The other day I was talking with a lady who told the story of a friend who was struggling with business overwhelm because of the smallest decision for their business – what URL to choose. It’s not the first time I’ve heard this. I’ve had consultations with business who are overwhelmed with not getting anywhere with social media. But it’s not just where we show up in our business, we can be overwhelmed with how we show up.
I’ve helped a number of business owners through this. They come to me with a particular tool they are struggling with, generally Facebook, and they feel utterly overwhelmed. Like with most of life, what we think is the problem rarely ever is. But the thing with overwhelm is that it is all encompassing and that so often we are unable to realise that there is more to the problem that meets the eye and if we only looked a little further the answer would be so clear and so simple.
So often I see this overwhelm and it’s characterised by any or all of the following things.
- A disconnect from our passion
- A disconnect from our audience
Sounds simple right? Too simple to answer the issue of this overwhelm! It’s not and here’s why.
Humans are hard-wired for connection. Connection to our family, our friends, our community, our tribe. When we lose these connections we feel lost. As lost souls we grapple and grasp for things to give us direction and meaning. Much like connections do.
In business we have three connections. Connection to self (our passions). Connection to business. Connection to clients (audience).
When one or more of these are out we feel out of whack and the more disconnection we have, the more overwhelmed we become.
So what is some of the overwhelm I see in business?
- Social media overwhelm – which channel, what to call things, group/profile/page
- Niche overwhelm – what to niche to
- Email overwhelm – to send newsletters (or not), how often to email
These are tools. The ‘what’ to do in business. Unfortunately they’re often made to be the should do in business too.
Connection is the deeper why we do things in business. Remove them and we feel off kilter.
So what is the one thing we’ve lost other than the connection which is contributing to overwhelm in business?
We’ve lost that all of this connection is about people. We have lost that the ‘whats’ and ‘shoulds’ are actually about connecting to people. This is where I see the overwhelm sitting and this is where the relief comes when I show it to my coaching clients.
Now for some this might seem simplistic, but I have to say that there is a tonne of science behind people, connection, and how they interplay with social media, communication, and business. And this fascinates me.
If it fascinates you, use the link below to find a time for us to chat more. https://bookme.name/karalambert