Share your feelings. Talk with a colleague, friend or family member, someone you value and enjoy and trust to keep any sensitive information confidential. Be honest and open. Sharing your feelings can be validating and relieving.
Breathe. Use the 4-7-8 technique. Inhale through your nose for four seconds; hold that breath for seven seconds; exhale through pursed lips for eight seconds. Breathing triggers the relaxation response and you’ll be focused on counting not thinking. You can’t worry and count at the same time. Try this for five minutes twice a day.
Do one thing at a time. We fill our lunch hour with other activities; check emails during meetings; look at text messages during our children’s sporting events. Call it focus or go with the current catch-phrase, mindfulness, it not only helps manage stress; it improves our productivity.
Focus on the positive. Tis is easy for you glass half-full people; harder if you’re the glass half-empty type. Choose to look at the good in people or situations.
Laugh more. Tere are many documented health benefits to laughter. Find something that makes you laugh out loud. “America’s Funniest Home Videos” works for me.
Unplug. We’re not meant to be wired to technology all the time. Tink about what we did before cell phones, computers, and the internet. My husband and I were in Myrtle Beach at another speaking engagement. One night we were enjoying a lovely dinner at a restaurant overlooking the Atlantic Ocean at sunset. At the table next to us was a beautiful young couple….who both looked at their cell phones the entire dinner. Tey completely missed one another and the beauty of that moment. Turn off notifications on your phone so it is not constantly calling your attention. When I’m home, I only pick up my phone occasionally. Disconnect from technology regularly.
Adopt a healthier lifestyle. Get adequate rest, eat better, limit use of caffeine and alcohol, quit smoking, drink more water. Tere are so many little things you can do. Pick one or two and act on them for a week or two until they become a habit. Ten add one or two more.
Ask for help. For some of us, this will be the hardest strategy to adopt. Don’t be afraid to ask for what you need or to delegate.
Burnout
Burnout is defined as a state of emotional, mental and physical exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress. We feel overwhelmed, emotionally drained, and unable to meet constant demands. Our productivity wanes; our energy collapses; our motivation disappears. We feel cynical, resentful and hopeless. We have nothing more to give.
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Signs of Burnout
Physical signs of burnout include feeling tried and drained most of the time. We wake up and still feel tired. We have lower immunity, feeling sick frequently. We may have frequent headaches, back pain, and muscle aches. We have changes in sleep and appetite (too much or too little).
Emotional signs of burnout include a sense of failure and self-doubt. We feel helpless, trapped and defeated. We feel detached, alone in the world. We lose our motivation. We feel cynical and negative. We have decreased satisfaction and feel ineffective. We experience a loss of pleasure. We feel that there is never enough time to get things done. We worry excessively.
Behavioral signs of burnout include withdrawing from responsibilities and isolating ourselves. We procrastinate; it takes longer to get things done. We show increased irritability, take things out on others, and overreact. We may skip work, or start coming in late and leaving early. We use food, alcohol and/or drugs, including caffeine and nicotine, to cope.
All of the signs of burnout have a negative impact on us and those around us, and some of them pose a danger. Any form of self-medication is dangerous and can become more so if we become dependent on it. Te problem with alcohol is that it works. Te relief of stress through self-medication is temporary; the consequences could last a lifetime.
Now is the time to stop letting your life manage you and instead figure out how you can manage your life.
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