Many of my clients often ask me how to deal with stress. It’s a common occurrence since we live in a very fast-paced society and the increasing amount of workload, workplace, and other things are not helping us at all.

So how do we safely sail through stressful situations?

First, let’s get to know the stress a bit better. As I’ve said, we live in a fast-paced world now. To add to this, the constant need for validation on social media, the number of emails and voicemails we receive every day, and societal expectations placed upon us can truly make life more stressful for us than it already is.

Stress is a part of our body’s fight-or-flight mechanism and has hormones like cortisol involved in its process so it’s definitely not just in your head as some people have convinced themselves. In fact, chronic or constant stress has been linked to many issues before such as digestive problems, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and many others. Stress truly affects our body in more ways than one.

In addition, you may experience more headaches, body aches, and lower energy or motivation to start the day when you are subjected to stress every day.

However, if you’re one of the people who are suffering from constant stress in your everyday life here are some tips to help you condition your mind and spirit to power through all the stress we face in life:

Be self-aware

This is the first tip because oftentimes, my clients themselves are not aware that they are actually stressed! Stress has just become so normalized for them that they think it’s part of a normal person’s routine, but it’s not.

So, what you first need to do is to recognize or acknowledge the level of stress you are actually experiencing. Don’t just brush it off saying you have been through it before or anything. Simply acknowledge the stress you are experiencing every day, and we can get a proper start.

Don’t put too many expectations on yourself

Similar to not being aware of how much stress you’re experiencing, many people often put way too much burden on themselves without realizing it. It’s okay to have good expectations for yourself, but don’t be too harsh on yourself when things don’t always work in your way.

Sometimes, we have gotten too comfortable with being too harsh on ourselves that we don’t even realize the kind of stress we subject ourselves to. Just ask yourself, “If my friend or coworker made this mistake, how would I react? Would I be calling them out this harshly too?”

Remind yourself that no one else is going to be kinder to you other than yourself.

Take a breather

Sometimes the best way to win is to let go. Even if it’s just temporary, letting go of too much responsibility is a good start to lessening your overall stress levels. Taking a breather can often let us see things from an outsider’s perspective and in this, you will see just how small or insignificant the things you are worried about can be in relation to the grand order of the world.

Start to look at those thoughts

Just like being kind to ourselves, our thoughts can also play a huge role in lessening our stress levels. The way we see and think about the things in our lives can make a huge impact on how stressed we feel. Are you seeing every minor inconvenience and end up swearing and cursing at yourself immediately? Or do you see all the positive things and are thankful for every little thing that you have?

The latter constitutes thoughts that make us feel better no matter how bleak the situation may be, while the former allows us to feel stressed no matter how good our day may seem. Therefore, it’s completely up to you how you would choose to feel about your day every day.

In other words, are you choosing thoughts that feel good or feel stressful? Let’s say you are stressed about a presentation you need to do. If you are thinking, “I can’t do this, this is too difficult!” You won’t be feeling great. Instead, you need to start thinking about it differently to create a different feeling. Start challenging yourself to think the opposite – look for evidence to prove to yourself why you absolutely can do it!

Small improvements lead to bigger results

Everything so far may seem just tiny things in comparison to all the things we do every day, but when it all adds up, it can lead to better and even bigger results for us in the long run!

Remember that our thoughts can dictate how we feel about the things in our lives. We can choose how we feel about the things we experience, Whether we take everything personally, or take everything as a lesson to learn or whether we choose to be bitter about everything or if we choose to be thankful overall.

This is why I often teach my clients how to manage their thoughts and emotions first as this can be the foundation of everything else that we do to help ourselves manage stress better.

We need to be aware of our feelings and how we feel about these emotions and what thoughts have led to and come out of them. This will make us more self-aware and can allow us to help yourselves navigate through even the most difficult parts of our lives.

Find a balance, you can absolutely transform your life! ❤️