Omer Khan

7 Mental Hacks for the Overwhelmed SaaS Entrepreneur

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Episode Summary

If you are an overwhelmed entrepreneur running on all cylinders with a to-do list that grows longer every day, this episode is for you. Omer Khan shares seven mental hacks backed by Harvard research and Stanford studies that can help you clear your mind, regain focus, and start making real progress.

This isn't about productivity apps or time management tricks. These are simple strategies for changing how your brain responds to stress and overwhelm - from diaphragmatic breathing to micro actions that build unstoppable momentum.

Do you ever feel like there's not enough time in the day to get everything done? Do you start feeling overwhelmed as soon as you think about everything on your plate?

If you are an entrepreneur, you probably know this feeling well. You are running on all cylinders trying to build your business. You have a long to-do list that seems to grow longer every day. You just don't have enough hours in the day. Which makes you start to feel seriously overwhelmed.

Feeling overwhelmed can result in negative emotions such as anxiety, worry, or irritability. And it can increase your stress levels, which could lead to even more serious issues with your mental or physical health.

In this solo episode, Omer Khan shares seven mental hacks to help any overwhelmed entrepreneur stop the cycle of stress and start making meaningful progress. These are relatively easy to implement and could potentially make a huge difference to your health as well as your ability to get things done.

The hacks cover everything from Harvard-developed relaxation techniques to Stanford research on why single-tasking beats multitasking, from a simple writing exercise proven by psychological science to clear negative thoughts, to the "micro actions" approach that turns overwhelming projects into easy five-minute wins.

Whether you are an early-stage founder juggling product development, marketing, sales, and support, or a scaling founder drowning in team management and strategic decisions, these seven strategies give you a practical toolkit for the moments when overwhelm hits hardest.

Topics: Bootstrapping|Content & Inbound Marketing

Key Insight

Host Omer Khan presents seven science-backed mental hacks for the overwhelmed entrepreneur: diaphragmatic breathing to trigger the relaxation response, writing tasks down to clear mental RAM, top-down goal planning for the next 90 days, focusing on process over outcome, single-tasking instead of multitasking, learning to do less, and starting with micro actions to build momentum.

Key Ideas

Diaphragmatic breathing triggers what Harvard physician Herbert Benson called the "relaxation response" - reducing heart rate, blood pressure, and muscle tension
Writing negative thoughts on paper and throwing them away was proven to clear the mind in a 2012 Psychological Science study
Top-down planning with 3-5 goals and 3 activities per goal creates a list of 9-15 high-impact tasks for the next 90 days
Stanford University (2009) found multitasking is less productive than single-tasking and impairs attention, memory, and task switching
Micro actions - setting ridiculously small goals like writing 100 words - eliminate resistance and build momentum toward bigger objectives

Key Lessons

🧠 Diaphragmatic breathing resets an overwhelmed entrepreneur's stress response: Harvard's relaxation response technique reduces heart rate, blood pressure, and muscle tension - and you can do it anywhere in under three minutes.
📉 Write negative thoughts on paper and throw them away: A 2012 Psychological Science study proved that physically discarding written negative thoughts clears the mind - a simple technique any overwhelmed entrepreneur can use immediately.
🎯 Top-down planning prevents busy work for the overwhelmed entrepreneur: Define 3-5 goals for the next 90 days with 3 activities each, creating 9-15 high-impact tasks that should consume 80% of your daily time.
🔄 Focus on process, not outcome, to beat overwhelm: Thomas Sterner's Practicing Mind teaches that the joy is in the process of achieving goals - filling your mind with outcomes while doing daily work creates paralysis.
⚡ Single-tasking is more productive than multitasking: Stanford's 2009 study showed that habitual multitaskers perform worse at attention, memory, and task-switching than those who complete one task at a time.
🧠 Learn to do less by asking what matters in five years: Most daily fire drills won't matter in five years. Accepting you will never get everything done reduces resistance and helps you focus on the work that creates real impact.
🚀 Start with micro actions to build unstoppable momentum: Set a ridiculously small goal like writing 100 words or working for 5 minutes - eliminating resistance to starting is the key to overcoming procrastination and overwhelm.

Watch the Episode

Chapters

00:00Introduction

00:29Do you ever feel overwhelmed?

01:56Hack 1 - Take a deep breath (diaphragmatic breathing)

04:00Hack 2 - Start writing (brain dump and negative thoughts)

06:26Hack 3 - Reset your mental compass (top-down planning)

09:53Hack 4 - Focus on process, not outcome

13:17Hack 5 - Build a single-tasking habit

15:07Hack 6 - Learn to do less

17:37Hack 7 - Start with micro actions

20:23Recap of all 7 mental hacks

23:09Closing thoughts

Episode Q&A

What are the 7 mental hacks Omer Khan recommends for the overwhelmed entrepreneur?

The seven hacks are: take a deep breath (diaphragmatic breathing), start writing (brain dump), reset your mental compass (top-down planning), focus on process not outcome, build a single-tasking habit, learn to do less, and start with micro actions.

How does diaphragmatic breathing help an overwhelmed entrepreneur?

Harvard physician Herbert Benson developed the "relaxation response" technique that reduces heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, and muscle tension. Diaphragmatic breathing is the simplest way to trigger this response and can be done anywhere - lying down, sitting, or standing.

Why should an overwhelmed entrepreneur write things down on paper?

Writing tasks on paper clears your "mental RAM" so your brain stops juggling deadlines. A 2012 study in Psychological Science showed that writing negative thoughts and physically throwing them away helps clear the mind more effectively than digital methods.

What is the top-down planning technique for overwhelmed entrepreneurs?

Write down 3-5 most important goals for the next 90 days, then identify the top 3 activities for each goal. This creates a list of 9-15 high-impact tasks that should consume 80% of your time, ensuring you work on what moves the needle.

Why does Omer Khan say single-tasking beats multitasking for overwhelmed entrepreneurs?

A 2009 Stanford University study found that people who regularly multitask perform worse at attention, memory control, and task switching than single-taskers. Multitasking is really rapid task-switching that reduces productivity and increases stress.

How does focusing on process help an overwhelmed entrepreneur get more done?

Thomas Sterner's book The Practicing Mind teaches that filling your mind with outcomes (like a million dollars in revenue) while writing a single blog post creates paralysis. Focusing on the process of writing that one post eliminates overwhelm and produces flow.

What are micro actions and how do they help overwhelmed entrepreneurs?

Micro actions are ridiculously small goals - like writing 100 words or working on a project for 5 minutes. They eliminate resistance to getting started and build momentum. Like hitting a golf ball 5 yards before attempting 100 yards, small wins create confidence for bigger ones.

What does "learn to do less" mean for an overwhelmed entrepreneur?

Accept you will never get everything done. Then ask: what will I care about in five years? Most daily fire drills won't matter. Strip your list down to the one or two things that create the biggest impact and spend 80% of your time there.

How should an overwhelmed entrepreneur combine bottoms-up and top-down planning?

Bottoms-up planning captures everything on your mind (brain dump). Top-down planning identifies 9-15 activities tied to your biggest goals. Combining both ensures you handle daily tasks while spending most of your time on work that drives meaningful progress.

Book Recommendations

The Practicing Mind

by Thomas M. Sterner

The Relaxation Response

by Herbert Benson

Links

Omer Khan: LinkedIn | X

Full Transcript

Omer (00:11.840)
Welcome to another episode of the SaaS Podcast.
I'm your host, Omer Khan, and this

Guest (00:17.480)
is the show where I interview proven

Omer (00:19.200)
founders and industry experts who share their stories, strategies and insights to help you

Guest (00:25.160)
build, launch and grow your SaaS business.

Omer (00:29.570)
This Week's episode is a little different.
I don't have a guest.
It's just you and me.
And I want to start by asking you a question.
Do you ever feel like there's not enough time in the day to get everything done?
Do you start feeling overwhelmed as soon

Guest (00:48.250)
as you think about everything on your plate?
If you're an entrepreneur, you probably know this feeling.

Omer (00:55.090)
Well, I. I do.
You are running on all cylinders trying

Guest (00:58.650)
to build your business.
You have a long to do list that seems to grow longer every day.

Omer (01:04.410)
You just don't have enough hours in

Guest (01:07.490)
the day, which makes you start to feel seriously overwhelmed.

Omer (01:13.050)
Now, feeling overwhelmed can result in negative emotions such as anxiety, worry or irritability.
And, and it can increase your stress

Guest (01:23.460)
levels, which could lead to even more serious issues with your mental or physical health.

Omer (01:28.980)
While you can't add more hours to your day, there are a number of

Guest (01:32.940)
strategies you can use to help you stop feeling overwhelmed and get yourself in

Omer (01:37.660)
the right physical and mental state.
And I'm going to share seven of those mental hacks with you today, which are relatively easy to implement and, and could potentially make a huge difference to

Guest (01:50.510)
your health as well as your ability to get things done.

Omer (01:56.630)
Hack number one is to take a deep breath.
Now, I know that might sound a bit obvious, but bear with me.
When you're feeling overwhelmed or stressed, it

Guest (02:07.870)
can be hard to think clearly.

Omer (02:11.590)
And when you're not focused and thinking

Guest (02:13.470)
clearly, you are more likely to make bad decisions or struggle to get things done.

Omer (02:20.080)
The first and most important step when

Guest (02:22.960)
you're feeling stressed is to relax.

Omer (02:26.080)
In the 1970s, Herbert Benson, a Harvard

Guest (02:30.120)
Medical School physician, developed a technique called the relaxation response and actually wrote a book about it.

Omer (02:38.480)
Now, this is a state of deep

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rest that helps you to change your response to stress by things like reducing your heart rate, reducing your blood pressure, the rate of your breathing, your muscle tension, and so on.

Omer (02:55.690)
And you can use a number of

Guest (02:57.850)
techniques to induce what's called the relaxation response, including mindfulness, Tai chi, yoga, deep breathing, and deep breathing specifically, which is

Omer (03:11.610)
also known as diaphragmatic breathing, is a

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simple but powerful technique for dealing with stress.

Omer (03:21.510)
And in the show notes for this

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episode, I've included a three minute video which will teach you diaphragmatic breathing and

Omer (03:31.430)
you can get to the show Notes by going to ConversionAid.com129, you can practice

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diaphragmatic breathing, lying down, sitting, or even standing up.

Omer (03:45.170)
And once you're comfortable with this technique,

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you can do it anywhere.

Omer (03:49.330)
So watch the video, practice the technique for a few minutes, and the next

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time you are feeling overwhelmed, give diaphragmatic or deep breathing a try.

Omer (04:00.609)
Hack number two is to start writing.
One reason you might be overwhelmed is

Guest (04:06.610)
that your brain feels overloaded with information.

Omer (04:10.450)
You might be mentally juggling a long list of tasks, or you may have negative thoughts spinning in your head.
One of the best ways to clear your mind is to write things down.
If you're feeling overwhelmed because your head

Guest (04:24.350)
is filled with all the things you need to get done, then try this simple exercise.

Omer (04:30.430)
Grab a sheet of paper and spend

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10 minutes making a list of everything that you need to get done.

Omer (04:37.550)
Don't try to evaluate or organize every task.

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You can do that later.

Omer (04:43.320)
For now, just get those tasks out

Guest (04:45.920)
of your head and onto paper.
This simple technique can help you to reduce the feeling of overwhelm.

Omer (04:53.160)
Your brain doesn't have to keep juggling

Guest (04:56.120)
all these tasks and deadlines anymore.

Omer (04:59.160)
You've effectively cleared your mental RAM and

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captured all those thoughts in a safe place.

Omer (05:06.520)
And secondly, if you're struggling with negative thoughts that are just bringing you down

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or just putting you into a cycle

Omer (05:13.580)
of just constantly thinking about negative things,

Guest (05:16.740)
you can use a similar technique to help you get rid of that head trash Again.

Omer (05:21.820)
Grab another sheet of paper, write down all your negative thoughts again, spend about 10 minutes, and just keep writing down every negative thought that comes to mind.
And when you're done, grab that piece of paper, rip it up, shred it, whatever, and throw it away.
It might sound like a silly exercise, but in 2012, a study published in Psychological Science, a journal, showed that writing

Guest (05:56.420)
negative thoughts and then throwing them away

Omer (05:59.380)
can actually help to clear your mind.

Guest (06:03.070)
Now, you could try doing either of

Omer (06:04.750)
these exercises on your computer, smartphone, or

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tablet, but for some reason, at least,

Omer (06:11.630)
at least I kind of feel this is that for some reason, there's something magical about writing things down with pen and paper.
So give one or both of these techniques a try and let me know

Guest (06:24.150)
how you get along.

Omer (06:26.110)
All right?
Hack number three is to reset your mental compass.
Making a list of all the tasks that are bouncing around in your head

Guest (06:34.270)
is a great way to clear your mind.

Omer (06:36.510)
It's a simple bottoms up approach to planning your work, but it can still

Guest (06:41.750)
leave you with a nagging feeling.

Omer (06:43.870)
You might be able to check off

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things off your to do list and feel like you're doing busy work.

Omer (06:48.910)
But are you also working on the

Guest (06:51.150)
things that will help you to make meaningful progress towards your goals?

Omer (06:56.840)
I once worked with a software development team that used Scrum and Agile planning

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to regularly ship product updates.

Omer (07:03.800)
And every month they'd select items from

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their backlog, work on them, and then

Omer (07:08.800)
celebrate when they were done.
But when I asked them what they

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were trying to achieve with their product

Omer (07:15.480)
in the next six to 12 months,

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they didn't really have a clear idea.

Omer (07:20.440)
They were stuck in Buy Bottoms up planning.
It's kind of like getting into your car every day and celebrating that you've driven five miles, but you have no idea what your final destination is.
And that's why you also need top down planning.
You need to think about your most important goals and identify the activities that

Guest (07:44.570)
will move you closer to achieving those goals.

Omer (07:48.250)
And again, here's a simple exercise that

Guest (07:50.210)
will help you with top down planning.

Omer (07:52.890)
Grab a sheet of paper and write

Guest (07:55.250)
down your three to five most important goals in the next 90 days.
These can be business goals, personal goals,

Omer (08:04.410)
just the three to five goals that

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you feel are the most important for you in the next 90 days.

Omer (08:11.050)
And then for each goal, write down

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the top three activities that you can do to make progress towards each goal.

Omer (08:21.160)
And by the end of this exercise, you'll end up with anywhere between nine

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to 15 activities, which is basically the list of your most important tasks.
These are the things that you should be spending 80% of your time on.

Omer (08:41.080)
So now you basically have two lists.

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One is your Bottoms up list, which is going to be everything that's been on your mind.

Omer (08:48.320)
There may be some things in there

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that help you move towards your goals, but there are also going to be a lot of things in there which

Omer (08:54.320)
are really just, you know, stuff that you've got to do, like thumb some grocery shopping that you've got to get done, or solving an issue for a customer.
And those things are important, but are

Guest (09:08.680)
they really moving you towards your goals?

Omer (09:11.860)
Maybe, maybe not.
If you also combine that with your top down planning approach and your 9 to 15 most important activities for the

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next 30 to 90 days, you also

Omer (09:24.740)
end up with a very powerful list of things which if you work on those every day, even if you're making

Guest (09:32.180)
small steps towards each one of those,

Omer (09:34.660)
you know that you are making good

Guest (09:37.740)
progress towards your goals.
And over 30 days, 90 days a

Omer (09:42.860)
year, you're going to build more and more momentum.
And before you know it, you're going

Guest (09:47.660)
to be able to check off these Big goals that you had, and maybe you weren't sure how you were going to achieve.

Omer (09:53.660)
Hack number four is to focus on process, not outcome.
It's great to have a vision or a big goal that drives and motivates us.
It gives you a direction for your business and personal life.
But when it comes to sitting down and doing work, continuing to focus on a vision or goal can actually become a problem.
Let's say you want to write a blog post.
You know that you're doing this so

Guest (10:23.630)
you can get more customers.

Omer (10:25.110)
You want to use content marketing to

Guest (10:27.430)
generate a steady stream of new leads.
You want to hit a million dollars in annual revenue.

Omer (10:35.690)
But suddenly you realize how much work you have ahead of you, and you start thinking about how many more blog

Guest (10:43.290)
posts you'll have to write before you

Omer (10:46.210)
see any kind of meaningful result, how many words you're going to be writing, how much research you're going to have to do, how much time you're going to have to spend publishing and promoting each piece of content.
And then you're going to have these

Guest (11:04.300)
thoughts about, is anybody going to read this?

Omer (11:06.500)
Am I writing the most important stuff that that's going to actually help me

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to hit a home run?

Omer (11:11.940)
And suddenly the task of writing one blog post now seems so overwhelming because you've filled your mind with the outcome instead of the process.
Now, several years ago, I read a wonderful book called the Practicing Mind, and

Guest (11:31.480)
I'll include a link in the show

Omer (11:33.160)
notes by a guy called Thomas M. Sterner.
And it really helped me to clearly understand the difference between process and outcome.
And instead of thinking about how your

Guest (11:47.760)
blog post is going to help you generate a million dollars in revenue, you

Omer (11:53.880)
should focus on the process of writing

Guest (11:56.560)
that one blog post.
You should approach it with what Stirner

Omer (12:01.040)
calls a practicing mindset and a skill

Guest (12:05.680)
that you can improve.

Omer (12:07.760)
And really what you.
You start to do is you put.
You get into flow or try to get into flow and really focus on.
On the one task that you have

Guest (12:19.390)
in front of you.

Omer (12:20.630)
And as Stirner says, the secret is

Guest (12:24.230)
in learning that the process of achieving your goals is not something you must endure, but instead is where the real joy waits to be discovered.

Omer (12:36.630)
And I'm going to say that again because I think it's so important.

Guest (12:40.710)
The secret is in learning that the

Omer (12:43.400)
process of achieving your goals is not

Guest (12:47.000)
something you must endure, but instead is where the real joy waits to be discovered.

Omer (12:55.200)
You should absolutely have an inspiring vision and big goals.
But when it comes to doing the work, focus on the process, not the outcome.
Hack Number five is to build a single tasking habit.
The truth is that our brain isn't

Guest (13:17.730)
very good at multitasking.

Omer (13:20.250)
Our mind is programmed to deal with one thing at a time.

Guest (13:24.250)
So when we try to multitask, we're

Omer (13:26.410)
effectively rapidly switching from one task to another and back.
We try to multitask because we think we'll be more productive, but there's plenty of scientific evidence that shows the opposite is true.
Also, when we multitask, we're not being

Guest (13:44.020)
mindful and fully engaged with the task we're doing, which goes back to the previous point about focusing on the process, not the outcome.

Omer (13:52.220)
In 2009, a research study by Stanford

Guest (13:55.540)
University showed that multitasking is less productive than single tasking.

Omer (14:01.490)
In other words, doing one thing at a time.
The study also found that people who

Guest (14:06.250)
are regularly bombarded with several streams of electronic information don't pay attention, control their memory, or switch from one job to another, as well as those who prefer to complete one task at a time.

Omer (14:23.090)
I came across a great quote, and I don't know who said this, so

Guest (14:28.210)
I can't attribute it to anyone, but

Omer (14:31.010)
it basically said, multitasking is the opportunity to screw up more than one thing at a time.
And I think that's a great way

Guest (14:41.930)
to think about multitasking.

Omer (14:44.850)
So it might seem counterintuitive, but when you're feeling overwhelmed, focus on doing one task at a time.
You'll be more productive and less stressed.
Hack number six is learn to do less.
As entrepreneurs, we have no shortage of ideas.
You probably have a long list of

Guest (15:07.140)
things you want to do today and enough ideas to keep you busy for years.
It can be frustrating when you realize that there just isn't enough time for you to do everything in the day

Omer (15:19.650)
or maybe even in this lifetime, and that creates overwhelm.

Guest (15:24.610)
The first step to dealing with this

Omer (15:26.250)
is to accept that you'll never get it all done.
I know that's hard to accept and to say, but it's a reality.
And once we acknowledge that, we feel

Guest (15:38.850)
less stressed because we have less resistance

Omer (15:42.450)
to this feeling of trying to get it all done.
The second step is to realize that it's not about doing lots of things.
It's about doing a small number of things that really matter and help you to make a positive impact in people's lives.
Think about five years from now.

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What would you have liked to have accomplished?

Omer (16:09.360)
How many of the things that you're working on right now will you even

Guest (16:13.510)
care about in five years?
It's easy to get consumed with our day to day priorities and fire drills.

Omer (16:22.710)
But when you do this five year exercise, you quickly realize that most of these things just won't matter in the future.
I mean, do you look back at maybe something that you did five years

Guest (16:36.990)
ago which you thought was really important

Omer (16:39.930)
and now you say to yourself, well, that wasn't and that was a waste of time?
Maybe, but the chances are you've probably even forgotten about it because it was

Guest (16:47.450)
that insignificant to the big picture.

Omer (16:50.490)
And I think that's kind of part of the challenge of stepping away from thinking about the day to day stuff to thinking about the long term and saying, is what I'm doing today something

Guest (17:03.450)
that's really going to matter to me next year, three years, five years and so on.

Omer (17:09.990)
And by doing that, you'll also start

Guest (17:12.110)
to build, get more clarity about the

Omer (17:14.550)
one or two things that you should

Guest (17:17.270)
be spending the majority of your time on.

Omer (17:20.310)
So remind yourself every day that it's not about getting more done, it's about getting results that matter.
Hack number seven is start with micro actions.
Some years ago, I started taking golf

Guest (17:37.610)
lessons at a local driving range in England.

Omer (17:41.730)
And I'd arrive early and practice hitting the ball.
I'd missed the ball completely eight times out of 10.
And the times I did make contact, the ball either didn't go very far or it didn't go straight.
The instructor gave me a simple tip.

Guest (17:57.730)
Instead of taking a big swing and

Omer (17:59.730)
trying to hit the ball 100 yards, he told me to take a very small swing and hit the ball five yards.
It seemed like such a pointless exercise, but I agreed to do what he said.
Now.
Now that I had such a small

Guest (18:15.290)
goal, I didn't try very hard.

Omer (18:18.250)
I took a very small swing and slowly hit the ball five yards and it was almost a perfect shot.
The instructor then asked me to hit the ball 10 yards, then 20 yards and so on.
And eventually I was hitting the ball a hundred yards eight times out of ten and pretty well.
And why was I able to do this?
Because I started with a micro goal, a micro action, something really small and easy.
It didn't take much effort and I didn't need to try very hard.
But that micro goal also gave me confidence.
It helped me to build momentum and pretty soon I was achieving a bigger goal.
So when you're feeling overwhelmed, it can be hard to get started and it's

Guest (19:14.360)
really easy to procrastinate.

Omer (19:16.440)
And that's something I do all the time.
And I have to remind myself of how to break out of that procrastination.
So start by setting yourself a micro goal, a micro action, and give yourself something so easy that you have no

Guest (19:33.340)
resistance to doing it.

Omer (19:35.460)
If you're struggling to write a blog post on a regular basis, set a goal to write 100 words a day.

Guest (19:42.900)
And you can do that in probably five or ten minutes.
If you've got a big project that

Omer (19:47.660)
you need to start, pick one action

Guest (19:50.290)
that you can do in a few minutes.
I mean, we can work on anything for a few minutes.
Kind of reminds me of Tony Horton

Omer (19:59.890)
in P90X if you guys have ever

Guest (20:01.930)
done those home workout programs and he kind of gets you to do this kind of crazy work and it's like

Omer (20:06.410)
you can do anything for 30 seconds.
And it's the same thing here.
You can do anything for a few minutes.
And most of the times those few

Guest (20:14.250)
minutes will build the momentum and, and

Omer (20:17.030)
it'll give you what you need to

Guest (20:19.070)
keep working and take the next step and the next step.

Omer (20:23.830)
So if you're feeling overwhelmed, if you're

Guest (20:27.190)
struggling to get started, if you're feeling

Omer (20:30.710)
like you're procrastinating, start with a micro action.
So those are the seven mental hacks to help you stop feeling overwhelmed.
Just as a quick recap.
Number one, take a deep breath and

Guest (20:48.650)
learn diaphragmatic breathing, which you can do anywhere.

Omer (20:52.890)
Hack number two is to start writing

Guest (20:55.450)
and either use that as a way

Omer (20:57.050)
to do bottoms up planning and get

Guest (20:59.850)
all the tasks and deadlines in your

Omer (21:01.850)
head down on paper, or use it

Guest (21:04.450)
as a way to get the negative

Omer (21:06.810)
thoughts out of your head and in the trash, basically.

Guest (21:11.990)
Hack number three is to reset your

Omer (21:14.030)
mental compass, which is to make sure

Guest (21:16.590)
that not you're not just doing bottoms up planning, but you're also doing top

Omer (21:21.070)
down planning by thinking about your 3

Guest (21:24.550)
to 5 most important goals in the next 90 days and what are the things you need to do to make progress towards those.

Omer (21:33.750)
Hack number four was to focus on process, not outcome.
And applying the lessons that I learned

Guest (21:43.260)
from reading the book the Practicing Mind, which is a great read and it's a very short book, so highly recommended.

Omer (21:51.500)
Hack number five was to build a single tasking habit.
No matter what we think about multitasking,

Guest (21:57.740)
we are not as productive when we multitask than we are when we single task.

Omer (22:05.640)
And we're going to be more present,

Guest (22:07.720)
we're going to focus more on the process.
So there are a lot of benefits to single tasking and there are studies

Omer (22:14.920)
that back up that that's true.
Hack number six was learn to do less.
You don't need to get it all done, you need to constantly figure out

Guest (22:25.320)
how to strip down your list to

Omer (22:29.400)
boil it down to the essential things

Guest (22:31.760)
that really make a difference that will

Omer (22:33.560)
help you to make the biggest impact,

Guest (22:36.740)
to help you to identify the things that you'll really care about in five years time.

Omer (22:42.580)
And number seven.
The number seven hack was to start with micro actions.

Guest (22:49.140)
If you're feeling overwhelmed, if you've got

Omer (22:51.220)
too much to do, if you're procrastinating, set yourself a ridiculously small goal, a small action, and use that as a

Guest (23:02.890)
way to build momentum and gradually start doing the bigger things.

Omer (23:09.690)
These are simple strategies, but they have the potential to deliver big outcomes.
It can be easy to get overwhelmed as an entrepreneur, and the overwhelm can

Guest (23:22.410)
lead to anxiety and stress, which, as we've discussed, can make things worse.

Omer (23:27.140)
There's no silver bullet that's going to cure your overwhelm or stress, but the

Guest (23:33.780)
simple strategies in this episode can be a useful reference when you need a little help.

Omer (23:41.540)
So the next time you feel overwhelmed,

Guest (23:43.380)
hit the pause button on what you're doing.

Omer (23:46.660)
Think about one or more of the mental hacks that we've discussed today and use them to help you clear your mind and get refocused.

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