October has arrived as though it didn’t quite get the memo on all that has transpired over the last several months.

While many of us are lamenting the loss of warmer days and the brief respite summer gave us after months of staying indoors and keeping our distance, October blew in with gorgeous colour, lots of sunshine and the promise of cozy days ahead. Oh – and Pumpkin.Spice.Everything.

Even if pumpkin spice lattes, matcha, protein bars, Cheerios, or pumpkin spice-flavoured Jello (why, Jello?) are not your thing, this season also brings with it an opportunity to find – and share – a feeling of gratitude.

Related: A simple gift with a big impact

Gratitude helps us shift our perspective in powerful ways. We end up focusing less on minor annoyances and more on growth and progress.

Gratitude boosts happiness, health, sleep, and improves the quality of our relationships.

Perhaps most importantly, gratitude helps us be content with our current state no matter how many things linger on our to-do list.

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.” – Oprah Winfrey

Now, admittedly, it can be a challenge to adopt an “attitude of gratitude” when we are feeling overwhelmed by a to-do list that never ends.

When faced with competing priorities and pulled in multiple directions, we are far more inclined to feel distracted, disorganized and stressed with no room to be thankful and optimistic about what’s ahead.

Here are 3 ways to ensure you always have enough room on your plate (Thanksgiving pun intended) so you can avoid getting bogged down:

  1. Be clear on your top three core priorities. Once you have established your top priorities, you can classify other work as: future priorities (these priorities are on hold while you focus on your top priorities), supporting tasks (operational and administrative work) or distracting tasks (low-value tasks that do not align with your core priorities, goals or values).

Grouping our work into categories like this helps it feel more contained when we are stretched thin. We’ll have more on how to use these categories in an upcoming blog.

  1. Leverage The Simplify Filter to streamline, scale back and make faster progress on all of your work.
  1. Shift your mindset. Remember: your goal is not to complete your list. You will always have a list. The key is to prioritize what is on your list.

I hope these strategies inspire you to maintain focus on your core priorities to give yourself the time – and space – you need to do your best work and achieve amazing results.

I would love to learn what works for you when you’re feeling overwhelmed. Please share with us in the comments. Thank you for your time.