overwhelmed
One day when I had way too much time on my hands, I decided to opt for all of the toolbars when I was working on a Microsoft Word document. I wanted to know what that screen would look like. Well, I found out.
BLAH! Look at all those freaking tools. I'm glad they are normally hidden. Quite frankly, I'm surprised that they let you have more than three up simultaneously. I could only tolerate staring at the screen for five seconds before I had to remove them all.
Seeing the screen full of toolbars summons the same feelings I'd get when I walked by the store Gadzooks. If the name doesn't give it away, it shouldn't surprise you that the store was a literal onslaught of visual overload. Busy patterns, bright colors, aggressive sales displays, trinkets, doodads, unhelpful teenaged staff - the store was a cornucopia of mall cliches. I could barely tolerate being on the same wing as the store (I used to work in the mall, hence my reason for being there so regularly) let alone set a toe inside.
Sometimes I get impatient with people who get overwhelmed too easily. You know, the type of person who is doing one task - and as soon as you approach them they have a mental breakdown and let you know what a big deal
a. what they are doing is
b. that you came up to ask them in the middle of it
c. and some other crazy event fabricated to create a sense of tension and anxiety.
That being said, I think there are times (like walking into Gadzooks) when you see your screen full of toolbars and the feeling overwhelmed is quite warranted. I'd like you to share those experiences. Oh, and not the "I was having my baby" type or "we got in a car crash" schpiel. I'm thinking more along the lines of irrational-overwhelming. That's what I'm after. Additionally - if you have stories about people who get overwhelmed too easily, that'd be great too.
9 comments:
The other grad student in my lab doesn't necessarily get overwhelmed so much as is completely incapable of doing more than one thing at once. And usually that one thing is talk. Which means I'm usually stuck doing all the work while he follows behind me talking. I find him interesting and entertaining so I don't usually mind. But Friday we had 24 rats to do a particular surgery on, and we split them up 50/50. We got started early in the morning so we could get them all done in one day. He got started on his little stories and, of course, was unable to suture and talk at the same time. So guess how many surgeries he did? SIX. How many does that leave me with EIGHTEEN. That's right, I did three times as many surgeries, because of his inability to multitask.
He says his mind just can't do more than one thing at once, its too overwhelming. I've now lost any patience I had with those who get overwhelmed.
i get overwhelmed attending professional sporting events. i'm not really that into professional sporting events in the first place but my family really is so i tried to pick one that i kind of liked several years ago and came up with basketball. i especially liked watching my college team when they really sucked. it was easy enough to follow, it was comparatively short so it didn't take my whole day, and it was just kind of cute how much they tried but still sucked.
however, in the last few years as i have attended a few professional games with my parents, i did not enjoy it nearly so much. every second, every space is filled with some kind of visual/audio stimulation. it seems like they take a time out once per minute and there's some kind of stupid game, mediocre dance performance, loud obnoxious music/crowd camera, or something every time. there's never not anything (bonus points for a double negative?). this is too much for me. maybe i'm a pansy, but i like a little room to think now and then.
I got overwhelmed by the selection of toilet bowl cleaners the other day at Target. Why are there so many? If I buy the ones with bleach does that just basically mean I am flushing bleach into the ocean? Does my toilet water go into the ocean? because if so eww. Are toilets really supposed to sparkle? Why would you want blue water in your toilet bowl? although that was kind of cool whe you were little to turn the water green with your pee... and so on.
This is how my brain works all the time. I don't think I know how to be underwhelmed.
I find taking all of my children to the grocery store overwhelming. Actually, I am overwhelmed if I take three of them. One or two is easy.
I feel overwhelmed in rush hour traffic. I start to think about all the cars I can see and all the people in them, where they might be going, all their little lives in motion, and how is it possible that the world has come to this, and is so complicated.
dang dawn... that is all metaphysical and what not.
here i am blasting about gadzooks, and dawn is carl jung'en it up around heres.
i want the goods on your co-workers who can't deal with stress.
I have two co-workes who are overwhelmed when I don't pay attention to them, or ask them to do one of their preassigned tasks (ie make the bed). One will even throw himself on the floor and cry if I ignore him for more than two minutes :)
man mia... how on EARTH could you work in such an environment.
;)
Interesting. I think I'm the odd ball here. It takes a crap load of coinciding things for me to feel overwhelmed. I figured this out about myself a while back.
I consider myself an adrenaline addict so the more I have to juggle, or the more I have to organize, I get all hopped up and it feels like a high. (This condition does not include dreary, mundane tasks. I procrastinate those almost entirely.)
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