Trading Your Overwhelm and Anxiety for Peace
How often do you find yourself rushing through your day, feeling completely stretched thin by an endless list of demands, creating overwhelm and anxiety?
In a culture driven by performance, perfectionism, and self-reliance, so many of us walk around carrying the unspoken expectation that we must keep every single plate spinning. But living this state of stress was never how we were designed to operate.
I recently had the privilege of sitting down with author and speaker Nichole Suvar to discuss her latest book, I Don’t Have to Hold It All Together: Cultivating the Peace of Eden When Feeling Overwhelmed. If you’re hanging on by a thread, riddled with overwhelm and anxiety, you’re not alone. Nichole knows that feeling all too well. And in our conversation, she shared some amazing insights from her journey. A journey that led her back to Eden.
Cultivating the Peace of Eden
In the beginning, God placed humanity in a garden. In Eden, creation drank in God’s goodness and lived in complete, undisturbed harmony. Peace wasn’t something people had to hustle or strive for; it was the atmosphere they lived in.
Since then, however, we’ve tried to construct our own versions of “Eden” through control, achievement, and frantic activity—only to find those self-made solutions deepen our unrest. Cultivating the peace of Eden today means returning to God’s original blueprint. It’s about recognizing that true peace isn’t something you manufacture on your own—it is a gift already available when you return to God’s presence.
“Whenever I encounter a difficult situation, I ask myself, ‘what part of this was good in Eden? What was good before sin distorted it? What was good in the Eden ideal that has been twisted to be part of your life’s unbalanced, anxious, striving feelings today?’”
Recognizing the Warning Signs of Overwhelm
Overwhelm rarely happens overnight. It creeps in when we try to manage, predict, and control every detail of our lives.
Some key warning signs that you are operating in self-reliance include:
- Irritability, resentment, and persistent anxiety: Feeling constantly on edge or unable to settle down, or resentful of your mental load.
- Perfectionism and striving: Believing that if you just work harder or organize better, the chaos will stop.
- Emotional exhaustion: Feeling weary from holding up the weight of your family, job, or relationships.
When these signs surface, they aren’t failures—they are signals telling you to stop, breathe, and loosen your grip.
Communing with God
One of the central characteristics of Eden was unhindered communion with God.
When anxiety builds, our gut reaction is often to work harder to solve the problem. But the antidote to a stressed-out mind is quiet communion. Communing with God isn’t about adding another task to your quiet time routine; it’s about inviting Him into the raw, messy reality of your day. It means swapping the pressure to be “superhuman” for honest, vulnerable dependence on the One who holds all things together.
We can remain connected to Jesus throughout the day by setting alarms to readjust our attention back to Him through prayer, gratitude, or walking Him in nature—Eden’s original setting.
Letting Go of Control
Much of our daily exhaustion, overwhelm and anxiety stems from the illusion that we are in control. We drive ourselves ragged trying to predict outcomes and manage circumstances beyond our reach.
Letting go of control is a daily practice of surrender. It means acknowledging your human limitations, setting healthy boundaries, and trusting that God’s care and provision don’t depend on your perfection.
“Whatever the control may look like, we cling to it with a tight fist. But the problem with tight fists is that we can’t do much else with them except hold on.”
Remembering Who Holds the Scepter
Perhaps the most freeing truth in this journey is simple: you were never built to hold the world on your shoulders.
You don’t have to pretend you have it all together. God created you with natural limits, and accepting those limits isn’t weakness—it’s wisdom. The moment you stop trying to be the foundation holding your life together, you make room to marvel at the God who was holding you all along.
“In Genesis, when God rested, it wasn’t out of fatigue from creating the entire universe for six days. Instead, it was rest like a king who has put everything in order and can now rest on his throne and look out of his Kingdom. He calls us to reflect that same kind of rest in our life. But we aren’t the King in this instance. Instead, we are his children, able to rest at his feet, trusting he has everything held together and in order.”
Reflecting on Your Next Move
What is one heavy burden or worry that is yielding overwhelm and anxiety in your life today? Can you intentionally place it back in God’s capable hands?
Make sure to connect with Nichole Suvar here!
Click here for our full conversation on the UnPerfect Podcast.
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