Decreasing Stress

 When you are experiencing high stress often, you need to focus on how to relieve stress. This is an appropriate time to evaluate your self-care – What is going well, what can go better, and what specific activities can you do when you are experiencing a high level of stress?

What does stress do to our body?

When we are stressed, our brains produce adrenaline. This makes our blood pressure go up, our breathing accelerates, and we don’t digest food regularly. Our bodies also do this when we go into a fight, flight, or freeze response. It makes our bodies ready for action. This is helpful in an emergency; however, it is not helpful when we are experiencing this regularly as we may then experience regular headaches, insomnia, stomachaches, and an overall lower immune system.

What is “Self-Care”?

Self-care is taking deep care of yourself on a physical, emotional, and spiritual level. Good self-care is a challenge for many people and yet with proper planning and understanding, you can find time to complete it. Self-care is unique for everyone. Below are some ideas to get you started in developing your self-care plan. It can be overwhelming to consider taking on many new things. It may be helpful to start with a couple of ideas and continue to build on that foundation.

Physical Self-Care

Food

Meals: it may be unreasonable to expect healthy, homemade food for each meal. Instead, focus on what is reasonable. And don’t forget about drinking enough water! “I will eat something for each meal” or “I will take a lunch break at work at least 3 days a week.” 

Reduce stress: While your busy schedule may not have room for extravagant indulgences every day, focus on small treats you can give yourself periodically. “I will pick up my favorite coffee before work” or ”I will take a lunch break to my favorite sandwich shop once a week.”

Alcohol: We all need to be mindful of addiction; however, we can enjoy a stiff drink when we’d like. “I can treat myself to a scotch with my friends when we go out to dinner” or “I’ll open a cold beer while I journal after I had a stressful day.”

Exercise

Exercise, even if it is a quick walk at lunchtime or taking the stairs at the doctor, can help combat feelings of sadness or depression and prevent health concerns as well.

Exercise does not automatically mean you have time to meet with a personal trainer a few times a week, but you can make it unique and customized for your specific goals instead. “I will go on a walk after church on Sunday” or “I will hit the gym 3 times a week.”

Sleep

Although everyone has different needs, a reasonable guideline is that most people need between 7-9 hours of sleep per night. “I will go to bed by 11:00 p.m. during the week so that I can get enough sleep” or “I will not set my alarm on Saturday mornings.”

Sleep hygiene: Sleep hygiene is a variety of different practices that are necessary to have normal, quality nighttime sleep. If you struggle with regular sleep patterns, try implementing sleep hygiene into your self-care plan. Some examples of sleep hygiene may include: turning off electronics 30 minutes before bed, avoiding caffeine too close to bedtime, eating dinner a couple of hours before bedtime, developing a nighttime routine, and keeping arguments or tv watching in other rooms to ensure your bedroom is associated with sleeping. 

Mental & Emotional Self-Care

Keeping a Journal

Some people find that recording their thoughts and/or feelings in a journal helps them manage their emotions during everyday stresses to high-stress situations. “I will write in my journal at least once a week” or “I will write in my journal when I am having a high-stress day.”

Meditation or Relaxation Exercises

Relaxation techniques or meditation can help with emotional self-care.

Example: Sit comfortably, with your feet flat on the floor and your back straight. Place one hand over your belly button. Breathe in slowly and deeply through your nose and let your stomach expand as you inhale. Hold your breath a few seconds, then exhale slowly through your mouth, sighing as you breathe out. Concentrate on relaxing your stomach muscles as you breathe in. When you are doing this exercise effectively, you will feel your stomach rise and fall as you breathe in and out. Try to keep the rest of your body relaxed – your shoulders should not rise and fall much as you breathe. At the end of the exhalation, take another deep breath.

“I will practice deep breathing before I go to sleep to calm down from the day” or “I will take 10 minutes when I get home to relax alone.”

Reflection

If these other activities seem to not fit with you, then try reflecting on your day. This may not mean you are specifically tied to your emotions in this situation, but instead, the activities or thoughts you had throughout the day. “Today was a bad day when I had to let an employee go” or “I kicked ass closing that deal”.

Relational Self-Care

Points of connection with your partner are important for your relationship. What makes you or your partner feel loved and connected? Relationship goals are important because dating your partner never ends and we need to be intentional about continuing to strengthen our bond. Daily goals may include “We will have dinner together every night after work – even if it is late” or “We will have a regular date night every Saturday night”.

In addition to your goals, encourage your partner to create a self-care solution – specifically for your relationship. This should be an open dialogue and can adapt to make sure you both have the points of connection you are looking for. 

Additional Support

· Emotional self-care can also involve the people around you.

· It is important to make sure that the people in your life are supportive.

· Be wary of friends or family who only call when they need something, people who always leave you feeling tired or depressed when you see them, or friends who never have the time to listen to you. “I will call my best friend when I need an adult to talk to” or “My wife and I will take turns helping our children with homework so we can also have alone time”.

· You may also want to set limits: choosing when to spend time with friends versus having time alone or making sure that your time with friends and family has a clear end time. Screening your calls – if you don’t feel like talking on the phone, then call back at a time that’s more convenient for you.

Spiritual Self-Care

Faith, Religion, Spirituality

These words mean a variety of things to each of you. Some people may think of church, synagogue, temple, mosque, parish, shrine, etc. Some other people may also think about gardening, hiking, or other outdoor activities. “I will attend Sunday services every week with my family” or “I will work toward planting a garden every year”.

Create A Self Care Solution

If you’d like to use my premade outline, you can do so here. 

To create your own, here is a good starting point: 

1. Start by writing down the main headlines of periods.

2. Next, under each period, write down the topics you want to have your goals around.

3. Have a section on the plan specifically for high-stress times.

4. Then create your goals.

5. From here, reflect after a week or so (then again at a month), to see how the self-care goals are working or not working for you.

6. Adapt the goal as needed.

Life changes, so you must create your solutions knowing that things will change depending on circumstances. Maybe in a year, your current high stress times will be more manageable and something else will spark higher levels of stress – will these goals still meet that need? When you are struggling with stress relief, this means it is time to change your goals to help you adapt to the times. Keep adapting to stay successful!

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