When overwhelm starts stalking me

My to-do list today was short, or so I thought. I had a list of things to check online (bills, balances, etc.) and I thought I'd get through it in no time.

I ended up losing an entire afternoon. Why? because things I should have been able to do easily online didn't go smoothly.  I ended up on hold, waiting for call backs, etc. 

And as I listened to elevator music, I began to think about how much I really needed some of the things I've been maintaining.

We have a lot of electronic clutter in our lives.  You know, passwords, accounts, credit cards, loyalty cards, etc. How much of it is habit?  How much is really necessary? How much am I willing to maintain?

Inspired, I started by trying to close a couple of bank accounts.  That proved more daunting than expected and will require another round of phone calls tomorrow.  A cashback credit card deposits into one of those accounts and the associate I was speaking with wasn't authorized to do anything credit card related. 

I suddenly found myself thinking of the lyrics to that old Eagles tune, "Hotel California" - "You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."  LOL  Oh well, I'd made start anyway.

I then recalled that my Etsy shop was connected to one of the now closed accounts so I went in to change that information.  Try as I might, it would not accept the account number necessary before changes could be made. No version of that account number was accepted.  Go figure.

At this point, the maintenance of the Etsy Shop has more to do with my vanity than sales, so today, I shut the doors again.  If I can't easily manage things from my laptop, I truly do not need the aggravation any longer.

If I decide to have an online sale in future, I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.  For now, I'm kept busy trying to get a handle on my chronically low blood pressure while trying to get some much needed home maintenance projects organized.

I'll still maintain my website/blog, Facebook and Instagram presence, but that's enough for me to look after right now. I'd rather spend my time doing things I love than jumping through hoops to access what is mine in the electronic universe.

In truth, my response today was consistent with an overarching theme in my life: simplification.  What do I need in my life to be happy?  Where are the sources of stress?  What can I do about them?

As someone living with chronic health conditions, I need extra stress like I need a hole in my head.  My energy is too precious now to allow it to be squandered on things that bring neither joy nor contentment to me life.

I expect this may be a recurring theme over the next few blog posts as well, so stay tuned for more on that.  In the meantime, I hope you're finding ways to keep stress from sucking the color out of your life as well.

Cheers!