Reduce Your Stress:

Stress Reduction Tips

Expectations are increasing. Money is tight. You have to do more with less: less time, less money, less help.

It is no wonder that you may experience stress as pressure. Your thoughts flood with images of all you have to do. Your muscles tighten. You breathe more rapidly and shallowly. Your chest feels compressed. You notice your heart beating faster. Your blood pressure goes up. When someone brings you another request or expectation, the tension in your scalp tightens into a headache.

In moments like these, you often regret what you say and how you say it.

Still, you push yourself harder to meet the demands.

At home, your body tells you to rest and recover, while your loved ones insist they need your time, attention and effort. Again you may do and say things you regret.

In general, stress is the result of the shortage of time, energy, or ability to meet life’s demands and expectations. Many of these demands come from people and situations around you. Many more may come from the unreasonable expectations you place on yourself.

For most of us, managing stress often centers around managing the demands we put on ourselves—which are the stresses we can most easily control. As we gain control of these, we are better able to decide how to deal with stress from other sources.

Here are some basic strategies for reducing stress:
1. Breathe slowly and deeply. Under stress, we tend to breathe rapidly
from the upper chest. Breathing down into your stomach area
(diaphragmatic breathing) slows breathing, helps other body
functions ease into a more relaxed state, and increases ability to
focus.

2. Slow down. Often when we have too much to do, we try to cram too
much work into too few minutes. The results usually disappoint us .
Rather than getting more done, we make more mistakes--leading to
time wasting “do-overs.” We tend to get more done when we work at
a deliberate, purposeful pace.

3. Take Breaks. Ernest Rossi, Ph.D., in his book The 20 Minute Break
(Rossi and Nimmons, 1991), describes the natural work-rest cycle.
Part of the “ultradian rhythm,” the rest cycle consists of periods of 10
to 20 minutes of physiological rest every 90 minutes or so, during which
the body makes repairs and the subconscious mind integrates
learning. According to Rossi, people who force themselves to work
during these natural relaxation periods lose efficiency and become
increasingly anxious. By contrast, those who utilize these natural rest
periods tend to maintain efficiency, organize their productive time
better, and solve problems more effectively.

4. Exercise. Many sources describe the advantages of regular exercise,
including lowered blood pressure, better sleep, and increased energy
from increased metabolism. Personally, I have found that a brisk,
contemplative walk can help me reflect on problems in a more
creative state from which solutions or next steps may just come to me.

5. Avoid substance abuse. This includes not only illegal drugs and alcohol
abuse, but also smoking and excess caffeine. All of these, in their
own way, add to the level of stress, whether by increasing anxiety
(too much coffee), creating cravings that rob your time and attention
(tobacco and illegal drugs), or producing a “rebound” effect that
reverses the “benefits” of the substance (hangovers and other
withdrawal symptoms).

6. Learn to set your own priorities. Some priorities are by nature more in line with
your abilities and interests better than others. Some tasks are more critical
to the job than others. These should be the focus of your “to do” list, with
the most important priority as your prime focus.

Perhaps you can delegate tasks that you find overly stressful to
someone who naturally does them well--or even enjoys them.Then
you can contribute your best. With priorities set, you can clarify what you
want and need in line with what you can and cannot do.

7. Learn to be tactfully assertive. If you let them, others will set your
priorities for you. Learning to tactfully assert yourself will help you
focus your time and will often lead to improvements in your
relationships with others. (See my “Be Heard!” tip sheet for some
basic assertiveness skills.)

8. Build a haven away from work by investing in your family and friend-
ships. This often requires pacing yourself. If you want your home to be a
haven, you need to contribute to that haven. Take time to help out, listen,
cheerlead, encourage, and have fun with your family. If you expend all your
energy at work and then go home and collapse on your spouse, you can
expect stress and tension at home, too.

A good question to ask is “From exactly where did all this pressure come?”

If your stress is job-related, you may benefit from reading my tip sheet on improving performance (“Improve What You Do and Smile”). Job stress is often multi-dimensional, having to do with work-place culture; our learned expectations of ourselves; and a distorted relationship between work, money, and personal meaning.

If your stress extends to several aspects of your life, you may well have some big time healing to do. The more severe your stress, the more it will cost you in money, relationships, and health.

References:

Rossi, Ernest Lawrence and David Nimmons. The 20 Minute Break. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1991.

Copyright 2009 Gordon Glessner
         Gordon Glessner, M.A.
Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist
At Link Care Center
1734 W. Shaw Avenue
Fresno, CA 93711
(559) 439-2647 Ext. 143