On People Hiding Behind How "Overwhelmed" They Are

We could concoct a partial list (and it would only be partial) of things that overwhelm most people these days, and we could even do it at a macro- and micro-level. To wit:

Macro

• Income inequality
• Inflation
• Women’s issues/abortion
• The economy as a whole
• The climate
• Partisan bickering
• What social media is doing to us

And then: Micro

• Pleasing your boss
• Getting your kids places
• Figuring out if you’re doing a good job with your kids
• Being a good spouse
• Groceries
• Keeping up with friends
• Aging parents

Some of those “micro” and “macro” may overlap, of course.

We’ve even created terms around all this, including “languishing,” and I’d be completely surprised if “burnout” wasn’t a top-five term used since 2020.

But the bigger picture here is a little more complicated, I think.

Everyone is overwhelmed, but … not at the same levels.

I think in the last few years, we’ve definitely seem overwhelm in these buckets:

• Health care
• “Essential” workers
• Single moms/dads
• Multi-child families without a large space or general affluence

It does feel, though, like there’s been “semantic creep” around the “overwhelm” term and now everyone wants to claim it. Just because Subdivision Sarah’s Instagram feed is loaded with BLM and politics and critical race theory and the normal tummy tea stuff, that doesn’t necessarily mean her relatively comfortable (with admitted challenges) life is overwhelming, especially not when you contextually compare it to others. It’s a bit similar these days with “trauma” — everyone seems to be claiming it, and while it’s important to acknowledge that everyone has some degree of trauma in their life, it can feel a little “Boy Who Cried Wolf” sometimes. Hopefully that makes sense. (We discuss trauma enough now that we’ve created terms like “digressive victimhood.” )

“Overwhelm” is something that we naturally are going to feel at this intersection:

• Work demands
• Family demands
• Keeping up with friends/staving off loneliness
• Our own personal issues, i.e. co-dependency, alcohol, etc.
• Society writ large

So yes, everyone experiences some degree of overwhelm, and I’d also argue it varies by day and week. But what seems interesting right now is that a lot of the overwhelm culture is almost becoming an excuse, i.e. “I can’t do the things to overcome my overwhelm because I am, in fact, overwhelmed.” That’s odd.

It’s like how we load up on commitments to avoid disappointing people and then, in the process, have too many commitments and disappoint people.

I see this discussion also as parallel to our discussions about “being busy.” Again, everyone is busy at some level, yes. It’s very tied to overwhelm. But “I’m so busy” or “I’m so slammed” has become the de facto response in offices for the last two decades, and if you actually walk around most offices, half of it is people on YouTube, or their phones, or taking 2.5-hour lunches. (I worked with a guy at TCU who was gone from 11am to 2:30pm every day, and I mean gone, like you couldn’t even reach him on Slack or text or email. I always laughed at that.)

Do you think “overwhelm” is always unflinchingly real, or is it something people hide behind?