How to Overcome Overwhelm as a Solopreneur with Anna Dearmon Kornick
- Amy Traugh
- 56 minutes ago
- 20 min read
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Why Overwhelm Is Slowing Your Business Growth (And How to Get Out of It)
Overwhelm as a solopreneur? Oh, it’s real. It hits us all at some point — that heavy, all-consuming feeling that steals our focus and slows down business growth. But when overwhelm becomes your daily norm, it’s not just a bump in the road anymore. It becomes the roadblock.
Today, I’m sharing insights from my chat with Anna Dearmon Kornick, a time management coach who knows overwhelm inside and out — because she lived it herself. Anna helps busy pros like you stop drowning in chaos and start spending time on what truly matters.
What’s Really Causing Your Overwhelm?
You might think overwhelm means working too many hours, right? That’s what I thought. But Anna breaks it down: overwhelm isn’t about the amount of work, it’s about your attention being split in too many directions.
Imagine your attention as a pizza. The more slices you try to juggle, the smaller each slice gets — until the flavor’s gone, and all you’re left with is the crust. That’s what overwhelm feels like — trying to do a little bit of everything but never getting to the “good stuff” that fuels your passion and progress.
As solopreneurs, we wear ALL the hats. CEO, marketer, accountant, customer service… and yes, even janitor. Add life’s demands on top, and suddenly your attention is on fire, with nothing left for what matters most.
Been There, Done That — Anna’s Story
Anna’s journey is a classic “overwhelm” origin story. She started as a scheduler for a U.S. Congressman, juggling other high-stress jobs after that — think hurricanes, oil spills, crises. Talk about chaos. She was good at managing it, but the cost was her own well-being. Relationships frayed, self-care vanished, and overwhelm became her shadow.
Sound familiar? She got so smothered by it that she finally said, “Nope, this isn’t the life I want.” That leap of faith to walk away from a “fancy career” into the unknown was terrifying — but also the start of reclaiming her life and time.
How to Navigate Out of Overwhelm? No Magic, Just Real Work.
Anna didn’t snap her fingers and suddenly have it all figured out. Instead, she embraced a messy, exploratory process. She dove into books, podcasts, and courses — about habits, energy, goal setting — trying things, failing, learning, adjusting.
What really helped? Getting crystal clear on how she wanted to feel and designing her life around that feeling. It wasn’t about a rigid plan but about a vision for the type of days she wanted to live.
She calls it building a “toolbox” — a set of strategies to pull out depending on the problem. Sometimes it’s a new habit, sometimes it’s managing energy better, sometimes it’s knowing when to recharge.
The Biggest Mistake That Keeps You Stuck in Overwhelm
Here’s where it gets juicy — almost everyone tries to fix overwhelm by jumping straight to their calendar or to-do list. But that’s putting the cart before the horse. Productivity hacks and planners don’t fix overwhelm if you don’t know what matters most.
It’s like buying all the gym gear without ever stepping on the treadmill. We want quick fixes, shiny apps, and hacks — but until you decide what your priorities and values are, those tools won’t stick.
Slow Down (Yes, I Said It)
I know — slowing down feels like the opposite of what a busy solopreneur needs. But that’s exactly where you have to start. Anna forced herself to slow down, to create daily routines, and — here’s the kicker — she shifted her mindset from “I am unemployed” to “I am starting a business.”
That mental shift changed everything. Suddenly, she wasn’t just reacting to chaos — she was intentionally structuring her time around a new goal, a new way of life.
Your Takeaway: Overwhelm Isn’t Forever
If you’re feeling like Anna was, like you’re caught in that constant swirl, know that it’s okay to pause, reflect, and re-center. There’s no one magic fix, but you can build a toolbox that works for your life and business.
Start with your vision. What kind of days do you want? How do you want to feel? Get that clear before you dive into calendars and to-do lists.
Stop guessing what will fix overwhelm. Start growing your business with clarity, confidence, and ease.
And if you want help building your own toolbox to ditch the data drama and overwhelm for good, check out my signature program, Metrics Mastery — designed exactly for solopreneurs like you. Get started for free at amytraugh.com.
Until next time, remember: simple is sustainable.
Episode Links
✅ Get Anna’s FREE video course: Blueprint to Balance here.
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Transcript for Episode 420. How to Overcome Overwhelm as a Solopreneur
@1:29 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Overwhelm as a solopreneur is real. It's something we all experience from time to time in our business. However, when we're living in a constant state of overwhelm, that can really slow down our business growth.
And in today's episode, we really want to unpack that. And I have the perfect guest expert for you. Anna Dierman Cornick is a time management coach who is on a mission.
to help busy professionals like you stop feeling overwhelmed and start spending time on what matters most. Now, Anna, it really seems like we are living in this constant state of overwhelm, especially when we are a solo-preneur, wearing all of the hats in our business, throw in life, and it's just crazy.
What's causing this?
@2:26 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Yeah, you know, Amy, one of the biggest misconceptions about overwhelm is that it's based on how many hours we're working.
That, Ohma, I'm so overwhelmed and I'm working all the time, so I must be overwhelmed because I'm working so much.
And especially with solopreneurs, because, like you said, we're wearing all the hats, we're the CEO, the CFO, the CMO, and we're the janitor.
So, I mean, there's no surprise that we're constantly feeling overwhelmed. But actually, overwhelm comes from splitting our attention in too many directions.
It's kind of like imagining your attention as a pie or a pie or a pizza. And the more we divide our attention, the smaller and smaller those slivers get to the point that when you try to have a teeny, tiny sliver of pizza and you can't even taste the good stuff.
And that's kind of the way that we show up when we're overwhelmed because we have divided our attention in so many different directions, whether it's creating multiple new authors in our business at once, while taking on the PTO mom responsibility and trying to keep up with our shows and maybe have a 15-minute conversation with our husband once in a while, it can we feel like we're all over the place and our attention.
is in more demand now than ever before. There are entire departments of startups in Silicon Valley that are charged with keeping us addicted and on their platforms.
So we are constantly having to fight to make our attention our own.
@4:22 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Yeah, that's a great analogy. I love that pizza analogy because you're right. We are so spread them. We're trying to do all of the things all of the time.
And you know, part of it is for so long multitasking was like this skill, right? Oh, in order to be successful, you've got to be able to do it all.
And all of it really well right now. But you're right. When we're spread so thin, then we can't even get to the good stuff.
And we just end up in this endless reactive mode, which is especially being a mom, especially you with kids.
It's hard. It's so hard and it's frustrating. Now, because you are a time management coach, you know how to navigate this, but have you ever struggled with over wrong yourself?
@5:10 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Oh my goodness. Are you kidding me? Of course. Of course. That is literally the reason why I became a time management coach.
So my very first job right out of college, I was a scheduler to a United States congressman, and that really thrust me into this world of managing someone else's time while trying to learn how to manage my own as a as a brand new professional.
And I loved, I loved living and working on the Hill and DC, but you know, we talked about it before we hit record.
I'm a Louisiana girl. It is my girl right now as we are recording this, and I missed home. And so I moved back where I worked in crisis communications and government affairs for 10 years.
And we're talking hurricanes, oil spills. We're talking plant explosions. I navigated a non-profit embezzlement. he wants. I mean, crazy stuff.
And every single day was fresh chaos. And here's the thing, I was really good at navigating all of this chaos.
But I'm sure you can imagine that when you're working in crisis situations and you're working not just with companies or organizations, but you're supporting people.
You're supporting people who are going through the toughest time in their And in an effort to be there fully for the people that I was supporting, I was not there for myself.
So cue the overwhelm, cue the overwork, and the complete lack of self-care and erosion of our relationships. Overwhelmed. Oh, yes, ma'am, 100%.
To the point that I just kind of had to throw my hands up and say that this is not the life that I want for myself.
This is not I do not want to continue on this trajectory. And so I walked away from what my family, my friends, thought was this really fancy career that I had, and it was terrifying.
But Amy, I knew that, first of all, there had to be a way out of it, and I was determined to figure out what it was.
I was determined to get back to living my values and creating the life that I wanted. And once I figured that out, I can't just keep that to myself.
I've got to share it with as many people as possible. And so when I tell you, I know what it feels like to be almost smothered by the feeling of overwhelm.
I get it. I've been there.
@7:42 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Thank you so much for being just so open and vulnerable about it, because a lot of people don't talk about this.
And we're thriving amongst the chaos so much so that it becomes the norm. And we're just like, well, you know, I've got this really successful career.
Now I'm stuff. And so we're just perpetuating this cycle of self-imposed reality that doesn't have to be in this state of constant overwhelm.
So I would love to know, like, did you do about that? When you recognize, you know what, this is not good.
I am being, like you said, smothered. How did you navigate your way out of that?
@8:23 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Oh my goodness. I wish I could tell you that I snapped my fingers and life was perfect. But that would be no fun.
I, you know, when I look back on that time, I had a loose plan for what was next. But I really wasn't sure.
And for the first time in my life, I didn't really have a solid plan. And that was scary for me because I'm an Enneagram three.
I'm very, I've always been very goal oriented and plan driven. And so I, everyone who asked me, so what are you doing next?
I would tell them something different. I would everyone a different answer just to try on different possibilities. And that, that exercise of trial and error is what continued.
I mean, I look at that period, that very messy exploratory period in my life of getting out of overwhelm and moving on to what was next to a destination that I couldn't see at that point as tons of trial and error and learning and taking in as much as I could.
You know, I've always been someone who, when I want to learn something, I'm going to find a book about it.
I'm sure that, I mean, all of us, we're solarpreneurs. That's what we do. YouTube, university, we buy a book, we buy another book, we get an audible subscription.
And that was really where I was. one book about goal setting would then lead me to a book about habits, which would then lead me to a book about managing your energy, which would then lead me to a book about entrepreneurship.
And it's almost like they were multiple. flying because another author would be referenced and it would send me down another path and little by little I started to put together the pieces because if you think about it there are books about habits there are books about your energy there are books about all of these different individual topics and in order to and in each one of those books individually they're wonderful but they don't have all the answers right that and that's what they're not meant to have all the answers but we need to take all of these different pieces and concepts and roll them into the way that we design our life and so like I said little by little I started to put together the pieces and realize that well first I've got to have a vision and I may not know exactly and clearly what that's going to look like what the end goal is but I can create a vision for the way I want to feel.
And the type of day that I want to have, and where I want to live, and how I want to recharge, and spend time with friends and family and myself.
And then I realized, okay, well I've got that vision, why do I need a plan? How are we going to roll priorities and planning and goal setting into this?
Okay, but now that we've got the goals and the priorities, how do we be consistent? How do we actually execute this on a daily basis?
And what I realized is that there's not just one silver bullet answer to getting yourself out of overwhelm. It takes being still, it takes trial and error, and it takes approaching your life as if you have a toolbox by your side.
Knowing that at any moment, you can solve any problem by pulling something from your toolbox. And it's not going to be the same tool every time, because installing a new habit isn't always going to be the answer.
Monitoring your energy isn't always going to be the answer, but it's a possibility. And so by paying attention and using trial and and assembling a toolbox of habits, energy, recharge, and time, I suddenly over time, how funny is that?
I really began to feel capable and confident and able to share that with others. And it was just, I'm really grateful for that messy time.
I'm so glad that. I lived that in the moment. I certainly didn't feel that way. But I mean, think about just what is now on the other side, made it all worth it.
@13:10 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Yeah. It's so cool to reflect back on the journey, isn't it? Just to really appreciate, you know, I got honest with myself, and I made a choice to make a change.
that's scary. And so many of us never do. We get into the mode where you were in, where you were consuming all of the information.
You were reading all the books, listening to all the podcasts. But you did something that most people don't, and you got into action.
And that's where it's scary. That's where it's nerve-wracking and hard. But until we actually take the time to do what you did and get into action, but really even before we do that, getting clear on how do I want to feel?
What do I want my life to look like? We forget that we have a choice. and it's just crazy to me being on this side of things you know I look back and I was stuck for years in a career that like you it no longer served me I was making great money you know it was I got all these accolades but at the same time I wasn't fulfilled anymore I took a leap of faith I made a choice to make a change and looking back yeah there were a lot of mistakes I made but I really had to get clear on exactly what it was that I wanted so I knew that okay as I'm taking action is this leading me towards that goal you know in a long the way we do make mistakes we make lots of mistakes but if we can learn from them oh my gosh it's so worth it what are some of the most common mistakes that you see people making or maybe yourself you've even made when we're first trying to get a handle on that overwhelm oh 100% and it's so amazing Amy it is nearly
@15:00 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Everyone, nearly everyone makes the same mistake when we are trying to work ourselves out of overwhelm and get our lives organized, get back on track.
And that mistake is going straight to our calendar, going straight to our to-do list. I wholeheartedly believe that good time management and a life well lived doesn't start on the pages of our planners, our calendars, or our to-do lists.
It starts by getting crystal clear about what matters most. And so often when we feel overwhelmed, we want a productivity hack.
We want to download a new app, a habit tracker app that's going to that we think is, oh, this is it, my life is crazy.
let me download a habit tracker app, because surely that's what will get me on track. But we've all done it, we've all been there, because we think, oh, I'm going to buy a
inner, that's what's going to get me organized, which is kind of like when you make the decision to get in shape.
So you go by a ton of like lulu lemon to try and like psych yourself up. So we buy a planner and then we buy another planner when that first planner didn't work, you know, because that happens.
And so we end up thinking then that we're a hopeless case, because the planner didn't work or the habit tracker didn't work or we couldn't wake up at five a.m.
every single morning to do a seven part morning routine that we read about in a book. I'm not naming names, but they're out there.
When really and truly rearranging the things on our calendar, the productivity hacks, all of that stuff is great. That's not our first step.
That's actually all the way at the end. First, it's deciding what you want your life to look like. Then it's creating a plan to make it happen.
@17:01 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Yeah. It's as simple as that. You know, we're flipping this around. And I think in our consumerism, like society, where we're just so conditioned for instant results, for living on demand society, we want results now.
And if it doesn't work in the next week, guess what this thing doesn't work. And we give up on these strategies versus taking the time to ask ourselves those hard questions.
It could be very hard to slow down. I noticed that too. Did you experience that when you were going through that transitional phase of business?
Like, hi, just, it was hard for me to slow down and ask myself, what do I really want? Because I didn't know at the time.
@17:44 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Yeah. I mean, it was weird. It was wild. But I really forced myself to slow down. And I look back on that time of waking up in the eye.
would eat breakfast and do a Bible study and go to the gym and I started to create a routine for myself and one of the biggest things that I that I noticed along the way is that.
So in that exploratory period I wasn't necessarily planning to start a business I imagine that I would go back to work full-time somewhere else I was applying for jobs I was interviewing for jobs and not getting jobs and.
The day that I shifted my mindset from I am unemployed to I am starting a business I didn't know what business it was going to be I didn't know what it was what was going to happen but the day that I shifted my mindset away from I am unemployed to I am starting a business it completely changed the way that I approached my day and I started to create more structure with how I spent my life.
And I spent in order to. And just in order to create a rhythm, because, you know, we think about, we think about toddlers, and we think about babies.
So I have a three-year-old, almost four-year-old right now, so I'm kind of working my way out of that little bitty, that like little stage.
But our toddlers thrive, routine, babies, toddlers, they thrive on routines, that rhythm, because it sets an expectation, it helps their internal body clocks stay consistent, and y'all, we're just growing up toddlers.
We don't really think about it, we are just growing up toddlers. We need consistent rhythms, and routines, and routines, know, half of us are thinking, oh yeah, I love a routine.
the other half are like, ew, consistency, I don't want a routine. That's boring. I like to do things that are different and be spontaneous, really when it comes down to it, even if you don't call it a routine, or you don't realize it, you still have them, and it's okay.
They're good for you. They help you, they help cue your body as to what's coming next. And so, setting up-
teens and starting to be more intentional about how I spent my time. Sure, maybe I had a block of time that was dedicated to searching for and applying for jobs, but I also had a block of time that was dedicated to education and taking courses and trying to figure out what was next.
You know, a lot of times when we want to work our way out of overwhelm, we don't yet have the space and the capacity available to even create that vision for what's next.
And so much is flying around in our heads. I compare it to dumping out a bucket of ping-pong balls and they just kind of fly and bounce everywhere.
That's what our brains can feel like when we are so overwhelmed. And so if you're thinking, okay, and I hear you rearranging my planner is not the answer.
another app is not the answer, but how on Earth do I create the space to figure out what my vision is?
Well, first we've got to clean out the junk drawer. We've got to take all the stuff that's bouncing around in your head and we've got to get it onto paper.
And it's really as simple as that. Giving yourself five minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes to sit down either with a fresh Google Doc or a blank sheet of paper and let yourself a lot of people call it brain dump.
I'm not really a big fan of that term because I feel like a brain dump is like dumping a junk drawer out on the floor.
I really prefer mine to sweep because that's tidy, but it's, but when you're able to get everything out of your head, which is a major reason why we feel overwhelmed, you're able to start categorizing things and you're able to actually look at all of the different things that are taking up space in your head.
then you make decisions about them. But when they're just floating around, it's like trying to grab a fog. can't.
And so give your, I mean, if you feel like you don't even have a space to create a vision, give yourself 15 minutes at a timer and just download and get things out of your head and then see what, see what's similar, see what can be delegated, see what you can even completely eliminate because it doesn't matter.
And that's going to free up that space to actually give you room to, to dream and imagine what could be next.
@22:33 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
What a great suggestion. I love this idea of the mindset because you're right. It is. Everything's so jumbled up.
We think that everything's important. So then nothing's important. And we have no clue where to start. But I am totally systems and structure like I am totally on board with that.
Because what that does is it allows me then to focus. It allows me to say yes to the things that I want you and know to the things.
I don't because that's important to give ourselves that white space in our calendar, you constantly running, running, running, running, running, no wonder we're so overwhelmed by giving ourselves permission to have the time to do this mind sweep.
It's powerful because when you get it out of your head and onto paper, a lot of times it's not as jumbled up as we think it is.
You know, our minds are these bizarre, fascinating things that love to create these stories, but when it comes down to it, we already have all the answers that we're searching for.
It's just a matter of quieting the noise so we can actually hear ourselves and figure out what it is that we want.
So that's such a great, great suggestion, great exercise to do, that idea. So one other thing that I want to touch upon is this whole concept of work life balance.
You know, it is one of those, you've got people that are like, yes, it is possible. No,
@25:00 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
aspiring for 50-50. But when you aspire for a feeling of balance, get really clear with yourself on what that feels like.
Does it feel calm and prepared? Do you feel energized? When you are feeling balance, what does that feel like?
Because it's not going to be a mathematical equation of hours. It's not going to be this, okay, well, if I spend this much time on work, then I spent no.
It has to do with the energy that we are giving each of these areas of our lives and the quality of the time that we are spending.
Did you know at 15 minutes of undivided attention a day is what our children need to feel seen and loved?
15 minutes. That's it. And we think to ourselves, oh, well, that's it. That should be easy. But when you really think about like 15 undivided quality minutes with your six-year-old or my four-year-old, you're able to create quality time that really nurtures them in a small window.
And maybe you're doing it while they're in the bathtub. Or while you're doing nighttime stories and you're kind of doubling up.
And the thing is, is that if we think of work and life as being completely and totally separate and these quantifiable, hours-based things, we're never going to reach that type of balance.
But if you can understand how you want to feel and you call that balance, that can be achieved. And it's going to look different for everyone.
I already said that, but it's going to look different every day and in every season. And so, you start out with the goal of, I want to feel calm, prepared, for anything.
I want to feel like I'm there for my kids, for the people who mean the most to me. Then the hours, the minutes, they don't matter because you're showing up the way that you want to show up.
So that might be an unexpected take on work-life balance from a time management coach who's telling you that it's not about time.
It's about quality. It's about the way you feel. So yes, I believe it's possible.
@27:37 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
I love the explanation that work-life balance is a feeling and not a formula. I think that's where, as a society, we've gotten it wrong.
We put it up on this pedestals like it's some goal to be obtained. But in reality, like you said, it's about that quality of the time you're
We do have, so say you're working all day, but then you can spend that undivoted, like undivided attention that's totally devoted to your child, to your family, to your spouse, to yourself.
I mean, just think of the changes you could make within that period of time. So I love it. You framed it that way.
This feeling and not a formula. we lean into that, overwhelm will decrease. The quality of our relationships will increase as it gives us back control and give our power to choose and to choose the life that we want, how we want to feel it, how we want to experience it.
So good. Anna, this was amazing. Thank you so much for sharing just so many practical strategies that we can start implementing.
How can we get into your world and learn more about you?
@29:03 - Anna Dearmon Kornick (Anna Dearmon Kornick)
Yes. Well, first of all, Amy, thank you so much for having me. This has been my pleasure. It's been such a treat to spend time with you and talk time management, work like balance, all the things.
I would love to invite you to tune into my podcast. It's about time, a podcast about work, life and balance.
Wherever you listen to podcasts, I have new episodes that go live every single Monday. And if you were feeling that overwhelm, if you are thinking, I want to get out of it, but I want a load of help.
I've got a free video training called Blueprints of Balance that is designed to take you out of overwhelm and into feeling more organized, call prepared, ready for anything.
And you can check that out at blueprintsubbalance.com. I would be thrilled to know how it goes for you.
@29:55 - Amy Traugh (Amy Traugh)
Amazing. Thank you so much, Anna, for sharing those awesome resources. Make sure to. Check out her podcast. It's amazing.
And until next time, stop guessing and start growing.
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