3 Ways to Reduce Stress

Stress – a very common topic, too common.  We talk about it, read books about it, attend seminars and lectures.  We get ourselves stressed out by all the running around learning how to de-stress.

How about taking a few action steps to simplify our lives so that we will take on less stress?

1. Say No.  We need to be able to say no sometimes to opportunities and requests. It’s a small word that has large ramifications.  We can work on this big and powerful concept of two letters.
2. Do less rather than more.  We don’t have to fill every space.  We can be less busy.  Busyness in today’s world seems to have taken on a life of its own.  It almost feels like some people are proud of their busy schedule, like it’s cool or something.  Not sure what that’s all about.  But it’s not O.K. to have little to no time for what we value in our lives.  We need to periodically {re}-evaluate our doings – what are the truly necessary ones and what are the seemingly necessary ones that if examined and prioritized can fall by the wayside and make room for nothing, or down time or good old fun time.
3. Slow down.  Our world is going at a very fast pace, with all the changes and  technological advances.  We feel pressured to keep up.  We’re afraid of being left behind, of losing the edge.  Our society emphasizes productivity and so we’re in this rat race to get ahead and produce.  It’s about the outcome.  For our own health and well-being we have to shift a bit here and recognize that how we’re doing what we’re doing is just as important.  We’ve created an extreme imbalance and we’re losing ourselves: our health is suffering with all sorts of stress-related illnesses, our minds are suffering with so much anxiety and depression and our souls are suffering with emptiness and purposelessness.

The means is just as important as the ends.  What is our cost of getting to the end?  So far we see it’s very high.  We must slow our ‘means’ down.  We need to build in recovery periods where we incorporate breaks into our daily work patterns. Concentration and focus is naturally higher when we’re refreshed.  We need to allow ourselves those refreshing moments throughout the day.  Work two hours and take a fifteen minute positive distraction break. (That doesn’t mean dealing with the frustrating insurance phone calls or house repair calls; that’s part of our daily work allotment.)

It’s not only about the destination.  The journey is just as important.  It’s along our journey that we can say no, do less and slow down.  Our life trip will be that much richer and more rewarding.

 

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