Conceptual Foreknowings: Integrative Review of Feeling Overwhelmed

Abstract

Feeling overwhelmed is a universal humanuniverse living experience of living quality. From the humanbecoming perspective, all individuals choose to feel overwhelmed or not as they make choices moment to moment. Thus, it is of importance to understand feeling overwhelmed from divergent perspectives. To achieve this, the author in this article reviews the extant literature on feeling overwhelmed from the disciplines of nursing, business, psychology, philosophy, theology, social work, education, and sociology. Three themes that emerged from the extant literature were (a) feeling overwhelmed arises as an engulfing turbulence, (b) feeling overwhelmed surfaces with disquiet isolation, and (c) feeling overwhelmed emerges with reaching for relief.