Kids Get Overwhelmed Too!

Periodically I get the priviledge of working with young kids, elementary school age on up, and help them develop positive communication skills. If you can get them to trust you, then they are more willing to share their feelings and ask for help.

Recently I was working with a middle school dance team and the girls had been practicing their routines for over two months. This particular day they were preparing for their first performance on the football field in a couple of hours. Energy was high, as was their anxiety! I can tell you these girls worked hard on their routines to get it perfect.

However on this particular day, the first performance day, one of the girls just was not putting her energy into the practice. Now she had already complained of some shoulder pain and leg pain, but I still saw her able to smile and cut up with the other girls periodically so I new the pain was not that bad. After a few reminders to her to pick up her energy level while performing, she just could not get it together.

Now previously, the director of the dance team had already informed me that this dancer was "in trouble" with her parents because the dancer was showing resistance to committing to this dance team. Understandably, as parents, we want to instill in our kids that once you make a committment to an activity, you must see it through - be a team player.

With all this information, I took the student aside and sat down next to her in a quite room and asked her about her "ailments". She said she was just achy but otherwise ok. So I then asked her about how she felt about being in trouble with her parents and I tried not to pry as best as I could. As first she said it was no big deal, but she looked as me and saw my expression of "please don't fib". And sure enough she shared with me how overwhelmed she felt with school, homework, projects, and responsibilities at home, not to mention practicing for the dance team. I think we can all relate that when there is too much on our plates, we begin to shut down. We don't want to disappoint anyone but the energy just seems to have been sucked out of our bodies and we have no motivation to do anything.

This dancer was feeling this pressure physically (achy joint pains) and emotionally (unable to focus). And because the field performance in a coupls of hours needed her participation to be successful, here is what we were able to do for her to regain her focus.

I had the student get 5 small pieces of paper and I asked her to write down one pending task, project, or committment that was expected of her on each piece. I made sure that the dance team obligation was on one of them. Then I asked her to place all 5 pieces in front of her and take a good look at them. I asked her to prioritize the 5 pieces of paper in order of importance in getting the tasks completed.

The next step I asked the student to complete was to pick paper #1 (the dance team performance) and put all the other pieces of paper in a small envelope. This, I told her, represented how we need to mentally view our tasks at hand. Since the dance team performance had the highest priority at that time, then the performance was what she needed to keep in her head and be focused on. I asked her to take a few minutes to mentally picture herself performing the routine and to try to "feel" what energy she would need in order to pull off a fantastic performance. She was not to think of any of the other tasks that were in the envelope until later.

I asked the dancer if completing the performance would make her parents happy. She said yes. Then I asked her if completing the performance would make her happy. She said yes. Then I asked the final question. Would thinking of any other responsibilities right now help get them completed, right now? She said no. Then the dancer smiled at me and said, "What a relief!"

That dancer along with the rest of the team not only performed beautifully, but they all had a great time together!

So the next time you feel overwhelmed and cannot seems to regain focus, try to write down and prioritize the more important projects you have and work on them one at a time! It will prevent you from "burnout"!

A wise man once told me that it is better to submit quality work on one task than mediocre work on multiple tasks.