How to relax when you’re stressed
Work has been crazy lately. I don’t know if that’s the case for you, too…
And it’s not necessarily about the number of hours I work, but the heightened emotions and the situations I’m dealing with. And I’m not actually talking about coaching and speaking right now. I’m talking about in my day job.
When you work in an education company, the stakes always feel high. Students are always freaking out about tests, but this year I have a lot of seniors on my student roster and they’re not just freaking out about tests. They’re freaking out about college, too.
I get it. I totally get it, but during this time, I’ve been having a lot of trouble with my boundaries (more on that soon). I’ve been taking last-minute sessions and pushing myself a lot more than I otherwise would to support them and help them out. When you care about someone—in this case my students—their burdens become yours and that’s not exactly healthy or helpful is it.
But that brings me to the topic of today’s post—how do we relax when we’re stressed? I have been stressed in my day job lately. Absolutely. There’s not question about it, but, in dealing with another stressful situation yesterday I realized that—even though the stress is still there—I’ve gotten much better at dealing with it. At finding ways to release it. At relaxing.
Here are 5 things that I do help myself relax when I’m stressed.
no. 1 | do a stress-relieving workout
I kid you not, yesterday I had some things happening at work and you know when you just feel that stress starting to course through your body. You feel like a string that’s pulled too taut. You’re on edge. You’re tense. That’s how I felt. And I know myself well enough to know that when I feel like that, I need to work out. I need to do something physical to get the stress out of my body. Plus it helps to resolve your stress cycle (which I dive into in my ABC memberships)…
But, my workout? It just wasn’t cutting it.
So, I went to one of my go-tos—MMA! I have an old workout DVD from like almost 10 years ago now that is still 1000% a favorite of mine! Seriously, it’s a total blast! You’re doing a choreographed MMA-style routine to an awesome song and I just get so into. And, I’m not going to lie, punching feels gooooood when I’m aggravated or stressed!
Some of my other favorite stress-relieving workouts are yoga (if you’re someone who needs to go more zen when you’re stress-working out, which isn’t really me lol) OR going for a walk. When I do a stress-relieving walk, I usually put on a fave, sassy playlist like my Badass Woman playlist and literally like strut my way down the path and damn does it feel good.
Plus, it also gives me space to emotionally process… which brings me to tip 2…
no. 2 | vent or emotionally process in some way
I am soooooo team venting. Unfiltered. Say what you want to say. I’m here for it! I think venting is incredibly healthy. I love what Brene Brown says: “piss and moan with perspective.” She’s not saying don’t piss and moan. She’s saying get it out of your system and then move on and move forward.
Emotionally processing and venting are incredibly health, in my opinion, and the best way to get the shitty emotions out of your system. My two favorite ways to vent are a) by writing or b) by talking. For me, the context or situation really dictates what I’ll do, but I would say my preference is probably talking it out because it’s more unfiltered than I am when I’m writing.
Now, for talking it out, you can do this a couple of different ways:
Have a good vent sesh with a friend, even if it’s via audio messages on Instagram
Talk to yourself by talking into the voice memos on your phone
Or do voice transcription into your application of choice
That being said, writing also has its place in this process. One of my favorite ways to vent by writing is to write a letter, especially if the source of stress is a person. I’ll write them a letter (that I often will never send) to get all the crap out of my system. It also helps me formulate my thoughts for when I do sit down and have a conversation with them.
no. 3 | deep breathing
This is like the one time I’m going to get a little therapy-y. But deep breathing is a great way to calm yourself down when you’re stressed. Like workouts, it’s bringing a physical component in which helps resolve your stress cycle (see my ABC memberships for more on that), but the cool thing about how this works is it gets us out of our sympathetic nervous system—I know, big words, but it’s that fight flight or freeze part of your brain—and into our parasympathetic nervous.
I jokingly say that the parasympathetic nervous system is the “chill the eff out” part of your nervous system, because, well, IT IS! And deep breathing is a really effective way to get yourself back into this.
Therapists often recommend what is called the STOP technique, which stands for:
S: Stop whatever you’re doing and pause momentarily.
T: Take a breath to re-connect yourself. The idea is to anchor yourself back to the present moment.
O: Observe. Just notice what is happening. What is happening inside of you? Outside of you? Where has your mind gone? What do you feel? What are you doing?
P: Proceed. Continue doing what you were doing. Or don’t. Let your check-in help you determine if you need to change course.
This is similar to what meditation teaches you: that you don’t have to react to every thought you have. Thoughts are just thoughts. They’re just stories. And using a technique like deep breathing, the STOP technique, or box breathing is a great way to come back to yourself.
no. 4 | watch a comedy or something funny
I did a speaking engagement where I exuberantly yelled out “Watch the damn cat video!” but it was in this exact context. Because similar to working out and deep breathing, laughter also resolves your stress cycle and triggers the “chill out” part of your nervous system.
Think about it practically. Watching something funny not only feels good and lightens and lifts the mood, but psychologically, if you’re laughing and smiling, your brain is going to perceive you as being “safe” and it’s going to calm down. So, yes, watch the damn cat video…
no. 5 | connect with others
This is where COVID and the pandemic did us in. We missed our people desperately. We missed the fellow moms we could vent to about our kids who we love but that sometimes we need and want to get away from. We missed our business owner besties who we could vent to about clients who don’t pay on time OR the stupid Instagram algorithm (I feel you on this!). We missed that connection. We missed those people that get our perspective.
And when you’re in stress, we need that connection too!
This is what’s called “social self-care.” I talk about the different types of self-care and how to get them in my memberships as well, but this one has always blown my mind because social self-care and burnout is one of the most well-studied contributors to overcoming burnout! Seriously, it blew my mind 🤯 how many research articles there are on this. Science says, friends: Time with our friends helps to relieve our stress and our burnout.
So, whether it’s a phone call, a quick FaceTime, a virtual happy hour, or a girls night, GET THAT TIME IN! ASAP!