Step by step is the only way forward
Lesson #15 of 40
As I approach 40, I’m embarking on a year-long project to reflect on the lessons I’ve learned in four decades of life. This is lesson #15. You can read the full series here.
Last week, my mom moved from her third-floor apartment to an identical, but newly updated, unit on the fourth floor. Her apartment’s property management company is renovating units one by one and asking residents, one by one, to move their belongings to the updated spaces. Moving to an upgraded, freshly painted apartment is nice. But moving in general? It’s a pain.
Change is hard, and moving, even one floor up, is a significant change. I tried to keep this in mind as my brother, sister-in-love, and I helped my mom transport her things. The process was slow and, at times, frustrating. Every so often, my mom would stop, sit down, and do nothing — not out of physical exhaustion, but out of overwhelm.
The weight of the move was more than just boxes. The process was emotional. Whether my mom came across mementos from her childhood, found items from when my brother and I were young, or discovered scraps of paper with my dad’s handwriting, it all felt bittersweet. It was emotional. It was a lot to process.
Watching my mom grapple with the overwhelm of moving was like looking into a funhouse mirror. I saw pieces of myself reflected in her — parts I like, parts I’m working on, and parts I’d rather ignore. Wow, my mind works the same way! Oh, I would have trouble with this, too. No, is that really what I’m like? I also tend to freeze when life feels like too much.
I suppose that’s why, before and during the move, I kept giving my mom the same kind of advice I’d give myself: Take one bit at a time. Breathe. I know it feels overwhelming, but it will get easier.
I told her what I’ve told myself a million times. Step by step is the only way forward.
I didn’t plan to write about my mom’s move, but I’ve long planned to write this lesson. Breaking big tasks into smaller steps is one of the most basic concepts we learn. Still, it’s one that I need to be reminded of again and again. Overwhelm feels like my default setting in stressful situations. Staying calm and collected? That’s much harder.
Overwhelm comes in many different forms. There’s the moving-to-a-new-home kind. The juggling-too-much-at-once kind. The kind that happens when the world’s problems seem too big and my capacity to face it all feels too small. I’ve experienced the overwhelm that comes when your spouse dies, suddenly and without warning. I know the overwhelm that comes with perfectionism, knowing things won’t turn out like I envisioned them. And I know the routine, everyday overwhelm: the kind that happens when my child needs to be bathed, her lunch for school needs to be made, the kitchen needs to be cleaned, and I remember a half-dozen other things I meant to accomplish earlier in the day.
No matter what form it takes, the answer is the same: Step by step is the only way to get where I want to go next.
Plenty of others have shared this advice in more memorable and masterful ways. Anne Lamott famously recalled her younger brother feeling daunted by a big school project on birds — now, “bird by bird” has become shorthand for breaking large tasks into smaller, more manageable pieces. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered versions of, “You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step,” in many of his powerful speeches.
And in The Comfort Book, Matt Haig wrote about the time he and his dad got lost in the woods while in France. They wandered for hours, trying not to panic. Haig’s father finally told him, “If we keep going in a straight line we’ll get out of here.”
He was right. They eventually found a road that led them back to the village where they were staying.
“I often think of that strategy, when I am totally lost — literally or metaphorically,” Haig wrote. “I thought of it when I was in the middle of a breakdown. When I was living in a panic attack punctuated only by depression, when my heart pounded rapidly with fear, when I hardly knew who I was and didn’t know how I could carry on living. If we keep going in a straight line we’ll get out of here.”
Sometimes, when I’m feeling overwhelmed, I berate myself for getting into such a challenging situation in the first place. Couldn’t I have managed my time better? Started packing sooner? Said no when asked if I could take on another project? Why am I like this?! Responding this way, not surprisingly, does nothing to make the situation better. Negative self-talk is guaranteed to make it worse.
Sooner or later, I remember to treat myself with compassion and kindness — another lesson for another day, another lesson I learn over and over again — and the load feels a little lighter. I take a deep breath and remember exactly what taking things bit by bit, bird by bird, minute by minute, looks like.
Whenever I’m overwhelmed by one too many work responsibilities, I’ll write them all down. (By hand, in pen, on a legal pad. These details may not matter to you, but they make a difference for me!) Then, I’ll determine what needs to be done by when and estimate how long it will take me to complete each task. Finally, I’ll map out my day or week, figuring out when I can make time for each task, reminding myself to factor in breaks and walks. This approach can be tedious in the moment, but laying everything out in such a concrete way usually stops me from panicking and sets me on the path to getting things done.
When my overwhelm is more existential, I might pause and take time to meditate. Sitting for 10 minutes almost always helps. Writing down all my worries helps, too. Seeing all my fears all on paper allows my thoughts to slow down, to stop running rampant in my mind.
And on some days — the particularly difficult days I’ve had in the past and will certainly have in the future — facing overwhelm looks like giving myself a hug. Reminding myself to drink water. To take a walk and, perhaps, a shower. To reassure myself that I can always start anew the next day.
Most of all, I stop beating myself up for the fact that it all feels challenging. Sometimes it is a challenge. And that’s okay.
My mom is now mostly settled into her new apartment, which looks identical to her old one, only brighter and with a higher view. Whenever she takes the stairs, she has to remind herself to climb an additional flight. And she does just that. Step by step.
xoxo KHG
Hi Katie. I love this lesson. I have been feeling an urgency lately to get through hard tasks. I often have to pause and remind myself that sometimes hard things take time and that is okay and the small steps add up. I wrote and reflected recently on keeping it simple, boiling down my tasks into what I value rather than a tedious list and this helps too. So for my classroom, I want students to read, write, speak, build community and feel loved. The details matter but sometimes they distract from what really matters. I love the patience you offer your mom through the move. It can be hard sometimes to remember the thing under the thing when moving through tasks and the thing under the thing needs to be tended as much as the task. 🌸
Loved this lesson (and this series as a whole!). Each week is so timely to what’s going on in my day to day and feels like something I can immediately implement.
I’ve been getting overwhelmed with the prospect of actually starting my grad school applications and can feel myself in the familiar freeze pattern that has had me stuck for so long. Moving from the saying I’m going to do the thing to actually doing it has always been a sticking point for me.
This has urged me to revisit my to-to list (generated with the help of Chat GPT, love that i can use it to take on some of the more mundane planning aspects) and figure out what the next step is. Probably something smaller than “write a perfect personal statement in one go.”