Is it a shark or a piece of seaweed? How to stop stressing out - Women's Agenda

Is it a shark or a piece of seaweed? How to stop stressing out

Isn’t it amazing how we can stress ourselves out in a split second? Someone cuts you off in the traffic, a bill arrives that is bigger than expected, the bus is later, the coffee machine is not working. Even these simple things can trigger stress.

Stress is not something tangible – it is a chemical reaction that occurs from our thoughts. The fight or flight theory suggests that when you see a shark in the water, your body quickly responds and has a physical change in order for you to exit the water as quickly as possible!!! Jaws trained us well in this regard.

The trouble is we’re not always brilliant at recognizing when something is a piece of seaweed and we don’t need to react like it’s a shark. Resilience is about training your thoughts and your mind to have a little more control over itself so it doesn’t run away and adversely affect us – physically or mentally.

PWC recently did a survey which suggests that 1 in 6 Australian workers now suffer from mental illness, which can be seen as stress, anxiety or depression. When unchecked or untreated this can have devastating consequences.

Feeling like everything that occurs is a shark and stressful can become habitual. The good news is it’s possible to alleviate. We can train ourselves to keep unnecessary stress at bay during our day to day tasks. Perspective is the key and something we must teach ourselves if we want to have a calm and confident existence and have a little more control over our health and wellbeing.

TOP TIPS FOR RESILIENCE STRAINING AND KEEPING THE SHARK AT BAY

  1. Know thy self Awareness is first and foremost. Taking a good look at yourself and how you are reacting to situations and questioning yourself. Notice your physical reaction when you feel stressed, how your heart rate increases and how you find it difficult to make any decisions when you are in that high stress survival shark mode. We can make some great changes to our mental health and wellbeing by starting to be aware of how we are reacting to the traffic, the to-do list and how long it takes to get a coffee.
  2. Get some perspective Think about the bigger picture and how important this so called “stressful situation” really is. Assuming you are not in the emergency room of a hospital with a suspected heart attack, take a breath before you react. (If you are in the emergency room with a suspected heart attack, then your stress is warranted.) When you take a breath or two and resist the urge to react instantly, you will be able to get some perspective and respond with a calm confidence.
  3. Have your plan in place Like anything in life that you want to succeed at, you need a plan for handling stress. A simple structured plan that you go to when you feel stress, anxiety or that general feeling of being out of control.

My plan has always been:

Take a breath
Is it an emergency?
Is it in my control?
Can I let it go?
Can I change my attitude and perspective around it?
What can I take responsibility for?
What is best for my health?
Am I managing my time well so I can handle the tasks I have?

That helps me realize when I’m facing a piece of seaweed – rather than a matter of life and death. It helps me recognize when it’s just something to deal with and move on from. Sometimes it is genuine stress, and when it is we can work with it and get some help and support to start “fleeing” the shark.

Life throws us many curve balls. It is full of ups and downs and twists and turns. Why don’t you start your own resilience training programming and reigning in that word called stress, which is just a word, and challenge your thoughts for a few weeks. Save your physical reactions for when it really is a stressful situation.

How do you cope with stress? Are you good at differentiating between sharks and seaweed?

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