Have you ever felt overwhelmed with your plans, to-do lists, and goals? Do you find yourself planning every moment of your day and then feeling guilty when you don’t complete them? Overplanning can be a major source of stress and can leave you feeling burnt out and exhausted.
Here are 7 simple tips to help you take charge of your life and become more mindful of how you spend your time. These strategies will help you make the most of your time and make room for the things that really matter. So take a deep breath, relax, and start living in the moment – it’s time to stop overplanning and start living.
What is overplanning?
Overplanning is the habit of making plans that are overly detailed. It’s when you make plans that are so rigid that they don’t leave any room for spontaneous and unexpected moments.
This type of behavior can lead to difficulty adapting to the unexpected and increased stress caused by trying to stay one step ahead at all times.
If you find yourself having trouble managing your time or feeling stressed, or if you consistently make plans that you don’t follow through on, you may have an overplanning problem.
How does overplanning impact our lives?
If you suffer from overplanning, you may find that you’re constantly feeling stressed and overwhelmed. Life probably feels like a constant struggle, and you’re probably finding it difficult to make progress toward your goals and dreams because you’re so busy trying to keep up with all of your plans and commitments.
Overplanning can manifest itself in negative ways such as procrastination, micro-managing, and an overwhelming fear of failure. It can limit creativity, limit decision-making, and detract from the overall enjoyment of what could otherwise be an enjoyable task.
Learning to recognize overplanning and instead strive for reasonable planning can help ease unnecessary stress, lead to greater productivity, and open up opportunities to make memories instead of just checking off tasks from a list.
7 Simple Tips To Help You Stop Overplanning
1. Learn to prioritize
If you’re a chronic over-planner, you probably have a long list of goals and aspirations that you’re trying to tackle all at once. Although it might feel good to have your plate full, it can be difficult to make progress toward your goals if they aren’t prioritized correctly.
To begin, prioritize your goals based on what’s important to you. For example, if being healthy and fit is important to you, then prioritize exercise and nutrition over other goals such as getting a promotion at work. Once you’ve prioritized your goals, make a plan for how you’re going to tackle them.
2. Practice saying “no”
Saying “no” can be one of the most liberating things you do for yourself when you’re trying to stop overplanning. It can feel like you’re going against your nature to turn down plans, commitments, and invitations from others, especially when you’re trying to “be the best” at everything you do.
However, it’s important to remember that you don’t need to do everything that’s asked of you. Try to keep your “yes” ratio at around 20% of the time. This means that you’re saying “no” to 80% of the things that are asked of you.
When you first start saying “no”, you may find yourself feeling a bit of guilt, but remember that there’s no need to feel guilty for taking care of yourself. Saying “no” will help you stay focused on what is most important and prevent you from overcommitting your time and energy.
3. Take time to rest
One of the easiest ways to keep your life from spiralling out of control is to make time for rest. Rest isn’t something that you do once and then it’s done. Instead, it needs to be a consistent part of your routine.
Aim for 7-9 hours of sleep every night and make time for rest during your day. To make the most of your rest time, try meditating, doing yoga, reading, or even taking a nap. All of these activities will help you clear your mind of stress, anxiety, and overwhelm and make it easier for you to relax at the end of your day.
4. Identify your values
Do you ever feel like you don’t know what’s important to you anymore? Overplanning can make it easy to lose track of what’s important to you and can result in you feeling ungrounded and confused. However, you can get control of your life again by identifying your values.
Values are important ideals and qualities that are unique to you. There are no right or wrong values, but there are ones that are most important to you. Once you’ve identified your values, it’s easier to make decisions that reflect your values and keep you on the path toward your goals and dreams.
5. Focus on what you can control
It can be easy to get overwhelmed about things that are beyond your control and things that aren’t actually happening yet. When you’re feeling stressed out, overwhelmed, or guilty, it’s important to take a step back and focus on the things that you can control.
This means that you need to stop trying to control everything in your life. Instead, it’s important to accept that some things are simply beyond your control.
6. Set boundaries
Overplanning can also be a sign that you’re letting too many people take advantage of you. This can lead to feelings of resentment, being burned out, and not having enough time for yourself.
Make sure that you’re prioritizing your needs and setting some healthy boundaries with the people in your life. This doesn’t mean that you have to be rude or completely cut people out of your life. Instead, it means that you need to be more selective with who you let into your life and the plans that you choose to commit to.
7. Make self-care a priority
It can be easy to forget to take care of yourself when you’re overplanning, especially if you have a lot of commitments and plans to follow through on. However, it’s important to make time for self-care no matter how busy you are. Self-care is an important part of maintaining your mental and physical health.
When you make time for self-care, it can help you relax and reduce your stress levels, and it can even help you improve your sleep. It can take many different forms, so find what works best for you.
Final Thoughts
No one likes feeling overwhelmed and out of control, but it’s something that can happen when you’re overplanning your life. Fortunately, there are some strategies that you can use to help get a handle on your daily schedule and prevent yourself from getting too overwhelmed.
By taking the necessary steps to stop overplanning, you can start to feel more relaxed, focused, and in control of your life. So take the time to identify your values, set boundaries, and make self-care a priority and soon enough you’ll be back on track.