AMiable Solution #164: The Stress Less Strategy, Part 2

It’s pretty easy to feel overwhelmed at any time, but we’re particularly susceptible to such feelings at year-end, when inventory, budgetary, or holiday activities seem to reach a peak.  How can you survive the stress? 

To steal a page from psychologist Karl Weick’s playbook, look for a small win.  Instead of focusing on the exhausting task of compiling year-end reports, focus on one aspect of the report.  Instead of looking at that dreadfully long list of to-do items, select the easiest or quickest task, complete it, and check it off the list.  Once you accomplish one small goal or one small part of a larger goal, the whole task seems a little less insurmountable and more feasible. 

In their May 13, 2011, Harvard Business Review article, “Small Wins and Feeling Good,” Teresa Amabile and Steve Kramer echoed this sentiment, saying, “Because setbacks are so common in truly important problems, people become disheartened unless they can point to some meaningful advance most days, even if that advance is seemingly minor, and even if it involves nothing more than extracting insights from the day’s failures. This strategy propels long-term goal achievement.”

So go on.  Take on your “opponent” one play at a time, one small victory at a time.  You can win the game: you just have to get the ball moving.