How To Cope With Stress At Work Employment
According to citation.com, up to 36% of the population have left a job because of stress – a positively shocking statistic. However, these statistics are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the true cost of stress on our working lives. Because although everyone goes through stress at some point of their lives, it is still seen as something to be ashamed of: 53% percent of the population report to fear of showing signs of stress at work, 3 in 10 people worry that showing stress will make them look weak, and 18% of the people asked fear for their career because of stress. In an era where good mental health is seen as a priority, these statistics are not only shocking. They are horrifying.
Everyone gets stressed at some point in their life. And while it’s certainly not an easy thing to deal with, it is possible to manage and prosper while dealing with stress with just a little bit of work.
Coping With Stress
In this article, we’ll be going through five easy ways of dealing with stress in the workplace. The aim of this welfare advice article is to make your working life much easier and far more enjoyable. We believe that by following these steps you’ll do just that.
Track Your Stressors
The first step in coping with stress is to work out what makes you stressed. To do that, all you need to do is to keep a journal or a notebook near you at work. Then, whenever you feel yourself getting stressed about something, write it down in the journal. Each day, start a new entry; this is so you can keep track of what causes stress on each day and work out trends. This notebook can be as nondescript as you want it to be. You can even use your notes app on your phone, if you want.
After the week is over, you should go through your journal entries and find the things that consistently annoy you. Once you’ve got these things figured out, you’ll be able to build strategies for coping with them, which we’ll go through next.
Set Up Boundaries
After you’ve worked out what stresses you out, the first technique you should try to help reduce stress is to set boundaries.
What this specifically means will depend upon your personal preferences. For some people, this will mean not checking emails at lunch or after the end of the day. For others, this could mean saying no to projects that you simply don’t have the time to do.
With these boundaries, it’s important that you don’t interfere with your general productivity. But at the same time, you don’t want to compromise on these boundaries. It’s a tight line to walk, but it is possible. If you feel comfortable speaking to them, you can speak to your manager or HR representative to help you.
Don’t Forget To Recharge
Next, it’s important to take the time to recharge your batteries. This is the ultimate boundary: the point where you say that you will not be doing any work related activities or think about work in any shape, way or form. Don’t waste your holidays thinking about work; don’t check your emails on your phone on the weekend.
Taking the time to recharge is very important. Not only will it allow you to come back to work recharged, but it will also improve your overall mental health.
Relax
Related to the above is the need for you to relax during your day to day working life. A quick five minutes spent meditating during lunch will dramatically improve your overall mental health and sense of worthiness. Likewise, doing some deep breathing exercises in coordination with some mindfulness exercises whenever you have a spare quiet minute will dramatically improve your overall mood.
These are little releases, designed to help you get through the day before an overabundance of stress can build up.
Build and Maintain Your Support System
Finally, the very best thing you can do for yourself, if you’re dealing with stress, is to make sure that you have a working support system behind you. This can consist of friends, family, as well as the aforementioned people from work. These are people who you can talk to about your problems and who will offer and support, without judgement – thus ensuring that you can cope with your stresses. Having one of these is extremely important as humans are inherently social creatures, and we function better when we have other people to share our problems with. Even introverted people need a group to call their own – even if it is a very small one.
Once you’ve got your support system set up, you should take steps to make sure that you aren’t simply using it. By this, we mean that your support system is, like any other relationship, a two way streak, and you shouldn’t just be using it to throw your problems at. You’ve got to make sure that you offer just as much support to your support system as they offer you.
Employment Support in Staffordshire From Building Better Opportunities
These tips will, hopefully, allow you to tackle your stress and allow you to live a happier and less stressful life. For more welfare advice and employment support in Stafford and the greater Staffordshire area, contact Building Better Opportunities.
We are a Staffordshire-based charity dedicated to putting people back into work and helping them stay there. For more information on how we can help you, speak to us today.