Let's talk about what even is stress management, why it's important and some realistic strategies to implement to improve your everyday stress management.
As I’m sitting here in the waiting area of the operating room at our local children’s hospital, the one I was terminated from only months ago, while awaiting information about how my 2.5yr old daughter is, you can imagine my stress level.
Stress hits us everyday, somedays more than others and sometimes it can feel overwhelming, so, what do we do about it?
Before we look at what stress management is or isn’t, we first need to learn what stress is. When most people think about stress, they think bad stress. There’s actually two kinds of stress, there’s distress, which is the type of stress that tends to build and build resulting in what we call maladaptive behaviours, this is the stress we all fear. Then, there is eustress, eustress is basically the type of stress that creates motivation and a willingness to change. Both types of stress activate our stress response, however distress feels unpleasant, uncomfortable and sometimes even painful.
What is Stress Management really?
Stress management is all about keeping your head above water when the waves just keep on coming. It's being able to take the hit, absorb it and continue on with the game. Now that I've gotten those cheesy metaphors out of my system, this is how I look at stress management.
Stress management is being able to move through the ups and downs of this hectic thing we call life and continue to move forward without a crazy overwhelming painful feeling which can result in behaviours that impact not only our wellbeing but potentially the wellbeing of others.
I tend to look at stress management in two dimensions. The first dimension is about using less maladaptive coping mechanisms to deal with your distress, and the second dimension is attempting to transition distress to eustress by changing how you think about stress and utilizing a growth mindset.
So now we know what it is, let's find out what it's not...
What stress management isn't?!
Every year, in one of the college courses I teach, we talk about professional wellness, self-care and balance. When I ask the question “when work gets too tough, or life is just too stressful, how are you going to manage that”.
Now, at least 90% of my class will say “I’ll take a day off” or “I’ll do some of my self-care strategies like take a break or go on a vacation or go to the spa”. My question back to them is always “well what if you can’t. What if, you don’t have sick days and depend on that shift for rent and food, what if, you have other life commitments and can’t just take a vacation, or go to the spa?” What then…
Stress management isn't about not feeling stressed, or just going to the spa and getting a massage etc. It isn't about instantly feeling better or always feeling good about your situation.
Dimension 1 - Using LESS maladaptive strategies when stressed.
So now, we understand what stress management isn't, what things can we do to make sure we "keep our heads above water".
This is where the first dimension comes in, using LESS maladaptive coping mechanisms. Notice how I capitalized the word LESS, that’s because we are all going to respond to distress with some sort of maladaptive response, stress management isn’t about never having those, it’s about limiting them to keep yourself going. I think we all would love to just “take a day off” when things get stressful, but that’s not realistic.
If you can start to understand some of your maladaptive coping strategies you use to cope with stress, you can start to really identify different ways to decrease them. For example, I tend to stress eat, when things get tough, I go for sweet food. Something I typically do when I know my stress level is starting to rise is to practice insightful and mindful eating. I ask myself - Am I just eating this because I'm stressed?
Remember this....you WILL engage in maladaptive coping, the goal is not the ELIMINATE it but to DECREASE it.....
Dimension 2 - Mindset Shifting
The second dimension is all about mindset shifting, going from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. This may help shift your emotional responses from distress to eustress.
Now, this won’t work all the time, takes a lot of practice and there are some things that are going to happen in life that you are going to have a really hard time shifting that mindset.
Just remember, these two things:
You can have a fixed mindset about one thing and a growth mindset about another.
It’s not about being positive all the time, or seeing the silver lining in things. It is simply about feeling the nasty feelings of the situation (whether that be frustration, anger, sadness, embarrassment, guilt, shame etc) and then shifting that mindset a bit to focus on accepting the stress. Acceptance doesn’t mean being happy about it, or even “embracing it” like some would say, acceptance simply means “it is what it is, and I can get through it”
A growth mindset is not just about switching up your thinking, it's also about how that shift in thinking impacts you both emotionally and behaviourally.
So, what's the secret? What can we do, realistically?
Back to those cheesy metaphors, what really can we do to "keep swimming with our heads above water" - well, theres NO secret one thing, skill, strategy a or way to do it. It's really based on individual situations and needs at the time.
To anyone that has gone to a professional, taken a look on social media these days or spoken to someone about stress, they all mention one thing “self-care”. But what happens when your “self-care” in the sense that we think about it, isn’t possible.
This is what you do....
Sometimes, taking a look at what we call a "Sphere of Control" can really help someone identify the areas in their lives in which they can implement some techniques to help manage your stress.
For example, if you are a mom, 6 months postpartum and I tell you to "get more sleep". Is that realistic? Absolutely not!
For me, I like to think that practicing very small daily techniques that will helps overall when you’re in a crisis stress mode. Focusing on your breathing (even just a few exhales), taking a 2-4 minute mindful break, small bits of exercise, and even just getting outside for a few minutes are all things we can do daily that will help your overall management. We will take a look at each one those individually in later blogs, but for now, just remember that these things don’t need to take a long amount of time or done a specific way to be effective.
In terms of the mindset shift, I like to remind myself about the meaningful events that happen while they are happening, that just really helps me break the negative thoughts cycle. Here's an example, as tough as it is was holding my daughter as they put her to sleep for her procedure, I just kept thinking to myself how much it means to me to hold her that close.
Final Thoughts
When we talk about stress management, there's no one size fits all. We aren't trying to make the stress go away, and we won't instantly feel better. You are going to engage in maladaptive coping, but it's trying to limit the amount of maladaptive ways to cope with stress on a daily basis.
Little changes make big differences over the long run.....
Like and Subscribe if you enjoyed this little read and follow us on our social media platforms.