough" to a state of flow, where we do one thing after another. We don't gain time, but we get into a state of flow, positive energy and action.

This is not putting a positive spin on life, this is merely reducing the time and energy we potentially spend in an emotional tunnel that can stop us from moving forward.

Escaping the busyness trap is life changing for many high achieving leaders, leaving them with greater control over their time, energy and emotions and a better balance in their lives. For clients, it's frequently the initial part of their coaching journey, freeing up space to focus on their big goals.