Things are opening back up, little by little. Some restaurants are available for dine-in now, certain parks and beaches are available to the public again. We’re all slowly learning our new ‘normal’. But of course, things aren’t exactly normal, so why is everyone calling it that? In my opinion, it’s more of a new reality because it’s all very real. And that causes stress on many of us.
Whether it’s stress from returning to work and things are completely different now or stress from being nervous about the whole reopening thing to begin with, we’re all stressed in some shape or form. (By the way, whichever stress is your stress, I’m not judging either way. I’m stressed too!) And it’s not like the stress is going away any time soon. So why not try to find ways to cope with it instead?
That’s what I’ve decided to (try to) do. And so far, it works! There may be some times where the stress inevitably gets the best of me, but all I can do, or try to do, is learn from it and keep growing. I mean, c’mon, no one never gets stressed. That’s impossible. So here are my tips for managing stress that I’ve been working on. Take ’em or leave ’em!
1) Get Some Space
In the heat of the moment, it’s not always easy to think clear-headed. Whether plans fall through and it causes scheduling conflict with people involved or a huge financial burden that you were unprepared for falls into your lap. Either way, the perspective you have can be too close to the situation to understand it fully or overcome it. So what I need to do sometimes is get some space, to take a step back and look at the situation from a different point of view.
There are especially times of stress that can cause tension between the people you are closest to. That is especially the time you need to take a step back and try to look at it from the other person’s perspective. Rather than staying mad and continuing your train of thought, get some space. It’s not worth it to stew over the small things. And if the other person is ready to apologize, take that apology sincerely, even if you aren’t ready to apologize yet.
It can be too easy to let our emotions get the best of us, especially when we’re all dealing with our own form of stress. Try not to compare your stress to someone else’s, better or worse. I’m sure we all could think of something negative in our life that is worse than someone else has had to handle. But what’s the point in that? We are all dealing with our unique obstacles and challenges that only we are capable of overcoming. I try to remind myself of that as often as I can. Just get some space and some perspective!
2) Write It Out But Don’t Send It Out
I can’t say how many people this will work for besides myself. All I can say is that it has helped me more than any other tip or trick I’ve learned in managing my anger. Btw, have I mentioned I have a slight anger problem? Anyway, there have been times where someone has said or done something to me that I was really not happy with. But instead of using my anger to fuel the fire on the situation, I have found a way to extinguish the fire.
For example, recently I had a not so nicely worded message from someone via text. Instead of letting my anger get the best of me, I decided to write it out but not send it out. I opened the Notes app on my phone (just to be safe) and let out all my feelings. The good, the bad, the ugly, the righteous, all of it. Then I just read it out loud to myself as if I was actually saying it to the person I wanted to say it to. And then I deleted it.
And you know what? I felt better! I had gotten my anger out and now there was nowhere else for it to turn its attention to. If I had written back to that person, who knows how many more strongly worded messages would’ve been exchanged between us. Who knows if we would’ve ever come to a conclusion if we had both let our feelings control our words. And I’ve used this tactic many times! It really helps when your stress and frustration feel like it’s boiling over. All it takes is learning what to do with the excess!
3) Reflect Honestly And Often
If you’ve ever been to therapy then you might understand the benefits of journaling. I’ve been using a journal since I was about 8 years old, and at the time, it was childish nonsense. “Today we played kickball at school. It was fun.” But as I got older, I started to realize how many ways it can actually help. From writing out your feelings for only you to see to being able to look back and reflect on those feelings later. Sometimes I write for 2 pages long just to get everything off my chest that I’ve been holding in.
Later when I go to look at it, I can see how my anger clouded my thoughts just a little too much for me to see clearly. Do you ever feel the same? It’s a good reality check for me sometimes which really helps me learn and grow. So I take the time to reflect as often as I can. Then I try to do what I consider the hardest part, which is to take emotion out of the situation. When we take emotion out of the equation, we’re able to see things from a whole new perspective and might even see where we might have been in the wrong.
You could look back and think “Hmm, maybe I was so caught up in trying to get them to see my point of things that I didn’t really stop to think about the really good points they made like X, Y, and Z.” And journaling isn’t even necessary to reflect! Sometimes all it takes is being aware of your emotions and paying attention to the way you said something. Then just ask yourself, “Why did I react the way I did? What is it specifically that made me react that way?” Then you’re able to go back to the situation with a calm and level head and actually work on resolving it.
The Burden Of Stress
As I said, we are all dealing with our own forms of stress. But stress comes and goes, just with every high and low in life. The best we can do is try to cope with it, try to learn from the situations that cause stress so we can learn to not let it affect us as much, and well, continue living our lives. The tips above are just my tips that I’ve been using to manage my stress, you can take ’em or leave ’em and it won’t hurt my feelings. I just want to help in any way I can!
What about you? Do you have any tips or tricks that you’ve been using to cope with stress? If so, please share ’em in the comments below! You never know, you can be the one to help turn someone’s entire life around! And if you’re looking for more ways to keep calm during chaos, check out ETM’s blog here.
As always, thank you so very much for being a part of ETM’s community of Mommas! I encourage you to join discussions, interact with Mommas alike, and be unapologetically yourself! Until next time, I hope I’m able to help make your life as simple as could be. (:
With all my love, Brandolyn – Earth To Momma
