Job Stress Management|| Step 2

Go into Brainstorming mode of how you could use your time more efficiently, minimize your time and exposure to stressful people or situations. Speak to your boss or coworkers about the challenges you are facing if your plate is too full, how you can priorities what truly needs to get done first, and are there ways to get help. Let them know if they give you 12 hours of work in an 8 hour day, we are setting ourselves up for failure on a long term basis; this isn’t a realistic pace that we can maintain. So something has to change. Game plan to change expectations, reprioritize what gets worked on, and set windows aside to work on special projects.

Put down your game plan to reorganize each stressor into more manageable daily activities so you are setting yourself up with realistic expectations and meeting them. If you have unhealthy people in your environment, minimize your time and exposure to them. Find personal interest to focus in on when you take a break. Re-evaluate your game plan and where you are with reducing your stressors. Keep coming up and testing new ideas of how to handle challenges. Learn to praise yourself for your accomplishments, as opposed to looking for them from outside sources. “Great Job, I finished that project on time. “

Always know we have choices. If you don’t like what is going on around you, choose to look at the situation differently or change it. How else can you look at your situation? What are my options?

For Example) I had a client who was a stay at home mom, played tennis and golf during the day and loved and prioritized spending time with her kids. She hated her husband and resent being with him. She would binge from 6pm when he got home until 10pm when he would go to sleep. She didn’t want to leave him, because she was concerned about how it would affect her kids.

We brainstormed, and what she decided is that she looked at her job as starting at 6pm and ending at 10pm. She looked at those 4 hours as her work time, that she was paid well and had a good daytime quality of life. She realized if she left him, she would have to work 8 hours a day and not earn nearly what she would want to to live on. So when she saw her husband each night, she would tell herself, I’m getting paid to be here.  Just like any other job, you have to put up with situations or people you may prefer not to, but because I’m getting paid to do it. I can overcome it. I’m getting paid to do it, and tomorrow I’ll be golfing and spending time with my kids. This is well worth it! When she changed her attitude, guess how her husband’s behavior responded?

How can you look at your situation differently? 

How can you share your concerns with others and work together to come up with win-win solutions to workplace challenges?

Job Stress Management||Step One

Job Stress Management

The right amount of stress is optimal.  If we don’t have some stress then we get bored. The key is to be stimulated, but not overloaded. We want to consider things that affect our stress like factors outside our control, needing more training, setting realistic expectations, or not getting recognition.

Step 1:

Identify and list your work stressors, how you feel about them and how you respond to them

Example)

I never have enough time to get everything done my boss expects of me daily.

It makes me feel like I’m not as productive as everyone else.

I work through lunch and then I start eating junk food at 3:00pm.