10 Ways to Manage #Stress & #Anxiety at #Work

1. Face Your Stress

• The least you can do about your stress is to acknowledge its presence. Numbing yourself or pretending everything is okay isn’t going to make the stressors disappear magically. Don’t be afraid or feel shameful of the fear, uncertainty or anxiousness you’re going through inside. Emotions can give us invaluable insights about ourselves. If the same kind of work keeps giving you sleepless nights or anxiety attacks, then perhaps you should re-evaluate your career choice seriously. Each one of us is unique and every one responds differently to the same stimuli. Just because your colleague, brother or friend seemed to handle similar situation better than you do doesn’t make you a failure or loser. Who knows? He or she might have experienced the same struggles without telling you about it.

2. Step Out of the Office

• Taking a 15-minute break outside the office works especially well for issues which you can’t solve there and then. Although it may seem like a waste of time, removing yourself from your work space can give you a fresh perspective which would otherwise elude you when you are knee-deep in your work. Solutions may even pop out seemingly out of nowhere when you’re sipping a cup of coffee! This works because as you’re taking a relieve from work, your subconscious mind takes over and carries on the unfinished work which you were struggling with minutes earlier. But to make this work, a change of scenery is important. It wouldn’t work as well if you simply stay put and do something else. Get up and enjoy a tea break at the nearby cafe, or have lunch in the park instead of packing food back to the office.

3. Ask for Help

• This may sound like a common sense approach, but asking for help isn’t a natural for many people. Some of us tend to withdraw into ourselves in the face of stress and see others more as an obstacle than another useful pair of hands. People with this type of personality tend to blow their top when they’re met with the slightest interruption at work. This can be detrimental to working relationships and create an unfriendly and false image of yourself. If this sounds like you, consider coming out of your shell deliberately and learn to trust in the abilities of your fellow workers more. No matter how much help you can get from those around you, a little goes a long way to building trust between you and the people involved. You’ll also feel more comfortable delegating jobs to those whom you trust next time. But as with any relationship, help should be rendered both ways. So be sure to give back and return favor to those who have made your working life easier and less stressful.

4. Divide and Conquer

• Any work can be made simpler and less complicated simply by using this time-tested method: break large jobs into bite-sized tasks. Not only will you instantly downgrade your stress levels by a few notches, this also allows you to delegate or outsource tasks to other people easily. And when you’re working on a task, give it your utmost concentration and keep at it before going on to the next one. Before long, you’ll find yourself clearing a path of ticks through your long to-do list.

5. Update Your Storyline

• We are all accomplished storytellers, whether or not we’re aware of the fact. We tell ourselves stories every day and we’re totally engrossed in our own dramas. But sadly, many stories we tell ourselves are like those coming from a broken radio: repeated old stories which are no longer serving us. When you’re feeling stressful, for instance, your storyline may go something like: “I’m never going to make it”, “My career is done for this time”, or “My whole life is going to be destroyed if this deal falls through.” These plots only serve to elevate our stress levels and make adrenaline runs wild. Change your narratives to one that shores up your confidence levels, not destroy them. For example, “I’ve done similar jobs before and have completed them well and on time. I can repeat my success again”, “I’ve completed projects that were much more complex than this. I can do this with ease”, and “I’ve completed the bulk of the work. Even if I couldn’t finish everything before the deadline, I can still submit whatever I’ve finished and complete the less important ones later.”.

6. Eat Brain-Friendly Foods

• When time is running short, it’s tempting to eat carelessly and hastily, or even skip meals altogether to save some time. But this is a big mistake because an empty stomach or taking the wrong foods often lead to low and unstable energy levels. Without sufficient energies, suffice to say, your productivity and quality of work will suffer. Under stressful circumstances, it’s all the more important to feed your body properly. Eat brain-enriching foods and foods rich in antioxidants such as salmon, clam, cherries, turmeric, and lots of vegetables and fruits, and stay away from additives such as sugar, caffeine, trans fats, preservatives, monosodium glutamate as well as artificial colorings and flavorings that fog up the mind.

7. Boost Your Stress Resistance with Herbs

• During highly stressful times, it may be worthwhile to boost your stress resilient levels and increase your adaptation to stress with adaptogens. What are adaptogens? They are simply natural compounds found in herbs that boost your energy levels and help you counteract the effects of stress. Well-known adaptogens are from plants such as ginseng (for example, Panax, American and Siberian ginsengs), ashwagandha (also known as Indian ginseng), rhodiola root and gotu kola. There are also herbal formulas that combine a few adaptogens and complementary herbs together, such as Adrenal Health by Gaia Herbs, which includes holy basil, rhodiola root and ashwagandha.

8. Cultivate Mindfulness Awareness

• While it may not always be possible to meditate at work, you can cultivate an objective sense of awareness about your inner state of mind and what’s happening around you, instead of going along with the mayhem. Try this exercise: Close your eyes softly and take a few deep breaths where you are. When your breathing is slow and calm, bring your attention to your body. Which part of the body is tensed and stressed up? If your shoulders are hunched, relax them. If your jaw is tightly clenched, relax it.

  Now focus on your thoughts and emotions. Be aware of any anxiousness, fears, visuals and narratives that you are experiencing now. You don’t have to stop them or get involved in them. Just simply feel and observe them. Develop a sense of compassion towards yourself and the ups and downs you’re feeling inside. Realize that these thoughts and feelings are temporary and will go away by themselves when you don’t hold on to them. When you feel balanced and centered, open your eyes and bring your renewed mental stability to your workplace. Witness the frantic mess around you without getting sucked into the energy black holes.

9. Visualize Tranquility

• What does tranquility look like to you? A relaxing garden filled with dense foliage and songs of birds? Is it a clear sapphire sea with gentle lapping waves? Or is it enjoying a freshly cooked meal with your family in your childhood home? Whichever it is, conjure up a picture of serenity in your mind as clearly as you can for a couple of minutes. You’ll find yourself much more sane and relaxed with just a few minutes of mental escape.

10. Get a Massage

• Besides sipping coffee in the cafe and taking lunch away from the office, another way to relax at work, short of visiting a spa, is to ask a good colleague, or if you’re lucky enough to work from home, your partner to give you a nice shoulder massage. Studies found that a therapeutic massage promotes the brain to release feel-good chemicals that help you to relax in no time. Of course, this assumes that your office culture and your relationships with your co-workers allow for such bodily contact. So, if your office doesn’t frown on such mutually-beneficial behavior, start by giving your stressed out colleagues a taste of the benefits of a 5-minute shoulder and neck massage. In this way, when you need one yourself, it’d be easier to call on your “free masseurs” for a quick massage in the office.