Our lives are often stressful. So many things to do and most of us struggle to find the time to fit in all in. We are trying to make sense of an ever- faster world, that can feel like we get on a treadmill when we get out of bed in the morning and only get off it when we crawl in to bed. For the time in between, our lives are like a little hamster on the treadmill, rushing to get somewhere – not even he knows where.
How often does your life feel like that? On the perpetual treadmill, never really feeling as if you get off it? We need strategies to reduce stress.
The reality is that stress kills. The daily challenges of modern day life mean often we don’t look after ourselves well enough. We don’t focus on our health properly, we may drink too much and exercise too little.
My hairdresser’s fit husband, only 38 years old, was dead before he hit the ground. Stress. He had been feeling a little tired lately but not enough to stop him in his tracks. And it cost him. His life.
I’m going to reduce stress – My New Year’s promise to myself
92% of people who make new year’s resolutions don’t achieve them. A remarkably high statistic, but for many of us our new year’s promises to ourselves are just that – promises. But with stress and our health, we need to get serious about keeping our promises. If we don’t, it could cost us our life.
In 2016 almost two in five Australians reported experiencing symptoms of depression, with 13% of these people reporting symptoms in the severe to extremely severe range.
The importance of reducing stress
There are many benefits of learning how to deal with our stress well, which include:
- Better feeling of wellbeing
- Increased concentration, taste, fitness and ability to cope with life’s challenges
- Elevated mood and energy
- Ability deal with multiple issues at the same time
February is Heart month – what are you doing to look after yours?
We only have one heart and without it, we don’t tick – in any form. So, we need to consciously think about reducing our stress and keeping its associated downfalls at the minimum. And looking after our heart.
This means reducing fat intake, drinking water each day, exercising and keeping your weight down. If you are overweight, your heart must work harder to pump blood throughout your body than if you were a healthy weight. And most of us coming into a new year are carrying a little more than we should. But do we exercise it off? Not always. So, what are you going to do about it?
Ways to reduce stress
Stress is a perception. It is different to all of us as individuals. We don’t all experience stress the same way. Because we are all triggered by different life events’ and experience it differently, we should get in touch with what our greatest stress triggers are. Those things that really ‘get us going’ and make us feel frustrated, angry, anxious and uptight.
- Identify factors that stress you. What exactly are you stressed about?
- How does it affect you? (Some of us are not always aware of how different we are when we are stressed).
- Identify solutions to your stress.
- Implement a wide range of strategies to reduce your stress.
- These should include regular exercise, enjoying a healthy diet, sleeping well (8 hours a night), minimising alcohol consumption, avoiding smoking (your lungs don’t like it!) and keeping your thoughts positive at all times.
- ‘You’ve got this’ is my daily mantra.
5 daily rituals to get rid of stress
- Wake up quietly and slowly and move slowly into the world for the day.
- Meditate when you wake up and two or three times a day. Just find yourself a quiet corner and centre yourself, breathe, visualise and stay calm.
- Do one thing at a time, slowly and well. No more rushing around like a crazy person trying to get a zillion things done at once. Slowly, once thing at a time.
- Every day do something to connect with the earth and nature. Sit under a tree, walk in a park, smell the roses in the garden. Ground yourself.
- Let it go until tomorrow. Trust me, the whole won’t stop because you haven’t finished a report or forgot to do something. The world keeps going, but you won’t if you don’t take care of yourself.
Pure Magic International Business Solutions is an award-winning company, passionate about helping clients achieve strategic business outcomes through leadership, management and people development strategies and techniques at all levels and by using a range of easy-to-implement HR and Organisational development strategies.
To find out more, head to www.puremagicbusiness.com.au.
If you’d like to discuss stress reduction for you or your Organisation, why not book a free discussion via https://my.timetrade.com/book/QGY21 today?
Photo by Nik Shuliahin on Unsplash