Coping with Panic: Divide and Conquer

So you've been staring at  your to do list, right?  The one that you made to help you cope with panic.  And maybe your list had 47 things on it, like my "Stuff I gotta do before I go home for Christmas" list.  What's next?  Pick one thing off of the list and do it.  Don't worry about doing 20 things.  Don't worry about doing everything.  Do ONE thing. 

Now, if you're looking at your list, and you're getting ready to do your one thing, and every one of your one things to choose from seems huge and overwhelming, then my dear you may need to divide before you conquer.  Like let's say your list has just one thing on it like "get in shape".  Well this is a pretty big goal.  It's not something you can get done tonight or even this week.  So when all the stuff on your list is huge, you've got to divide these tasks into smaller tasks.

This may seem counter-productive.  After all the stupid list is getting longer, not shorter, right?  But until you get the tasks down into discrete pieces you can't cross them off your list, and thus you can't make the list shorter.

So if your goal is "get fit", maybe you could break it into smaller tasks like, call gym around the corner and check out prices or buy really cute workout top or go to http://www.thefatchick.com and order a DVD to work out with.  (I'm shameless, what can I say?)

But when you're in panic mode, there's nothing like crossing something off your list, and I mean ANYTHING off your list, to help you calm down and find some control.

So go cross something off your list.  Go do it right now!  There, doesn't that feel better?

Love,
The Fat Chick