Manage Workplace Stress

No matter how much you love your work, there will always be days when you feel the pressures of your job strain your mood, productivity and relationships in the office. Many individuals easily succumb to stress the moment it attacks them. Don’t be like them. You have the power to manage workplace stress and transform it to something positive for yourself.

Understanding Workplace Stress

If you think that getting stressed out in the office is an ordeal that you alone face, you’re wrong. Do you know that right now, about 25 out of every 100 people in your workplace are experiencing the same pressures as you? Some reports estimate that about 75 percent of career people consider their on-the-job stress level to be way much higher than that of their parents.

Workplace stress is an inevitable reality. It spares nobody – not even the most well-adjusted and most pleasant officemate that you know. Realizing that everybody gets stressed out too is sometimes enough to remind you that can get past the stage and start bouncing back.

Luckily, you can be proactive about stress. Even if you can’t eliminate it completely, you can reduce it to manageable levels.

Reducing On-the-Job Stress Levels

To manage workplace stress, you can:

• Keep a mental and emotional wastebasket.
• Maintain a healthy balance between work life and family life.
• Establish your own social safety net.

Keeping a Mental and Emotional Wastebasket

Imagine that you own a mental and emotional wastebasket where you can dump all your negative thoughts and feelings. Let go of your worries. Relax. Choose to approach life positively. When you make a conscious effort to stay upbeat, you can cope with stressful situations better. Note that you will still feel the strains of work life. However, you will learn to interpret stressful situations in a more positive manner. Stress does not necessarily have to be the great antagonist in your life story.

Balancing Work Life with Family Life

Don’t obsess about your career. If you focus too much on it, you might get super stressed out when the smallest inconvenience rocks your workplace. You lose sight of other equally important things too. Use your family life and personal time to keep your work life in check. Set aside some time everyday to pursue non-related activities such as calling your friend or reading a short story. Too much workplace stress can consume you, and your efficiency suffers in the process.

Establishing a Social Safety Net

Don’t make your home an extension of your office. Take the time to build your own social safety net – a group of co-workers, friends and loved ones whom you can interact with in non-office scenarios. Let these people remind you that you can still enjoy life without equating happiness to a promotion, a raise or an international business trip. Basically, your social safety net helps to keep you sane whenever you’re under stress.

Indeed, workplace stress is inevitable, but you don’t have to give in to it. Master the art of managing stress, and you can enjoy a great life – whether you’re in the office or outside it.

Stress Fighting Foods

10 Stress Fighting Foods

Stress and Your Diet

How do your eating habits affect the way you handle stress? How does stress affect your dietary preferences? Whichever angle you focus on, food and stress are interrelated. Food doesn’t necessarily have to be your only coping mechanism for stress however. You can manage daily pressures in a variety of other ways.

Three Ways that Food and Stress Connect

• Your over-eating or under-eating tendencies surface when you are under stress. Your blood sugar level takes the toll either way. Severe mood swings result, and you end up compounding the present problem as well as your stress level. Like many people, maybe you haven’t realized yet how food can harm you! Stress management begins with awareness. You must know precisely what you need to change in your food preferences or dietary habits.

• Food is not the cure, but it can help you manage your stress. Supply your body with nutritious food. Proper dieting can sustain your body with the energy required to overcome stressful experiences. Consuming fatty food and sugar-filled treats alone doesn’t really help you much. In fact, you’ll end up feeling more exhausted, more anxious and grouchier than ever. You need more than those to combat stress.

• The right foods fortify the immune system. Stressful situations weaken it. A weak immune system is more prone to contacting diseases, bacteria and viruses. Studies prove that with proper food intake, you can make your immune system healthy and strong. It isn’t difficult to see what the studies are driving at: You have to eat right in order to feel great!

Stress and Diet

The connection between food and stress is so obvious and hard to miss. The kind of foods you consume directly affects the way you feel, think and react. Poor food choices and either over-eating or under-eating subject both your body and mind to more strain. If you want to manage your stress, try starting with your diet. Evaluate what you eat, how much you eat and how often you eat. Then, gradually introduce changes to your lifestyle.

Beyond Dieting

While the right food allows you to cope with stressful experiences more effectively, it isn’t enough. Try pairing a good diet with the following strategies:

• Get enough sleep. Seven to eight hours is ideal.
• Find time to relax.
• Establish a support group.
• Accept your limitations.
• Work and live life with a plan in mind.
• Learn to say “No” from time to time.

Healthy dieting coupled with the above steps can empower you to manage daily pressures well and take better control of your life. Say goodbye to stressed out days. Say hello to a lighter, happier you.

Loosen the Grip of Workaholic Ways

If the bulk of your waking hours goes to your job, you’re in for some trouble: Life will eventually grow unfulfilling for you. Sure, you love your work, but pouring long hours over it can transform love into addiction. It’s time that you break away from your workaholic tendencies.

Identifying Underlying Problems

Underlying problems are often responsible for fueling your workaholic tendencies. While work pressures and deadlines do push you to your limits, there is a greater possibility that you’re using work as your defense mechanism against other problems and insecurities.

Examine yourself. Assess your schedule. Then answer these questions:

• Do you work so hard for the money?
• Do you work so hard so you can minimize social interactions at home?
• Do you work so hard so you can elude some issues?

Working too hard to grab financial rewards is not something you can sustain for a long time. This habit will take a toll on your mental health and physical well-being. Work hard but strive to contain it within a definite timeframe. If you can’t live with this arrangement, then maybe you should aim for a new job that pays better than your present company.

It’s crucial that you address problems plaguing your home as well. Although work can give you temporary relief, it won’t solve anything. In fact, problems don’t get resolved by themselves. You have to face them and act on them. The power to improve your situation at home lies with you.

Restoring Balance

After targeting the underlying problems responsible for your unhealthy work habits, do your best to reintegrate balance into your life. Several strategies can help you with this area.

Make room for the following:

1. Personal Time. Use this concept to place yourself (and your health) above your job. You are entitled to your own time, so when you are in the middle of a well-deserved personal vacation, do not allow deadlines to interrupt you.

2. Bedtime Ritual. Unwind and treat yourself to enough hours of sleep. Set a specific hour when you’re switching the lights off. Spend half an hour before your designated bedtime to do something relaxing. Make sure the activity doesn’t remind you of work.

3. Movement and Physical Exercises. Include exercise routines in your weekly schedule. The frequency need not be daily. You can do it once in every 2 or 3 days if you want. Physical movement helps you to de-stress from work. Exercise is good for both your body and mind.

4. Breaks. You need time away from work. It’s a given. Regular jobs usually designate weekends as rest days. Make an effort to spend your weekends not working. Don’t even try to remember or talk about your job. Just free your mind and enjoy your break.

Starting Out Slow

Breaking away from your workaholic tendencies need not be drastic. Distance yourself from the unhealthy habit one step at a time. Remember that your work doesn’t define your life. There are plenty of activities that you can enjoy, and none of them have to remind you of deadlines, quotas or reports.

Restore balance into your life today with a strategy or two. In no time, you’ll get the idea: Life outside work does exist!

How Moms Can Cope with Stress

No doubt, motherhood is one of the most challenging and rewarding jobs around.When you’re a mom, you tend to neglect yourself because you allow your domestic duties to take precedence over personal care. Both working moms and stay-at-home moms go through the same stressful situations actually. Whichever type of mom you are, know that you can cope with stress.

The Tips

Establish a routine for dealing with your kids. The scheduling will greatly benefit the entire household. Sticking to a routine eases your experience in making meals, monitoring naps and setting bed times. If you fail to establish one, you will quickly become disoriented, overwhelmed and stressed out. Kids can get unpredictable at times. However, the simplest routine can create a semblance of predictability into your life and can help preserve your sanity as you manage your household.

Take breaks. A lot of moms just push themselves to their limit when they should be taking a time out. Your frequent exposure to stressful experiences entitles you to many breaks. Your kids even take breaks, and so should you! When you are in the verge of losing your cool, rush to a room and pace your breathing. Imagine how you wish to react, and then temper your thoughts with one reminder: You should model good behavior for your kids. Your short time outs can spare your entire family’s mood and day!

Mind your diet. Eighty-five out of 100 moms don’t seem to mind their diets anymore. You just tend to eat whatever food you can grab at random times of the day. Although you’re always on the go, make healthy dieting a priority. You need the nourishment to help you cope with stress and match your kids’ energy levels.

Team up with other moms. A support group composed of moms like you is great. True, you cannot afford to meet everyday, but you’ll rest easier knowing that there are people you can count on when you need empathy, comfort and some attention. All moms get stressed, so choose carefully who gets to be part of your support group. Invite only those who are truly into the idea of moms mutually supporting each other.

Enjoy your personal time. With tons of roles to fill and tasks to accomplish, you sometimes fail to give yourself some credit. You should definitely set aside time for yourself on a daily basis. Occasionally get some help with the household chores. While your kids are sleeping or attending school, read a few chapters of your favorite novel. Get a manicure or a pedicure. Treat yourself to a cup of tea, a body massage or a long bath. You need not spend money to enjoy your personal time. Just make sure your “me” time is included in your regular scheduling. Fifteen minutes of the day to yourself can work wonders for you!

Is Sexual Equality Taking an Unequal Toll on Women?

In the last half century, tremendous strides have been made in sexual equality between men and women, but the battle is far from over. For every small gain, women seem to be paying a higher price than men.  According to a Time magazine Special Report on The State of the American Woman (Oct. 26, 2009), women today earn 77 cents on the dollar compared to men. While that’s a tremendous improvement over the 58 cents women earned in 1972, it’s still a huge discrepancy; especially considering that today women are the primary breadwinners in 40% of American homes.

The economy has accelerated the shift in earning power. More traditionally male jobs than female jobs have been lost, particularly in manufacturing. Unfortunately, women’s earnings fell 2% last year, twice as much as men’s. American families that were comfortable with two salaries are struggling to live on one, especially when that salary is brought home by an underpaid woman. Women are feeling the financial strain much more acutely than men.

Not only are women often shouldering the sole burden of providing for their families, but they feel they carry greater responsibility than men for child rearing and home care. The feeling of inequality at home remains despite the fact that 84% of couples recently surveyed said they negotiate responsibilities, rules and relationship issues.

Perhaps most disturbing is the revelation that despite the achievement of greater freedom, education and financial power, women are less happy. Puzzled social scientists say increased female stress and unhappiness are universal across all socio-economic levels.  Theories include basic changes in American society and the American family that are felt more keenly by women than men or perhaps gains in workplace equality are now forcing women to battle the same pressures that have long contributed to male unhappiness or it may be that women have finally gained the self-c0nfidence to be honest about what they want and don’t want from life.

Carrying a constant burden of increased stress can eat away at a woman’s physical and mental health. Stress can cause irritability, lack of energy, sleep problems and even lead to serious depression. If taking a mental health day isn’t enough to get you back on track, you may need professional help to learn to cope with stress and re-balance your life.

Self-Help Techniques that Reduce Stress

For most of us stress is a normal part of daily existence. However, if we don’t learn to manage our stress it can spiral out of control, leaving us worried, anxious and unable to enjoy life. Left untreated, chronic stress can take a physical toll and even lead to self-destructive behaviors or depression. Learning what triggers your stress and how to effectively manage your stress are key to living a healthy, happy life.

Since you don’t control the universe, you may not be able to rid your life of stress, but you can certainly learn to modify your response to stress. In other words, you can learn how to manage your stress successfully and significantly decrease how stressful life feels, a worthy and life-affirming goal.

Identifying the things that cause you the greatest stress and discovering why they affect you so deeply may require guidance from a skilled psychotherapist. You may need help understanding what motivates your response to stressful situations. With the right guidance, you can learn to replace negative behaviors with positive ones and regain control.

There are also several proven self-help techniques that you can learn and practice that are effective at reducing daily stress.

• Meditation is a process that quiets the mind, blocking external distractions and allowing you to focus on a state of internal peace. Meditation has been proven to decrease tension, anxiety and depression and improve concentration and focus. As you focus on your breathing and relaxing muscle groups, you’ll be able to feel your blood pressure drop, headaches dissolve and muscles untense. Meditation energizes the body and the mind.
• Guided imagery allows you to place yourself mentally in another time and place, one that is soothing and restful. In guided imagery you imagine yourself in a peaceful scene, allowing each of your senses to fully experience the sight, sound, smell and feel of your peaceful setting. Guided imagery recordings can help provide a framework for practicing the technique and making it your own.
• Progressive muscle relaxation teaches you to consciously relax your muscles, one group at a time. As you systematically tense and release each muscle, body achieves total relaxation. Relaxation recordings can coach you through the process as you learn to relax individual muscles. Tension and stress float away and you feel renewed and refreshed.

You Can Learn to Manage Stress

Stress can be debilitating. Excessive or chronic stress can take an unhealthy toll on both your physical and emotional health (see our Oct. 2 post on Learning to Recognize Symptoms of Stress). Many women need a little help figuring out what triggers their stress and why certain situations or people seem to push them over the edge. They may need some guidance from an experienced professional to discover and learn new methods that allow them to effectively manage stress and stay in control. The good news is that with the help and guidance of a psychiatrist experienced in understanding and treating chronic stress, women can live healthier, happier, stress-free lives. 

Discovering the source of your stress often involves exploring why you respond to certain situations or people in ways that increase your stress levels. Guided by an experienced psychiatrist, psychotherapy (also called insight-oriented therapy) can help you discover the sources that explain your behavior. Cognitive-behavioral therapy can help you replace negative thoughts and behavior patterns that may be aggravating or even creating stress with healthy, positive thoughts and actions.

Trying to balance the daily demands of home and work life, places considerable strain on today’s professional woman. Recognizing the arduous toll stress can take on professional women, Atlanta psychiatrist and psychotherapist Dr. Tracey Marks has developed a special 4-Step Stress Buster Plan geared to give women the tools they need to cope successfully with the stress in their lives. During a 90-minute initial evaluation, Dr. Marks will talk with you about your current situation and help you develop a personal action plan to reduce your stress levels. As a medical doctor, Dr. Marks can assess and discuss with you any need for medication or additional medical intervention to ensure your good health.

As part of Dr. Marks’ unique 4-Step Stress Buster Plan, you receive the doctor’s valuable notebook  How to De-Stress & Achieve Balance. Packed with helpful information and de-stressing exercises, the notebook provides valuable insights and suggestions for future thought and discussion. You also receive access to Dr. Marks’ collection of soothing meditation CDs containing proven relaxation techniques you can practice and use at home.

You are not alone. Dr. Marks can help. Call and make an appointment with Dr. Marks today.

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