I’m sitting at my desk staring at the wall to my right. It’s covered in the big desktop calendar pages, one for every month left in the year. If you know me, you know I’ve got colored pens and sticky notes going, planning out the last few months of the year.
My calendar’s looking pretty full right now, and if I’m honest, I’m feeling a little anxious about it.
Part of me is wondering how we got to the last few months of the year so fast. The other part of me is doing the math: four pages left on that wall, and how is all of this going to get done?
The end of the year always adds a little extra pressure, and this year the holidays land right in the middle of it, big family celebrations that stack another layer of accumulation on top of everything else.
But that’s not really the whole story, is it?
This happens all year. Spring shows up and we wonder how it got here so fast. Summer rolls in with vacations and travel and kids home from school, and suddenly we’re overwhelmed again.
Things pile up on our calendars the same way they pile up in our pantry.
And just like the pantry, a full calendar doesn’t mean we did something wrong or we’re bad at managing our time. It’s just accumulation.
Instead of cans of beans, it’s one more responsibility, one more commitment, one more thing I said yes to, one more person I want to help or show up for.
Some of what piles up isn’t even an obligation. Some of it is good stuff, the things I want to do, the people I want to see, the plans I’m actually looking forward to.
Accumulation isn’t always a bad thing.
Why do I feel overwhelmed when my calendar gets full or starts to get full?
A full calendar can feel overwhelming because it’s not only the number of things you have to do. It’s the mental load of remembering, planning, and managing everything at once.
Sometimes feeling overwhelmed isn’t a sign that you need to manage your time better. It may be a sign that you simply have too much to manage.
Here’s what I think is really going on.
As capable women, and you found me for a reason, so I know you’re one, we take on a lot over the course of a year, and we handle it.
We don’t usually notice how full our life has gotten until we’re already in the middle of the overwhelm, or until, like me, we’re staring down three months to get it all done before the calendar resets.
For you it might not be a wall of calendar pages. It might be a closet or a pantry you’d rather just close the door on.
It shows up differently for all of us, but it’s the same feeling underneath: the weight of accumulation, whether it’s in our physical space or on our calendar.
Getting better at managing our time can help.
But sometimes the truth is simpler than that: we just have too much to manage.
And that’s the part we don’t want to say out loud, or write down, or even think about too hard, because once we admit it, we have to make some decisions.
Some of those decisions aren’t easy.
Then I caught myself
As I sat there looking at my wall, thinking about how I could create more space in my calendar to get everything done, I almost did something I bet you do too.
I started to take my own things off the calendar first.
There’s a four-day conference I really want to go to. I see friends there, I learn, I come home re-energized. But it’s four days away from home, and I know my family doesn’t love it when I’m gone.
Maybe I shouldn’t go, I thought.
I could cut back on my workout schedule this month, too. That would give me an extra hour or two in the morning.
And what about the lunch dates and the get-togethers I’ve been looking forward to?
Maybe those should go.
Those were the first places I went looking for more time.
And then I caught myself.
My first reaction is to move myself, or remove myself, to make space for everyone else.
I don’t think that makes me weak or bad at managing my life. I think it’s what happens when you’re the one who notices what needs to be done and takes care of it, because most of us who show up here are wired to care for everyone else first.
That’s not the part I’m trying to fix.
But I still sat with it for a minute.
My family really doesn’t love it when I’m gone for four days, so maybe I should just stay home this year.
Skipping a few workouts felt like an easy trade for two extra hours every morning.
And the lunches, those felt like the easiest thing to let go of, since nobody would even notice if I said no.
That conference isn’t a task I can just check off, though.
Cutting my workout wouldn’t make me more productive; it would just make me more depleted.
Those are the things that actually restore me, and if I keep giving them away first, there won’t be anything left to give from.
So I made a decision.
Those things are staying.
I’m calling them written in Sharpie, not sticky notes, because sticky notes come off and A Sharpie doesn’t.
What might go instead?
I could simplify Thanksgiving. I could skip decorating the whole house before company comes.
I could make simpler meals. I could even do the thing that makes me flinch a little: ask for help.
We’re about to turn the page to October.
Next week I’ll be looking at just three pages on that wall: October, November, and December.
I want to look at them with excitement and gratitude for everything I get to do, not dread for everything I have to do.
I can’t promise I’ll get that right every single day.
I can’t promise that when I look at my wall each morning, I won’t still feel that flicker of overwhelm looking at all the days already filled in.
But I can promise to try, and I’d love for you to try it with me.
We’ll finish this year surrounded by the people we care about, doing the things that actually mean something to us.
We’ll honor the people we miss in whatever way brings us comfort.
And we’ll start by honoring ourselves, by refusing to take ourselves off the calendar to make room for everything else that needs to get done.
And if your version of this isn’t a calendar at all, if it’s that closet or that pantry you’d rather just close the door on, the same thing applies there too.
That space doesn’t need you to disappear from it either.
Before you take anything off your own calendar to make room for what “needs to get done,” ask yourself one more question:
What could go on a sticky note instead, and what deserves to be written in Sharpie?
Tell me what’s written in Sharpie for you. I’d love to know.
Talk to you next Monday,
Meryl
Part of the Monday with Meryl series.
