Clear your head

It is so easy to get caught up in the crazy spindle of expectations that we weave for ourselves. These expectations can be just as easily created in moments of weakness, feeling the need to compare oneself to others and their accomplishments, as in moments of brilliance, with great ideas that beg for more attention. Recent examples from my psyche: I should read more; I should write more; I should get more international experience; I should learn more languages; I should do more research; I should start doing yoga; I should practice my clinical skills more often; I should start up a nationwide curriculum for health policy; I should follow up on that idea I had for an internet start-up company; I should, I should……

The problem is that while these expectations are easy to create, they are hard to dismantle- even if they should be; they persist in the back of the mind, a constant reminder of all the things not being done. What often results is a feeling of guilt, and it is this guilt that I think paralyzes many of us from doing anything at all- the “too much to do” syndrome.

I know this feeling. I’ve had it. I still get it sometimes. However, as I mentioned previously, I have recently been trying to stick to some of the main ideas of David Allen, author of “Getting Things Done”- particularly the habit of writing down the next action of everything I want to do. As simple as it sounds, writing all of these actions down, even for projects with no specific timeline tied to it, can help to get these things off your mind. If you get it all down, gone will be the constant feeling of guilt- because you know that you can’t forget about anything as long as you look at your list every once and a while- and your mind will be free to work on the things that you have decided are important at this moment.

Try doing this is you are feeling like you have too many things on your mind or if you have too many goals/projects for your own good. I was amazed at the immediate change it made in my life.