Managing Stress | Tips for making sure anxiety doesn't overtake your life
Stress is so common today that most of us assume it is normal to be pushed to our maximum, either physically or psychologically. Wrong. Whether you are feeling stressed in your personal or work life, learning how to reduce and manage stress can positively change the quality and length of your life.
Let’s face it, if you are constantly chasing time, tasks, projects, and feeling anxious for it, ask yourself if this is the way you really must spend your life.
Too often we deny that we are overloading ourselves with stressors. We’ll acknowledge that stress isn’t good for us, but we’ll accept it as being unavoidable. We’ll believe that because we’ve lived with stress for so long, we’re just used to it and don’t know how to change. We’ll even go so far as to defend our stress, believing that life would be boring without that hectic pace and that the adrenaline rush is worth it.
Signs Of Stress
Our bodies provide signs when we are dealing with too much stress. Doctors often tell us how one disease or another is the result of stress. Not knowing how to deal with stress can result in: migraine headaches, weight loss or weight gain, the inability to get to sleep, back aches, high blood pressure, asthma, muscular pain, immune suppression, soreness, sexual dysfunction, digestive dysfunction, depression, diabetes and more.
Do you know how stress affects our mind and emotional reactions as well? Our ability to cope is diminished. If you find yourself unable to say “no” to people’s demands; if you find your concentration levels have decreased; or if you find yourself irritable or angry often, you may be under too much stress.
Moving Beyond Stress
The great news is that you can learn to deal with stress in ways that reap enormously positive results. Whether your stressors are due to your work, your personal life or both, there are ways for managing your thoughts and your actions.
First and foremost, your new response to stress must start with the decision to make a change. Ask yourself the following two questions: “Am I trying to defend my behaviors?” and “Am I going to listen to what I need and change?” Once you honestly answer those questions, you’ll be on your way to make positive change.
One of the greatest stressors on the human body is also one that can easily be removed. Make sure you’re getting plenty of sleep each night. Over time our bodies simply shut down due to exhaustion. By changing your sleeping habits, you’ll allow your body to refresh itself.
A surefire way to improve the quality of your life and avoid stress is to remove internal messages that everything has equal importance. All activities are not equal. Learn to prioritize and make choices.
Learn to communicate your needs while appropriately considering the needs of others. Learn to be comfortable with delegating, rescheduling, reorganizing and being happy. Doing so will promote positive thinking and behaviors.
Finally, when you do take action, remember to be gradual about it. Choose to change one step at a time. Be kind to yourself.
Patricia Stepanski Plouffe is the Founder/CEO of Career Management Consultants of Worcester. She can be reached at info@careermc.com.
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