Hi everyone! This week, I want to dive deeper into work-life balance, stress, and stress management. Last week, I interviewed Brooke MacTaggart about how she manages running her own business, being a mom, and life in general. Check out the article here: Managing The Balance: A Business Owner’s Take on Work & Life Now, let’s dive into this week’s topic!
Work-Life Balance
When you think about your job, does it stress you out or cause anxiety? Or does your personal life take up all of your attention? Then please, keep reading. Everyone is encouraged to find a healthy balance between their professional and personal lives. Yes, I know, finding a healthy balance is something easier said than done, but hopefully this post provides some additional tips to help you out. But first, let’s talk about stress.
Stress and Stressors
A simple definition of stress would be a response to external factors. But did you know that there are good and bad types of stress? Eustress, the good kind, creates a positive impact on your life. It could provide motivation, improve focus, and increase energy. This type of stress turns the situation into a motivational moment instead of a negative one. Distress is the “bad” type of stress. This type of stress leads to burnout, anxiety, mental exhaustion, and much more. Now, let us identify stressors. Stressors are the events that trigger stress. They can appear in any form but the most common are work, financial, and emotional stressors.
Stress Management
Stress relief looks different for everyone. For some, going for a walk or exercising is effective. For others, positive self-talk, a healthy diet, or even journaling can work. No matter how you relieve stress, being able to do so, in any capacity, can have many benefits. If you can identify stressors at the start, you can use these tactics to help alleviate oncoming stress. If you are a leader of a company there are many ways you can help your employees with stress management. It could look different for each employee, but offering mental health days for employees can be effective. Another idea could be delegating workloads so one person is not overwhelmed compared to others. Team bonding could eliminate conflicts*, therefore reducing stress. It is also important for employees to be comfortable with speaking up if they need additional help. If that happens, as a leader you should do everything you can to help them.
Overall, stress is unfortunately normal. Being able to identify stressors and have tactics to relieve stress can improve your attitude towards work & life. The balance between your professional and personal life is something that not everyone can balance. However, if you can identify the parts of the balance that need work, it will make an impact.
-Brea
*Not all conflicts are bad. Stay tuned for an oncoming article discussing further 🙂
Sources:
https://www.betterup.com/blog/stress-vs-stressors
Stress Relief: 18 Highly Effective Strategies for Relieving Stress