(This one could ruffle your feathers or (royally piss you off)

Feeling overwhelmed and stressed out is something common I see among my clients. However, believe it or not, the reasons why you and many others are dealing with tons of stress daily are something within your control.

“I work 10 hours a day and I have tons of paperwork at my desk, so how is this something within my control?”  “Are you kidding me? I work full time and have a family! And you´re trying to tell me it’s within my control!”

Sure, those can feel like a lot to take in, but the majority of the source of your stress does not come from those. Don’t believe it? Well, stay tuned as we will go in-depth about these sources of stress.

As someone who’s used to high-stress environments myself, I can quite confidently tell you that the majority of stressors that make you feel stressed, overwhelmed, and craving food and alcohol boils down to these things.

Here are just a few common examples:

• People pleasing
• Perfectionism
• Low self-esteem
• Self-entitlement
• Overthinking
• Need for control/high certainty

Did any of them hit the mark? Well of course they did and now let’s talk about them even further. (I’ve probably earned Olympic gold in most of them).

People pleasing (closely related to the doormat)

This is when you avoid making other people feel uncomfortable. Now, there isn’t anything wrong with trying to make others feel comfortable wherever they are, but if it means never being able to say no to any of their whims and demands, then that’s when you’ve got a real problem. 

Do not cater to everyone’s needs at the expense of your mental health. Learn to say no especially if their request is beyond the scope of your work! You don’t get paid more by helping them and you certainly aren’t being appreciated more by your co-workers. (Although you secretly enjoy being the go-to-fixer). Yes, sorry to break it to you but they’re probably not constantly asking you for help because you’re nice, but rather because you’re just easy to ask.

Perfectionism 

There’s certainly nothing wrong with making your work spotless and error-free, but when you agonize over every single detail of every paperwork that you need to get done, then chances are that it’s not healthy for you mentally anymore when it’s driven by the fear of being judged or criticised. This extends to even after you’ve submitted your work and you still agonize over what you could have done correctly, and once it’s completed you still feel anxious about it.

Low self-esteem

This one is just as the title says, having low self-esteem is an extreme detriment to your overall well-being, it creates a great deal of stress and takes your energy. So, start believing in yourself a little more and start appreciating even the little things about yourself and eventually, you’ll have enough self-love to know your own worth.

Self-entitlement

This one’s not just on you, but also on the environment that raised you- parents/upbringing. If you were raised to act helpless and complain over every single inconvenience, then chances are that you’ll only have your stress build up over time, you believe that if you complain, moan, worry or act helpless, or play the victim, that eventually somebody else will fix your problems for you and you don’t need to do the work ( this may have stung a little for some). Obviously, this doesn´t work in most areas of your life, so, learn to move out of your comfort zone and ask for help (therapy if needed), when it truly matters particularly when it comes to fulfillment, purpose, and personal growth. Your relationships and self-esteem will love you for it!

Overthinking

Much like perfectionism, this is when a lot of intrusive thoughts come to take over your mentality. These thoughts often drag your self-esteem through the mud and hinder you from reaching for opportunities that come your way.

Need for control

Often, we like to be in control of the situations we are in every day. When we encounter things that are new to us, we often can’t help but feel stressed. You should shake off this mentality as soon as you can as things will never be truly in our full control.

HIGH CERTAINTY: An excessive need for control and certainty – to feel like everything is guaranteed, safe, predictable, where it should be. Yep, good luck with that one! 

Controlling emotion is a solution

Now if the list above ticks off a lot of boxes, then fear not because there is a solution – controlling our emotions. As they say, you can’t afford to get carried away by everything that comes your way. You need to develop emotional strength and manage how you react to challenges that you may encounter.

Just think of how much better things would be if you just stop or pause for a second before reacting negatively to a problem that you encounter. Whether we like it or not, how we react to things affects how we endure them. 

This is a choice — a choice you’ll make whether you’ll continue to be cooped up in the prison of your emotions or if you’ll face things head-on from now on. It isn’t easy of course and we will have to take gradual steps to fully come out of your shell, in my case, it took me many trials and errors, but it doesn´t need to be that way!

The problem is, most people are fixated on the externals, they want a life, or circumstances or other people to change – which is out of your control! However, when you do the hard work, be an action taker who refuses to spend a day longer, seeking band-aids for emotional crutches or faffing about in information-gathering mode, procrastinating, or being a ditherer. Take full ownership, not indulge the victim or excuse maker mindset! and become the best version of yourself, to SHOW UP daily as who you really are and stop chronic stress, low confidence, or self-worth, developing emotional intelligence, where you are no longer reactive but instead have the emotional freedom.

And I´m here to help you become the best version of YOURSELF.

Be bold, be brave, be an action taker and see what happens……..