If you’re like most people, you’re probably aware that you’re stressed and don’t need Stress Awareness Month to figure it out! Not only is this a problem for us in general, it may also cause problems at work. 

Are you a manager or a business owner who hasn’t been considering the stress on your employees? You may find yourself having to hire people when you can’t retain the ones you’ve got because their work environment is so stressful. 

You can’t make sure your workers are taking care of themselves when they’re not at work, of course. But you can absolutely cultivate a culture that prioritizes well-being and reduces some of the common causes of stress. Many of us don’t recognize all the things we can do differently to manage and reduce stress when necessary. 

Why did we say “when necessary”? Isn’t it always better to avoid or prevent it? Well…

Stress is not always a bad thing

When you’re about to do something “big”, whatever that means to you, feeling a little stress can actually help you perform better. Maybe it’s giving a presentation to the big boss at work or waiting in the wings for your cue to enter the stage, or anything else that makes you feel a little anxious or fearful.

When your body’s preparing you to take something on and the brain releases the “stress hormones” like cortisol, you actually become very focused on the task in front of you. Your eyesight narrows a bit so you take in less of what’s on the periphery of your vision, and your whole being is focused on the task at hand.

Having some stress actually helps motivate you to accomplish your goals. After all, when you’re lying around eating grapes and feeling content, do you have the urge to make a call to a prospect or get up in front of a big audience to deliver a presentation? Of course not. 

Plus, it turns out that people who lead stressless lives (whoever they might be) often suffer from depression and boredom.

“Good” stress inspires you to act and try new things. It’s typically short-term, and it’s nothing you need to worry about. 

However, you may feel acute distress in the short term, where the stress is related to fear or things that you perceive as danger or threats. As long as you can (sometimes literally) shake it off, you won’t experience a lot of long-term effects.

The problem is long-term or chronic stress, where the stress hormones are almost constantly elevated. That’s what contributes to all the diseases and illnesses that people think of when they think of the negative consequences of stress.

Use the moments of stress to your advantage

Now that you know stress doesn’t have to be bad or damage you permanently, it may make more sense to think about how you can use it for your benefit. Mostly it works when you can channel it for those big moments in life or work.

The trick is that many of the same physical symptoms that you get with stress, like a faster heartbeat and shallow breathing, are the same things you get when you’re excited. Your body doesn’t necessarily know the difference between fast stress heartbeat and fast excitement heartbeat, so tell yourself that you’re excited.

Reframe your conscious thoughts away from things like “I’m so stressed out about giving this presentation”. Change it to something like, “My heart is racing because I’m so excited to give this presentation!” 

You’re going to feel the same body symptoms either way, so why not reframe it positively? Rather than dreading stepping out on the stage, it’s something exciting (instead of something stressful) that you get to do. That will have a huge effect on your confidence, which will in turn energize your presentation.

Sometimes, after you’ve been experiencing a stressful event (whether you experience it as stress or excitement) your body can’t quite simmer down right away. In that case, physically activate a different part of your nervous system, which will help return you to baseline – give in to the shakes.

Shake it off

Animals do this after stressful events. They’ve got a lot of stress hormones built up, and it’s automatic for them to return to baseline by giving themselves a good shake.

It works on humans too. Though if you’re up on stage, you might want to wait until you’re back in the wings to give yourself a good shake. 

It will allow you to release any muscle tension you might be holding that you might not be aware of. How often do you open your jaws to realize you’ve been clenching your teeth? Or that your shoulders have been around your ears for minutes or hours? Shaking helps you get rid of any tension you might be holding.

It also helps you burn off excess adrenaline. The danger has passed, but your body is often still in threat mode with higher levels of adrenaline and cortisol. A good, full-body shake will help you release it. Shaking is a primal impulse that will help you release all those stress chemicals and return to normal.

In the modern world, chronic stress is pretty common, and our other primal impulses don’t always help us out! Fortunately, there are a number of other tools that can help you lower the amount of stress in your life.

Getting a move on

There are no magic potions that will automatically keep you healthy and stress-free, but honestly, regular exercise comes pretty close. Even just standing to work instead of sitting can help encourage you to get more movement into your day (and we can help you lift your folding table up so you’re comfortable working at it standing up.)

Exercise, or movement if you hate the e-word, is good for your body in various ways. Weight-bearing exercise keeps your bones going strong; regular movement keeps your heart healthy, and people who stay strong by lifting weights also maintain their bone density as they age.

It’s good for your brain too, which needs oxygenated blood to perform properly. Having trouble solving a problem? Go for a walk and get your blood circulating. Moving throughout the day, not just at the gym, keeps you fit and healthy into your old age as well.

Plus, it lowers stress levels. While not everyone can avoid depression just from exercising, many people can. Especially when you do it outdoors and boost the exercise benefits with nature. And who hasn’t had a rough day and taken it out on the basketball court or the hiking trail, and felt super relaxed afterward?

Getting enough of a move on can also help you sleep. When you’re getting enough exercise, you might find that you fall asleep more easily and stay asleep during the night too.

To sleep, perchance to reduce stress

Our moms were right, we really do need enough sleep to function properly. But it’s not just an old wives’ tale. It turns out that the brain does a LOT of work while we’re snoozing, and if you are not getting your required 7-8 hours most nights, your brain won’t be working right. Stress is one result of that.

Science has identified four sleep stages, and you need four to six cycles of the stages each night. The first stage is basically dozing off, which lasts a few minutes. You may not need much more stage 1 sleep time during the rest of the night. 

The second stage is where the body temperature drops, the heartbeat slows down, and muscles relax. There’s still some brain activity going on here.

The third stage is deep sleep or delta wave sleep. It’s really hard to wake someone up from this stage, and a lot of the brain’s work happens here. It’s thought to bolster the immune system and help creativity and memory.

Stage four, or REM sleep, is where brain activity picks up again, although your muscles are paralyzed. This stage is typically where you have your vivid dreams, so the temporary paralysis prevents you from hurting yourself during a dream.

What kind of work is your brain doing at night? Human brains are known as plastic, meaning they can be rewired. Neurons (brain cells) that wire together fire together! The brain will strengthen neural pathways that are being used and prune back pathways that aren’t used as much. It’s processing the events of the day, which is often what your dreams are about.

When your brain gets enough sleep cycles and is able to progress through the stages as necessary, you wake up refreshed and ready for the day. You’ll feel less overwhelmed. Your brain has had a chance to process things, so anything that was upsetting you yesterday and stressing you out often has a clear solution in the light of day. 

Eat your veggies

While the nutrition link to stress may not be as clear-cut, it is there. Nutritious food helps keep the immune system ticking and lowers blood pressure, which can help mitigate any long-term stress effects. 

You know what to eat. And it’s not that you can never have the stuff that’s not great for you (pretty much anything that comes from a box, is manufactured, or is fried), but just don’t make those foods the main part of your meals.

Nutrition and exercise are good for you, and your inner rebel may want to do something different. But there are other ways to prevent stress that you might actually enjoy.

Be with the people you love

Humans are wired for social connection. And no, tapping away on a keyboard doesn’t cut it. Unless you’re also on the phone or videoconference. Commenting on a friend’s post? Doesn’t count.

We literally survived as a species by banding together to hunt, eat, defend against predators, and the like. So your brain wants you to interact with other people, for one thing.

Yes, even introverts. They may reduce the number of people they spend time with, but they still need a few people they feel they can count on. Extroverts often need more. 

Not only does this make your brain happy, which counteracts stress, but your loved ones can actively counteract the stress you’re feeling. Ever have a chat with a friend about something that’s bothering you and realize later that whatever it was, actually wasn’t such a big deal? Shakespeare’s Hamlet says there’s nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so, and it’s the stories we tell ourselves that can lead to stress.

For example, maybe you’re texting a friend who normally gets back to you right away and you don’t hear from them. You might start wondering if you did or said something that made them angry with you, or some other story that starts freaking you out. 

Then when they finally text you back and say their phone died, you feel relieved, and maybe kind of silly. What happened was that they didn’t respond immediately, but it’s the story you developed around it that stressed you out.

Being with other people can help us put things in the right perspective and help prevent us from winding up over a story that we’ve told ourselves. 

Meditation

Many business people don’t think much of meditation, but prayer (if you pray) is actually a form of meditation. There are a variety of ways to meditate, not all of which involve chanting “om” while you sit crisscross applesauce, or trying to keep your mind blank for twenty minutes (which for most people is impossible.) 

Meditation is a way of seeing things objectively, of noticing what’s going on without attaching meaning or stories to it. So you can be aware of things without stressing out about them. The more you meditate the more time you have to think about your reactions instead of just reacting to every stimulus that comes your way.

Being able to notice what’s going on without reacting right away can help you reduce stress. You can take your time to decide how and whether you want to act, instead of feeling like you have to make a move right away, which can be stressful.

But you probably can’t meditate at work, and if you’re a business owner, you probably don’t want your employees meditating while they’re on the clock either. But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing you can do to help them reduce stress at the workplace.

How business owners can help reduce the culture of stress

Remember that you have to walk the talk. Telling your workers that you value flexibility while refusing to allow them to work from home periodically tells them that you don’t value flexibility… and they may start looking for a boss who does. 

Also, telling them to feel free to take vacation days but never taking yours sends a mixed message. Everyone needs to take a vacation and reset periodically. That goes for you too, and that means a real vacation, not one where you’re up at 4 am answering emails.

Wellness programs aren’t necessarily the answer either. Teaching workers how to do yoga is nice, but won’t have much of an effect if you expect them to be glued to their computers 12 hours a day or don’t allow them to take time off when they need it.

Moving away from the hustle-and-grind mentality is one of the best things you can do for your people. Set the expectation for them and yourself that they need to be able to get their work done in a reasonable time frame. (Which also means that you can’t overload them with 12 hours’ worth of work.) Go home to your kids or pets or spouse around dinnertime most days.

The human brain is not capable of multitasking when it comes to things that are cognitively demanding. It just switches back and forth between the tasks very quickly, which means that both tasks take longer and have more errors.  It also fatigues the brain, which leaves people making poor decisions, especially towards the end of the day.

So don’t ask or expect them to multitask. 

Think very carefully before demanding that they answer emails immediately. Does every email need an immediate response? Could the sender be happy with an auto-responder that explains the email was received, but will be attended to during a certain time of the day? Can they set up their inboxes to allow non-urgent emails to go to one place and filter through the emails that are important?

Help your staff block off time for specific tasks, and honor those times. Consider setting aside certain days for certain types of tasks. For instance, instead of meeting with clients at all hours of the day every day, there are certain days or times that are set aside for client appointments.

When your workers feel less overwhelmed and less time pressure, they’re also feeling less stressed. And you’re more likely to retain your talent when they know you want them less stressed too. (Not to mention that less stress often means more productivity.)

Now that you’re read through this whole article… what step will you take to reduce stress, either for yourself or a member of your team?

If you or your team work at a folding table, lift up the surface of the table to work more comfortably standing up. Moving more means less stress, so check out our full line of folding table risers here.

Lift Your TableⓇ… SAVE YOUR BACK!