I can't do this.

Anxiety Paralysis.

It's something we've all suffered from on occasion, and I definitely count myself in that number.

That feeling that there is so much going south in your world that we can't possibly make it right in the time we have to do it. Usually this is work related, because it's rare that our personal issues have time specific deadlines that cause us this problem. When we work for ourselves, we generally don't give ourselves concrete deadlines, and the goal posts can always be moved. When we work for others, we are sometimes a victim of their timelines - without possibility of compromise.

If we were going to describe the situation, we'd say it's when we've either bitten off more than we can chew to make ourselves look ambitious, or when we've committed to something, assuming we would be able to figure it out. We then get to the end of the project and realise that actually, we don't possess either knowledge or skills to complete it.

Sometimes it's because through no fault of our own (team member phoning in sick, or being taken out of the picture in some way) we are left with too much work, and too little time.

At the point we realise this, our brain shuts down. Our human side (the logical element) isn't fast enough to block out our chimp (emotional) side (The Chimp Paradox) and our chimp gets all flustered, and goes into panic mode. The sinking feeling in your stomach ? The feeling that it's all too much and we can't cope ?

Our chimp goes into panic mode

Then we spend the next 5 minutes (feels like an eternity) thinking about all the things that are beyond our control, that we have nothing in our computer (the internal memory banks) to tell us how to cope with the situation - we've not come across it before, or perhaps didn't cope well with it last time. It usually culminates in a feeling of despair and hopelessness.

As I say, I know the feeling well.

Ultimately, we need to get a grip of this situation if we're ever to have a hope of combatting it. Often, it's not the task itself that is the blocker, but our emotions and fear. An old manager of mine once said "Come to me with solutions, Paul... not Problems". It felt pretty harsh when he said it, and at the time I thought he was just being brutal. How could I come up with solutions to problems I've never had to deal with before ?

The truth is - we all can. There isn't a right or wrong way to deal with any given situation, and as a good friend of mine said the other day, "You can only control the controllable". Completely. By focusing on the things that we CAN effect, allows us to feel like we're being productive again. By finding a small corner of the project to make a start on, our chimp calms down and feels more in control.

"You can only control the controllable"

But how do we combat the paralysis?

Two ways - during (reactive) and before (pre-emptive)

First, let's start with what to do when you're already there and panicking, in full-blown armageddon mode.

The important thing here, is to gain perspective. Time becomes distorted, and the temptation is to work through all our breaks, food time, cigarette time, break our routine... all in an effort to break the back of the seemingly impossible task.

This is the first mistake. Adjust your routine, by all means. Focus on the project, absolutely. But look after yourself and your mind and body first and foremost. It's a falsehood to say that you can go without sustenance in order to accomplish a task while in this state. Once you are focused and being productive, cutting down on distractions can be crucial, but wellness is not a distraction.

So my advice at this point, is to try and stick to your routine as much as possible. Forgive yourself for needing a break. Don't pile guilt onto the fire, it will turn into a firestorm. Take a moment, step away from it all, and prevent it from overwhelming you, by refusing to think about it for five minutes or more.

Remember WHY you come to work each day

Remember that you've done this a hundred times or more, and you're still here. Life has gone on. Tomorrow you will laugh about this moment. Today we just need to get through it and try our absolute best. We can't always perform our absolute best, so although we should aim for that, we need to accept that on any given day, all we can do is TRY our hardest and give it everything we can.

That doesn't happen because we pile pressure on ourselves. Some work well under pressure, some don't... but nobody works at their best BECAUSE of pressure. Remove it in as much as you can.

Next, it comes down to your preference for how you work, but being quite an 'earth' (assertive and direct, procedures driven) person, I tend to prefer to make a list of all the tasks I have to do, in order to make today work. Everything. Sometimes, even the stuff I've already done, so that I can cross them off, and give myself a small pat on the back for seeing how far I've already come in the process.

Maybe there's a different step for you - but we should find what works best to plan our situation out.

Then, we prioritise. Remember the Eisenhower Matrix ?

Think of every task in terms of its' urgency and importance. Prioritise the things that at important and urgent, then move on from there. Top of your immediate 'to do' list, should be smaller tasks that you can accomplish straight away to make an impact on the Pareto principle... 80% of the results from 20% of the work - what makes you look further ahead than you are in terms of your list ? What is easy to accomplish, and earns you some recognition in what you've achieved ?

80% of the results from 20% of the work

Next, look at what you can personally achieve in a realistic stretch goal, and what you know as a fact that you can't. Now is the time to enlist help from your network, if possible. If you're in a team, it may be borrowing or calling in some favours from team members (remember Sam from marketing ? Now's the time you understand why you should have kept that relationship on a simmer !) to assist with what you don't have time or experience to do yourself.

Alternatively, it may be that you can compromise with the stakeholder for your project. If you can demonstrate transparency, could they meet you half way ? "If I ... Could you..." is a great negotiating framework... and always worth a try when the chips are down. If I can achieve 80% of the goal today, could you give me an extra half day to complete the remainder ?

Don't always assume that the answer will be no - especially if you can be endearing, and not come across as being negative or moaning about the project.

Remember, how you are at anything, is how you are at EVERYTHING. We should always do our best to be upbeat, positive, and show the silver linings in what we are doing. Smile (where appropriate) when talking to the stakeholder... all of these things add together to make our request seem reasonable to them. Ask them if our proposed resolution or compromise seem "fair" - most people strive to be fair to others and this usually causes them to re-examine if they are being unfair or demanding.

How you are at anything, is how you are at EVERYTHING

People appreciate transparency more than anything else in these situations. Closely followed by ownership of the problem. Telling a client or stakeholder that the problem exists and how you intend to resolve it is one thing. Owning that problem and being in charge of resolving it is the next.

Be it, do it, own it

Ok, so hopefully that all gets us moving again and we get to the end of the project. What's important here, is to become self aware of how the situation happened, whether we dealt with it well.

Recognising faults here is crucial, but it's easy to be over-critical. Sometimes it's worth bouncing these concerns off a mentor or colleague who has been through similar to get a more rounded approach to your analysis - make sure they are free to point out if we have been too critical and unfair to ourselves, or likewise let us know if we're failing to hold ourselves to account and making excuses !

This then, leads to the pre-emptive approach to managing these situations. Once we understand why we got there in the first place, we can understand what sort of things we can put in place to avoid them happening again, or at least stop ourselves escalating them to the same point. It's important to understand that by building a plan in our mind before the events come to pass (and they will), we can then choose to bypass the quick response of the chimp (and go into emotional overload) by employing our plan as best we can.

Crucially, a large part of coping with these situations, is our network. Whether it's advice on how to plan for the potential problem, gained by understanding how others have experienced the same situation and dealt with it, whether it's by asking for assistance at the time to help lighten the workload, or whether it's to gain insight on our process effectiveness after the point - the relationships we have around us are very important.

Sometimes it's even just good to have a moan out loud to someone (or ourselves if we have to).

By building our relationships and network, and supporting others when they go through a similar process, we not only build a library of people who can assist us when we need it most, but we can also see them going through the same thing, be their support when they need it, and see how they deal with the situation themselves... again, learning without having to suffer ourselves. This is invaluable.

What I'm not saying, is that you should spend all day building relationships and not actually getting on with your own work - that's a very different thing, it's procrastination. It won't get you to your end goal - so there is definitely a balance here for productivity and networking - and we need to get that balance right.

Ultimately, my advice is this... don't let fear of the unknown paralyse you on the day.

As Michael Jordan once said...

"Why would I worry about a basket that I haven't shot yet?"

Focus on what is within your control, accept that some things aren't within your control, and move on.